The Japanese battleline in WWII was not the most modern in the world...

The IJN had 4 Kongo-class battleships launched in 1912/13 and refitted in 1936. They were the fastest of the IJN's BB at 30.5 knots. They weighed in at 31,720 tons and were armed with 4 twin mounted 14-inch guns, 14 single mounted 6-inch guns (later lowered to 8), 4 twin 5-inch DP guns (increased to 6 twin mounts) and 20 25mm AA guns (increased to 94).

Two Fuso-class battleships launched in 1914/15 and displacing 34,700 tons and with a speed of 24.75 knots. Armed with 6 twin 14-inch guns, 14 single mount 6-inch guns, 4 twin mount 5-inch DP guns and 16 25mm AA guns (later increased to 37) The IJN modernizied them in 1932 but considered them to be too slow for front line use.

Two Ise-class battleships launched in 1916/17 and displacing 36,000 tons and with a speed of 25.25 knots. Initially armed with 6 twin 14-inch guns, 16 single mount 5.5-inch guns, 4 twin 5-inch AA guns and 20 25mm AA guns. After the disaster at Midway, the IJN converted these two into hybrid battleship-seaplane carriers. The armament was changed to 4 twin 14-inch, 8 twin 5-inch DP guns and 57 25mm AA guns as well as 22 seaplanes.

Two Nagato-class battleships launched in 1919/1920 and displacing 39,130 tons and with a speed of 25 knots. Armed with 4 twin 16-inch guns, 18 single 5.5-inch guns (lowered to 16), 4 twin 5-inch DP guns and 20 25mm AA guns (increased to 98).

And finally the two Yamato-class battleships, launched in 1940 and displacing 71,659 tons and with a speed of 27.5 knots. Armed with 3 triple 18-inch guns, 4 triple 6.1-inch guns (reduced to two mounts), 6 twin 5-inch DP guns (increased to 12 twin mounts) and 24 25mm AA guns (increased to 146 25mm).

Unlike the USN, the IJN fought the war with older battleships, most of whom were modernized in the 1930s and later had refits with radar and increased numbers of light AA guns. Of the twelve BBs they started the war with; 2 were sunk in 1942; 1 in 1943; 4 in 1944; 4 in 1945; 1 in 1946. Ten were sunk by US forces, one by an accidental magazine explosion and one survived the war, only to be a target at the Bikini nuclear bomb test.

There were also a lot of concerns about Bismarck's underwater protection as well as her vulnerable rudder design, not mention the difficultly she had in using her engines to steer.

Have to disagree here, to be certain the US started mounting radars after Pearl Harbor, but it took the murderous fighting off Guadalcanal to teach the USN how to effectively use radars.

The USN started out with a serious case of severe overconfidence in the capability of radar. In many of the naval battles, the IJN, using lookouts with the old Mark I Eyeball spotted US ships long before they were visible on radar!

Japan's biggest naval advantage over British and American forces at the beginning of the war were the quality of its aircrew and carrier capable aircraft, which were noticeably superior to their British and American counterparts, and its government was far more ruthless. With the exception of the two giant Yamato Class battleships Japanese battleships were no better than British or American battleships, in fact their fleet may have been on average older than the two main allied navies, and most would consider the later war Iowa Class a better and arguably more powerfull battleship than the Yamato Class.

The Japanese fleet was smaller than both the American and British fleets at the start of the war, although it was concentrated in the Western Pacific. Japan did had more operational carriers than either Britain or America, and some cheating went on about their dimensions during their construction as Japan was still bound to the terms of the Washington Treaty. But Japanese carriers werent superior to allied carriers at the start of the war, in fact the best might have been the British carriers which had armoured flights decks.

As to who had the better carrier, many people forget that the primary mission of the carrier is to project power; this is executed by the carrier's airgroup (both in size and capability). By this standard, the British did not have the finest carriers of the war, they had the most surviveable carriers, but their protection was paid for by smaller airgroups and above all, less storage space for avgas and munitions.

