The Worst Battleships of World War II
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- Опубликовано: 22 фев 2023
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I'd say the Kongo class "battleships" should be on this list, as well…..they basically weren't battleships, they were still battlecruisers. Starting off their life as battlecruisers, they were allegedly unarmored to fast battleships, but only their deck armor was made thicker, and they still carried 8-inch belts. Two ships of the class were lost because they were basically battlecruisers being used as battleship. Hiei was crippled by 8-inch cruiser shells, something, say, Yamato would have survived. Kirishima was sunk by USS Washington, when again, Yamato probably would have survived the encounter.
G.I.Joe was not a Saturday morning cartoon, it was a syndicated weekday afternoon cartoon. It's clear from your mistaken advertising copy that like Cobra Commander in the episode "Eau de Cobra", you should also exclaim, “I have morons on my payroll!” At least you have the good taste to have "Sink the Montana!" as your favorite G.I.Joe episode.
@@metaknight115 Yamato is close to 2-times bigger than Kongo class. That's comparing some heavy cruiser to battleship. Hiei was crippled in chaotic close quarters battle - probably any battleship would suffer at such encounter. Washington was modern BB, completely different breed. Are we still judging Sherman as a tank based on head-on engagement with KonigsTiger?
Anyway, whole video is ridiculous - judging the worst battleships of WW2 that were not battleships at all ... because they were not battleships at all. Makes lot of sense to me ...
1939-1945
What do you mean that's debatable ?
@@dave_h_8742 China was fighting Japan before 1939 and would continue its civil war after 1945. Germany didn't invade the USSR until mid 1941. The US didn't enter the war until late 1941. So it depends on the specific country you ask. 1939-1945 is a solid European set of dates.
Of course, the Arkansas, New York/Texas, Nevada/Oklahoma, Pennsylvania/Arizona were all scheduled to be retired as the fast battleships joined the fleet. Then Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and Germany declared war. The rest is history. You have to admit the Arkansas gave good service in convoy escort and shore bombardment roles, even at her elderly age in 1941-45,
I don’t think anybody could question the service as a Battleship that Pennsylvania delivered either. I think she fired the most main gun rounds of any US Battleship during the war. She was present for pretty much every Pacific Amphibious Landing. More often than not as Richmond “Kelly” Turners flagship. She made it all the way to Japan. And was the last Capital Ship to be struck and damaged of the war. Taking a torpedo hit 2 days before Japan’s surrender.
I seent one fast battleship and one super-dreadnought. In reverse order: saw Texas when I was smol, is in the stocks now, so it'll be awhile 'til I can see her again, and I drove through Mobile just before closing time so I only got to walk around the weather deck of Alabama.
@@DeliveryMcGee It is pretty cool that even today, you can still walk the pre-dreadnought Mikasa, the super dreadnought Texas, and still can walk all three classes of US fast battleships. Along with cruisers, Little Rock and Salem, various destroyers, cruisers, and even Victory, Constitution and Constellation.
@@andrewtaylor940 Agree, folks get too wrapped in the slow speed and not running with the fast carrier groups to miss the fact that the Arkansas and US standards, along with the Wes and R class ships helped get many convoys through until the allies had eliminated the big ship and surface raider threat and the anti-sub forces started thrashing U-boats all across the Atlantic. Without them, Germany's plan for surface raiders would have had a lot more success.
Arkansas received four battle stars for her World War II service.
A small correction on Kilkis and Lemnos. The WW2 started for Greece on October 28, 1940 with the attack of Italy from Albania. Germanny came to Musolini's help on April 6th. The ships, acting as floating batteries for the Salamis Island Naval base, were both attacked on April 23rd. IE they made it through the first few months of Greece's participation in WWII
sounds more like "they were spared the first few months" :p
That's correct. A lot more reading needs to be done. I had some bloke say to me the EVA was crushed in the first day of the war. That was at a scale model contest. I just laughed in PZL P-24 and walked away.
You can't really count the bit where they were only fighting the Italians.
