Japan '46 Operation Coronet Allied AAR

[ComradeP]

17th of March 04:00 Soft Conditions Turn 161:



Weather conditions have improved slightly, but we'll need Normal conditions for the next push. To make any kind of real progress, being able to move and assault in Clear, Brush or Village/Town terrain is a necessity in order to be able to launch follow-up attacks or to pull back Disrupted units and assault with fresh units.

A pile of engineers is clearing RUBBLE in Zemba in the X Corps sector and Kadosawabashi in the XIV Corps sector, but it will take them a while to do so unfortunately.

I think it was during this day that, at some point, there was a Partisan unit two hexes of the 50 point beachfront objective at Fujisawa. As Partisans don't exert a ZOC and the Japanese unit directly next to the objective can't ZOC-block the beach, I decided to land the remaining units.

As assaulting the Partisans would have been a bit gamey, I refrained from doing so.

One battalion of the 38th ID took a beating, but losses were otherwise acceptable. Some XIV and XIII Corps assets, 4 battalions of the 38th ID (I originally thought 3 couldn't land safely, as I wrote earlier) and an armoured infantry battalion of 13th Armoured could land. All Allied units that arrived earlier but couldn't land were on-map after that.



XXIV Corps and the 1st Marine division bumped into a Japanese bunker line almost immediately when attacking north of Honno, so the offensive started a few days ago was cancelled after capturing a couple of hexes. Still, it puts more space between the Japanese and the Primary road and I can now fortify the Forest.

The tail end of 7th ID is still south of this screenshot.

As you can see, rolling up the Japanese line along the coast is still going well. 6th Marine Division met limited resistance so far, but resistance is stiffening as units approach the Primary road (in the Brush hexes where you can see a Japanese AT gun unit). The tank LOS-blocking screen allows units to move in T-mode without risk of being hammered by Japanese artillery.

The Japanese chose to withdraw from the first bunker hexes we encountered. We'll soon run into an infrastructure dilemma as the regimental HQ's are motorized and the area to the north-east consists of Field hexes which they can only enter along a road. That will explain the peculiar deployment you'll soon see.

It also explains why I'm careful to clear all the mines in Beach hexes, as all units can move through those hexes. For tracked units, it's also a convenient way to bypass all the Medium bridges. The Secondary road next to the beach has proven to be very helpful thus far.