It seems like every career of late has a patrol, whether by design or accident, that covers a stupendous area without encountering any real traffic. I'm not sure if I'm having another of those or if the radar issue is leading the enemy to route traffic away from us.
It's late summer 1942, Japanese expansion has stopped and they're intensifying air coverage of their SLOCs. However we've sighted exactly two ships at sea in 40 days while covering the Sunda Strait up to Hainan, the Gulf of Tonkin, SCS up to Taiwan, over to the Luzon Strait, down to Manila, Balabac to Basilan to Balabac to Hainan to Singapore. In the great port city of Singapore there was exactly one ship, a medium tanker, and a daihatsu guarding it.
Crossing the Sulu Sea, we had seven air contacts eastbound and nine west, each in one day. Even in the middle of the SCS we had approximately that many. I'm beginning to feel like a Kaleun in 1944.
If this is the new norm for 1.46, I think I may take Uncle Louie up on that desk job in the Pentagon until the next release.