@@himoffthequakeroatbox4320 Why not?m
@G V despite the poor equip.ent the army had their air force was better trained and capable.
Royal Sovereign when she was in Soviet service as _Archangelsk_ is my choice for the list. Whilst she was thoroughly out of date by WW2 she was adequate in the roles the RN used her but the Soviet Navy were incapable of operating her properly. So poor was her maintenance they never even turned the turrets and they rusted in place, any battleship incapable of firing its main guns has to have a place on the list.
You mean the Russians have had problems with maintenance on their ships?????
@@michaelpiatkowskijr1045 They go a step further, having problems with maintenance of others' ships, too.
@@steeltrap3800 if it's not broke, don't fix it. If it's broke, ignore it. Sounds like most management.
She was sometimes called "Tiddly Quid" in RN service, being neat and tidy, while a sovereign coin was worth £1, a quid.
I feel that's a bit unfair on the ship, after all it was a capable design; neither of the Scharnhorst's would go near convoys being escorted by R-Class ships. Any piece of equipment used incorrectly or badly maintained will perform poorly, even if it is the best design.
A little known ship that could have made this list is the Spanish battleship Jaime I of the Espana class. Even by WWI standards when they were built they were considered some of the worst dreadnoughts, being smaller and slower than their contemporaries and having the worst armor (8" belt). All three Espana battleships were destroyed, one after running aground in 1923 and another after hitting a mine in the Spanish Civil War. Jaime I was damaged by aircraft in the war and later by an internal explosion but wasn't scrapped until 1939.
We didn’t have the money to build anything better. They were supposed to have been built sometime after Dreadnought but lack of materials and WWI delayed construction. By the time they were completed they were utterly obsolete.
Ryan, as a brazilian i can guarantee you that Minas Gerais was pretty much useless even before the WW2 starts, even for coastal defense. There were shortage of ammunition, fuel, training, good communication hardware etc.
Minas Gerais was one of the first dreadnoughts in the world,being built around 1907~1909, she was obsolete even for WW1
Thank you for not mentioning BB-3 USS Oregon in the honorable mentioned list. It’s a crime and shame that she was removed from moored museum service to “serve” as an “ammunition barge” and later scrapped in Japan. IMHO, she qualifies as the most egregious of scrappings due to her epic place in Pre-dreadnought history. Imagine pulling out the Mikasa, stripping her down to her hulk and using her as a storage barge, that’s what happened to Oregon!
Funny you mention that since Mikasa survival is just short of a miracle, being decommissioned in 1923 and scheduled for destruction due to Washington Naval Treaty saved because all participates agreed on allowing her to be a museum ship, then the Pacific War happened and the USSR demanded she was dismantled (you have 1 guess why), the compromise was to remove parts of the ship but whats left was turned into a dancing hall and Aquarium that eventually closed down leaving the remains of the ship to rust, survived today to the efforts to restore her but 3 times she faced being scrap iron.
@@drakron also, wasn’t part of the museum deal that she be encased in concrete?
@@lonelylad3023 indeed, i believe the intention is so that mikasa would never sail again (and rendered her unusable as a naval ship), since many pre-dreadnoughts of the signatories were also being scrapped at the time
The Mikasa barely survived, sadly, but yeah, Oregon is pure Tragedy.
Arkansas, being outdated and obsolete, had far greater service during WW2 than modern and overpowered Yamato and Musashi _combined_.
Any weapon is only as good as how well it is used...)
I think it's not entirely fair to class the coast defense ships as battleships. While many of them did sport battleship-size main guns, the lesser displacement meant they couldn't have battleship type defensive features. The fact that many of them were really old by World War II is important. I like the coast defense battleship as a type. It's a product of a different line of thought compared to seagoing battleships, very suitable for a smaller, regional power like the Scandinavian countries. We should remember that the US entry into the era of steam and steel was spearheaded by just such a ship type...the monitor. It's significant that the 2-turret monitor was the origin of the "predreadnought" layout of the main armament. And that was in 1863 or '64, right? Way ahead of its time.