The Japanese carriers started the war with a small, hand-picked group of pilots. The primary failure of the IJN aviation is that they had no means of expanding or replacing the loss of the pre-war pilots. Many people consider the Battle of Midway to be the critical turning point, it wasn't. The key turning point for the IJN was the brutal fighting in the Soloman Islands were many of their most experienced pilots died, the IJN never recovered and their losses in the 1944-45 battles reflects this.

The American carriers stumbled in the early war but as more decks and additional air groups entered the war, they quickly became the major factor in the Allied advances in the Pacific.

where's Matt Wiser? He usually chimes in on naval matters.

I think survivability in the Pacific was highly important in a war which became dominated by air power more than anywhere else. Most British carriers up until the two Implacable Class ships and the Indomitable Class were built within the confines of ship design and the Second London Naval Treaty to which they complied, unlike the Japanese who had withdrawn from it. America was able to produce the pre-war Lexington's as they were originally to be battlecruisers, but they were cancelled after work had begun under the terms of the Washington Treaty and the tonnage was allowed for aircraft carriers instead. Once the war started America could build whatever it liked to what size it wanted hense the rapid production of the Essex Class, which neither Britain or Japan could match in numbers for industrial reasons, and Britain also had different naval ship buiding priorities. British heavy units and carriers were pretty much absent from the Pacific after early 1942, and only started returning from 1944. Different design philosophies for different priorities influenced the differences between US and British carriers. Although the American carriers had bigger air wings the werent as survivable as the British units until the Midway Class.

There is no doubt that when a suicide plane was inbound, I'd rather be aboard a WWII British carrier than an Essex-class.

But the purpose of an aircraft carrier is not to survive attacks, it is to launch them. The USN made the decision to go with more hanger space as well as increased avgas storage and magazine space. Did it make US carriers more prone to damage, without a doubt! But it also allowed the USN to throw heavier airstrikes for a longer period of time than another navy in WWII. And those larger air groups allowed the carriers defense in depth. Coupled with the development of the new VT fuze, it made attacking an American carrier task force a bloody affair.

Since we are discusing carrier air groups, here are some intresting facts...

In Dec 1941

A US Fleet Carrier deployed with 18 fighters, 36 dive/scout bombers and 18 torpedo bombers.

A Japanese Fleet Carrier deployed with 18 fighters, 18 dive bombers and 18-27 torpedo bombers.

A British Carrier (Feb 42) deployed with 21 fighters and 24 torpedo bombers.

In Sept 1943

A US Fleet Carrier deployed with 38 fighters, 28 dive bombers and 18 torpedo bombers.

A Japanese Fleet Carrier deployed with 18-27 fighters, 20-27 dive bombers and 10-23 torpedo bombers.

A British Fleet Carrier deployed with 36 fighters and 12 dive bombers.

In Dec 1944

A US Fleet Carrier deployed with 71 fighters, 15 dive bombers and 15 torpedo bombers.

A Japanese Fleet Carrier deployed with 26-27 fighters, 25-26 dive bombers and 17 torpedo bombers.

A British Fleet Carrier deployed with 60 fighters and 18 dive bombers.

Here's an intresting tidbit....the all time record for most enemy aircraft confirmed shot down in a single action goes to the USS South Dakota.

During the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, on October 26, 1942, she was attacked by a force of over 65 dive and torpedo bombers. In a wild melee in which she suffered three bomb hits and a near miss, she shot down 26 of her attackers. A record that has remained unbroken to this day.

And probably never will be broken given that an average plane today is probably worth an entire WWII wing+.

The German Navy did understand the potential of aircraft carriers. Hitler just didn't keep to the timetable. He invaded Poland nine years too early for a German Navy with carriers.

Webstral

The plan was called Plan Z. The biggest drawback to it was it made mo allowances for the Royal Navy to react to the programme, oh and the war started early...

Technology is a combat multiplier, like troop quality. A bankrupt strategy is a bankrupt strategy. Assuming a halfway decent strategy, the key is that the leaders and troops using the technology know what to do with it. I suspect the tankers of VII US Corps would argue that technology gave them a decisive edge in western Kuwait in early 1991. The Japanese Navy trained hard for night actions and really took it to the US Navy around Guadalcanal in 1942. As the USN learned what to do with their radar, night actions at sea became less successful for the Japanese.

