The setting for the battle between John Paul Jones and his allies against Baron and his teammates was the battle of Saipan. Which happened to be one of the last engagements between the United States and Japan in the Second World War. The island of Saipan was a little island in the Pacific Ocean that the Japanese were using as a military outpost that had fully functional airstrips: which the Americans were after so that they could be within striking distance of the Japanese homeland.

The massive naval battle that was the Battle of the Phillippine Sea occurred during this time as well. This battle had the US strength at 71,000 men while the Japanese forces numbered 32,000 plus thousands more in regular civilians living on the island. Aside from airstrips, the island had many fields of sugarcane. It was the most heavily fortified of the Mariana Islands that also included Guam to the very far south.

In real life, the casualties on the American side were about 10,000 men wounded with less than 5,000 men killed or missing. On the other hand, at least 90% of the defending Japanese forces were either killed in action or committed suicide. Also, many Japanese civilians living on the island committed suicide due to their indoctrination that the invading forces would kill them regardless. Of course, the American depiction of the Japanese forces wasn’t all rosy either, some were warranted, some were not.

Once again, Baron was on the losing defending side. Such a streak was unlucky, but he had to try his best to win anyway. Preparation time was limited, only limited to 2 weeks. Nowhere near enough time to do everything he wanted to do. The civilians would need to be trained to fight to increase their odds of successfully repelling the invasion. They were already so hopped up on anti-American propaganda that many were willing to defend their island and families.

Baron had spent a lot of his time studying the first and second world wars, and he studied this battle quite a bit. Many small details led to the crushing defeat of the Japanese forces. These would have to be given more attention to not sway what advantages Baron had at the start of the war. This included such things as anti-tank trenches, many sand fortifications along the beach that the forces under John Paul would need to get through, and tall sugarcane trunks that could hide an army of tanks within them.

For the two weeks that they had time to prepare, much of the time was spent training the troops as well as building even more fortifications all along the beach and further inland. Guerilla warfare would be a big part of the battle if the enemy forces were able to breach the beach, which was almost a given. If John Paul did the logical thing, he would start the war just as in history by bombarding Saipan with untold numbers of shells and other explosives then they would be sending in the amphibious tanks from their transport ships.

However, given what Nicholas had told him earlier, who knew if that would be how it turned out. Just in case, Baron had multiple squadrons of tanks hide in the tall sugarcane trees to report on a few other possible landing sites. The main one would be the only one that was heavily guarded. A wild card like John Paul Jones would not always be logical in their actions. They might just do things differently just to trip Baron up.

Once again, Roxi was set up to snipe from afar. She was given the task of training the sniper corps that consisted solely of the civilians of the island. This way, they wouldn’t immediately be in any danger. Since there were very advantageous positions just past the sugarcane fields, there were more than enough spaces for the thousands of recruits. Along with developing weapons, these were her 2 priorities.

As for Baron, his task this time was to train all the other troops as well as to improve their defensive areas around the perimeter around the beach. This would take up most of his time as he found it necessary to scope out more than just the main beach. To be cautious around their new opponent would be a necessity.

Finally, Jaxon would not be participating in this war directly as his talents in aerial warfare was much better suited to somewhere else. The battle of the Philippine Sea would be happening during the same time as this battle, so Jaxon was sent there to help the Japanese not get crippled like in real life. If Jaxon was successful, Baron’s battlefield would be as good as won.

The day finally came for when the battle was to begin. The trio did not know exactly what to expect from such an erratic and spur of the moment strategist. However, they were quite surprised to find that the enemy decided to forego the bombardment and went in straight for trying to get their amphibious tanks onto the shore. This was a tricky business as even an above-average wave would be able to put a tank out of commission.

All the while, Baron’s forces were firing back at them. Enemy fire support ships began to fire their weapons as soon as Baron’s forces showed themselves. John Paul Jones had 2 battleships and 7 destroyers. However, soon enough, they would be diverted to intercept a fleet coming to aid Baron’s forces. Baron decided that what firepower they had that were capable of destroying these tanks were to all be used on this battlefield since there were many easy targets.

Artillery bombardment along with other guerilla warfare tactics was used extensively to stall the American advance. Thankfully, the anti-tank trenches had been widened enough that they were not able to get through, at least not on this beach. This left the American soldiers abandoning their tanks and rushing forward as infantrymen to try and make ground.

Baron’s forces were slowly being pushed back despite their defensive advantage, just as he had predicted. Once the encroaching troops came close enough to the sugarcane fields, there were many groups of soldiers just charging in blindly. The order was given for the Japanese tanks to emerge from the fields and push the enemy back to the trenches where many amphibious tanks were still stuck in. It worked marvelously.