Going by Ryan's sole criteria of having "Double digit main battery guns" then the German Panzerschiffs must be on the list of the Worst Battleships of WW2 because if they had actually run into ANY proper BB they would have died quickly
A coastal defence ship was supposed to shoot from the cover of archipelago. Yes, they were expensive misinvestments. But sure enough not battleships…
It's weird to include a ship with less than 4000 tons into a list of battleships. But according to the treaty definitions they were battleships, because they had had guns larger than 8 inch and were no aircraft carrier. Of course the small navies did not participate in the treaty system.
The Panzerschiffs were built as replacements for the few obsolete “heavy” 11.1” equipped WW 1 “Armored Ships” that were approaching their 20 year service lives. Their basic design was conceived BEFORE the Nazis came to power. They were supposed to not exceed 10,000 tons but did anyway. Their main Armament consisted of upgraded 11.1 guns and were propelled with 8 2 stroke Diesel Engines.
They were very innovative in Design.
The British Press hyped them as “Pocket Battleships”, just before the start of the War the Kriegsmarine classified them as Heavy Cruisers so they don’t belong on this list.
@@henryblanton6992 Watch the video Again!! Ryan included Coastal defence ships, never meant for deep water work, solely because they had (in HIS words) "Double digit main battery guns"
Going by THAT limited criteria the Panserschiff (meant for ocean work) should be include regardless of what the classification of their owners was. I'm sure the owners of those coastal defence ships didn't class them as true Battleships.
So why do the Germans get a free pass???
the German ship of the line "Schleswig-Holstein" was used as a training ship only. There were only 2 exceptions: Firstly she fired the first shots against the Polish garrison in Danzig and secondly she participated in the occupation of Denmark. That´s it. The rest of her life she was used as a training ship, sometimes in the very cold winters as an icebreaker in the Baltic Sea. As such she accompanied "Gneisenau" on her last voyage to Gotenhafen.
So it was used as a battelship... Not really a useful comment. It was ready to use if the need arise, and in fact they planned to retrofit it as a sort of AA specialized ship... Before it got bombed
Definitely the Fuso-class battleship. They had the turret farm layout and all the explosive dangers that come with that, the extremely tall pagoda mast causing stability issues and worst of all the turret layout meant having the two magazines either side of the boiler space, the hottest part of the ship. They were considered obsolete by the start of WWII and Japanese sailors considered them the worst possible ships to be assigned to as any combat sortie basically meant they weren't coming back.
Agincourt moment
Actually Ise and Hyuga were considered worse postings than Fuso and Yamashiro. They were far more cramped and slightly less capable as not all of their turrets were able to be modified to allow for 45 degrees of gun elevation like Fuso and Yamashiro were. That plus Hyuga having a turret wrecked by a breech explosion was reason for them to be picked for conversion to battlecarriers over Fuso and Yamashiro. Fuso and Yamashiro were still relatively useful as battleships by comparison.
I don't think they are that bad. Sure survivability is horrendous. However having 12 whole 356mm (14") guns accompanied with 16 152mm (6") means it can deliver a lot of firepower into one location with a broadside. And also it means that it has almost no down time, there's always lead raining down towards the enemy because of how many guns it has. It had its uses as a shore bombardment tool. And it outperformed even more modern battleships in that role. That's why I think neither Fuso, Yamashiro, Ise or Hyuga belong in this list, all those ships still had their uses and even outperformed others, while the ones on this list had limited usability.
but the fuso looks so damn cool.
@@grahamhufton7715 Agreed, I have a soft spot for her and her sister myself. I've been a sucker for tragically doomed ships since I was a small child growing up in the aftermath of the Titanic movie. Throw in a fascination with mechanical things and guns of all sizes and warships like Fuso and Yamashiro are prime candidates for me to have a deep interest in.
Would say the Swedish Sverige class was fairly effective in its intended purpose, especially considering that she and her two sisters were critical in thwarting a German naval force advance on their home territory in 1944.