Unfortunately, I agree that Americans are inclined to learn the wrong lessons from Vietnam, etc. There are some good reasons for this. Hardware looks handsome and brings revenues into Congressman Jones' district. Well-trained troops cost money but don't employ factory workers; and on the parade ground it's nearly impossible to tell the proficient killers from the professional boot polishers. Also, we cling fervently to the idea that all around the world people are, deep down, Americans: democratic, enterprising, and all the other nice ideas. Therefore, we believe in the "tipping point" thesis, in which just a little more effort (money, technology, firepower) will set off a chain of events in which the people will come together, the war will be won, representative government will spontaneously erupt, and the rats we had to get into bed with will be swept away in the new dawn of Vietnamese, Iraqi, and Afghani democracy. Then we'll all have pie (make mine apple, please). Machines, therefore, are more comfortable to believe in than cold-eyed killers and pragmatists who say things we'd rather not hear about what it will take to achieve victory--whatever that means.

Webstral

The problem, the very scary problem, is it will take a massive and bloody defeat on American soil to change this attitude. While America fights conflicts in the gardens of other nations, there will never be enough incentive to change doctrine.

Look at internatonal terrorism, for decades the Americans never took it seriously enough, in fact they supported many terrorist groups operating in Soviet-controlled nations. It's also a big bone of contention over here that Americans in New York and Boston where fund raising for the IRA.

It took 9/11 to really shake America and make the American people and government realise how dangerous terrorism really is and why supporting it, even in hostile nations, is a recipe for disaster. Afterall, it was the American-supported individuals who fought the Russians that masterminded 9/11.

Aye, it always gets me how people do not realise the "other side" of my fathers exact comment when I got home from school that day and said "what the hell is going on", he replied "The bastards finally got what they need".

Part of that IS because the US paid for terrorism against Communism, but also, large areas of the Eastern Seaboard in the US paid, supplied and even hides IRA people, who in my fathers eyes, as he was 1 Ulster Defence Regiment of the British Army, born in Northern Ireland, are terrorists.

But I think we are going a little off topic from Carriers, but yes, its interesting to see what overtures are going on in Taiwan and China, and that it does appears since some news I heard yesterday, that China has an interest in a "Coastal Defence Force" and using fighters launching Exocets at long ranges.

Owning a carrier is one thing, operating one and carrier strike group, is something completely different, by the time China can operate a carrier strike group, the US will have left that field and moved onto something far more flexible and unmanned

Which could be America's downfall.

Operating cheaper UCAVs that don't risk pilot's lives and have longer loiter times in zone is worse for America than operating expensive and very complex jet fighters that risk pilots to imprisonment, torture, and/or death?

Remember that thing about over-reliance on technology?

Yes. In this case it's replacing a very expensive, technologically very complex manned plane with a much cheaper, less complex unmanned one. So your point is what?

Using something newer isn't automatically bad. Or is nothing short of lining up hordes of troops and having them toss rocks at enemies going to please you? No western country can afford to field a massive "low tech" (50-70s level) army. Hell, the current Libya thing is showing just how poorly Europe is prepared to handle even a short duration 'war' against a third-rate country. Several of the NATO participants are already running low on ammo (which the US is having to supply in the interim), and that's not even the best high-tech stuff such as cruise missiles, just the sort of bombs and missiles that were used as far back as Gulf War I. So any force multiplier, such as cheaper unmanned drones that don't cost friendly lives and a whopping amount of money if lost is a smart idea. The alternative is worse. If you have a better idea regarding using tech to solve manpower and cost problems (other than to not fight at all, which is an entirely different discussion), I'll be interested to hear it.

This is an aerospace technology that could to a certain extent level the playing field. Advanced manned combat jet aircraft are very expensive to develop and manufacture, and this is an area where America is unquestionably ahead of the rest of the world, as America's main competitors dont have the money (Russia), the technology (China, India) or the political will/unity (Europe) to fully compete. The development of combat UCAV's could give other countries a chance to catch up to a degree with American aerospace technological dominance in the future.

The UK (RAF) also has their own (and impressive) UCAV development program. They just aren't throwing as much money at it, nor publicizing it as much as the US Navy and Air Force programs.

