"US Marines vs Japanese in the Philippines, Fight #4" Topic

All,

It's 1530 on 24 December 1941, and 1st Platoon is tasked with taking Horseshoe Ridge, again. The good news is that the platoon has gotten plenty of water and some hot chow, and five of their men have recuperated well enough from their injuries to rejoin the unit. The bad news is they're heading back to Horseshoe Ridge, where twice they've battled the Japanese, taking heavy casualties.

Sgt Carlson: "Horseshoe Ridge again, eh Sir?" "Yes Cody, Horseshoe Ridge. Ours is not to reason why, young man," Capt Moon said with a smile.

"Christmas Eve, eh Sir?" "Aye. It will be all the merrier when we're sitting atop Horseshoe Ridge, manning our machine guns, with visions of sugarplums dancing in our heads," the Captain laughed. "We'd best get to work."

Overview, north is to top left, the entirety of Horseshoe Ridge is displayed, the mass at center, running west (bottom left) to east (top right). The previous two fights took part on the eastern end of Horseshoe Ridge, at top right. The Platoon linked up with the Company CP off camera to bottom center several miles, and now is making a push to take the ridge again. The Marines will enter from the west, the Japanese will be on and around the ridge. The table is, once again, 6' x 4's, and my son and I are playing co-op as the Marines against the Japanese in 15mm, using Ivan Sorensen's rules, "No End In Sight."

The Marine 1st Platoon, reorganized again: Platoon Commander, Platoon Sergeant, two-man M-1917 water-cooled machine gun team, three-man 60mm mortar team, an M-3 Stuart of the Army National Guard's 194th Tank Battalion, and two seven-man rifle squads. The Company Commander, Major Ford, promised help after he tracked down the rest of the platoons. Guess he hasn't found them yet…

Mortar rounds (blue beads) are targeted all around the Japanese howitzer (bottom left), which is engaging the US tank (top center left), which has just crested the west end of Horseshoe Ridge.

A Japanese Lieutenant leads a Banzai charge straight into US guns. To see how the fight went, please check the blog at:
link

Cut off by a second Japanese landing at Lamon Bay in southern Luzon, Capt Moon and Sgt Carlson reorganized the platoon, working in replacements from 3rd and 4th Platoons, then sited them in a 360 degree perimeter atop Horseshoe Ridge, and waited for the Japanese counterattack. It came the following night, Christmas.

V/R,
Jack

That first picture looks great. That is a really nice table.

If I recall correctly, there were not any Marine units in the Philippines during the Japanese invasion. It was the US Army & Philippine military that opposed the invaders.

Thanks Dale, I appreciate it.

Jdginaz – Sorry man, there were definitely Marines there, the entire 4th Marine Regiment, plus some miscellaneous service and support elements (had just come from China). The vast majority of the Marines were held on Corregidor, though there were some small Marine units with the North Luzon force that got bottled up (bottled itself up, actually) in the Bataan Peninsula.

As near as I can tell there were no Marine units with the South Luzon force, though who knows, it was a very confusing and chaotic time. In any case, I want this to be an ongoing saga, I plan to follow this platoon through the entire rest of the war in the Pacific, so I need them to survive. So I created a fictional Provisional Rifle Company (the concept isn't fictional, there were plenty, I just mean this one in particular) and put them with the South Luzon Force in order for them to be able to fight in the Philippines but have a somewhat plausible route of escape. And I put a tank from the 194th Tank Battalion down there just to spice things up a bit.

The next stop in the war will be entirely fictional: they're going to escape by catching a ride on one of Admiral Hart's destroyers (delayed in leaving PI due to engine troubles), and they're headed to the Dutch East Indies, where US Navy ships, and US Army air and ground units fought, but no organized Marine units.

V/R,
Jack

Wherever there are sailors on land there are usually Marines nearby to guard them.

I thought for a minute that the Japanese field gun was going to turn out to be a tank. Fun game!

Why not stick it out until January and fight at the Points? Then you could evacuate.

If you fight the Points then you could grab some sailors from Eureka and have all sorts of Navy Department goofiness.

"Hey Sarge!" a loud voice boomed.

Sergeant Carlson turned around and pushed his tin hat back to wipe the sweat off his weary brow. He still hadn't made the adjustment to the heat and humidity of the Philippines. It made him miss his cozy supply office in Shanghai that much more.

Oh no, he thought to himself as he spotted who called him out. It was THAT guy again.

THAT guy was an old Petty Officer decked out in Navy whites and blues and that dinky white cap the swabbies loved so much. And he was old too! He was probably in the Asiatic Fleet chasing
Chinese girls in Shanghai back when Christ finished boot camp, and he had the tattoos to prove it. The old sailor pushed his way up the march column to catch up.

"What do you need, sailor?" Carlson grumped.

"Could you take a second and show me how you load this here rifle gun again?" the burly sailor snapped while glaring at and smacking what appeared to be a jammed ammo clip. "I've been tryin and I just can't get the rounds out that thar stripper clip."

Carlson just shook his head.

Great report again! Looking forward to seeing more coming!

Another question. Does the game make any distinction between the bolt action rifle and the Garand?

If I remember right marines at that point were still armed with the Springfield. It wasn't until later in '42 that they started upgrading to the Garand. At Guadalcanal they were still using Springfield.

Dale – Someone has to.

TGunner – That was hilarious. I always liked the Navy kid from "Bataan." I would have liked to have had some blue-jackets, but 1) I've got too many other projects going on to spend even more time on this one; 2) I need to tighten up defense spending a bit (especially after the teddy bear fur mat!); and 3) they don't fit very well with the ongoing campaign narrative (couldn't take them to Guadalcanal, didn't want to just cut them all loose into the oblivion, probably could have gotten them all killed though).

Landorl – Thanks man. Only one more fight in the Philippines, then we're off to the Dutch East Indies. You're correct: the Marines still had the Springfield, all the way up through Guadalcanal, didn't get the Garand until Bougainville (moving up the Solomons). And yes, the rules ("No End In Sight") have different rates of fire for bolt action rifles and semi-auto rifles.

V/R,
Jack

I want to say it was actually '43 before the Corps got the Garand. The Army had first dibs and was outfitting its infantry units with the Garands, so it needed nearly every rifle that was being cranked out at this time. Heck, even the Army didn't have enough Garands and there were units soldering on with Springfields or Enfields, but those were supporting units mostly.

Yep, I believe 1943 is it for the Garand. 3rd Marine Division had them at Bougaineville, 2nd Marine Division has them at Tarawa, and 1st Marine Division had them when they at New Brittain, all in 1943.

I did read that the Raiders on the Makin Raid had them (1942); I thought they had Springfields, but even if correct, we're just talking about a small battalion (maybe 400 men) with them. I even read there were actually 400 M-1 Garands with 1st Marine Division (reinf) at Guadalcanal, but not nearly enough to arm the entire division of about 12000 men.

V/R,
Jack

I bet they stole…, err, borrowed them from the Americal GIs who came rolling in around November.

link

There are stories to that effect ;)

V/R,
Jack