WesWorld

April 2nd 1934- Preparations continue for the delivery of the battleship Lima to the Indian Navy, with as expected, it was announced the old cruiser Almirante Grau and Colonel Bolognesi were also being transferred to Indian control.

Members of the Indian Naval Mission have being very busy the last couple of weeks examining the ships and it's expected in the next couple of weeks the arrival of the Indians that will man the ships so they get accustomed to the ships for the trip to India.

At the same time the Ministry of the Navy reported that indeed members of our Naval forces are already in India being trained in the ships expected to be delivered.

Excerpts from Field Marshall Ricardo Arjona’s private diary.

April 6th 1934- “Today I ate dinner with the Japanese commander in the area (1) and the members of his staff and the meeting went well. They actually seem happy in the area assigned to them(2) and they gave me the confidence they were ready to launch operations pretty soon to eliminate partisan activity in their area.” (3)

April 9th 1934- “The reports tell how the relationship between the nations now in Bolivia truly is. While we have a expected good working relationship with the Japanese, the Dutch and the Germans I was very surprised how well behaved and how good so far the relationship between our remaining troops in Bolivia and the Atlantean forces of the Nato command. True professionals in all senses.

But the American Marines! Hijos de putas! Truly good soldiers but also true brawlers! The fight in the Club Mendoza turned into a small riot in the Red Light district late last night, with soldiers of all commands in a free for all that only ended with military policeman from four different nations using their clubs to bring them into submission. We better come up with a better way to deal with situations like this. My military police let the situation ran amok until we received permission from Nato to act against their soldiers to control the situation in conjunction with some of their own elements. I’m planning to meet the Nato commander Geiger tomorrow to try to sort out the situations.”

April 11th 1934- “The meeting with the Yankee went well, with an agreement reached on how to deal with situations similar to the one of the night of the 8th. While the League of Nation troops pretty much are under a centralized command under Geiger we are not included in those arrangements and pretty much we are a majority in La Paz(4). I wasn’t too happy when the North Americans decided to stick their big noses in our business but this arrangement could work after all.”(5)

(1) Major General Yamashita
(2) by the Rio Beni region, bordering the Brazilian protected so-called Republic of Santa Cruz.
(3) Walther, feel free to add the adventures of the SOB’s.
(4) Majority of the Nato and other forces are down the line so La Paz pretty much is the rear for all forces involved expect maybe for a large bulk of Peruvian forces waiting the final orders to leave plus to flex some political muscle until the final treaty is signed.
(5) Having League of Nations troops in Bolivia for a while.

April 18th 1934- It was announced today that the Czech company Skoda will use their subsidiary of Skoda-Davao for the delivery of the vehicles ordered to that company by the Ministry of War. The complete order is expected to be in country by the middle of 1935 with the first delivery late on the year.

April 23rd 1934- Reports of increasing partisan activity in Bolivia were denied by Field Marshall Arjona from his headquarters in La Paz. "Completely false and untruthful. Our forces and the ones led by the League of Nations plus Nato have the situation well under control." was his initial statement. But when questioned over the destruction of the rail line to Cochabamba by a dynamite attack, protected by Nato forces, he turned defensive and his response was evasive; "All I have about that incident is that it seems it was an accident and I ask the press to report the event as such instead of creation rumors of partisan activity in Nato controlled areas. The area around Cochabamba is being patrolled by Atlantean and Canadian forces and I believe their reports that the area is secured at this time. So please omit mention of this as a partisan attack."

This reporter considers that while is true the partisan activity is indeed being reduced the official line that everything is all right is far from the truth. (1)

(1) tragically this reporter suffered an accident couple of days after filling this story.

Quoted

tragically this reporter suffered an accident couple of days after filling this story.

... so did he fail to obey the traffic signs and got trampled into the ground by those Siamese elephants or did the accident happen while shaving?

Perhaps the Club Mendoza needs to start a fight club so those rowdy brawlers have a way to chanel thier agression into something entertaining!

April 28th 1934- The expected delivery of 70 Hawker Hurricanes continue as planned according to sources in the Ministry of the Navy but the delivery of another 70 fighters purchased in Great Britain is being pushed to early in 1935 due to production problems.(1)

The fighters will replace the older Fokker fighters currently in active duty(2) and rumors indicate some of the older aircrafts could be available for sale after the delivery of the Hawker aircrafts.

(1) Defiants

(2) 30 Fokker fighters purchased during the war.