Well I would consider Britain's aerospace industry among the strongest in the world, mainly due to BAE Systems and Rolls Royce plc. I would also argue that Rolls Royce plc is the most important industrial company in Europe, and its notable how the British government has never let it be taken over by a rival company or a foreign based concern despite its relatively small size.

Unfortunately Britain is part of the EU, and the British government insists on cooperating with other European countries in defence matters, supposedly to save money in R&D and manufacturing. However most of these project always end up over budget and lead to squabling, and usually harm its competiveness and potential marketability.

I agree with previous posters that eschewing technology becomes almost an article of faith. Nations don’t lose wars because they have incorporated new technologies. Nations lose wars because they have poor strategy, poor doctrine, poor leadership (there are no poor soldiers—only poor leaders), logistics that aren’t equal to the task, or don’t know how to make the most of the technology they possess. To the degree that reliance on new technology supplants leadership, doctrine, and motivation, it is possible to become over-reliant on technology. However, a military that goes down this path has deeper problems than new gadgets.

Webstral

Pretty much what I was trying to say. Also over-reliance in technology actualy increases the amount of conflicts a nation is willing to fight.

Increases in technology has reduced casualties, reduced risk and has therefore made governments MORE willing to deploy a military option, believing (mistakenly as history has recently proved) that such technology will enable a quick and bloodless victory.

This lures nations into conflicts where they believe the tech advantage will secure victory in a shot space of time but as Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya have proved, the enemy just develops tactics and stratagies that lower or negate the tech advantage and leaves the more modern nations in a conflict they have not really anticiapted or prepared for.

Hell the Iraq war strategy was nothing more than "blow the bastards to hell with our superior air force, blitzkrieg to Baghdad with our superior armour and enjoy the sun while the Iraqi people shower us in flowers and thank us for ridding them of Saddam"

The resulting mess is mostly due to lack of any real strategy for dealing with an insurgency or rebuilding post-war, we expected to go in, kill the bad guys and go home.

Congratulations to the ChiComs. They now have exactly the same amount of fleet air power that Brazil, Thailand, France, India, Spain, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom have.

We've got 11 active and more that could be made active if the need were pressing.

The Soviets never, ever managed to get the Kiev nor its aircraft working right.

I hate to sound like one of "those" Americans, and pride goeth before the fall and blah blah blah but honestly we've perfected blue water Naval ops to a fine art in the 20th century and we're pretty much the only country to do carriers "right", ever.

If China wants to fuck around with a through deck cruiser and join the CV club they're welcome to try. Lots of luck with that 40 year old tub. On the other hand if China wants to put us in our place they should just do it like they're planning to do: via Citibank and the Federal Reserve. A lot simpler and so easy we won't even feel it until its too late. Then our CVNs will in actuality belong to them without them having to sink a one.

Remember the scene in Jericho? "DO NOT FIGHT. CHINA IS YOUR FRIEND."

Er, I think you got it wrong Sir, the Fleet Air Arm is no longer an effective force due to the Tories cuts, we have NO force, even if we re-activate Ark Royal, all she will be able to use is Lynx and Sea Kings, no attack craft - AT ALL, not until 2018, and that's IF the F-35 actually does work properly.

I have had a friend of mine from Denmark joke that even the Danish Navy could take out the RN now.

China is no one's friend. All you have to do is ask the Tibetans, the Vietnamese, or the Indians, just to name a few.

IF The Chi-Com's wanted to sink a CVA
 

IMHO, the Chinese could sink one of our Nimitz class carriers.

Imagine this scenario:

The Chi-com's threaten Taiwan. They start massing what blue water craft the have with loads of landing craft.

The POTUS orders 7th Fleet closer to support Taiwan. Say about 2-300 miles from Taiwan.

As of today, there is one (yes only one!!) Nimitz class carrier based in a forward staging area, the U.S.S. George Washington. Carrier is based in Japan.

http://www.c7f.navy.mil/forces.htm

So, the GW and supporting ships and subs head for Taiwan.

Once on station, the GW could start air power projection flights.

one small problem.

the 1000 - 2000 cigarrette boats that China sends at the 7th fleet. Each carring about 750-1000 pounds of HE.

