My dad was a pilot in VT-84 on the USS Bunker Hill flying TBM Avengers. His squadron attacked the Yamato around 12:58pm on April 7, 1945. One plane from their group was shot down (Lt Walsh) but the rest of the squadron made their torpedo runs and recorded their observations on departure. Half of the pilots who participated in the sinking of the Yamato were later killed May 11, 1945 when two kamikaze struck the USS Bunker Hill, killing nearly 400 men. My dad was awarded the Navy Cross.
My dad was a radar operator on the USS Bennington that also attacked the Yamato. He didn’t talk much about his war efforts. Our family presented him with a lithograph of an artists rendition of the battle for Christmas. My dad is very stoic but that Christmas he broke down and cried. His generation is still the greatest.
My Dad probably gave your Dad a dental exam or filled some of his teeth. LOL. My Father was Dentist on the Bennington. He was proud of his service. He had started the War on the USS Otus in the Philippines when they were attacked on Dec 10th... So he was there at the Beginning and then just outside Tokyo Bay at the End. The Greatest Generation.
My grandfather was a dove bomber pilot in the first wave that attacked Yamato. According to naval records, they scored 4 hits, which was one of his. He received the distinguished flying cross in this battle.
My dad was one of the Pilots of the 2 PM Mariners who located the Yamato and the rest of the ships in the group. After the battle the two PBMs flew towards what was left of the group to look for any American survivors in the water. One was spotted and the other Mariner landed under fire to rescue the pilot . They both made it back to base safely. Both crew were recommended for the DFC for that act of bravery.
I remember asking my dad, who passed in 2014, what it was like to be on a ship struck by an 18" shell. He was in aft steering on the USS Johnston. He said he had no memory of it because he was concentrating on his job. He only noticed when it got real quiet so he went topside and noticed everyone had abandoned ship, and so he followed them over.
Oh, that’s cool. My grandpa was on the USS Samuel B Robert’s. He was in the forward 5 inch main battery. I did have a chance to talk to him about it before he passed as well. He said almost the same thing but just kept loading and loading all that they had. Then he said a massive explosion happened and they went dead in the water with no propulsion. Then they ordered a abandon ship and I think he said he was in the water for 40 something hours.
May your father rest in peace. What a story of the Johnston. It should have been a movie years ago. Navy hides it because Halsey disregarded direct orders and should have faced court martial. Still to this day the navy hates that battle. God bless your father and every other man on that fighting ship. Such a valiant heart in such a small ship.
Unsinkable? Every engineer, shipbuilder and sailor know any ship will sink, as long as the hole is big enough, or there are enough of them. As you said: "She would face a force she simply wasn't designed to withstand".... Good one, though....
@@edgardovillacorte7012 Again, if the hole is big enough.... Bulges will be filled with water, if perforated, and giving neutral buoancy. They were designed to protect parts of the hull, but only to a certain degree, never to be "bullet proof". It'a always a matter of balancing speed, weight and protection.... I suggest you check out Drachinifel's channel for further details, both on bulges, and Yamato herself........
The 18" AA shells were totally ineffective, but pilots reported they were a spectacular fireworks display. Regarding ships defenses, two thing the Americans had that the Japanese didn't, was radar controlled fire direction for the AA guns, meaning the entirety of the AA guns could be brought to bear accurately on attacking planes where the Japanese were still targeting based on a guy with a long stick pointing at the attacking plane, and the second was proximity fuses shells, which exploded at or near the target with extreme accuracy, the combination was deadly. So ineffective was the Yamato's air defenses, that only 10 US planes were lost, and most of those were knocked out of the sky by the shock wave of Yamato's explosive end.
Yup! Radar and proximity fuses were a game changer for the US. Japan had radar but they didn't use for fire control. They didn't have any idea about proximity fuses and couldn't figure out why the USN's AA was so deadly.
I seem to recall that the U.S. battleship rifles were maximum of 16" while the Yamato and Musashi both had 18" guns. IIRC, the ability to bring precise shore bombardment was beyond the capability of Japanese gunners at that time because they didn't understand the Coriolis effect and while our 16"s were much more accurate, we could only loft them 20 miles or so. The Japanese Navy 18"s would travel a max of 30 miles.
One of my uncles served on a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier in the Pacific during the final months of World War Two. He didn't want to say much about it, feeling that he was only doing his duty. My uncle did, however, give honor to the brave airmen. He said that it was common for planes to return to deck with battle damage - some barely making it. Truly The Greatest Generation
My father was on a Fletcher Class Destroyer, DD-559, along with 14 other destroyers who were ordered to speed to the Yamato to launch torpedo attacks in the hopes of sinking her. He said when the crew got that order they all knew they were dead men, but the planes sunk her before our destroyers got there. A few weeks later, on April 26, 1945, his ship the USS Longshaw was sunk off Okinawa with 65% casualties. Though wounded he survived the ordeal, and was rescued after 18 hours in the water.
@@damnhandy thats horrible i remember the tragedy of the indianapolis that was a hell of hell but fortunately your dad was lucky thats what is important youre here because of that luck or because god wanted congratulations and stay safe
@@robertdegiroI had learnt about the fate of the poor survivors of the sunk USS Indianapolis thanx to the first JAWS movie by Steven Spielberg. Terrible beyond imagination...
Plenty is said about our casualties on land, but the Navy took quite a few themselves. The Navy was the reason our ground-pounders on Iwo Jima and Okinawa were able to focus on the ground fighting.
This is remarkable work. The scene of the torpedo damage as the ship rolls over shows how violent underwater torpedo detonations were. Great CGI and impressive narration.
As the proud grandson of a WW2 navy vet and son of a Vietnam Navy Veteran I offer a virtual handshake 🤝 to both sides. And I think no military force in history has ever fought with as much heart and determination as did all branches of the Imperial Japanese military.
@@EdgarFriendly-op3rn WWII Marine combat corespondent Alvin M. Josephy Jr once wrote a story where he asked a Japanese POW on Guam about choosing suicide over being captured by the enemy. The prisoner replied “if you give me a knife, I will kill myself now. I will kill you too. Then we can go to paradise together as friends”
My dad fought in Korea and my wife's dad fought in WW2. Both did not want to talk about any of it. My old man would tell me briefly about some of it when he was drunk and the stories were horrendous. My wife's dad lived to be 93 a great man and fought in the Italy Anzio invasion. He saw alot of combat and hand to hand too. Truly the greatest Generation. There bravery and patriotism is off the charts. We came close to speaking German...we came close to speaking Japanese if not for these incredibly brave guys.
Wow this was almost like a movie!!! Great work portraying the battle as if it happened yesterday, I can't imagine the fear on both sides, so many young sailors and pilots, all now share the same watery grave.
I thank you brave Americans, for your valor and service to stop the Japanese scurge that had caused so much suffering in the world ,we Australians will never forget.
Don't forget your own contribution. The Kokoda Trail campaign with Aussie militiamen and Papuan porters (the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels) fought a relentless and courageous battle that end with their pushing the Japanese regulars back to their starting point--with no ground won, Port Moresby still in Allie hands, and the Japanese 'rewarded' by being shipped to Guadalcanal.
My gramps was an aft engine room worker on the USS Indianapolis. He said he didn't see much action, but he was on the ship that delivered the last parts for the Little Boy and the Fat Man. He had gotten off the ship for a new assignment and the USS Indianapolis was sunk a week later. I still have a ton of mementos from doing reports about WW2 as a kid. All the stuff I was able to bring in for presentations had my teachers stunned.
Great video! What vainglorious folly to waste so many human lives on an operation with zero chance of success. As you say the age of the battleship was already over, and probably before the keel was even laid down.
I read in an interview of one the dive bomber pilots after the sinking. He stated that Yamato's anti aircraft fire was so intense, he compared it looking into the crater of an active volcano.
@@Revkor Plus the fact IJN vessels were not equipped with radar. Dive bombers & torpedo planes could come out of the sun and lookouts with binoculars would spot thr too late.
@@Revkor Unfortunately for Yamato's crew, the radar room was hit in the first wave of attacks. In fact, this wasn't such an unusual occurrence, There were several actions in which radars were disabled. What would seem to have been abundantly clear is that the IJN's damage control measures were woefully below that of the other naval powers. There are several excellent analyses of the reasons for this on YT, but to sum them up; the excessive rigidity of command and damage control on IJN ships resulted in many ships being lost unnecessarily. The fact that ONLY damage control were allowed to control damage meant that, if a damage control station was hit, then that entire section was left with literally no damage control. When this happened in a critical section of the ship, the ship was pretty much guaranteed to sink, and sink with all hands. Conversely, on USN ships, everybody was expected, and trained in, damage control, and if your section was hit, the nearest seamen would immediately start in on damage control. This did not always result in the ship surviving, but it did mean that the chances of survival for the crew were much better. Even crippled carriers were often able to transfer the larger part of their crews before sinking. Contrast that with the desperately sad number of IJN ships that lost virtually all crew.
@@Revkor I'm not sure that it was particularly crap, but it was certainly unprotected, which meant that fighter escorts could not only draw fire off the bombers and torpedo bombers, it meant that they could also staff the Yamato and cause significant damage to its defences.
I knew a vet who flew his Hellcat against Yamato. Apparently the strafing of Yamato's AA crews was so intense that shovels had to be used to move body parts out of the way to keep operating their guns.
Fyi for those who are not military knowledgeable, In the video and historical facts, the Yamato was repeated hit by torpedoes multiple times on the Port side (left side) Which means that it was taking in water from the left side. And when the airplanes were attacking the ship they want to only attack it from just one side, because if you attack it from both sides, the damage balance out each other, and you want to sink it. However in this video it clearly shows the ship received damaged on the right (starboard) side and it rolled and sank on its right side. Just a minor technical detail
The bravery of these unknown Japanese sailors is Off the Charts. They were ALL given the option to stay and avoid what was literally a suicide mission. Or stay on board and Die? Not one got off the ship. Every Single Man knew there was no coming back. They wrote goodbye letters to family and went to battle stations. This story is very underrated in the history of warfare.
