10 February 1942
Yet another cruiser hit by submarine in Coral Sea area; Clark airbase captured.
Coral Sea
The Townsville area was meant to be an antisubmarine bastion, with a dozen light bombers on patrol and three ASW groups made up of minesweepers and destroyer-minelayers. But that didn't stop a submarine from hitting the HMAS Leander as if finished escorting transports back to port. The torpedo impact caused a massive secondary explosion, but the ship survived. I'm now up to four cruisers in this area out of action with torpedo damage, plus a fifth sunk.
The attack resulted in a flurry of ASW activity, with three subs detected in the area, two of which were prosecuted for significant damage. The one that hit the Leander was quite possibly sunk.
Hawaii
4 BB bombarding again. It's a shame I haven't found the supply line that's supporting this endless stream of ammunition.
Japan
USS Trout attacked a cargo ship in the Kyushu-Okinawa gap, oddly closing range to rake it with .50cal fire before eventually deciding this was what torpedoes were for, sending it to the bottom far more efficiently than Ma Duce could.
Malaya
Yesterday's strike against Singapore reduced the numbers of fighters we could get in the air today; we never had 10 or more to try to intercept any wave of bombers. Our Hurricanes picked their spots against enemy light bombers mostly--we got 4 Nates, 1 Sally, and 5 light bombers for 1 Hurricane. The bombing wasn't as successful today as it was yesterday but it still caused some facility damage at the airbase.
Timor
He deployed Zeroes to defend his troops at Dili from my bombers flying out of Koepang. We lost 2 P-40s to them during our strike.
Borneo
Soryu made another attempt on the ASW group outside Balikpapan, 10 Zeroes escorting 2 Mabels and 4 Kates. We lost 2 P-40s trying to stop them, shooting down a Zero and a Kate. The bombers that got through missed again.
China
The Japanese army attacked at Chusien, our lines held but fortifications were reduced to level 2. Casualties were 4229 to 616 favoring us. They still don't have enough to break through without reinforcements.
Philippines
Our retreat to Bataan became a rout as the Japanese attacked in full force. We had nearly 5000 people killed or captured. The supply situation in Bataan isn't much better than it was in Clark, although they did have enough to resupply some of the units that made it there. But at least we have level 3 forts there, that should help us hold on for at least another week. I should probably task a few more subs to supply runs.
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