Yamato Class: The Heaviest Battleships Ever Constructed

Before getting started I want to tell you guys  why didn't we use more images of them and that's because well as we address later, the Japanese made a hell of an effort to destroy all evidence of these things so there honestly just aren't a lot of images to use we are doing our best.

Because sometimes size is everything, the word Yamato in Japanese means great harmony but the two monstrous battleships launched in 1940 which fell under the Yamato class were anything but harmonious.

The largest battleships the world had ever seen were built to intimidate and instill fear as Japan's nationalistic vigor was reaching its crescendo and the country began gazing greedily around the pacific.

The irony of it all was that the two Yamato-class battleships were almost too important to risk in combat and they spent much of the war safely cocooned in naval bases.

So why build them at all then?.

 

But as the ends neared for imperial Japan these leviathans were finally forced into the fray.

In the immediate years after the world war one several countries continued their naval build-up which had started during the war the UK, USA ,France ,Italy and Japan.

The victors from the great war invested heavily in their naval armadas and the world saw its first mass peacetime arms race.

In 1921 the Washington naval treaty was signed by the five countries in which they agreed to limit the size and weaponry of future battleships a cap of 35 000 tons of displacement and a gun limit of 400 millimeters 16-inch caliber was introduced in the treaty interestingly though the total tonnage of capital ships battleships and battlecruisers available to each country was not actually equal.

The UK and the USA were both allocated 525 000 tons Japan got 315 000 tons and France and Italy were left with a meager 175 000 tons.

It's fair to say that there was a bit of bitterness from the outset about this particular treaty no surprises there then the 1930s saw the grip of ultra-nationalism titan in Japan suddenly calls to expand the Japanese empire they grew louder and more consistent and they were not limiting their sights to that immediate surrounding area.

The Japanese guys had cast out over an enormous area stretching 4 800 kilometers from china to the American island of midway in the pacific ocean and if Japan if they had ambitions for an empire of that size well they were going to need a navy to match it.

In 1934 Japan left the league of nations a crude precursor to the UN after a scandalous incident in 1931 in which it staged a bomb attack on one of its own train lines and blamed the explosion on Chinese dissidents.

A period of international isolation followed in which they freed themselves from the shackles of treaties and minor things like political commitments while Japanese military leaders began pondering a great naval fleet  as the dominant powers of the pacific it was somewhat predictable that Japan and the united states would come into competition and well eventually conflict Japanese leaders knew that they could not match the building power of the Americans.

During the 1930s, at least the US accounted for 32.2 percent of worldwide production with Japan producing only 3.5 percent.

The Japanese would need to be rather creative if they had any hope of matching the mighty Americans.

Members of US congress pledged to out-build the Japanese three-to-one. 

When it came to a renewed naval arms race in terms of numbers the Japanese had very little chance but they pinned their hopes on the kantai kessen decisive battle doctrine a military strategy in which the Japanese navy could win a future war by fighting and winning a single significant battle the basis for this had come during the Russian-Japanese war of 1905 in which the Japanese navy had almost  completely destroyed their Russian counterparts in what had been the world's first large-scale naval battle using modern steel warships.

Kantai Kessen had been adapted to the American threat and was a direct response to the American plan orange which had been in place since world war one as a way of responding to a hypothetical Japanese threat the kantai kessen set out a plan to invade the Philippines and then draw the US navy all the way across the pacific.

For an almighty showdown while things didn't really work out quite like that, in the end, the attack on pearl harbor was very much a part of this Japanese doctrine but again there was the problem of numbers Japanese leaders knew that any potential force sent by the Americans would heavily outnumber them and that a new type of battleship would be needed one that could take on multiple ships at once smashing the indomitable American navy.

Well I mean that was the plan at least  between 1934 and 1936 24 separate designs were submitted for what Japan hoped would be a battleship so large it would strike fear into the hearts of those who saw its vast bulk appear on the horizon.

These designs varied greatly from their armaments to their size from their armor to their speed but in the end it came down to just two designs the a140 f3 and the a140f4.