Yes but also a culture obsessed with honor and duty. The pilot's who "volunteered for suicide mission's often accepted out of fear of the repercussions of refusal. The same reason japanese soldiers rarely surrendered. Anyone who got off that ship wouldve been shunned by society along with their families.
The Japanese military literally committed genocide in China. Killing non combatants such as women and children and also graping people regularly. They history of the Japanese military deserves nothing but shame and disrespect. They were savages that didn’t deserve life.
@@captainpiggz6391 no one on Yamato committed war crimes, you can't paint an entire group of people the same color and consider yourself historically accurate. To blame them for the actions of others is just petty.
In 1965, I got 2 books from Scholastic book ordering at school -- two biographies, War Fish and Japanese Destroyer Captain. Cannot remember the authors, but eye opening to a 12 year old. Part of why Yamato was sent was in that book. Yamato went out a couple of times but then was based in the home fleet anchorage and known to house the Admirals through the war. So when Okinawa happened, the Navy was shamed of having this Battleship that wasn't in battles. Again, Army vs Navy only this time the Navy was shamed. So Yamato and escorts started down to Okinawa. I believe my memory is correct in this instance. This Captain was one of the escort ship Captains and taken prisoner. Both are good books for history.
Captain Hara's memoirs are on RUclips on "WW2 Tales", Hara was Captain of the Cruiser (also sunk) in this battle. Just watched the Yamato episode yesterday!
I remember watching Star Blazers which was a Japanese animation program on American Television. It was called Space Battleship Yamato in Japan. That's how well-regarded she was by the Japanese.
I watched the original ad a kid. I just finished watching the remake, Space Battleship Yamato 2199. The artists stayed true to the design of the real Yamato. Such a sad story for such a mighty ship. It totally broke the naval treaty for what a battleship could be. It's sad that it didn't survive the war. It would have made a magnificent museum ship. Not that that would have been an option.
The most powerful battleship ever constructed, and without air cover, it was about as much use to Japan as a ripe tomato. They might as well have renamed it the "sitting duck" when they sent it out of port.
Not even close to the most powerful, she had big guns yes but her hull armor was shit, her targeting was nothing compared to the Iowa Class. She was just another BB and that's it, nothing special.
@@GenSphinx except fact yamato had one of best armors in ww2 if not the best. Only problem for japan was fact they had almost zero aircrafts/fighters/jets
@@vadencium1615 her specs said one thing but her construction was totally different. They cut corners and it was confirmed that Japanese steel was significantly inferior to German and especially US steel.
@@GenSphinx well, thats possible due to Steel shortage at the end of war, but still, yamato was something, whole american navy was afraid and Green by greed always they heard its name, cause they had shit technology for ships, its only sad world couldnt ever see her, or A-150(super yamqto class) in full sea action unlike Bismarck
I grew up in the 50s. My best friend's father was part of an anti-aircraft crew on a cruiser in the battle of Okinawa. His ship was hit twice by kamikaze. Some of the crew were killed and my friend's dad was seriously wounded. He still carried shrapnel in his body. As far as I know he didn't talk about the war.
My dad had it much easier aboard Halsey's flagship, the Missouri. The kamikaze aircraft that struck the ship did a miniscule amount of damage. I still have the piece of the plane's wing that my dad took as a souvenir. It's on my mantelpiece next to his urn.
I think they learned after the hard time they had sinking the Musashi, focus on torpedoes on ONE side! Enemy or not, the Yamato class battleships were the zenith of battleship power, and armored beauty ever created. Both the Yamato and Musashi died the death of a Samurai.
So true and everyone should read the late James Hornfisher’s book “The Last Stand of The Tin Can Sailors” absolutely one of the best books about naval warfare.
My dad was in the navy in the south Pacific. Battle of Okinawa driving landing craft to the island. He received a commendation for his service that day. I never knew that until after he passed away
@@stephenphillip5656 One of their better admirals...But the emperor giveth...the Lockheed P-38 taketh away.......The giant's awake, admiral..nighty night....
Even if she had escaped the air attack, the Americans had a fleet of 7 fast battleships waiting on her closer to Okinawa. The shame is the senseless loss of life the Japanese high command ordered to save face.
I actually have a photograph of one of the ships that escorted this ship with its crew on board saluting the captain I believe, it's one of many photos my grandfather and his brother come back with
@@adraper6816 At least these "proud warriors :/" had a chance to fight back. Like cowards, they claimed total victory when they struck pearl harbor at dawn on a Sunday with a country they weren't a war at. I grab some popcorn and smile at this total defeat and revenge. I hope people on the shore's of Japan saw that final explosion.
@@adraper6816 "The Japanese were brutal in a way that even the nazis could not match" What a load of tosh. The Japanese were absolutely brutal, I'll agree wholeheartedly. But they never signed that Geneva accords and were not bound by them. Germany was a signatory to all levels of the Geneva accords, yet were just as brutal in their treatment of Russians. Nor did the Germans differentiate between soldiers, commissars or civilians, and they systematised and industrialised the extermination of not just the Jews, but homosexuals and anybody they considered to be a political enemy. The Japanese were simply brutal, the Germans were far more. Their brutality was in the face of also being signatories to those conventions.
@@davidcolin6519 yeah yeah everyone is bad, only america is good, we know this one... bombarding civillian zones in Iran, Vietnam, and many more countries is totally legal, when america says so... I hate whole fucking america, I hope you will get your main land invaded one day too, and recognize war. And I hope you will lose
@@davidcolin6519 have you heard of the rape of Nanking and unit 731? During the rape of Nanking,even a Nazi party member who was in Nanking at the time thought the Japanese were going too far and wrote to Hitler for him to intervene. It is undeniable that both committed unforgivable crimes and atrocities, but when a nazi is saying something is too much, you can easily draw the comparison.
My grandfather was in the pacific and his brother was in Europe. Thank you for the amazing video as their history has always been something I am passionate about learning about.
“Over 400 aircraft from 9 carriers” that’s fucking insane!!!! Also you probably should’ve mentioned that the first wave was primarily to destroy the escorts, which would make it easier to target the Yamato directly
The animation is a clip from the video The Great War of Archimedes (2019) just mirror-imaged which is why all the attacks in this video look like they are attacking the starboard side rather than the port. This whole scene is from the start of the movie and then flashes back to the building and proposal of the ship. A really great movie to watch is Yamato (2005) which focuses on the individual sailors and their dedication and builds up to the final climatic battle.
No qualms when the battleship Yamato was sunk with 3,000 souls. The IJ military, had massacred 250,000 Chinese civilians, men, women, and children in a brutal reprisal for their help for Billy Mitchell bombed Tokyo. This was kill or be killed.
I learned something from this. (Among other things, that is.) Battleship main guns had access to anti-aircraft ammunition and could shoot at aircraft. I didn't know that before.
the shells were 3000 lbs each , and I would think the explosive charge would not cover a much larger area than smaller rounds just more force within that area . so a simple math calculation let's us know that we could get 1200 3" AA shells for the same storage weight , and I would think a much higher chance of a hit with those 1200 shells. two corrections I was thinking 3" was a 25lb , but it's 17lb and I added a extra zero , so the correct number would be 176 shells for each main gun charge
The IJN Yamato had a sister ship . The IJN Mushashi was almost identical and was also sunk by the US Navy during the battle of Leyte Gulf, also by navy airplanes flown from USN carriers in October 1944. There is no such thing as an "unsinkable" ship.
Sure any ship can sink unless it were made of cork, so it would float even if holed, it may appear to be unsinkable, but made of metal, which is denser than water, it can sink.
Good Show Sir! It was a most painful thing to watch, the deaths of so many brave souls and an amazing ship even though at the time they were my country's enemies.
Great video,but when the commentator said the torpedo attacks were to the port side, it was clearly showing that these planes were actually attacking the starboard side. Nevertheless it was a great description of how the world’s mightiest battleship et her fate.
That small USS Johnston a Fletcher-class destroyer with 5-inch guns took on the world's largest battleship with 18-inch guns. The Johnston put on such good battle that Yamato’s captain had his crew salute the sinking Johnston as they passed it.
One of the US carriers to take part in the attack was USS Hornet (CV-12), now proudly serving as a museum ship at Alameda, CA. Her scoreboard indicates four torpedo hits and three bomb hits.
Your not far wrong an almost identical ship went down in the Philippines sea on 24 October 1944 at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Yamatos sister ship the Musashi was destroyed by aircraft after being struck by at least 17 bombs and 19 torpedoes. Because she was attacked from all sides she sank at an even keel, hardly any need for counter flooding, so it took more hits to sink here. It also ment that she could use here anti-aircraft guns on both side, increasing the casualties inflicted on the attacker. The US navy used the lessons learnt for the attack on Yamato 6 months later.
@@johnemerson1363 they had four hours to evacuate survivors and she had gone under by the time her magazines blew up so the explosion was muffled and not as devastating as on the Yamato.
Nice narration. As a retired Navy veteran, I appreciate the retelling of these events. The scenes are from a Japanese movie glorifying the Yamato and her suicide mission. In reality despite the theatrics only 10 American planes were lost and 12 crewmembers. If one assumes seven aircraft were lost due to the explosion of the Yamato as she was sinking it means only three American aircraft were shot down by all of the Japanese ships combined. From PBS, " Eight Japanese destroyers and one cruiser, the Yahagi, tried to assist Yamato in fending off her attackers. By the end of the battle, Yahagi and all eight destroyers were lost" so although four destroyers survived the initial onslaught they were hunted down and sunk within hours of the sinking of Yamato and her other escorts.
