9th September 1943 Surrender of Italy Armistice of Cassibile

Kuma started pursuit of Eritrea who had changed sides. Minelayer Hatsutaka, the 551st Air Group and other vessels and aircraft searched for her with all their strength. When Italy surrendered, Eritrea was escorting a transport submarine inbetween Singapore and Sabang, in Japanese-occupied territory.

However, 2 years ago in East Africa, Eritrea slipped through a naval blockade guarded by Dutch Aircraft and British Ships by changing her paint and putting on a fake mast and escaped to Japan. In other words, Eritrea is an Escape Specialist! Her escape in the East African Campaign

I escaped~~

Oh, Nice~

This time too, she managed to escape to Ceylon in a magnificent disappearing act! Even her British captors praised her for pulling off such a great escape. While on her escort mission from Singapore to Sabang in Japanese territory, she picked up news of Italy's surrender, and quickly changed course to Ceylon to surrender to British forces

4 days later, 13th of September

ku~~ another Italian ship,kuma~?

In the port was the Italian submarine that surrendered and was acquired by the IJN, the Comandante Cappellini, and Kuma was to escort her to Singapore... The submarine that Eritrea was supposed to be escorting

I am not going to lower my flag until we reach Singapore, om nom nom and thus

I will not allow any Japanese to board. om nom nom

Italian Submarine Comandante Cappellini Named Adora-3 after German aquisition Japanese codename Akira-3 Wikipedia says the German name was UIT-24

Does this girl know her place-kuma...?

Even when we acquired her, she said "I will scuttle myself if anyone of you steps aboard"......

I will not move an inch if you don't comply with my demands.

Also, I'll be having seconds for this Bak Kut Teh A Singaporean/Malaysian dish literally meaning "meat-bone-tea", it is essentially pork ribs in a broth.

Looks like Hatsutaka herself escorted Cappellini in the end, huh?

And without any Japanese boarding her?

I don't understand what the Italians were thinking-kuma...

Kuma-oneesama, do you hate Italian ships now?

That's not the case-kuma~ Libeccio, Roma and Littorio are all my good friends-kuma~

You're gonna make us starve "Starve" here refers to starvation tactics in warfare

No one knows exactly why...

... maybe it's because they were pissed for letting an Italian ship just days ago...

... or maybe it's because it became a situation where no Japanese can board the captured ship....

...or maybe it's because they had a bad impression of the Italians who didn't scuttle themselves ...

...and because Kuma's liaison officer and Cappellini's captain couldn't come to an agreement, the sortie abruptly ended.

What's wrong with it! It's a natural right I am entitled to! Right to not lower her flag and not allow any Japanese to board

... that during preparations the day before the sortie, mutual understandings broke down...

Onee-san! A message! A message!

For today's PvP exercise, it's dangerous for our Italian ship opponents to go to sea right after their meal, so we'll have to wait another two hours for PvP.