My dad served on the Arkansas during WWll. He was a 3rd class gunners mate on a secondary battery (5 inch gun). He spent his 18th birthday on that ship off the coast of Normandy. They later went on to the Pacific and did shore bombardment at Iwo Jima & Okinawa. I remember being a boy and paging through the War Diary of that ship.
I have a soft spot for pre-Dreads, just for their steampunk look.
Jauréguiberry is my waifu. Yes, I have terrible taste.
I have a particularly soft spot on my left buttock.
The Danton class, imagine them with paddle wheels and they are comical. Steampunk dreams!
@@beaterbikechannel2538 with all the over-the-top stuff to top it off.
October Revolution (Gangut) and sister Marat were with the Baltic fleet and blockaded in Leningrad. Both were heavily damaged like Pearl harbor but Marat was refloated and served as a gun platform and October Revolution aided on breaking the 890 day seige and latter bombardment so they should be considered useful
Agreed. Many older BBs served well.
Great video and God bless the work you do reserving the legends of World War II. If only, if only CV-6 USS Enterprise have been saved.
If only...
I have to disagree with Arkansas being on this list. Yes she was an older ship, but only slightly older than Texas and Nevada. She did have 12" guns, which weren't as powerful as modern Battleship guns, however they fired an 870lb AP projectile which was over 100lbs heavier than the German 727lb 28cm APC used by the Scharnhorst class much less the 661lb APC used by the Deutschland class. She also had significantly more guns than either of these. Yes she was slower, but more than fast enough to sail rings around even a fast convoy she may be escorting. As such, her presence within any convoy would easily insure its general safety from these surface raiders, since their commanders would never risk being crippled buy her in an attack on the convoy, even if both Scharnhorsts were operating together. Yes they could overwhelm and likely sink her, but she would likely leave more than a dent in them and may well mission-kill one of then if not take one with her. This makes her as effective against surface raiders as a "fleet-in-being" protecting a convoy as Tirpitz was at threatening them.
In addition, you mention her service at Normandy, she served front line combat very effectively, not only in Normandy, but elsewhere in arguably the primary role of a Battleship - force projection ashore - she was very effective in shore bombardment, her 6 turrets actually giving her something of an advantage in being able to spread her attention to up to 6 different target areas if needed. She was much more effective than any of the French Battleships, I would even include the Jean Barts in that.
The Arkansas should be replaced in this list by the Italian Conte di Cavour or Caio Duilio Classes which underwent even more radical upgrades but were of limited effectiveness during the war.
A like mind.
Scharnhorst would stand off and destroy Arkansas at long range.
The Arkansas was the weakest battleship that served in any major navy of the war. She 100% belongs on this list. Assuming equal crew quality, a rebuilt Cavour or Duilio would have very little difficulty wrecking her and there would be precious little she could do about it in return. The Italian ships outrange the Arkansas by 9000 yards and are seven knots faster - that's the kind of margin of superiority in range and speed the USS New Jersey held over a Nagato class battleship.
Was expecting a list of battlecruisers and battleships, not necessarily the coastal defense ships of smaller nations like Sweden and Finland. My grandfather served on the Sverige which was the flagship of the Swedish navy, they did serve as a clear deterrent against invasion for Sweden along the rest of the navy during WW2 (unlike the army and air force that were not on a proper level until 1943 when the threat of invasion had all but dissipated). Still a very nice video with the breakdown and presentation of ships you rarely hear about :)
I always thought the Conte di Cavour class belonged on this list. While certainly upgraded during he refit, she was a very weak class of ships.
I would add the Japanese battleship classe Ise first and Fuso second. The Ise-class really wasn't used much. Fuso was a repeat of the Ise-class with modifications. Both had two turrets with arcs of fire only for broadside.
You have that slightly backwards. Fuso and Yamashiro came first. Ise and Hyuga were the slightly more compact versions of the Fuso class. The compactness made them less livable and very limited for modernization despite being newer.
I think the Ise class might be the only ships to get worse after a refit
The other way around, Fuso was first and Ise the improved version were the mid turrets were superimposed. Nevertheless they were better than the ships in the list.