By 1937 these two designs had morphed into one and the final blueprint for the Yamato-class battleship it had finally taken shape and you better believe that what they had designed was truly titanic not only would it be the largest battleship the world had ever seen but it would also pack a terrifying punch with nine mighty 460 millimeter that's 18.1 inch naval guns mounted on three triple gun turrets which themselves would weigh more than an entire destroyer from the 1930s era.

Once the plans had been signed off by Japanese naval high command order for five Yamato-class battleships was placed but only two would appear with a third eventually being converted into an aircraft carrier .

Let's jump into the construction  perhaps just as impressive as their vast bulk was the fact that the Japanese managed to keep their existence a secret for so long in fact the US didn't become fully aware of the two battleships until 1942 nearly a year after pearl harbor had been attacked.

Even after this, their exact dimensions were keenly debated and often underestimated this class of battleship was the biggest warship the world had ever seen and in terms of battleships it remained so to this day they were 256 meters in length at the waterline roughly the same size as two and a half football pitches with a beamwidth of 38.9 meters and a draft of 10.4 meters.

In terms of water displacement they dwarfed everything else on the planet at the time and this wouldn't be surpassed until supercarriers arrived many decades later they displaced a massive 72 000 tons when fully loaded in comparison the largest American battleships during world war ii were the Iowa class ships themselves the second largest battleship class ever seen and yet they displaced nearly 25 000 tons less than the Yamato class.

Twelve Kampen boilers powered the four steam turbines which turned four six-meter propellers generating 147 948 horsepower if we keep the comparison with the iowa class this was over 60 000 horsepower less than the American class battleship.

The yamato ships had a top speed of 27 knots less than their American counterpart and they had a range of 7200 nautical miles but at a reduced speed of 16 knots.

As we touched on earlier these battleships were designed to fight well outnumbered and to give them the best possible chance they were outfitted with both a fearsome array of weaponry but also the kind of armour that was just unparalleled at the time.

So let's start with the guns the nine 460 millimetre type 94 naval guns were the largest to ever be fitted to a warship with a length of almost 21.13 meters almost the same as two London double-decker buses.

Lined up the secondary armament included 12 155 millimetre type three guns mounted on four triple turrets one forward two in the center one in aft.

And twelve 127 millimetre type 89 guns on six double turrets three on each side of the ship.

The ship's anti-aircraft defense was provided by a dozen 40 caliber 127 millimeter type 89 dual-purpose guns spread over six twin turrets three on each side of the ship.

We're really not messing around here so as you can see the avatar-class battleships could pour out a nightmarish amount of firepower but could they take it as well as give it.

The armor that protected these leviathans was second to none a primary belt of armor along the side of the battleship was up to 410 millimeters thick that's 16.1 inches and was followed by a lower belt closer to the water line measuring 200 millimetres but this was all nothing in comparison to the armour around the ship's turrets which could measure up to 650 millimeters in thickness.

The armor plating found in the belts and around the turrets was made of Vickers hardened a face hardened steel armor while the omaron deck was made from a nickel chromium molybdenum alloy but it wasn't just the armour that gave these battleships a competitive edge much of the superstructure was built using arc welding which was a relatively new form of construction at the time where metal is joined together using electricity effectively melting the metal together this provided a much more durable armor plating than had ever been created before it was thought that the ships could withstand hits from 460 millimeter shells at ranges between 1.9 and 3 kilometers.

The deck was designed to be able to withstand a strike from a thousand kilogram bomb dropped from 3 400 meters but while their armor was superior to anything else at sea they were certainly not invincible both the Yamato and the musashi had significantly lighter armor at their bows.

While the Yamato suffered numerous weaknesses most likely down to its rushed finish poor joining was reported around the torpedo defense system while doubts over a water tightness remained throughout her lifespan.

So while five of these beasts were originally planned only the amateur and the musashi were completed the third the shinano was converted into an aircraft carrier after the defeat at the battle of midway but was sunk just 10 days after she was commissioned.

Until last  the Musashi was laid down on the 29th of march 1938 and launched on the 1st of November 1940. like her sibling, it seems the Japanese command was willing to keep the Musashi sheltered whenever possible though she was damaged by an American torpedo in 1944.