The ship, whilst imposing-looking, was lost against airpower of the era. It suffered the same fate as the HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse had suffered four years earlier. She was the ultimate expression of an obsolete idea. It was proved in Pearl Harbor, that a Battleship could not withstand hits by aircraft bombs or torpedoes.
Love the use of World of Warships stock video for the ships as they should have looked in color. Have to say it was a good video and well explained. I do see the issue, however, with the ship listing to the starboard side in the video and the port side in the narrative. Perhaps the video was image reverse? Cheers!
I do like to show clips that have been seen many times in the past from a new prospective. Coloring, sound effects and flipping the shot over. In this instance you are correct that its a mistake to flip the clip, Because which side the ship is hit is integral to the true telling of the story. Glad you liked it.
The death knell of capital battle ships. Ironically, it was the Japanese who proved air power trumped battle ships, when a few years earlier, sunk the British battle ships prince of Wales, and her sister battle ship.
The deathknell of the battlships was way before this, though not at Pearl Harbor. Once surprise was achieved the U.S. fleet were sitting ducks. The British loss of Prince of Wales, and Repulse sealed the deal. They were able to fight back.
Well done/explained. The narrative was given in concert with the video images. Only small glitch was the described port list was opposite (starboard) in the video. That aside, a great presentation.
You should also cover the battle off Samar, the famous last stand of the tin can sailors, and the only time Yamato engaged enemy surface targets, sinking the escort carrier Gambier Bay and the destroyer Johnston
Counter-flooding the engine room to correct the list led to the drowning and deaths of several hundred sailors, who were unable to be warned. The classic case of fighting the ship at the expense of the crew.
It is a sad reality of naval warfare, though. You've gotta keep the ship afloat, and sometimes you don't have the time or the ability to get the crew out of the way.
Given the circumstances of the battle he should have know the ship was already lost. Without air cover the end was inevitable. Instead of flooding the engine room, he should have called abandon ship. It was a pointless waste of lives to continue fighting. There was nothing to be gained.
A high school friend told me about his dad flying a "Helldiver" against the Yamato. I read recently that the ship had been discovered lying "keel up" on the bottom. It was in two pieces, having exploded as it capsized. His dad's rear gunner wrote an article about seeing their bomb hit the battleship. They flew back to the carriers in the dark, almost out of fuel.
My Grandfather was an Electricians Mate on the Hackleback at this time. Her sighting and tracking of Yamato was as close as they got to combat before the end of the war. It was interesting to see how this battle played out.
If only they had the area denial mechanism called the “Wave Motion Cannon”. Real talk though, every ship they’ve said is unsinkable sank with a very short service span.
all of those ships that were unsinkable except the Titanic were hunted down because of the damage they could cause. so those Japanese ships and the German Battleship Bismarck were doomed because they had to be taken out immediately
@@bobbygetsbanned6049 that is true but its overall service life like those other ships was very short. And essentially the IJN was done for after the battle of midway. So at that point once they lost all their carriers all remaining ships were sitting ducks.
My father was on the hackleback SS 295 They spotted the fleet Orders were to radio in the location And submerge The XO also fired a torpedo that missed U295 avoided depth charges for several hour having a dud charge hit the deck They stayed submerged until a match wouldn’t light Surfaced at midnight….. To hear that the armada was destroyed
Thanks for sharing. We, sons, of great men, live our lives in tribute to our father's courage.Dad was a ball turret gunner on a B-17g, European Theater. Be well.
Well done, mate. A very interesting documentary. I'm half-way through an incredible book," Tennazon", about the battle of Okinawa, and the atomic bomb, so this little film enhanced my reading material. I thoroughly recommend the book to anyone interested in this era.
well the modern lifeboats used on oil rigs, cruise ships and freighters won't sink. Even if you pump them full of water with them fully loaded with people they will stay on the surface. I guess you could call them unsinkable. Something about using massive amounts of flotation foam in building them.
Some of the ships are backwards in the animation. The submarine is sailing in reverse when is submerges when he is talking about the Threadfin and Hackleback. The aircraft are leaving the carrier with the bridge on the left hand side, which is backwards. And the torpedo attacks on the Yamato were on the port side, but the animation shows the right side.
Anyone having the opportunity to visit Hiroshima, extend your stay for a day and go to Kore, a 30-minute train drive from Hiroshima and visit the Yamato Museum. It's an amazing trip in history.
Having just returned from Japan & been in Hiroshima, I did indeed travel to Kure to see the Yamato museum. That ⅒-scale model is 86 feet long and starts to convey the enormous size & power of the Yamato class battleships. Well worth a visit, it's about 15 miles from Hiroshima.
I assume the first of the three torpedo hits in the second attack was achieved by my next door neighbor when I was a boy in the 1960s. He was credited with the second torpedo hit. He had medals from it.
Looks like you “borrowed” some cgi footage from “Requiem for Battleship Yamato”, a Japanese film that is an excellent film with English subtitles. Planes from my Dad’s ship, USS Bennington CV-20 were the first to put direct hits with helldivers on the Yamato, and several torpedo hits from avengers. Dad served aboard Bennington in ‘56, ‘57, ‘58 and ‘59 when she had been modified with an angled deck addition and reclassified as a CVA
And may the hundreds of thousands of innocent Chinese civilians coldly butchered, raped, tortured & murdered feel some semblance of justice in this humiliation of the animals responsible for their cruel deaths.
Japanese took it to another level & must be mentioned. The TORTURE & DEGRADATION of MILLIONS deserves to be noted. It wasn't the same. My uncle was a witness to the creative brutality & it stuck with him till he died. I don't really care what you think.
@@Transilvanian90 Tell that to the Filipino and Chinese who were brutalized by the Japanese. They killed 250000 Chinese just to retaliate for helping the US carry out the Doolittle raid. Let that sink in.
Where Japanese soldiers brutally & coldly sliced Chinese women & children into pieces, showing no mercy or conscience, raping & murdering helpless civilians numbering in the hundreds of thousands, in a display not seen in history since the tales of Mongol hoards centuries before. The memories of these unspeakable atrocities all but forgiven & forgotten in recounts of later battles of the war. Chinese women & children, along with many American servicemen, would dispute the honor & distinction accorded them by American cinematographers in their 2018 recounting of the battle of Midway. .
@@rossbrown6641 If you are really interested, there are many accounts of Japanese atrocities with both combatants& civilians. If you've never heard about these events, you will be surprised, at the very least. You've probably heard about Bataan,but nothing else.
My father just died two days ago. Thirty one years in the Navy starting as a Seamen Recruit in Vietnam. I'm fifty four now, I just see tragedy. So many young lives lost on both sides. My niece is a Rhodes Scholar and she lives in Danang, Vietnam. I know when you're in a fight, you have to fight. I'm saying you have to do it but nothing changes. Such a waste.
If you want to be picky only 3 1/2 Destroyers made it back to Japan. One had been blown in half, losing the forward third of the ship. The survivors managed to put the back half in reverse and sail home stern first. One of the other survivors was the IJN Yukikaze. “The one which survives”. A ship present in every naval engagement from Pearl Harbor to Ten Go. And which watched all three Yamato class ships go down. Other ships crews had started viewing her as a cursed death ship. Yukikaze would survive, but they wouldn’t. She simply had the fortune to always be sailing next to bigger juicier targets. She would survive the war, and amazingly bring most of her crew home. Only 11 lost across the 5 years of war. After the war she was given to Taiwan where she served a long career.
The story of the Yamatos escorts is worthy of its own video. The Americans wanted all 10 ships sunk and diverted a substantial amount of resources to achieve this. You have already mentioned the Suzutsuki which had to sail in reverse all the way back to port. The light cruiser Yahagi suffered as much as the Yamato. I wasn't aware of the Yukikaze history thanks for taking the time to share that
Yamato is the real name of the first emperor of Japan. He is the ancestor of the current emperor. The current emperor is the 126th generation. Yamato was born about 2000 years ago in Miyazaki, south of Japan. Miyazaki is the land of the sun. Yamato's ancestors include Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. The symbol of the Japanese flag is the sun. Japan is Rising Sun.
@@ChrisHolman Thank you. The Japanese dynasty is the oldest in the world. Miyazaki (south of Japan)where the first Emperor YAMATO (JINMU) was born, has many ancient ruins and legends. It's like an Egyptian ruin. The current Emperor is the 126th generation from YAMATO. Japan has a long tradition. The Rising Sun Flag is one of them
@@robertyoung3992 Thank you for asking. YAMATO is the name of the first emperor of Japan about 2,000 years ago. Born in Miyazaki prefecture, the ancestor of the current emperor.
@@ChrisHolman The Japanese can't either. Myth might sometimes be based, partly, on fact, but it's not fact. The Japanese royal family doesn't go back that far, except in myth. But then I suppose the part about decent from deities might have been a clue about that.
My great grandfather wasn’t in the navy but he was a paratrooper and fought at Iwo Jima. I couldn’t imagine jumping into almost certain death. Luckily he lived and he brought back 2 katanas and 2 rifles which my grandma has to this very day. Amazing to see the Japanese rifle and sword.
@@greggblack8205 ...and could have easily been used to reverse the video, making the ship list to port, syncing with the narrative, as she did in real life. Sorry, but that point pretty much ruined the video for me. 🤔
@@jjohnston326 I hadn't noticed that, actually. Good catch. Even so, I think this is a good video. (Maybe some clips had to be reversed for copyright reasons? I don't know...)
Imagine how many aircraft carriers could have been built instead of building the Musashi and Yamato if the resources and materials and labor had been so directed.
I feel no sadness for these butchers after what they had done to Pearl, Guam, The Marianas, The Philippines, etc. It was an amazing thing to humiliate the Japanese in such a way to show them that their unsinkable billions of yen worth of machinery was so epically destroyed and absolutely sinkable.