Will the Chi-coms loose a lot of little boats? Sure....

Will the USA loose a Nimitz class CVA and all of the prestege attached to that ship? At least maybe... And that is with no nukes!! I would think that the CHi-com's do NOT want to poke that particular stick in Uncle Sam's Eye.

my $0.02 ! :D

Mike

Over-reliance on technology to solve problems of asymmetrical warfare, which the NLF practiced in Vietnam, is a symptom of a bigger problem. Reliance on mass, patriotic fervor, élan, reprisals against civilians, etc. are symptomatic of immaturity at the highest levels of command and, in the case of nations with representative governments, immaturity among the body politic. Under the stress of warfare real or threatened, nations reflexively turn to whatever advantage they perceive themselves to possess. In the case of the US during the run-up to American assumption of the main Western effort in Vietnam, a fervent belief in the myth of international Communism combined with more-or-less successful containment efforts in Greece and Indonesia led us down the garden path. Once there, we invested what we had the most of: money. Our investment in Vietnam was characterized less by the use of technology than by a staggering investment of funds. From an ethical standpoint, we also allowed ourselves to benchmark our willingness to take life in the pursuit of objectives against the policy of bombing Japan. Without commenting on whether LeMay’s doctrine was appropriate or necessary, the level of destruction that became associated with victory over Japan led to an excessive hard-heartedness on the part of American commanders charged with saving from Communism the very people on whom they were unleashing unprecedented levels of firepower. American involvement in Vietnam was a product of paranoia about Communism. American investment in Vietnam was characterized by a lavish expenditure of funding on the sorts of things we like to spend money on: hardware, infrastructure (think Cam Ran Bay), things that go boom, and good living for the troops. Technology, though an important component of the overall scheme, was incidental to the willingness to spend, spend, spend and take as many Vietnamese lives as necessary to achieve victory using tools ill-suited to the war actually being fought.

The problem of immaturity is not unique to the United States. I dare say it is ubiquitous. Immaturity at the top of the American leadership ladder and among the body politic is more noticeable in the modern world because the United States has had the means since World War Two to undertake endeavors not possible for other nations. If French and British immaturities appear less pronounced than American immaturity, it’s because circumstances have imposed sharper limits on French and British opportunities for poor decision-making on the global stage. China’s expansion is so remarkable partially because it reflects good decision-making on the part of virtual autocrats who are under limited obligation to make good decisions.



This is a perfect example of the maturity challenge. The technologically advanced US military did exactly what it was supposed to do. The defending conventional forces were eliminated at a very low cost in Blue Force casualties and modest civilian casualties. It’s hard to find fault with technology or a so-called over-reliance on it here. The fact that the US military was charged with a mission with no substantive follow-on plan demonstrates that the civilian leadership of the day lacked the maturity to question the underlying assumption that once freed from the thirty-year reign of Saddam Hussein the Iraqi people would promptly become good citizens of a presumably emergent democracy. The voices of reason, like General Shinseki, were thrown out on their ears for suggesting that the US would have to pay for 350,000 troops to keep law and order during the post-liberation process. This has nothing to do with technology and everything to do with simple immaturity. The body politic, who should have reacted to the lack of any decent post-liberation plan of action by demanding that Congress get control of the situation before the troops were committed, instead acted as willing accomplices. Reliance on technology is a symptom of wealth and immaturity.


Webstral

I think a bit of wishfull thinking here. If China seriously started an invasion of Taiwan the US Navy would be sending a lot more than one aircraft carrier into the area, and in addition to the navy fighters there are a lot of Marine and USAF combat aircraft already in the Far East, and a lot more could be there in a few days.

True. But the real trick is for the very limited in-theater forces to be able to delay the oncoming Chinese horde long enough for those reserves to make it across the Pacific. The ROC, Japanese, US, Aussie, and ROK military units in the theater really don't have the power to stop an all-out invasion. Only the threat of a US escalation to nuclear really keeps China from munching on Taiwan today.

In the meantime, China continues to play the long game of destabilizing the economies and political will of its opponents and bides its time, hoping that some really stupid future government of Taiwan will cave in to their demands.