In October of that same year she left Brunei to participate in the battle of late gulf generally considered to be one of the largest naval battles in history the battle can be roughly divided into four separate engagements and it was during one of these that on October 24th the Musashi encountered fearsome opposition that she just couldn't match.

During the battle, she was hit by a total of 17 bombs and 19 torpedoes sinking with the loss of 1023 of her 2 399-man crew  the amateur was laid down on the 4th of November 1937 and launched on the 8th of August 1940.

It did not enter full service until 1942 after extensive testing and training but despite being the flagship of the imperial Japanese navy, dianato would spend the majority of the war well away from any significant combat she was involved during the battle of midway in 1942 but didn't engage enemy forces during the battle.

In fact the yamato would only fully engage enemy ships one time on Christmas day in 1943 she was badly damaged by a torpedo fired from the submarine USS skate and had to limp home for some structural repairs the amateur returned to the seas the following year and in October joined the action during the battle of late golf in which she sank the American escort carrier Gambia bay and the destroyer Johnson and this was the glorious high point of this record-breaking ship by early 1945.

The Imperial Japanese navy lay in tatters and the allied forces were closing in on the Japanese mainland so it was time for a bit of a desperate roll of the dice the word kamikaze meaning divine wind in Japanese is usually associated with suicide missions involving aircraft purposefully crashing into enemy ships a little known fact is that it wasn't just aircraft that were involved in kamikaze missions and it was on one such mission that the Yamato met her end operation ten-go would be the last major naval operation conducted by the Japanese navy a failed attempt to halt the American march towards Japan.

The operation called for ten warships led by the Yamato to fight their way to Okinawa where they would beach themselves creating a protective screen of the island their orders were to fight until no longer possible then wade ashore and continue the battle on land everybody involved in it knew that this was a suicide mission as if their orders were not far-fetched enough the small contingency would have no air support leaving them totally vulnerable to attack from American aircraft.

And well surprise that was exactly what happened it was just past midday on the 7th of April 1945 and still miles from Okinawa when the drone of enemy aircraft could be heard from the deck of the Yamato.

The US pilots realizing they had complete air superiority took their time to maximize their attacks within two hours two Japanese warships lay at the bottom of the ocean but the Yamato barreled on despite suffering two hits during the first wave of attacks the second and third waves saw a relentless concentrated attack on the Yamato and she was hit by eight torpedoes and 15 bombs and yet she still staggered on it kind of makes you think of this war hero charging towards enemy lines failing but just rising up and continuing bravely on but the situation it was hopeless and if there was any doubt over the Japanese military's attitude to the sanctity of life the order to flood the engine and boiler rooms with no warning drowning hundreds of seamen almost instantly proved just that the mighty battleship slowed now easy prey for the feasting aircraft above.

It was just past two o'clock when the pride of the Japanese navy began to sink it went out with an almighty bang a 1423 the Yamato exploded with the resulting mushroom-shaped cloud reaching 6 100 meters and being seen from 200 kilometers away the remains of the largest battleship in the world now lay strewn across the ocean only 202 of her 2700 crew survived operation 10 go  once it became clear that the end was near for Japan.

The government ordered documents and photos relating to the Yamato-class battleships to be destroyed to prevent them from falling into enemy hands the destruction was so complete that until 1948 the only photos of the battleships came from the united states taken during battle or from reconnaissance flights though images and documents have emerged over time the almost complete purge of anything relating to these battleships afforded them both a mythical and ghostly status in Japan operation ten-go in which the Yamato took its last stand is often portrayed as a heroic yet futile attempt to protect the nation the far-fetched plan and callous disregard for human life are all too easily brushed aside.

But the death of the Yamato had a powerful symbolic meaning as well the word Yamato, if you remember meaning great harmony, is often used as a poetic expression to describe Japan and so the fiery demise of the vast battleship on the 7th of April 1945 was not just the end of the Yamato or even the Yamato-class battleships but indeed it represented the end of the Japanese empire.