May 6th 1934- The battleship Lima lowered their colors today after their transfer to India was completed. The ship was bid farewell by the rest of the fleet in a ceremony in El Callao.

The colors of the Almirante Grau and the Colonel Bolognesi were also lowered but is unknown when those ships will began their trip to India.

In related news it was announced the former Indian units will arrive by the end of the month to Peruvian waters and the light cruiser will be renamed Colonel Bolognesi.

May 10th 1934- The Iberian Naval Mission announced that the ships from their Squadron in Guayaquil will rotate by the end of the summer. While ships and quantity of units has not been specified, it's expected to be the same size as the current force.

May 18th 1934- The Ministry of War announced today that possibly the cavalry regiments could be withdrew from the planned infantry divisions in the near future. According to sources "lessons from the just ended war demonstrated the cavalry and infantry elements tend to separate in action due to different speeds, working pretty much as independent units. While small cavalry elements will be maintained (1) in each infantry division our plan is to have the cavalry regiments independent of the infantry divisions by the end of 1935."

(1) two cavalry regiments will leave detachments in the eight infantry divisions to be used in the scout role. The other six cavalry regiments could be used for other roles, like motorized infantry or more armored units.

Hurricanes for Peru, phew I'm glad my air force intelligence will update the Hurricane file at Talons this year. Not too much to worry about methinks.

Any chance some of older stuff could find its way into Paraguayan Government Forces hands? Would provide them with much needed new planes to combat the I-100s the rebels will be getting soon.

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
Hurricanes for Peru, phew I'm glad my air force intelligence will update the Hurricane file at Talons this year. Not too much to worry about methinks.

Any chance some of older stuff could find its way into Paraguayan Government Forces hands? Would provide them with much needed new planes to combat the I-100s the rebels will be getting soon.

The old He-51's and other aircrafts in storage could be sold to earn some needed revenue. The Fokkers are not going to tbe replaced until at least late on the year.

So I guess it will be ok to sell maybe some of those aircrafts to Paraguay if they so desire.

May 19th 1934- The Ministry of War reported today the sale of the He-45 in storage to the Republic of Paraguay. The expected delivery was announced as late this month or early next month. The Ministry's spokesman reported the possibility also existed some of the He-51 in inventory could be also sold to Paraguay at a later date.

May 24th 1934- It was announced today Field Marshall Arjona will return to Peru by the end of June, surrendering his position as commander of our remaining troops in Bolivia to General Arturo Sandoval. "The Conqueror of La Paz" has stated he plans to mold the Peruvian Army following to the lessons from the last war together with help from the German Mission and that "the motorization of our forces has priority over everything else in our Armed Forces."(1)

May 29th 1934- The Iberian heavy cruiser Mercutio accompanied by the light cruisers Santa Juana and Santa Katharina made a courtesy call to the port of El Callao for the last couple of days, departing early this morning. Their presence in Pacific waters was a surprise but been escorted by the destroyers of the Guayaquil Squadron is expected that the ships are indeed the replacements for the current heavy ships of that squadron.

(1) he meant Army. Air Corps and Navy are under the Ministry of the Navy and under the control of his rival De la Garza.

June 6th 1934- Brigadier General Alejandro Sanz stood staring at the motor pool where the crews were working in the just arrived replacements of the losses of the Andean War (1) but he wasn’t satisfied with them. He agreed with the man that stood by him, Hans Kundts (2), in that new vehicles were needed and he was pushing hard to add the just purchased vehicles into his regiment order of battle (3).

But the other vehicles besides the new tanks were the reason he was there. Involved in that reason was to test the idea of Hans. “So you think this could work?” he asked Hans while observing the vehicles.

“Field Marshall Arjona’s plans for motorization could be accelerated if we use them and in reality the manpower of your cavalry regiments is close to an infantry battalion anyway.” was the response of Kundts in his slightly accented Spanish.

“So when the 3rd Cavalry Regiment (4) arrives at the end of the month we could began testing of your theories. I hope your superiors in Berlin find the results satisfactory.” said Alejandro while watching the motorcycle with a ZB-26 machinegun mounted on a sidecar being moved out of the warehouse.

“As so do I. As so do I.” said Kundts in turn.


(1) The Vickers purchased to replace the losses of the war in the Mobile Regiment

(2) Commander of the German Military Mission to Peru.

