Hyperion
Banned
...the bombship was just a stalking horse to trigger discussion of better alternatives.
Unfortunately, the discussions I've read mostly consider the carrier attack on Pearl Harbor the sole Japanese option. That's like claiming that Napoleon HAD to invade Russia. Alternatives to PH don't seem to appear - so I wanted to sound the waters.
The best chance I see of major success is having better trained gun crews on IJN submarines, possibly having some of them carry mines to lay near harbors or the mouth of known rivers that empty into the ocean, maybe the odd commando raid, send a dozen or so SNLF troops ashore to blow up a lighthouse or something
bombships and doing things like sending Nagumo to attack San Diego are either ASB, a showing of someone who is terrible at research and usage of the common sense factor, or a sign that a thread need be moved to the ASB section.
That or looking for a POD at least a couple decades earlier or longer.
I would advice you not try that again or stress stuff like that. A former member of the forum once took that stuff to extremes over several threads. You can check back through the pages looking for the threads, I think they where posted in 2007 or 2008, but needless to say, that member's material was shot down by better knowledgable people, and that person trolled to the point that Ian decided to give that member a long(permanent) vacation from the board.