Why no link or even mentions in the description of the various movies and other video clips you used throughout? Documentaries show their work, and always note the sources.
@Scott Struble My apologies. I wasn't meaning to be sarcastic. I was just pointing out that the guy's accent is not glaswegian (which is 80 miles from where I live) and that, in fact, he comes from a different country. That's the problem with written replies on social media, they don't have the subtle nuances of spoken speech.
To my way of thinking, the major problem with a lot of German and Japanese designs (ships, planes, etc) is that they were good designs in the mid-1930s. But the war went on into the 1940s. New tech was developed, and incorporated into Allied designs.
Naval strength is build strength. It takes time to build and all ships will be somewhat constrained by the technology and requirements when they were designed with some limited modifications as they are built. So it is pretty much a come as you are war. When Bismarck set out to the North Atlantic, the most modern ships the Royal Navy had were ships that were laid down not long after Bismarck. The King George V class battleships (laid down in 1937) were constrained by compromises to meet treaty restrictions (4 gun turrets to reduce weight) and being brand new (still working out the kinks with those new 4 gun turrets when they were needed to fight Bismarck). Examples of ships that were laid down in the 1940s are the Essex class carriers and the Iowa class battleships which were (of course) not available to the US Navy during the critical first year and a half of the war. It takes a lot of lead time to build a navy. Britain started the war with 12 battleships and 3 battle-cruisers compared to Germany's zero battleships and 2 battle-cruisers. But most of the Royal Navy battleships were in service in the first world war. Some were upgraded with new engines and additional armor but there are limits on this compared to building new ships. The German ships were fewer but more modern - at the time. Two things that were improved on during the war on all sides was radar and anti-aircraft defenses. But the Western Allied vessels excelled in these areas due to technological advancement - they were ahead of the Germans in radar technology and the Axis nations never developed proximity fuses (allowing near misses by AA artillery to be kills). Technology that allowed AA guns to be paired with radar and mechanical fire control computers that would calculate the bearing and train the guns. Human operators were there to reload and pretty much watch. The kamikaze attacks would have been much more devastating if they had gone up against 1941 air defenses. And the battle against Yamato would have been bloodier for the USN if the Japanese had air defense technology anywhere near what the USN and RN had.
Given the treachery of Pearl Harbor it seems most appropriate that Yamato and sister ship Musashi, rather than meeting their ends in the classic battle line actions for which there were designed, they both were sunk by naval aviation.
First of all, Pearl Harbor was not treachery. By this time, the United States had already been trying to push around Japan. They had been trying to control the foreign policy of a Sovereign Nation. Also, the United States have been annexing islands all throughout the Pacific. Additionally, if you want to talk about attacking without a declaration of war, allow me to remind you of all of the Indian nations that the US attacked, and all the time is the Cavalry just showed up and slaughtered people without any niceties such as a declaration. Then, let us move on to Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq, All Nations that the United States has attacked without a declaration of war. So please stop that sanctimonious bullshit
@@mikeggg5671 Don't care what you think, it absolutely was! America was "pushing them around" huh, poor little Japan. Gee, I guess we deserve it. Don't worry about the fact Japan was raping Nanking and the rest of China, don't pay any attention to that! Just say things like we were pushing them around like a big bully! And look at all the other places America fought with over 100 years! Big bully! Pear Harbor got what it had coming because we were "Pushing them around"? We didn't give them the oil they wanted to continue in China and that is considered "Pushing them around" to you? How the hell are we pushing Japan around when they had a bigger Navy than the US at that time? It's always strange to me that people like you always try to bring up the fighting in Vietnam, Korea and Iraq without ever once mentioning who was BEGGING the US for direct help. The war in Vietnam, who begged America to help? The war in Korea, who begged America to help? The war in Kuwait (aka Iraq), who begged America to help? When a country is invaded by a hostile enemy and they beg the US to please help them.....If we try to stay out of the war America is damned for isolationism. But if we do decide to help them we are damned for helping. Which is it? Are we damned if we do or damned if we don't? The whole world was begging the US to join the fight in 1939 and we were damned if we did. Should any country try to help the Ukraine right now? Or should the whole world just shut up and let the invader do what they want? You can't have it both ways.
Excellent plus documentary !!!
yamato went down on the port side, rolled and exploded.
My dad was a pilot in VT-84 on the USS Bunker Hill flying TBM Avengers. His squadron attacked the Yamato around 12:58pm on April 7, 1945. One plane from their group was shot down (Lt Walsh) but the rest of the squadron made their torpedo runs and recorded their observations on departure. Half of the pilots who participated in the sinking of the Yamato were later killed May 11, 1945 when two kamikaze struck the USS Bunker Hill, killing nearly 400 men. My dad was awarded the Navy Cross.
My dad flew in the Douglas SBD Dauntless bomber in the South Pacific Theater. He past away in 2019 at 95 yrs old.
@@neilouellette3004 God bless him.
I'm afraid that we will not see the likes of their generation again.
Much Respect!
Salute
My dad was a radar operator on the USS Bennington that also attacked the Yamato. He didn’t talk much about his war efforts. Our family presented him with a lithograph of an artists rendition of the battle for Christmas. My dad is very stoic but that Christmas he broke down and cried. His generation is still the greatest.
My Dad probably gave your Dad a dental exam or filled some of his teeth. LOL. My Father was Dentist on the Bennington. He was proud of his service. He had started the War on the USS Otus in the Philippines when they were attacked on Dec 10th... So he was there at the Beginning and then just outside Tokyo Bay at the End. The Greatest Generation.
My grandfather was a dove bomber pilot in the first wave that attacked Yamato. According to naval records, they scored 4 hits, which was one of his. He received the distinguished flying cross in this battle.
Yes they were, my grandfather was there from being to the end was a gunner on a 105
My dad was one of the Pilots of the 2 PM Mariners who located the Yamato and the rest of the ships in the group. After the battle the two PBMs flew towards what was left of the group to look for any American survivors in the water. One was spotted and the other Mariner landed under fire to rescue the pilot . They both made it back to base safely. Both crew were recommended for the DFC for that act of bravery.
I remember asking my dad, who passed in 2014, what it was like to be on a ship struck by an 18" shell. He was in aft steering on the USS Johnston. He said he had no memory of it because he was concentrating on his job. He only noticed when it got real quiet so he went topside and noticed everyone had abandoned ship, and so he followed them over.
Oh, that’s cool. My grandpa was on the USS Samuel B Robert’s. He was in the forward 5 inch main battery. I did have a chance to talk to him about it before he passed as well. He said almost the same thing but just kept loading and loading all that they had. Then he said a massive explosion happened and they went dead in the water with no propulsion. Then they ordered a abandon ship and I think he said he was in the water for 40 something hours.
May your father rest in peace. What a story of the Johnston. It should have been a movie years ago. Navy hides it because Halsey disregarded direct orders and should have faced court martial. Still to this day the navy hates that battle. God bless your father and every other man on that fighting ship. Such a valiant heart in such a small ship.
@@rickjohnson6559 Thanks Rick, I agree about Halsey! If you're interested in my dad's story search for "USS Johnston Survivor's Story" on RUclips.
The USS Johnston! Man, he had a rough go of it, that ship and crew will never be forgotten.
OMG he's lucky his first notice of the sinking wasn't water coming up around him...
Unsinkable? Every engineer, shipbuilder and sailor know any ship will sink, as long as the hole is big enough, or there are enough of them. As you said: "She would face a force she simply wasn't designed to withstand"....
Good one, though....
yup
Didnt the yamato's anti torpedo bulges work? They are supposed to protect the main hull.
@@edgardovillacorte7012 Again, if the hole is big enough.... Bulges will be filled with water, if perforated, and giving neutral buoancy. They were designed to protect parts of the hull, but only to a certain degree, never to be "bullet proof". It'a always a matter of balancing speed, weight and protection....
I suggest you check out Drachinifel's channel for further details, both on bulges, and Yamato herself........
@@Lassisvulgaris ok thanks
She is made of iron, sir...
The 18" AA shells were totally ineffective, but pilots reported they were a spectacular fireworks display. Regarding ships defenses, two thing the Americans had that the Japanese didn't, was radar controlled fire direction for the AA guns, meaning the entirety of the AA guns could be brought to bear accurately on attacking planes where the Japanese were still targeting based on a guy with a long stick pointing at the attacking plane, and the second was proximity fuses shells, which exploded at or near the target with extreme accuracy, the combination was deadly. So ineffective was the Yamato's air defenses, that only 10 US planes were lost, and most of those were knocked out of the sky by the shock wave of Yamato's explosive end.
Yup! Radar and proximity fuses were a game changer for the US. Japan had radar but they didn't use for fire control. They didn't have any idea about proximity fuses and couldn't figure out why the USN's AA was so deadly.
I seem to recall that the U.S. battleship rifles were maximum of 16" while the Yamato and Musashi both had 18" guns. IIRC, the ability to bring precise shore bombardment was beyond the capability of Japanese gunners at that time because they didn't understand the Coriolis effect and while our 16"s were much more accurate, we could only loft them 20 miles or so. The Japanese Navy 18"s would travel a max of 30 miles.
never underestimate the power of a man pointing a long stick. you can almost imagine being there the noise alone must have been incredible.
Using 18" guns against aircraft is like using a shotgun to kill mosquitoes. It just doesn't work. Why they thought it would makes no sense.
@@jamesstreet228 desperation?
