Indian National Army

Sometimes I do figure conversions and have bits left over.

I save the bits and recently when through them all and figured out a way to return over 200 partial figures back into service.

Most of these original figures donated heads to other figures.  

Most of these were British Indian Army troops and a few Japanese and various British troops.

I managed to find new heads for them so they could be returned to service as Japanese allies, Indian National Army troops.
 

One of the figures is even an elephant Mahout.  

Same figures after a bit of primer.

Japanese

While there are large numbers new sets, I still like the Japanese from Airfix.

They still form the basis for my army.

I am using the other sets to fill in gaps in the Airfix sets.

Hat has recently released Japanese bicycle troops.

When you add up all these different sets, you have a pretty good Japanese unit.

Japanese

These samurai figures are 28mm Heroclix.

I have been considering them as a sort of morale marker.

If the troops have good morale, then they get a spirit figure to represent that morale.

The spirit figure moves along with the troops but has no combat power of his own.

He makes it harder for the troops to surrender or run away.

I like morale and game markers that add to the view of the game table.

Japanese

Japanese fought more than just on little desert islands and in jungle.

They fought in the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, in the snow.

They fought in China in cities, in the country, and in the hills.

They fought against the French in Indo-China, and the Dutch in Java.

The fought against Americans, Australians and the British and Indians.

Plenty of potential enemies and lots of kinds of terrain to fight over.

Japanese

Redbox also makes IJ Naval aviators.  

They also make Kamikaze figures. 

There are also now a couple companies making Japanese heavy weapons.

The Airfix were a great set, but just about all riflemen.

There is the one guy with the flag.

And the officer figure with the traditional sword.

And one guy with a submachine gun.

Japanese

For decades the Airfix Japanese were nearly all we had for 1/72nd scale WWII Japanese troops.

Later we got the marginal Atlantic set and the short lived Matchbox figures.

Still, vast numbers of Japanese served well in many wargame armies.

Now we have an avalanche of Japanese.  

Red Box have given use three new sets of Japanese figures.

Imperial Japanese Army pilots for example.

Operation Storm

Operation Storm by John J. Geoghegan is a great book!  It is about the I-400 class submarines of the Imperial Japanese Navy and their secret missions.  These submarines were designed to carry aircraft and were intended to attack targets as diverse as New York City and the Panama Canal.

This book is told in a very personal style, discussing individual sailors, the construction and operations of the incredible weapons systems.  The research is great, there was much here and I had not read before.

 

 

I got this book free as a review copy, but I would recommend it to anyone interested in the IJN, submarines, and WWII.

Japanese WWII

Waterloo 1815 Japanese WWII troops. Grenade launcher, lunge mine, and observer.

ATR man with loader and observer.

Few plastic Japanese heavy weapons have been on the market and this set really helps beef up their units.

Lunge mine in use against a Soviet T-34 tank. It has a range of the length of the stick.

Half of the Japanese set deployed against a Soviet medium tank. These little guns were in use all during the war. The Japanese had very bad anti-tank defenses. There was little requirement for them against the Chinese and not much tank use on the Pacific islands, except the Philippines.