Lessons Learned : The Ryukyu Kingdom disagreement.

[The Rock Doctor]

What a fiasco.

[The Rock Doctor]

Union Take-Aways:

-Could we ease up on all the colonization efforts long enough to stuff some new FC systems on our ships?

-What do you mean we don't have a QF tertiary battery on that new dreadnought design?

-Are you sure we don't want torpedoes on our capital ships?

-Is it time to establish permanent overseas naval stations?

-Should we be thinking about providing our capital squadrons with some signalling redundancies?

[Kaiser Kirk]

One of the things I find interesting is the Role-Play aspect.

China has kept foreign delegates aware of Japanese ultimatums, and waited to be attacked.

Japan has declared a military blockade of the Ryukyus and threatened to sink Chinese Military vessels.
Japan then put out official newspaper articles stating they had been attacked and sunk a bunch of Chinese TBs and a couple cruisers, while the Chinese sunk their own freighters.

China notified the Foreign Embassies that morning that they received notice they were under attack.
China...now that things have gone well for them... will provide updates on the defeat of the Japanese Invasion.
Pictorial evidence of the Jeju fleet off Cheju-do, followed by those of a grounded Japanese battleship and armored cruiser will make it to Beijing for display.   

Which brings up another point -
In reality the Japanese vessels were the oldest and most expendable they had.  Most of their guns were 1890s BLs, with some more recent 1905 75mm added.

Then many were very small for their class. The Suma "protected cruisers" were small, lacked radios or QF, and were smaller/slower/undergunned compared to the Norse Blomst class the Chinese were using as a Scout cruiser.

Still, in the Newspapers and diplomatic releases...those Protected Cruisers, the Asamas were Armored Cruisers, there were 2 Battleships.... the newspapers aren't going to talk tonnage or age.

Then there's the effect on the Japanese sailors and officers. That's up to Foxy, but from a Role-play view, what would they be thinking about the High Command putting the oldest ships up as tip of the spear, and loosing them...and not surrendering when offered ?

[Jefgte]

What a fiasco.

A massacre...

I have often seen the weakest vessels at the end of the line.
There is no shame to running away from a significantly stronger opponent.

[Darman]

Iberia is going to begin putting radios on all vessels but also needs a better anti-torpedo boat gun than 75mm. 

[Desertfox]

I have often seen the weakest vessels at the end of the line.
There is no shame to running away from a significantly stronger opponent.

They were running away...

OOC I wasn't expecting a fight so soon. I was expecting the NPCs to move after the PCs did, so having the Chinese get to Jeju first really screwed everything up, compounded by the Chinese Northern fleet being right there, instead of Port Arthur. There's a reason the Japanese ships where the oldest and most expendable, they weren't supposed to fight.

[Desertfox]

So did some thinking:

1) Worried about a night torpedo attack so planned to hit Jeju during the day, still get hit by torpedo attack
2) Worried about a daytime torpedo attack so planned to conduct only a feint, torpedo boats stilled get destroyed
3) Worried about troopships getting caught so send them home, ships still get caught

So #1 lesson, worrying is just plain bad luck, so screw it go for broke just like the historical Japanese/Samurai would have done.

[Kaiser Kirk]

Worrying is not just bad luck.
Worrying nearly worked.

So, I started by writing up the Chinese plan and movements. Then as Japan moved, China stuck to the elements of their plan which best met the situation.

Japan actually managed to avoid the trap originally planned.
Japan- if they followed through with the threats over Ryukyu......was expected to respond to the Chinese occupation.

So the Chinese prioritized getting scouts out, and a radio station up- first things to unload and set up.

The Japanese were expected to anchor at Jeju village -the side of the island sheltered from storms and with an anchorage - and drive off any Chinese ships- and start unloading.
The Chinese would do their staging down the coast, so they could leave at dusk, and follow preplanned routes.
This would let the TBs hit the anchored task force an hour before dawn, torpedo lots of ships, and then have the Northern Fleet sweep in shortly after dawn, catch the Japanese in disarray. The Independent Cruisers, if still present, would "catch" any fleeing force in the other end of the Strait.

The spotting reports from the island, by naval personnel, with a reference code set up for this particular operation - was key.

The fact the Japanese decided to place their bait force off the tip of the island meant they did not venture into the original trap - but were ~20-30nm closer to the Chinese forces.
Had they chosen the other end of the island to wait at, they would have destroyed the Chinese timing.

They then stayed in the same general area for 24 hours. That gave the Chinese plenty of time to adapt and fine tune their plans.

Had the Japanese sailed away and came back the Chinese plan would have had major issues. 

The Chinese AC "Bait" off Jeju also stayed in one place - which is why the Japanese TBs found it so easily.

The Japanese then waited until the middle of the night to launch their strike, which was far far later than 'just after sunset' the Chinese expected.
That made the Chinese  AC slow to respond- crews had been on duty and were tired. Still, the Torpedo Nets worked as hoped.