One of my uncles served on a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier in the Pacific during the final months of World War Two. He didn't want to say much about it, feeling that he was only doing his duty. My uncle did, however, give honor to the brave airmen. He said that it was common for planes to return to deck with battle damage - some barely making it. Truly The Greatest Generation
My father was on a Fletcher Class Destroyer, DD-559, along with 14 other destroyers who were ordered to speed to the Yamato to launch torpedo attacks in the hopes of sinking her. He said when the crew got that order they all knew they were dead men, but the planes sunk her before our destroyers got there. A few weeks later, on April 26, 1945, his ship the USS Longshaw was sunk off Okinawa with 65% casualties. Though wounded he survived the ordeal, and was rescued after 18 hours in the water.
glad to know he survived one of the extra dangers were the sharks
@@robertdegiro The sharks had plenty of meat that day.
@@damnhandy thats horrible i remember the tragedy of the indianapolis that was a hell of hell but fortunately your dad was lucky thats what is important youre here because of that luck or because god wanted congratulations and stay safe
@@robertdegiroI had learnt about the fate of the poor survivors of the sunk USS Indianapolis thanx to the first JAWS movie by Steven Spielberg. Terrible beyond imagination...
Plenty is said about our casualties on land, but the Navy took quite a few themselves. The Navy was the reason our ground-pounders on Iwo Jima and Okinawa were able to focus on the ground fighting.
This is remarkable work. The scene of the torpedo damage as the ship rolls over shows how violent underwater torpedo detonations were. Great CGI and impressive narration.
How do they know what the damage looked like. It is fake CVGI and not real pictures. In fact all of the video in this post is fake.
@@unlvqasl Please provide us with actual information and better CGI then
Video shows torpedoes being launched from the starboard side as well as the port side.
Is it me.. or does most of the footage of this vid come from the film: The Great War of Archimedes (2019).
@@verushistorie It was the film called (drum roll please) Yamato. Came out in 2005 or so. Almost 20 years ago now.
As a proud U.S. NAVY veteran I salute the crews of both ships. May they all rest in peace. ✌🇺🇸
Even the enemy deserves respect in death.... Fair winds and following seas.
@@EdgarFriendly-op3rn
Very true.
As the proud grandson of a WW2 navy vet and son of a Vietnam Navy Veteran I offer a virtual handshake 🤝 to both sides. And I think no military force in history has ever fought with as much heart and determination as did all branches of the Imperial Japanese military.
Well said
@@EdgarFriendly-op3rn WWII Marine combat corespondent Alvin M. Josephy Jr once wrote a story where he asked a Japanese POW on Guam about choosing suicide over being captured by the enemy. The prisoner replied “if you give me a knife, I will kill myself now. I will kill you too. Then we can go to paradise together as friends”
My dad fought in Korea and my wife's dad fought in WW2. Both did not want to talk about any of it. My old man would tell me briefly about some of it when he was drunk and the stories were horrendous. My wife's dad lived to be 93 a great man and fought in the Italy Anzio invasion. He saw alot of combat and hand to hand too.
Truly the greatest Generation. There bravery and patriotism is off the charts. We came close to speaking German...we came close to speaking Japanese if not for these incredibly brave guys.
Best explanation of the sinking I have seen. First rate.
thank you for your kind comment.
Explanation? It was bombed and torpedoed to hell until it capsized and sunk. Didnt take no 40 someodd minutes.
Easy peezy chicken sneezy🤷
Wow this was almost like a movie!!! Great work portraying the battle as if it happened yesterday, I can't imagine the fear on both sides, so many young sailors and pilots, all now share the same watery grave.
Alot of this was scenes from "Men Of Yamato".
also see the great war of achmeies
Other than saying port side. Then, it shows the starboard being attacked. Port= left.
I thank you brave Americans, for your valor and service to stop the Japanese scurge that had caused so much suffering in the world ,we Australians will never forget.
It was a team effort :D
It was a scourge, and horrible evil scourge that was justly dealt with.
without help from countries like australia and canada we would not have won the war. it was a team effort.
@@paulsmallriver6066 Not everithing is black and white, not even in war
Don't forget your own contribution. The Kokoda Trail campaign with Aussie militiamen and Papuan porters (the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels) fought a relentless and courageous battle that end with their pushing the Japanese regulars back to their starting point--with no ground won, Port Moresby still in Allie hands, and the Japanese 'rewarded' by being shipped to Guadalcanal.
My gramps was an aft engine room worker on the USS Indianapolis. He said he didn't see much action, but he was on the ship that delivered the last parts for the Little Boy and the Fat Man. He had gotten off the ship for a new assignment and the USS Indianapolis was sunk a week later. I still have a ton of mementos from doing reports about WW2 as a kid. All the stuff I was able to bring in for presentations had my teachers stunned.
Great video! What vainglorious folly to waste so many human lives on an operation with zero chance of success. As you say the age of the battleship was already over, and probably before the keel was even laid down.
I read in an interview of one the dive bomber pilots after the sinking. He stated that Yamato's anti aircraft fire was so intense, he compared it looking into the crater of an active volcano.
imagine if she had good AA then not the crap japan made
@@Revkor
Plus the fact IJN vessels were not equipped with radar. Dive bombers & torpedo planes could come out of the sun and lookouts with binoculars would spot thr too late.
@@williamhaynes4800 Yamato was one of the few that had it
@@Revkor Unfortunately for Yamato's crew, the radar room was hit in the first wave of attacks.
In fact, this wasn't such an unusual occurrence, There were several actions in which radars were disabled. What would seem to have been abundantly clear is that the IJN's damage control measures were woefully below that of the other naval powers. There are several excellent analyses of the reasons for this on YT, but to sum them up; the excessive rigidity of command and damage control on IJN ships resulted in many ships being lost unnecessarily. The fact that ONLY damage control were allowed to control damage meant that, if a damage control station was hit, then that entire section was left with literally no damage control. When this happened in a critical section of the ship, the ship was pretty much guaranteed to sink, and sink with all hands.
Conversely, on USN ships, everybody was expected, and trained in, damage control, and if your section was hit, the nearest seamen would immediately start in on damage control. This did not always result in the ship surviving, but it did mean that the chances of survival for the crew were much better. Even crippled carriers were often able to transfer the larger part of their crews before sinking. Contrast that with the desperately sad number of IJN ships that lost virtually all crew.
@@Revkor I'm not sure that it was particularly crap, but it was certainly unprotected, which meant that fighter escorts could not only draw fire off the bombers and torpedo bombers, it meant that they could also staff the Yamato and cause significant damage to its defences.
I knew a vet who flew his Hellcat against Yamato. Apparently the strafing of Yamato's AA crews was so intense that shovels had to be used to move body parts out of the way to keep operating their guns.
I know it isnt funny, but 17 people gave this comment a thumbs up.
@@jamesdykes2968 they asked for it, they got it
@@anthonydavella8350 The Repulse and Prince of Wales say "Hi".
My gosh!!!
Fyi for those who are not military knowledgeable,
In the video and historical facts, the Yamato was repeated hit by torpedoes multiple times on the Port side (left side)
Which means that it was taking in water from the left side.
And when the airplanes were attacking the ship they want to only attack it from just one side, because if you attack it from both sides, the damage balance out each other, and you want to sink it.
However in this video it clearly shows the ship received damaged on the right (starboard) side and it rolled and sank on its right side.
Just a minor technical detail
The bravery of these unknown Japanese sailors is Off the Charts. They were ALL given the option to stay and avoid what was literally a suicide mission. Or stay on board and Die? Not one got off the ship. Every Single Man knew there was no coming back. They wrote goodbye letters to family and went to battle stations. This story is very underrated in the history of warfare.
Yes but also a culture obsessed with honor and duty. The pilot's who "volunteered for suicide mission's often accepted out of fear of the repercussions of refusal. The same reason japanese soldiers rarely surrendered. Anyone who got off that ship wouldve been shunned by society along with their families.
Maybe the second part of the option, -- if you got of the ship etc etc, was worse than stay on and die. Never know about the fake honor system
Every time I start to feel bad for these men I remember the atrocities they committed
The Japanese military literally committed genocide in China. Killing non combatants such as women and children and also graping people regularly. They history of the Japanese military deserves nothing but shame and disrespect. They were savages that didn’t deserve life.
@@captainpiggz6391 no one on Yamato committed war crimes, you can't paint an entire group of people the same color and consider yourself historically accurate. To blame them for the actions of others is just petty.
In 1965, I got 2 books from Scholastic book ordering at school -- two biographies, War Fish and Japanese Destroyer Captain. Cannot remember the authors, but eye opening to a 12 year old. Part of why Yamato was sent was in that book. Yamato went out a couple of times but then was based in the home fleet anchorage and known to house the Admirals through the war. So when Okinawa happened, the Navy was shamed of having this Battleship that wasn't in battles. Again, Army vs Navy only this time the Navy was shamed. So Yamato and escorts started down to Okinawa. I believe my memory is correct in this instance. This Captain was one of the escort ship Captains and taken prisoner. Both are good books for history.
Book fair day deliveries,,a beautiful day!!!!
Captain Hara's memoirs are on RUclips on "WW2 Tales", Hara was Captain of the Cruiser (also sunk) in this battle. Just watched the Yamato episode yesterday!
I remember watching Star Blazers which was a Japanese animation program on American Television. It was called Space Battleship Yamato in Japan. That's how well-regarded she was by the Japanese.
Oh, yeah, GREAT show. "We're oooofffff to outer space, we're leeeeaaaving Mother Earth...."
I watched the original ad a kid. I just finished watching the remake, Space Battleship Yamato 2199. The artists stayed true to the design of the real Yamato. Such a sad story for such a mighty ship. It totally broke the naval treaty for what a battleship could be. It's sad that it didn't survive the war. It would have made a magnificent museum ship. Not that that would have been an option.
Damn good show!!!
Yamato was sunk Sibuyan island Philippines sea not in Okinawa
A Really wonderful presentation! Sending all those men to die with zero strategic or tactical reasons shows how insane war truly is.
The most powerful battleship ever constructed, and without air cover, it was about as much use to Japan as a ripe tomato. They might as well have renamed it the "sitting duck" when they sent it out of port.