(3) The Skoda-Davao tanks with 45mm guns are almost equivalent to T-26’s.

(4) The regiment is being dismounted and transformed into a motorcycle battalion but in name will retain their cavalry designation.

June 9th 1934- Minister de La Garza read the reports and recommendations of the members of the Naval Academy with interest. He agreed with their assestments that the arrival of the two former South African dreadnaughts will help to increase the defensive arrangments for Peru and also agreed with them in that the planned new cruiser to be build in Iberia was a complete waste of resources. Of course he knew the political implications to build that ship (1) and that construction was going to go as planned.

The next reports stated the current submarines and destroyers being build locally took too many of the funds allocated for construction and maybe cheaper solutions needed to be found to increase the size of the fleet, with current German designs being named by them as their preferred choice. While the units currently being build are of very good quality he also agreed with the assestment that to increase the size of the fleet measures needed to be taken. He knew the Capitan Valdes class destroyers could be continued to be build while a cheaper solution could be build at the same time. Finally he made his decision and signed his approval to talk to Germany to seek a license to build destroyers and subs. He also signed the order cancelling further construction of P type submarines and to reduce the rate of construction for Capitan Valdes destroyers.

Finally he refused to sign a request to build a small aircraft carrier, considering it as a waste of funds and not a priority for the fleet at this time. (2)

(1) Iberia help with Peru's infrastructure has been too valuable to measure. If they ask for a favor we have to respond.

(2) a man of the old school. He's not convinced of the fighting capabilities of carriers.

OOC: I feel like I missed another chance to "escort" some Peruvian vessels home. Are they in Peru currently, and are they running up the South American coast, or across the Pacific?

Probably won't escort them...They probably outgun my ships unless I put a large force together.

Quoted

Originally posted by Ithekro
OOC: I feel like I missed another chance to "escort" some Peruvian vessels home. Are they in Peru currently, and are they running up the South American coast, or across the Pacific?

Probably won't escort them...They probably outgun my ships unless I put a large force together.

You maybe have another chance. The first one will not arrive until Q3 and the other one in Q4.

June 11th 1934- The first batch of 16 Hawker Hurricanes arrived from Great Britain with the rest expected to be in country by the end of August at the latest. The pilots and crews of the 4th Escuadron de Cazas were selected to begin training in the new aricrafts and is expected their current aircrafts will be put in reserve at a later date.

June 12th 1934- It was announced today the sale of 21 He-51 fighters to the Republic of Paraguay. The official response to the sale of close to fifty aircrafts to Paraguay in the last months was "the know arrival of the Hurricanes made possible the adquisition of revenue by the sale of slightly used equipment to interested parties and Paraguay demonstrated a great interest in our aircrafts."

June 18th 1934- Minister of the Navy de La Garza read the reports and shook his head in despair. He knew with the possiblity of Cleito dying the source of used ships will dry up and he was praying for the coming Conference in San Francisco at least save the dying Cleito agreements.

While the demise of Cleito will not affect the short term construction plans of his Navy(1) the limitations of the Treaty made possible for them to at least keep a semblance of a regional power, something he knew will end if the other nations in the region are not restricted anymore to 15" guns. He also knew it wasn't possible for his nation to compete in that terms and his orders were for the experts in the Naval Academy to find a solution to compete if necessary.

(1) destroyers and subs will be the order of the day for 1934-35.

June 24th 1934- A large mission, composed mainly of former crewmen of the battleship Lima, departed today for the South African port of Mar de Plata. The reason is unknown at this time but is considred that is tied to the transfer of the South African dreadnaughts later on the year.

June 28th 1934- The latest reports from the Bogota Conference, now on their third month, seems to indicate an impasse has been reached in regard to the existance of the rebel Republic of Santa Cruz. With all the Chilean concerns been resolved so far and pretty much reparations have been agreed to both Chile and our nation, this seems to be the last hurdle to formally end the war. Foreign Minister De La Guarda stated "this could be resolved in the next couple of weeks if the Brazilians decide to show some willingness to negotiate."

June 30th 1934- Field Marshall Arjona returned today from Bolivia and was received in the Lima Airfield by thousands of citizens, who hailed the "Conqueror of La Paz" all the way to Army Headquarters. Privately has been said the possibility exist the Field Marshall could run for the Presidency in the 1936 elections.

Quoted

if the other nations in the region are not restricted anymore to 15" guns.

A, B and C aren't restricted anyway.