That radio broadcast, that the Japanese had moved from threats to War, started events in motion.
But it was later at night than planned.
Which disrupted the Chinese schedule.

Which meant the MTBs could barely make it on schedule, and the Northern fleet could not be there by Dawn - instead they were far North and had to make a chase, with the IJN closing in.


1 ) Technically you got caught at daybreak.  By my time/course tracking, the TBs got there slightly before dawn, but I added a random extra time aspect to it as they were calculating things off charts and reports from the island, so it was just after daybreak - but which still put your ships silhouetted against the rising sun, while the torpedo boats were in poor light against the dark shore.

2) When the distance between fleets are that close, there is not much room for a feint. The attackers needed to close the distance to make the feint credible. That put them well inside the engagement ranges of the defending destroyers, who's mission is to prevent TBs from getting into attack range.

TB3 got the fleet to start a turn, but TB2 succeeded, and the Northern fleet dropped speed in a hard turn to the SE...at which TB2 turned and ran, and the Northern Fleet turned back on course and went to flank speed of 20knots to make up the time. It did make perhaps 10 (?) minutes difference in when they closed range. 

3) The troopships were not dispatched until after the Torpedo attack, which was too late as the Northern Fleet was Easterly of you. Had you sent the freighters SE, while taking the warships in a different direction, they may have had a chance, but the Chinese may have dispatched fast cruisers to deal with them.  Even a fast freighter is slower than a warship.


This is why the Chinese Admiral offered surrender terms at the end, even at full strength the Jeju force was overmatched, but damaged it had little chance. 

[Kaiser Kirk]

So for Phase II,
We move a monthly orders format.
Large battles will be diced out,
Small battles will be judged.

Both the Japanese and Chinese take their orders of battle and by Theater/Fleet or Squadron
assign "stances" -aggressive/average/conservative to units,  and primary (and secondary/tertiary) orders

I used SeeKrieg's weather chart and an online dice roller to determine weather by theater.
Google earth is used for various things.

The Japanese plans hinged on launching a second invasion as soon as possible with the remaining forces,
while moving new ones into position to be sent later.
This plan wrecked on unseasonable storms which show up right as the task force is ready to go.

The Japanese fleet is concentrated in one spot, which leaves no forces to guard outlying areas.
The Japanese do aggressively scout, and generally avoid the shore batteries, but are caught by one set.
That was simply me looking at google earth and noting that by time you can really see what's at the wharves, you are in easy range.
So I assigned a random number, and rolled it...then I gave each gun a 10% chance of hitting before the TBs got speed up and left...and 3/8 rolled a hit. Weird luck.
The Japanese do try to infiltrate some areas, but it is noticed.  Basically I assigned a 1 in 6 chance of the landing being noticed or the radio not surviving transport. One of each happened.
As the Chinese dedicated a land + deployment force to Cheju-Do...and most of that retreated, they have local forces which can respond.

The result is by the end of the month, when Fox can launch the attack he wanted for the beginning of the month....a lot of things have happened.
I rather doubt he will suddenly accept the Chinese offer of Peace, but he may want to adjust orders.

So I've paused it on the brink of the assault fleet sailing.

[Desertfox]

I just can't catch a break...

[snip]

I mean, you could always back off. Its not like any serious blood has been split here and I'm sure China would be reasonable coming to terms. I don't think you get all of what you want with negotiation, but you might have more of a fleet left.

[Desertfox]

I could, but it would not be very Japanese of me. Not when the main fleet is pretty much intact.

The Chinese are just not being very gentlemanly, I straight up offered to keep the conflict localized to the islands in question.

[Kaiser Kirk]

I just can't catch a break...

I thought it was really ironic you commented in a PM that a typhoon hitting Shanghai would be nice.
I thought such unlikely, the table gives good weather for this period.
I used the RNG for D100s rolls by week and it kept coming up 80s and 90s.
So...Shanghai did get a big storm...but it's the same Sea Area as your base.

The Chinese are just not being very gentlemanly, I straight up offered to keep the conflict localized to the islands in question.

And the Chinese did not accept, they counteroffered a Peace settlement, applying the same terms you demand in the Ryukyus for your possessions in the Philippines.
Then Japan committed multiple acts of war (declaring blockade, attacking ships).

Part of what was discussed with my sounding board was if the Chinese would give up their strategic advantage of better access to the Colonial areas - where Japan has more to loose- just so Japan could concentrate the war in an area favorable to it. They would much rather have the Japanese have to send forces 1200-2600nm from home, past Chinese bases.
There seemed no advantage to the Chinese to do so.
Instead they offered peace with terms.

[Desertfox]

The Chinese must not have taken Escalation Theory, going nuclear early on really limits everyone's options and makes deescalation much less likely, plus it just proved the Japanese point why they can't have the Chinese in those islands.

[snip]

So now the world knows Japan would rather start shooting than talk. Im sure thats a fun topic for the powers with extensive colonial holdings in that area.