Not even close to the most powerful, she had big guns yes but her hull armor was shit, her targeting was nothing compared to the Iowa Class. She was just another BB and that's it, nothing special.
@@GenSphinx USA USA USA
@@GenSphinx except fact yamato had one of best armors in ww2 if not the best. Only problem for japan was fact they had almost zero aircrafts/fighters/jets
@@vadencium1615 her specs said one thing but her construction was totally different. They cut corners and it was confirmed that Japanese steel was significantly inferior to German and especially US steel.
@@GenSphinx well, thats possible due to Steel shortage at the end of war, but still, yamato was something, whole american navy was afraid and Green by greed always they heard its name, cause they had shit technology for ships, its only sad world couldnt ever see her, or A-150(super yamqto class) in full sea action unlike Bismarck
I grew up in the 50s. My best friend's father was part of an anti-aircraft crew on a cruiser in the battle of Okinawa. His ship was hit twice by kamikaze. Some of the crew were killed and my friend's dad was seriously wounded. He still carried shrapnel in his body. As far as I know he didn't talk about the war.
My dad had it much easier aboard Halsey's flagship, the Missouri. The kamikaze aircraft that struck the ship did a miniscule amount of damage. I still have the piece of the plane's wing that my dad took as a souvenir. It's on my mantelpiece next to his urn.
I'm glad you channel came up in my recommendations, you have an excellent channel here and I am more than happy to subscribe...
Thank you its nice to know that my endeavours are appreciated.
I think they learned after the hard time they had sinking the Musashi, focus on torpedoes on ONE side! Enemy or not, the Yamato class battleships were the zenith of battleship power, and armored beauty ever created. Both the Yamato and Musashi died the death of a Samurai.
Thats good for the fate of mankind!
One could say that they committed Supuku.
Wow... what a maturing and heroic sentence.... "both Yamato and Musashi died the death of samurai...."
Yamamoto said it best. He was against investing in more Battleships. "The most fearsome serpent can be overcome by a swarm of ants".
Or in this case hornets.
The captain and crew of the USS Johnston put on one of the best ship battles protecting the smaller carriers of that group.
So true and everyone should read the late James Hornfisher’s book “The Last Stand of The Tin Can Sailors” absolutely one of the best books about naval warfare.
Taffy 3
Don’t forget the Samuel B. Roberts and Hoel also gave the ultimate sacrifice in helping Johnston protect the carriers and landing forces off Samar.
@@laurapeter3857 Yes. All because Half-wit Halsey and his mighty ego fell for the Japanese diversion fleet north.
My dad was in the navy in the south Pacific. Battle of Okinawa driving landing craft to the island. He received a commendation for his service that day. I never knew that until after he passed away
my father was on a mine sweeper, swept the area twice. They were small, made of wood and poorly armed, hence pay and a half.
The Japanese opted to wake America..America awoke. America was angry. America rose. Then America came for them..
Yeah that pretty much sums it up...😒
That was original.
Admiral Yamamoto after Pearl Harbour:
"I fear we have awakened a sleeping giant & filled him with a terrible resolve".
How right he was
@@stephenphillip5656 One of their better admirals...But the emperor giveth...the Lockheed P-38 taketh away.......The giant's awake, admiral..nighty night....
@@4catsnowand you hide
Even if she had escaped the air attack, the Americans had a fleet of 7 fast battleships waiting on her closer to Okinawa. The shame is the senseless loss of life the Japanese high command ordered to save face.
I actually have a photograph of one of the ships that escorted this ship with its crew on board saluting the captain I believe, it's one of many photos my grandfather and his brother come back with
@@adraper6816 At least these "proud warriors :/" had a chance to fight back. Like cowards, they claimed total victory when they struck pearl harbor at dawn on a Sunday with a country they weren't a war at. I grab some popcorn and smile at this total defeat and revenge. I hope people on the shore's of Japan saw that final explosion.
@@adraper6816 "The Japanese were brutal in a way that even the nazis could not match"
What a load of tosh. The Japanese were absolutely brutal, I'll agree wholeheartedly. But they never signed that Geneva accords and were not bound by them.
Germany was a signatory to all levels of the Geneva accords, yet were just as brutal in their treatment of Russians. Nor did the Germans differentiate between soldiers, commissars or civilians, and they systematised and industrialised the extermination of not just the Jews, but homosexuals and anybody they considered to be a political enemy.
The Japanese were simply brutal, the Germans were far more. Their brutality was in the face of also being signatories to those conventions.
@@davidcolin6519 yeah yeah everyone is bad, only america is good, we know this one... bombarding civillian zones in Iran, Vietnam, and many more countries is totally legal, when america says so... I hate whole fucking america, I hope you will get your main land invaded one day too, and recognize war. And I hope you will lose
@@davidcolin6519 have you heard of the rape of Nanking and unit 731?
During the rape of Nanking,even a Nazi party member who was in Nanking at the time thought the Japanese were going too far and wrote to Hitler for him to intervene.
It is undeniable that both committed unforgivable crimes and atrocities, but when a nazi is saying something is too much, you can easily draw the comparison.
My grandfather was in the pacific and his brother was in Europe. Thank you for the amazing video as their history has always been something I am passionate about learning about.
“Over 400 aircraft from 9 carriers” that’s fucking insane!!!!
Also you probably should’ve mentioned that the first wave was primarily to destroy the escorts, which would make it easier to target the Yamato directly
He did mention it
3000 souls
Well done!!!!!!!! Of course I was talking about the narration! Definitely not the deaths of all who lost their lives!
Great video. Felt like I was right there observing live..
computer generated images have got to the point now where you can hardly tell the difference from live footage.
Bravo, that was an excellent examination, and brilliant storytelling melded into a perfect fusion of beauty and horror.
Amen
💯
The animation is a clip from the video The Great War of Archimedes (2019) just mirror-imaged which is why all the attacks in this video look like they are attacking the starboard side rather than the port. This whole scene is from the start of the movie and then flashes back to the building and proposal of the ship. A really great movie to watch is Yamato (2005) which focuses on the individual sailors and their dedication and builds up to the final climatic battle.
No qualms when the battleship Yamato was sunk with 3,000 souls. The IJ military, had massacred 250,000 Chinese civilians, men, women, and children in a brutal reprisal for their help for Billy Mitchell bombed Tokyo. This was kill or be killed.
I learned something from this. (Among other things, that is.) Battleship main guns had access to anti-aircraft ammunition and could shoot at aircraft. I didn't know that before.
I understand the AA round worked fairly well, but it played hell with the barrel rifling making armor piercing rounds less accurate if used later..
Only the Japanese used it on the Yamato and Musashi. It wasn't very effective
the shells were 3000 lbs each , and I would think the explosive charge would not cover a much larger area than smaller rounds just more force within that area . so a simple math calculation let's us know that we could get 1200 3" AA shells for the same storage weight , and I would think a much higher chance of a hit with those 1200 shells. two corrections I was thinking 3" was a 25lb , but it's 17lb and I added a extra zero , so the correct number would be 176 shells for each main gun charge
I would think the problem would be the needed high trajectory.
The IJN Yamato had a sister ship . The IJN Mushashi was almost identical and was also sunk by the US Navy during the battle of Leyte Gulf, also by navy airplanes flown from USN carriers in October 1944. There is no such thing as an "unsinkable" ship.
What is the point of building a kick ass ship but not having fuel
Sure any ship can sink unless it were made of cork, so it would float even if holed, it may appear to be unsinkable, but made of metal, which is denser than water, it can sink.
Good Show Sir! It was a most painful thing to watch, the deaths of so many brave souls and an amazing ship even though at the time they were my country's enemies.
I don't find suicide that honorable.
Great video,but when the commentator said the torpedo attacks were to the port side, it was clearly showing that these planes were actually attacking the starboard side.
Nevertheless it was a great description of how the world’s mightiest battleship et her fate.
Video was shown recorded flipped. Yamato was hit by torpedoes on the port side.
Great! I thought that was what I was seeing. Still excellent video. Too bad on that though.
It is using non-public domain movie footage, so it was probably flipped at some point to make it less likely to get flagged for that.
Hey, no one can be accurate all the time...# Friendly Fire
BTW: According to Murphy's Laws of Combat - "Friendly fire...isn't."
At about 0:45 you can see the emperor saluting with his left hand, so yes it was very likely flipped
As far as ship design goes, it was a beautiful ship, like the Bismarck was.
That small USS Johnston a Fletcher-class destroyer with 5-inch guns took on the world's largest battleship with 18-inch guns.
The Johnston put on such good battle that Yamato’s captain had his crew salute the sinking Johnston as they passed it.
One of the US carriers to take part in the attack was USS Hornet (CV-12), now proudly serving as a museum ship at Alameda, CA. Her scoreboard indicates four torpedo hits and three bomb hits.
There will never be battles as epic and tragic as those during WWII.
The biggest naval battles, the massive army battles in the eastern front of the European theater. Epic and tragic.
We hope...
I wish you were correct, alas you are not tho.
Fabulous effort. I did now know the Yamato was sunk near Japan, I thought it was the Philippine Seas. Thank you thank you.
Your not far wrong an almost identical ship went down in the Philippines sea on 24 October 1944 at the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Yamatos sister ship the Musashi was destroyed by aircraft after being struck by at least 17 bombs and 19 torpedoes. Because she was attacked from all sides she sank at an even keel, hardly any need for counter flooding, so it took more hits to sink here. It also ment that she could use here anti-aircraft guns on both side, increasing the casualties inflicted on the attacker. The US navy used the lessons learnt for the attack on Yamato 6 months later.
@@WorldWar2inColours I believe Musashi also blew up when she sank. I could be wrong.
