Sallying Pacific

The year is 1943.

Japan is cornered. The Empire is attacked on all sides. Pearl Harbor is being bombed to oblivion, while in Southern China its armies reel back in retreat. The Solomons are being slowly being liberated by the Allies, and Tahiti has been reconquered by the French.

Strategically, the Empire is not faring well. The American submarine warfare campaign is starting to choke Japan's resources and the Imperial Fleet is feeling the pinch of the lack of oil and resources. America produces ships by the dozens every month while the Japanese shipyard struggles to keep a snail's pace of a few ships every other month. The outlook is not good, and the imperial forces do not seem to have an answer to mounting Allied power.

And Japanese Grand Admiral Yamamoto has decided that enough was enough. Having to evacuate Pearl Harbor, he orders all able Japanese ships to the south seas. The goal is to confront and destroy the American fleet to end the Allied reconquest campaign once and for all.

While the Allies are slowly regaining the initiative in the conflict under the leadership of MacArthur and Nimitz, a storm of steel and might is brewing with the Japanese Imperial Navy coming down on them. Fully aware of the Japanese moves because they can read their naval code, the two men will plan accordingly. An evacuation or a final battle is in the cards for the Allies. They will need to choose.

Yamamoto prepares his next move in the defense of the Hawaiian Islands with the construction of a new naval base 1500 kilometers west of Oahu on Johnson Atoll, while the U.S. Navy is ready to move on Pearl from San Diego.

In China, the Nationalists continue their offensive while the Japanese follow up with their retreat and hope to stop the Chinese. In the Indian Ocean, Admirals Somerville and Kondo are on a collision course for another battle. Americans on the west coast think themselves safe from Japanese raids. They are about to be reminded that Japan still has some bite.

The war is far from over.

This is the story of the Second World War.