Once their work was done, the tanks retreated to where the enemy could no longer see them. But not before the other Japanese forces had a chance to man up their beach defenses once more as well as picking up any arms the dead soldiers had dropped. Seeing that the amphibious tanks were no longer useful, the transport ships switched to releasing soldiers onto the beach in droves. Between Baron’s troops defending the beach, Roxi’s civilians firing from afar, and all the traps in between the two forces, John Paul Jones’ forces were not making much progress.

Over the course of the day, the invading forces suffered quite a bit of casualty, both in terms of tanks and soldiers while the defending Japanese forces had suffered minimal casualties. This remained true until the end of the day when the American forces decided to withdraw their troops for the day. They would be nothing more than sitting ducks if they were to set up camp on the beaches. It would be another matter if they had at least been able to push a few kilometers into Saipan soil.

For Baron, he knew that he had shown one of his hands to his opponent already. The sugarcane fields that housed dozens of tanks. The armor at the front of the tanks was able to repel most bullets, but the backside was not so protected. Baron deigned to have these tanks be his prized troops and had scattered them further inland after they completed their initial ambush and retaliation efforts.

The night passed by with neither side making any moves against the other. For once, it was peaceful without the rounds of bullets or shells exploding throughout the night. However, the next day saw the brief period of tranquility interrupted. Going by the scouts and infiltration specialists among the enemy ranks, Baron learned a few key decisions that John Paul Jones and his allies had taken during the night.

For one, they had only sent a portion of their navy to engage with the fast-approaching Japanese navy led by Jaxon. However, they must have been quite confident in their skills as not sending the majority of their resources to stop that fleet was quite a big gamble. But that must have just been the type of man John Paul Jones is. Another thing was the preparation of the bombardment of the island of Saipan.

Baron made sure that his forces inside the small 2-men fortifications on the beach pulled back a safe distance. Despite that, he was sure that what he was about to face was not just a simple bombardment. His guess was correct. The bombardment of shells started on the beach, just as he had predicted, but they slowly moved inward. A calculated sweeping of the area to clear out any potential forces that lay in wait.

Then, reports began coming in of the enemy soldiers that were landing on the beach, behind the bombardment, without any resistance. There was no choice, the two armies had to meet in battle, even if Baron’s men would take one hell of a beating with their locations exposed and the bombardment likely to target them as soon as they showed themselves. Since Baron did not wish to employ the tanks at such an early stage, he held off on them and advanced his infantry forces. Behind them, Roxi’s civilian snipers began shooting long before the two infantry regiments met in combat.

Needless to say, it would be an overwhelming victory for the advancing American soldiers. They were able to make much more progress than the day before. The support they were getting from their naval force showed no sign of letting up and so the ground forces just pressed on. Past the beach, and into the densely packed tall sugarcane fields. There, visibility was low for both sides. Both forces had units stationed inside, however, the bombardment had decimated quite a bit of the sugarcanes. Many were still on fire long after the explosions stopped.

By this point, the support shells stopped firing, for fear of hitting their men. But it did not matter as they had already successfully gotten control of the beach, and a few kilometers inland to boot. This tactic was used many times during the first world war, but with infantry soldiers so that they were able to bypass the trenches under the cover of a predetermined and calculated rain of explosives. It was decently useful in an amphibious assault, it turns out.

The only mistake Baron had made was for the preservation of his infantry. This had led him to abandon the beach which turned out to be extremely poor judgment. There were still many aspects of war that Baron was not an expert in. To succeed on his own now would be an uphill battle, to say the least. His screw up had cost him dearly, he felt incompetent. Today’s results would reflect poorly on him and would translate to his men.

As night fell, Baron decided for all of his men to withdraw from the sugarcane fields to Death Valley. It would be a lot easier to defend there. With knowledge of how many and where certain camps were, Baron decided to take drastic action. He recalled Roxi from the backlines with an important mission for her. To find and kidnap one certain soldier in all of the different faces among the enemy. Her target: Guy Gabaldon.

Very rarely did one regular soldier in an army have a big influence on the war as a whole. However, Guy Gabaldon was a huge exception. He alone convinced nearly a thousand Japanese soldiers and civilians to willingly surrender through gentle persuasion in real life. Something Baron did not need at the moment. Capture if possible, incapacitate if necessary. Those were Roxi’s orders. A few more names were given to her as targets to eliminate, but Guy Gabaldon was the big one.