IJN Battleships

Now, the imperial japanese navy did field some impressive ships, just like theyre axis ally the Kreigsmarine. The japanese had the mighty Musashi and Yamato, the biggest battleships completed. With enormous 18" guns, ( three barrels in each of three turrets, two fore, and one aft ) and impressive speed for its size, and an excellent armour compliment, these ships were very threatening. Not to mention the superb opics placed on this class. These two ships far surpassed any other japanese battleship afloat, for example the hiei, kongo, kirishima, nagato, mutsu. The Yamato class was modern in every sense, barring the fact it had no radar mounted on it. There was a third ship in the Yamato class, to be named Shinano, but she was converted to an aircraft carrier, and sunk while leaving leaving kure naval base for completion by a US submarine. The other ships of the class fared no better against the US, and were both sunk by american air power. Had these ships been used correctly, they could have made merry hell in the pacific for the americans and shipping. Paired with a few submarines, an escort carrier or two, and a heavy cruiser for good measure. Yamato, Musashi, two escort carriers, and a few subs, patrolling the pacific, hunting convoys, could have done some serious damage. Now i know your gonna say, what about the US carriers and battleships that were present? well my freind, thats what the subs are for, to draw away escorts or enemy fleets, so the main "raiding party" could escape or attack. the carriers could be equipped with some Kate torpedo bombers, and quite a few zero's, for interception of enemy carrier based aircraft. truly, this could have been a formidable force, and would have done some damage, but inevitably would have met the same fate. though they could have earned some honor to match theyre reputation that these massive ships got. Yes, they would have been sunk eventually, but at least they would have done some damage. Imagine the mighty Musashi and Yamato bearing down on a convoy, while the escorts for the convoy are attacking the japanese subs far off, and being bombed and strafed by the carriers.

[R Leonard]

Based on the last time Yamato and Musashi came out at the same time, late October 1944, how do you suppose "a few" submarines are going to distract something like 9 fleet carriers, 8 light carriers, 18 escort carriers, and their something like 1600 combined aircraft; 12 battleships, 9 heavy cruisers, 15 light cruisers, 96 destroyers and 17 destroyer escorts enough to keep them from going after the pair? And where were the behemoths planning on refueling once they burned up what was in their bunkers? And how were the Japanese planning on locate these convoys? And, for that matter, to which convoys do you refer? If you are referring to replenishment groups, don't forget they had CVE escorts. Last time Yamato went after a bunch of CVEs, they only managed to sink one and there were a whole lot more Japanese guns on the scene of that action. And since the US was reading the Japanese mail, how long do you think it would take to divine the Japanese intentions? And even if they don't talk about it, remember what happened to Yamato? Located and shadowed by patrol planes until the carrier planes arrived on the scene. What do you suppose would be the odds of a repeat that bags the both of them?


Sorry, I don't think it would work.


Regards


Rich

I know it would not work, its a very circumstantial scenario. But what i intended was that these ships could have served some purpose. rather than the biggest kamikaze ever. They would have accomplished something. And the IJN was not worryed about refueling, this shows with theyre suicide mission of the Yamato itself, it would have been a one way trip, out doing the best it could, with what it had. thats all i intended to say, they would have had the potential to do something, anything, instead of being wasted.

[R Leonard]

They never would have gotten close to anything. It would be just what happened to Yamato in reality. By mid 1944 there were very few, if any, holes in the search coverage. They would be seen, chased down, and sunk.

Rich

But at least these ships would have been put to some use, yes, it WAS a suicide mission, but come on, there is more honor in that than beaching yourself and using the greatest axis battleship as a shore battery against bombardment ships and landing craft. And, there were no possibilities at this point for and effective IJN attack, but this would have been as close as they could get, do you at least agree to that? No matter what they did, aircraft or 16" american guns would have sunk them, but in this case, they could go down in an attack, and not an intentional beaching.

[Jim P.]

But the Yamato never got a chance to beach itself....it got creamed from the air before reaching its destination instead. The BB was essentially obsolete throughout WW-II. Most of the actual combat seen by our own BBs during the was as offshore bombardment platforms. Between our subs and massive naval and Army AFs any surface ship, if spotted, was toast. And that 'die with honor' krap? Dead is dead.

[Rich47]

Hello. I think both battleships were antiquated at the time of launch off their quays. The Japanese would have been better off building carriers of some type off of the hulls.

There is some slight argument for BBs in WW ll as a platform for land bombardment/invasion and as a screen for carriers. I freely admit that the big BBs are my personal favorites of any ships. But WW ll in the Pacific was a carrier war, first and foremost. From Taranto on naval doctrine would center around the carriers.

Strange how the Japanese knew all this and still built these behemoths. I would assume they wanted a well rounded naval force. That, or the full impact of the air plane hadn't been assessed yet prior to the keels being laid. Either way both these magnificent ships were dead as dog meat once the Japs lost the carrier war.

Great forum BTW. And thank you...........Rick

[drgondog]

Rich - you are certainly right about World War II Naval action being dominated by Carriers, but the subs were huge - particularly for us in the Pacific and the Germans in the Atlantic.

The fleet subs destroyed most of the Maru's and the B-29 Mine laying missions managed to put the coup de gras on the rest before carriers got into range of Japan...

The BB's were relegated to fleet AA support and floating artilliary - and I can speak from personal experience that I have never seen anything like fire support from the US Navy for grunts in range... nobody wants to be singled out by either a 16in shell or a Mk-84 bomb...

Regards,

Bill

[ArtieBob]

IMHO, being ex-USN, some of the reality is being lost in time. The Allied Task Forces operating in the Western Pacific were enormous, composed of hundreds of ships. A few submarines could only make a small dent in one of these task forces even if they were able to trade all their torpedoes one for one for ships. Also remember the structure of the task forces, the largest quantity of ships were DDs and DEs with the primary mission of ASW. After the first torpedo strike, the few subs would instantly become the hunted. As for the big battle ships, without effective air cover, they were simply very large targets and had little chance of getting in range of even 18" guns. That is assuming they had ammunition, which I understand the Japaneses did not have in sufficient quantity to do a full provisioning when they were sent into combat.

Best regards

Artie Bob
(Pilot for over 50 years but also sea duty (peacetime, thank you) on BB-64, CA-123, APA-?, LSD 34. Variously, Navigator, CIC officer, Electronics Officer, Air Officer, and Band Officer. Qualified OOD fleet, Crypto Board, and CDO.

[Graham Boak]

I do feel that a read of books such as Kagero would be beneficial, to get a grasp on how the Japanese approached the war and the use of their fleet. The Japanese philosophy was to bring the opposing fleet to battle and defeat it. The reason their ships didn't do better is because of the technical and material superiority of the USN, as described above. The sheer size of the Pacific would rule against surface raiders and their reliance on supply ships.

One of the standard criticisms of the Japanese use of submarines was that they followed precisely the pattern suggested here: to concentrate against the USN warships. Most serious commentators suggest they would have done better used to intercept allied supply lines, along the lines of the U-boat campaign. However, there is much less kudos to be gained from sinking merchant ships than there is from sinking warships: mercantile warfare is against the warrior spirit.