@@johnemerson1363 they had four hours to evacuate survivors and she had gone under by the time her magazines blew up so the explosion was muffled and not as devastating as on the Yamato.
Nice narration. As a retired Navy veteran, I appreciate the retelling of these events. The scenes are from a Japanese movie glorifying the Yamato and her suicide mission. In reality despite the theatrics only 10 American planes were lost and 12 crewmembers. If one assumes seven aircraft were lost due to the explosion of the Yamato as she was sinking it means only three American aircraft were shot down by all of the Japanese ships combined. From PBS, " Eight Japanese destroyers and one cruiser, the Yahagi, tried to assist Yamato in fending off her attackers. By the end of the battle, Yahagi and all eight destroyers were lost" so although four destroyers survived the initial onslaught they were hunted down and sunk within hours of the sinking of Yamato and her other escorts.
The ship, whilst imposing-looking, was lost against airpower of the era. It suffered the same fate as the HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse had suffered four years earlier. She was the ultimate expression of an obsolete idea. It was proved in Pearl Harbor, that a Battleship could not withstand hits by aircraft bombs or torpedoes.
Love the use of World of Warships stock video for the ships as they should have looked in color. Have to say it was a good video and well explained. I do see the issue, however, with the ship listing to the starboard side in the video and the port side in the narrative. Perhaps the video was image reverse? Cheers!
I do like to show clips that have been seen many times in the past from a new prospective. Coloring, sound effects and flipping the shot over. In this instance you are correct that its a mistake to flip the clip, Because which side the ship is hit is integral to the true telling of the story. Glad you liked it.
The death knell of capital battle ships. Ironically, it was the Japanese who proved air power trumped battle ships, when a few years earlier, sunk the British battle ships prince of Wales, and her sister battle ship.
The Repulse was a Renown Class Battlecruiser. The Prince of Wales was a King George V Battleship.
The deathknell of the battlships was way before this, though not at Pearl Harbor. Once surprise was achieved the U.S. fleet were sitting ducks. The British loss of Prince of Wales, and Repulse sealed the deal. They were able to fight back.
@Fred brandon Nobody took the Italians seriously
@@jaimeosbourn3616 Well, the Royal Navy obviously did. ;)
@@GeorgHaeder And beat the crap out of them
Well done/explained. The narrative was given in concert with the video images. Only small glitch was the described port list was opposite (starboard) in the video. That aside, a great presentation.
Thanks, glad you liked it despite the “small glitch”
Well done. Thorough, without getting bogged down in too much detail.
You should also cover the battle off Samar, the famous last stand of the tin can sailors, and the only time Yamato engaged enemy surface targets, sinking the escort carrier Gambier Bay and the destroyer Johnston
it was a great, humbling read.
Taffy 3
Counter-flooding the engine room to correct the list led to the drowning and deaths of several hundred sailors, who were unable to be warned.
The classic case of fighting the ship at the expense of the crew.
It is a sad reality of naval warfare, though. You've gotta keep the ship afloat, and sometimes you don't have the time or the ability to get the crew out of the way.
that’s war brother
You don’t counter flood, you lose the ship that much faster.
@@gawainethefirst
Yeah, and then more than 300 die. It sucks, but as Don said, thats war.
Given the circumstances of the battle he should have know the ship was already lost. Without air cover the end was inevitable. Instead of flooding the engine room, he should have called abandon ship. It was a pointless waste of lives to continue fighting. There was nothing to be gained.
A high school friend told me about his dad flying a "Helldiver" against the Yamato. I read recently that the ship had been discovered lying "keel up" on the bottom. It was in two pieces, having exploded as it capsized. His dad's rear gunner wrote an article about seeing their bomb hit the battleship. They flew back to the carriers in the dark, almost out of fuel.
Incredible production.
My Grandfather was an Electricians Mate on the Hackleback at this time. Her sighting and tracking of Yamato was as close as they got to combat before the end of the war. It was interesting to see how this battle played out.
If only they had the area denial mechanism called the “Wave Motion Cannon”. Real talk though, every ship they’ve said is unsinkable sank with a very short service span.
* Wave Motion _Gun._
And the -Floating Hotel- _Yamato_ didn’t get that until _after_ she sunk.
all of those ships that were unsinkable except the Titanic were hunted down because of the damage they could cause. so those Japanese ships and the German Battleship Bismarck were doomed because they had to be taken out immediately
@@shawnbirt4161 The Yamato was sunk at the end of the war. The IJN sent her out to die when they had nothing left.
@@bobbygetsbanned6049 that is true but its overall service life like those other ships was very short. And essentially the IJN was done for after the battle of midway. So at that point once they lost all their carriers all remaining ships were sitting ducks.
My father was on the hackleback SS 295
They spotted the fleet
Orders were to radio in the location
And submerge
The XO also fired a torpedo that missed
U295 avoided depth charges for several hour having a dud charge hit the deck
They stayed submerged until a match wouldn’t light
Surfaced at midnight…..
To hear that the armada was destroyed
Thanks for sharing. We, sons, of great men, live our lives in tribute to our father's courage.Dad was a ball turret gunner on a B-17g, European Theater. Be well.
I can't imagine the terror a sailor would feel about a submarine's presence. And that of a submariner knowing he's fighting in what could be his tomb.
Well done, mate.
A very interesting documentary.
I'm half-way through an incredible book," Tennazon", about the battle of Okinawa, and the atomic bomb, so this little film enhanced my reading material.
I thoroughly recommend the book to anyone interested in this era.
glad you found it after being out half a year now.
The crew must have had a feeling of invincibility standing on the deck of Yamato or Musashi while at sea, incredible ships, shame they are no more.
Any ship that has “unsinkable” in its title is a goner.
well the modern lifeboats used on oil rigs, cruise ships and freighters won't sink. Even if you pump them full of water with them fully loaded with people they will stay on the surface. I guess you could call them unsinkable. Something about using massive amounts of flotation foam in building them.
Bro, facts
Don't name it with "un"
One of the best things i've ever seen.
The decision to only torpedo on one side was a damned smart tactic.
The US Navy commanders were almost always smart. The Japanese commanders almost always let their fighters down.
Well the order came after they saw what it took to sink the Musashi
Some of the ships are backwards in the animation. The submarine is sailing in reverse when is submerges when he is talking about the Threadfin and Hackleback. The aircraft are leaving the carrier with the bridge on the left hand side, which is backwards. And the torpedo attacks on the Yamato were on the port side, but the animation shows the right side.
Copyright strikes avoidance.
Am I crazy? Or, did the video show the torpedo hits and the listing to the starboard side?
Would have loved to see that on board as a museum.
There is a museum, with a massive scaled replica. Look it up.
Anyone having the opportunity to visit Hiroshima, extend your stay for a day and go to Kore, a 30-minute train drive from Hiroshima and visit the Yamato Museum. It's an amazing trip in history.
Having just returned from Japan & been in Hiroshima, I did indeed travel to Kure to see the Yamato museum. That ⅒-scale model is 86 feet long and starts to convey the enormous size & power of the Yamato class battleships. Well worth a visit, it's about 15 miles from Hiroshima.
I assume the first of the three torpedo hits in the second attack was achieved by my next door neighbor when I was a boy in the 1960s. He was credited with the second torpedo hit. He had medals from it.
Port is on the left side. This video is great but it shows the ship being attacked on the right side.
Looks like you “borrowed” some cgi footage from “Requiem for Battleship Yamato”, a Japanese film that is an excellent film with English subtitles.
Planes from my Dad’s ship, USS Bennington CV-20 were the first to put direct hits with helldivers on the Yamato, and several torpedo hits from avengers. Dad served aboard Bennington in ‘56, ‘57, ‘58 and ‘59 when she had been modified with an angled deck addition and reclassified as a CVA
why do you say port side and show starboard side getting targeted xD
May the crew from both the American and Japanese ships rest in peace
And may the hundreds of thousands of innocent Chinese civilians coldly butchered, raped, tortured & murdered feel some semblance of justice in this humiliation of the animals responsible for their cruel deaths.
@@Mister8224 Oh shut up, every side did its dirty deeds. No reason to dehumanize and disrespect Japanese servicemen who served their country.
Japanese took it to another level & must be mentioned. The TORTURE & DEGRADATION of MILLIONS deserves to be noted. It wasn't the same. My uncle was a witness to the creative brutality & it stuck with him till he died. I don't really care what you think.
And may Tojo rot in H*ll
@@Transilvanian90 Tell that to the Filipino and Chinese who were brutalized by the Japanese.
They killed 250000 Chinese just to retaliate for helping the US carry out the Doolittle raid. Let that sink in.
0:05 Just think, that when it was designed in 1936 it was already obsolete.
Fabulous depiction...I'm speechless by the conclusion!
Learned about this ship on animation showcalled " Star Blazers" My dad and step father told me greatest battle ship ever 😉
Salute to the brave crew of the Yamato, fought to the end.
Do you also salute the butchers of Nanking & other Chinese cities, where I Japanese soldiers
Where Japanese soldiers brutally & coldly sliced Chinese women & children into pieces, showing no mercy or conscience, raping & murdering helpless civilians numbering in the hundreds of thousands, in a display not seen in history since the tales of Mongol hoards centuries before. The memories of these unspeakable atrocities all but forgiven & forgotten in recounts of later battles of the war. Chinese women & children, along with many American servicemen, would dispute the honor & distinction accorded them by American cinematographers in their 2018 recounting of the battle of Midway. .
How do you know this? Nonsense, mate!
@@rossbrown6641 If you are really interested, there are many accounts of Japanese atrocities with both combatants& civilians. If you've never heard about these events, you will be surprised, at the very least. You've probably heard about Bataan,but nothing else.