Ise class was designed after fuso. They were originally upgraded versions. But I do feel that if they happened to have been able to have had aircraft and seen combat in that sense they would have been very affective.
It was actually the other way around. Ise was a modified Fuso design.
My dad served on the Arkansas, at this time when Arkansas embarked approximately 800 troops for transport to the United States as part of the "Magic Carpet" to return American servicemen home as quickly as possible. Arkansas received four battle stars for her World War II service.
BB 33 getting the love.
I think putting USS Arkansas on this list is unfair, she helped with Operations Torch, Normandy, southern France, Iwo Jima Jima and Okinawa. Most battleships did less then this.
I think she was the only BB to provide shore bombardment at both Normandy and Okinawa
* than
@@collinwood6573 Texas and Nevada were also at both
I'd like to see a segment on the USS Mississippi. Some of her remains in a park in Mississippi. She had a long life from 1917 to 1956. Participated in two World Wars, and transformed into a missile test ship after WWII.
Plus, my Grandfather was a plankowner and a GM.
My grandfather was on her shakedown cruise to Cuba.
Experienced capable crew with confidence in their abilities and equipment and good leadership is a critical factor. Sounds like USS Washington under Admiral Lee.
By the time WW II came about, the battleship itself was almost obsolete as a ship to ship fighting warship. The Prince of Wales, Britain's newest class as well as Japan's Yamato class did not stand up to air power. In terms of shore bombardment, one could say that even the pre dreadnaught battleships could be very effective.
WW2 began over two years before HMS Prince of Wales was sunk, and the equipment that was used to sink her didn't really exist in 1939. It is more accurate to say that the technologies that made the Battleship obsolete were developed during the war, rather than that the battleship was already obsolete when the war started.
@@mattbowden4996 By 1939, both the Japanese and Americans had their navies designed carrier task forces manned by relatively modern aircraft. While technology continued improve for all ships, including battleships, carriers and submarines, the battleship was not considered a ship to ship weapon.
@@phillipnagle9651 That's not true. Prior to Pearl Harbour, Japanese and American fleet doctrine both revolved around surface action between their respective battlefleets with the carrier forces operating as a supporting arm, not the principle striking power. The Japanese never gave up on the importance of the the surface fleet despite what the the Kido Butai had achieved and the US Navy changed doctrine out of necessity because their battlefleet was largely neutralized at Pearl Harbour.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kantai_Kessen
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Plan_Orange
As for the aircraft the USN and IJN were flying in 1939 - the Grumman F4F Hellcat, Douglas SBD Dauntless, Aichi D3A Val and Nakajima B5N Kate all entered Carrier service at some point in 1940. The TBD Devastator and Mitusbishi A5M were both in service in 1939 and were admittedly both fairly modern, but four of the six major types operated by both navies in 1939 were biplanes.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grumman_F3F
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtiss_SBC_Helldiver
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aichi_D1A
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yokosuka_B4Y
@@phillipnagle9651 Even after Pearl Harbour, even the Japanese were not entirely sure about the effectiveness of aircrafts vs. battleships in action. Only the sinking of the POW and Repulse convinced them that the era of battleships had come to an end. As for the Americans, the Missouri was ordered 12 June 1940 and commissioned 11 June 1944. Only the battle of Midway halted the construction of Illinois and Kentucky.
In retrospective, battleships were obsolete by 1939, but at the time the opinions differed.
This is why I say literally every battleship that first entered service in WWII was obsolete upon launch. This also includes the Iowas.
I'm a bit confused if SH and Schlesien were the "best" of the worst or the worst of the worst pre dreadnoughts. Because normally you would expect number 1 to be the worst, but what Ryan says sounds more like first place is the best of the worst
He was looking at the bottom 5 ships, classified as Battleships by their nations. They were on that bottom 5, but fifth from the bottom. As he stated, they still served a notable career in the KM, despite being useful as little more than glorified floating batteries.
