19 April 1942
CENTPAC
I-21 torpedoed an unescorted cargo ship west of Hawaii. The hit started a fire but the ship was not severely damaged--I expect it will return to Pearl and survive.
At Christmas Island, the I-19 was spotted snooping around the harbor and was peppered with damaging near misses by the US destroyer Grayson. She's in no danger of sinking, but the damage is bad enough I'd rather have her repair than fight in a compromised state.
SOPAC
I have a few destroyers roaming around between Fiji and Noumea trying to pick off the AKLs he's using as pickets. One such picket was sunk today by the Tokitsukaze.
Another sweep of Suva flew today, this time by a different Zero squadron while the one that took a beating yesterday rests and gets replacement aircraft online. These were just at 15,000 feet and did better: two Zeroes lost, 2 P-40s and 3 P-39s downed.
The Mutsu and Yamashiro are now in ideal position and remain undetected.
Bay of Bengal/India
I tried to sweep Cochin again and it was a disaster; 7 Oscars shot down with no victories. Again, it appears that no compromises can be made with pilot training when it comes to sweeps at this point in the war. Not that these were bad pilots by a long shot, it's just that I can probably make them marginally better and I need every little bit.
The sweeps did keep the enemy's Hurricanes busy enough that when 8 Betties attacked a cargo ship on the western Indian coast, there were no fighters protecting it. We missed, and the bombers flew without the Zeroes that were assigned to them. So that could have been godawful if enemy fighters were around.
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