Rip budget
My father just died two days ago. Thirty one years in the Navy starting as a Seamen Recruit in Vietnam. I'm fifty four now, I just see tragedy. So many young lives lost on both sides. My niece is a Rhodes Scholar and she lives in Danang, Vietnam. I know when you're in a fight, you have to fight. I'm saying you have to do it but nothing changes. Such a waste.
If you want to be picky only 3 1/2 Destroyers made it back to Japan. One had been blown in half, losing the forward third of the ship. The survivors managed to put the back half in reverse and sail home stern first. One of the other survivors was the IJN Yukikaze. “The one which survives”. A ship present in every naval engagement from Pearl Harbor to Ten Go. And which watched all three Yamato class ships go down. Other ships crews had started viewing her as a cursed death ship. Yukikaze would survive, but they wouldn’t. She simply had the fortune to always be sailing next to bigger juicier targets. She would survive the war, and amazingly bring most of her crew home. Only 11 lost across the 5 years of war. After the war she was given to Taiwan where she served a long career.
The story of the Yamatos escorts is worthy of its own video. The Americans wanted all 10 ships sunk and diverted a substantial amount of resources to achieve this. You have already mentioned the Suzutsuki which had to sail in reverse all the way back to port. The light cruiser Yahagi suffered as much as the Yamato. I wasn't aware of the Yukikaze history thanks for taking the time to share that
Actually, Yukikase means Snowy Wind. It was later nick-named "The unsinkable ship" or "The miracle ship."
Great visuals and narration. Thank you for bringing the destruction of this ship to life.
narration was rubbish. it's "Corsair" not corseeair!
Yamato is the real name of the first emperor of Japan. He is the ancestor of the current emperor. The current emperor is the 126th generation.
Yamato was born about 2000 years ago in Miyazaki, south of Japan. Miyazaki is the land of the sun. Yamato's ancestors include Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. The symbol of the Japanese flag is the sun. Japan is Rising Sun.
Is the Japanese monarchy the oldest sitting monarchy in the world? I can't think of any that can trace back 2,000 years.
@@ChrisHolman
Thank you.
The Japanese dynasty is the oldest in the world. Miyazaki (south of Japan)where the first Emperor YAMATO (JINMU) was born, has many ancient ruins and legends. It's like an Egyptian ruin. The current Emperor is the 126th generation from YAMATO.
Japan has a long tradition. The Rising Sun Flag is one of them
Yamato was a Japanese Prefecture and the ancient name for Japan
@@robertyoung3992 Thank you for asking.
YAMATO is the name of the first emperor of Japan about 2,000 years ago. Born in Miyazaki prefecture, the ancestor of the current emperor.
@@ChrisHolman The Japanese can't either. Myth might sometimes be based, partly, on fact, but it's not fact. The Japanese royal family doesn't go back that far, except in myth. But then I suppose the part about decent from deities might have been a clue about that.
Outstanding work, great content, more like this please.
I love the look of the Yamato. All of the Japanese fleet had a very Samurai look and feel to the ships they created.
Vanity and showmanship. And it cost them many lives.
and its a very good fish reef, Mooosashi is too. who da thought the Nipponese were so environmentally conscious way back then.
Most likely the greatest Battleship fight of all time! Amazing all those planes coming after 1 ship!
Same with Bismarck
Yamato shot down 3 aircraft. 7 were destroyed when the ship blew up. Pretty one-sided fight.
My great grandfather wasn’t in the navy but he was a paratrooper and fought at Iwo Jima. I couldn’t imagine jumping into almost certain death. Luckily he lived and he brought back 2 katanas and 2 rifles which my grandma has to this very day. Amazing to see the Japanese rifle and sword.
The video is great, but the opening part shows Yamato sinking on her starboard side, she actually sank capsizing on her portside.
You do realize that some video editing tools end up mirroring the original source.
@@greggblack8205 I didn't know that. Thanks for pointing this out to me!
@@greggblack8205 ...and could have easily been used to reverse the video, making the ship list to port, syncing with the narrative, as she did in real life. Sorry, but that point pretty much ruined the video for me. 🤔
Given that the footage was taken from a Japanese movie it was, probably, done for copyright reasons.
Awesome video describing (and illustrating with footage) this event!
Starboard is your right. Port is your left. This video is showing the exact opposite.
@@jjohnston326 I hadn't noticed that, actually. Good catch. Even so, I think this is a good video. (Maybe some clips had to be reversed for copyright reasons? I don't know...)
This explains so much of why you should make your greatest enemy your friends after their defeat. Good job!
Anyone comprehend this?
Very Silent and Sombre Salute to all the souls that were lost at sea..yours very truly Alfonso Cantu USMC
Imagine how many aircraft carriers could have been built instead of building the Musashi and Yamato if the resources and materials and labor had been so directed.
At the time, only Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto had the foresight to understand this. He pleaded with the Admiralty, but they wouldn't listen.
It was a beautiful, magnificent ship.. a shame it was lost..
I feel no sadness for these butchers after what they had done to Pearl, Guam, The Marianas, The Philippines, etc. It was an amazing thing to humiliate the Japanese in such a way to show them that their unsinkable billions of yen worth of machinery was so epically destroyed and absolutely sinkable.
My Dog was in the VT-48 USS Bullshit Billy and did fly with the ABM-Microsoft Sidewinder around 12:34 on April 1.
Why no link or even mentions in the description of the various movies and other video clips you used throughout? Documentaries show their work, and always note the sources.
Excellent video and script communication. The presenters slight Glaswegian accent is nice to hear.
Glaswegian accent???? The narrator is as Welsh as they come. Glasgow is in Scotland btw not Wales.
@@seanbarbour4591 , (sarcasm alert)
@Scott Struble My apologies. I wasn't meaning to be sarcastic. I was just pointing out that the guy's accent is not glaswegian (which is 80 miles from where I live) and that, in fact, he comes from a different country. That's the problem with written replies on social media, they don't have the subtle nuances of spoken speech.
To my way of thinking, the major problem with a lot of German and Japanese designs (ships, planes, etc) is that they were good designs in the mid-1930s. But the war went on into the 1940s. New tech was developed, and incorporated into Allied designs.
Naval strength is build strength. It takes time to build and all ships will be somewhat constrained by the technology and requirements when they were designed with some limited modifications as they are built. So it is pretty much a come as you are war.
When Bismarck set out to the North Atlantic, the most modern ships the Royal Navy had were ships that were laid down not long after Bismarck. The King George V class battleships (laid down in 1937) were constrained by compromises to meet treaty restrictions (4 gun turrets to reduce weight) and being brand new (still working out the kinks with those new 4 gun turrets when they were needed to fight Bismarck).
Examples of ships that were laid down in the 1940s are the Essex class carriers and the Iowa class battleships which were (of course) not available to the US Navy during the critical first year and a half of the war.
It takes a lot of lead time to build a navy.
Britain started the war with 12 battleships and 3 battle-cruisers compared to Germany's zero battleships and 2 battle-cruisers. But most of the Royal Navy battleships were in service in the first world war. Some were upgraded with new engines and additional armor but there are limits on this compared to building new ships. The German ships were fewer but more modern - at the time.
Two things that were improved on during the war on all sides was radar and anti-aircraft defenses. But the Western Allied vessels excelled in these areas due to technological advancement - they were ahead of the Germans in radar technology and the Axis nations never developed proximity fuses (allowing near misses by AA artillery to be kills). Technology that allowed AA guns to be paired with radar and mechanical fire control computers that would calculate the bearing and train the guns. Human operators were there to reload and pretty much watch.
The kamikaze attacks would have been much more devastating if they had gone up against 1941 air defenses. And the battle against Yamato would have been bloodier for the USN if the Japanese had air defense technology anywhere near what the USN and RN had.
@@iansneddon2956 What an honest, informed post!Thank you so much for that.
Given the treachery of Pearl Harbor it seems most appropriate that Yamato and sister ship Musashi, rather than meeting their ends in the classic battle line actions for which there were designed, they both were sunk by naval aviation.
Treachery? Lol they weren't exactly friends
Amen to that Mike!
First of all, Pearl Harbor was not treachery. By this time, the United States had already been trying to push around Japan. They had been trying to control the foreign policy of a Sovereign Nation. Also, the United States have been annexing islands all throughout the Pacific.
Additionally, if you want to talk about attacking without a declaration of war, allow me to remind you of all of the Indian nations that the US attacked, and all the time is the Cavalry just showed up and slaughtered people without any niceties such as a declaration. Then, let us move on to Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Afghanistan, and Iraq, All Nations that the United States has attacked without a declaration of war. So please stop that sanctimonious bullshit
@@mikeggg5671 Don't care what you think, it absolutely was!
America was "pushing them around" huh, poor little Japan. Gee, I guess we deserve it.
Don't worry about the fact Japan was raping Nanking and the rest of China, don't pay any attention to that! Just say things like we were pushing them around like a big bully! And look at all the other places America fought with over 100 years! Big bully! Pear Harbor got what it had coming because we were "Pushing them around"?
We didn't give them the oil they wanted to continue in China and that is considered "Pushing them around" to you?
How the hell are we pushing Japan around when they had a bigger Navy than the US at that time?
It's always strange to me that people like you always try to bring up the fighting in Vietnam, Korea and Iraq without ever once mentioning who was BEGGING the US for direct help.
The war in Vietnam, who begged America to help?
The war in Korea, who begged America to help?
The war in Kuwait (aka Iraq), who begged America to help?
When a country is invaded by a hostile enemy and they beg the US to please help them.....If we try to stay out of the war America is damned for isolationism. But if we do decide to help them we are damned for helping.
Which is it? Are we damned if we do or damned if we don't?
The whole world was begging the US to join the fight in 1939 and we were damned if we did.
Should any country try to help the Ukraine right now? Or should the whole world just shut up and let the invader do what they want?
You can't have it both ways.
@@mikeggg5671 Exactly, the hypocrisy is also showing because he hasn't replied lmao 🤣