@@GrasshopperKelly I mean, they already weren't that useful during WW1 (the high seas fleet removed pre dreadnoughts from their battle line after Jutland), being heavily protected gun batteries with largely unseen caliber on land was basically their best usage
Worst oldest outdated battleships must be NORGE and EIDSVOLL old Norwegian ships. The battle of Narvik was a sad story. Many years ago i was allowed to dive on them. They are now been listed as war graves
Since some people consider the Spanish Civil War to be part of WW2 I think the three _España_-class "dreadnoughts" might deserve a dishonorable mention. Launched in the early 1910s, they had 4x2 12" guns, a 9" main belt and a blistering top speed of 19.5 kts. _España_ herself ran aground in 1923 and was never re-floated, while in 1937 _Alfonso XIII_ hit a mine and _Jaime I_ exploded while in dock repairing bomb damage.
Another great video as usual, and thank you for letting us know about Magic Spoon; I’ll try it!
Thank you for not including the Texas, although she was old she punched above her weight and got her crew home safely.
Most of these are really stretching the definition of battleship. It’s like calling the Maine a battleship when she was actually at best an armored cruiser.
The Swedish Navy has put bar codes on their warships so they can Scan da navy in.
groan 🤓
They were assembled with Allen wrenches, too.
Lol. I seen what you were trying to do here.
That is original semi out-of-the-box thinking bravo
🤦♂ 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Actually that one's not too bad!
Dutch ship Surabaya was sunk at the start of the PACIFIC war (1941), not the start of ww2 (1939). As an Australian, I have certain very definite views about when ww2 began, shared with the rest of the British Commonwealth - as well as France, Holland, Belgium, Poland, and a few others.
The U.S.S. Arkansas probably would have been scrapped if World War 2 had started a year after it did. But in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, she became suddenly important again, and that, I believe was the main reason she was retained in service, and thank goodness she was. For all of her obsolescence, she gave a very good account of herself as a shore bombardment vessel. I am certain there were soldiers and marines who could tell you that her efforts were greatly appreciated. The Germans hated her viciously. Yes, she was only armed with 12 inch guns, but she was armed with a dozen of them. That much steel coming at you, that fast, I guarantee you, was not a comforting thing, even if it was coming from a ship that was already 30+ years old, at the time.
I stand in agreement with you, while I believe we still support New Jersey and her sisters the older girls could still make the dance.
12" was more than enough to take out an enemy pillbox.
@@bozodeclown67 And way more than enough for enemy supply trucks and tank columns trying to move up to the front within battleship range. Now as for enemy gun emplacements, I've seen footage shot at Normandy within the last 10 years, the empty gun emplacements there still have battleship shell dings all over them. It's not like the ships lacked accuracy, but the Germans really knew how to pour concrete.
@@donaldnevgonhapniv3084 And they did make the dance, in the Pacific, at Surigao Strait. :) look up " Admiral Oldendorf's Old Ladies" some time.
@@bozodeclown67 Considering people even consider 203mm artillery almost overpowered today.... 12x12" is a whole lot of weight of shot.
A flawed interpretation of the facts to say the least. While I wouldn't claim any of these ships were great, I certainly wouldn't bottom them out. Judging coastal defense ships as being bad because mainline battleships of major navies would run them over is missing out on important details, such as they were never meant to do so and weren't designed for that purpose. Or saying older ships used in front line service are bad even when that country would really rather not have them and replace them with something much better, especially when they may not be able to get better ones or aren't even allowed to have anything better.
Ise and Hygua. The were well behind the power curve at the start of the Pacific War, but turning them in to hybrid aircraft carriers made them useless as either a gun platform or an aircraft carrier. Dual role only works in select situations, like AA/ASW destroyer or light carrier/assault ship, but BB/CV(B?) was a complete failure.
Would you consider doing a video on the Delaware class?
Besides Arkansas using 12inch shells she wasn't that bad of a battleship, she had 12 12in guns, 4 turbines for propulsion and she was capable of surviving at least 1 nuclear blast. dont think she should be on a list for "worst" battleships of ww2.