But if the Chinese start massing its navy, landing craft and army across the Taiwan Strait I think someone is going to notice this fairly quickly.

How I see this is that China at the moment doesn't have the logistical capability to pull of a sucessful invasion of Taiwan. It also doesn't have the air or naval power to dominate the airspace or seaways around Taiwan once America commits itself to the defence of Taiwan.

If they do that. The Chinese do not have to do an Overlord or Sealion massing of forces before launching an invasion. Why telegraph intentions when you don't need to? They have enough ships and transport planes within range of Taiwan to launch a surprise attack at almost any time. Most ROC invasion scenarios begin with a simulated detection of waves of strike aircraft which will precede airborne landings. Those airborne assaults will be much larger in scale than those of D-Day. There would be Chinese troops already on the ground on Taiwan before any ships left their mainland harbors.

I believe that's wishful thinking.

The real issue is whether the Chinese can present a fait accompli before the US can do anything about it. Taiwan lacks the firepower to repel an invasion, and the US lacks sufficient force on station to do so either. Only the deterrent of China starting a war with the US keeps Taiwan free. Taiwan falls no matter what. The only question is if the US is willing to go to war with China (just as the UK and France went to war with Nazi Germany knowing they couldn't stop the Germans from taking Poland).

Well if the Taiwanese have already predicted how the Chinese are going to invade them, then they probably will already know what the Chinese are up to and how their going to try and invade them.

Taiwan does have a large and sophisticated air defence network with modern radars and Patriot, Hawk Phase III and Sky Bow II long ranged SAMs, E-2 AWACS and over 350 fighters. You can't just send in transport planes loaded with troops over a heavily defended country without eliminating the air defence network, which will take some time even in the unlikely event that America didn't intervene. Also I think mass paratroop drops are probably a thing of the past, and have been since the development of airmobile helcopters. Also paratroops are fairly lightly armed troops and have to be reinforced, the Taiwanese army has over 900 tanks and thousands of AFVs. Also if China planned to reinforce its paratroops then it would have to assemble armour, artillery, troops and supplies on the mainland in large numbers to be shipped over on Chinese landing craft and cargo ships, all of which wouldn't go unnoticed to American satellites.

No argument. But, as someone else likes to point out, technology has its weakness, and swamping the defenders is likely. Sure, the Chicom losses would be horrendous. Since when do the Chicom leaders care about killing thousands (or millions) of their own? Short answer is they don't. Is it sustainable? No. Does it need to be? No. The Chicoms throw several hundred planes and thousands of missiles at Taiwan, both of which they have. Eventually the defenders run out of defenses. The only question is how long it takes.

Manpack AT missiles are a lot cheaper than the AFVs they're meant to take out, they're highly effective, and all modern armies have thousands of them. They are readily carried even by airborne troops. HALO drops after most of the airspace over Taiwan is secured allows the Chicoms to get a toehold on the island and capture key objectives, clearing the way for second-wave airmobile reinforcements, which in turn secure more objectives clearing the way for third-wave amphib reinforcements.

The only issue is if the PLA air force can achieve air supremacy before the US arrives to kick serious butt. They don't even have to achieve it and maintain it for long. Just long enough to allow airborne/airmobile forces to get a toehold. Once Chicom forces are already on Taiwanese soil the nature of the battle becomes much more thorny for the good guys.

It would go unnoticed if the loading happened over a long enough period of time, and was done when the sats weren't overhead. You can put an awful lot of troops and vehicles on a commercial RO-RO and no one would be the wiser until said ship started spewing its cargo on to the docks. Surprise!

Taiwan has been preparing for an invasion from mainland China since 1949. China's amphibous assault fleet is limited to smaller vessels with limited sea lift capacity, and they currently have only LPD with a capacity of 800 troops, a few helicopters and 20 vehicles. They do have a large number of large and small landing ships, but they would be extremely vulnerable to air and naval attack from both Taiwanese and American forces. American could stop China from invading Taiwan without even bothering to attack the Chinese mainland outside of a few strikes on targets that might be considered dangerous to American forces operating in and around Taiwan, and would seriously maul Chinese naval and air forces in the process of doing so.