I'm afraid that's your bias showing, because the only major navy to retain any ships as weak as the Arkansas into WW2 were the French and Soviets, and the Courbets and Ganguts have already been called out in this video. The weakest ships left in the Japanese battle line were the Fusos, which were superior in speed and gun power, even if their armour was a bit suspect. The weakest battleships left in the Royal Navy were the R class, which could eat the Arkansas for breakfast and then come back for seconds. Unless you can name me five worse classes of dreadnought battleships that saw service in WW2, then Arkansas definitely belongs on this lest.
Pretty much called this correctly and in order (excluding coastal defense ships), although once you mentioned neutral nations were on the list I’d argue Rivadavia should’ve been just below Arkansas.
For what it was asked to do, the Arkansas was perfectly fine. I'd take the position that the Arkansas, as-is, was a better alternative than some of the Pearl Harbor survivors that were heavily upgraded to no real purpose. All they did was suck up a lot of money so they could do exactly the same thing the Arkansas did. Nevada, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Colorado were all basically left as-is and performed shore bombardment as well as any of the others.
The rebuilds of Tennessee, California, and West Virginia were extremely useful as it allowed them to win at Surigao Strait in a way that they couldn’t have otherwise done. Nevada, Maryland, and Pennsylvania were far from left as is since they received significant AA upgrades. This is especially true for Maryland as she got a complete rework of her superstructure and also received improved torpedo protection.
@@collinwood6573 I'd only say that those ancient Japanese battleships at Surgaio Straight were well on their way to the bottom from PT boat and destroyer attacks before any of Oldendorf's old battleships took a shot. All those upgrades were hardly necessary to win this battle. I agree that the AA upgrades were needed, but even the addition of 5"/38's weren't universal on the older ships.
@@andywindes4968 Yamashiro wasn’t in much danger of being sunk by destroyers immediately after Fuso was. The destroyers certainly could have launched a second attack that would almost certainly sink her but battleships are cooler lol. Also, from what I remember, the PT boats at Surigao were mostly a nuisance and didn’t pose much of a direct threat to Fuso or Yamashio.
Another interesting thing that I just thought of is what might happen to the old BBs if they were only quickly repaired and sent out to Guadalcanal. Perhaps they would have been sent in after the cruisers were decimated and also sank because they were even less equipped for night battles than the cruisers and destroyers.
@@collinwood6573 I certainly don't want to appear like a troll--these are just honest differences of opinion, so take what I say for what it is worth. My primary objection lies with the huge outlays made in order to bring very old, slow battleships up to standard--sort of. I'll never understand why we continued to build 21 knot BB's when years before the British built the far superior Quenn Elizibeths that could crank out 25 knots. I think the outlay of money and work would have been better spent elsewhere. So far as using them in the Guadalcanal campaign, I believe the Navy (rightly) made the decision to avoid using battleships in the confined waters around the Solomons. From my point of view, it was nothing but luck that kept Washington and South Dakota from going to the bottom during the Second Battle of Guadalcanal courtesy of Long Lance torpedoes, especially given that the destroyer screen was wiped out and that distances at which the battle was fought were ridiculously close. It must have been heavenly intervention. Decades ago I played an old SPI wargame called "CA" about the sea fight around Guadalcanal. In it, we were given the option to use the old BB's. Universally, they ended up on the bottom. Appreciate the interest conversation.
@@andywindes4968 It came down to design balance. You have to remember that Congress was still limiting US battleship design. 21 knots was seen as a good middle ground for the dreadnoughts considering everyone else's battle line was still limited to either the same or slower. For most capabilities, the Pennsylvania's (built 1915) and QE's (built 1915) are about the same. Pennsy brings twelve very good 14in guns more than capable of defeating either's armor, a nice armor scheme (it took two nukes, so I'd say its good enough for government work), and by the 1930's a superior fire control system to what the British operated. Queen Elizabeth brings 8 excellent 15in guns, a good armor thickness but a slightly worse layout in my humble opinion, and a fast speed. For the Americans, it was more guns, a little bit more amor and trade off on speed. For the British, it was more speed for less guns and a little less armor.
What about the Turkish battle cruiser Yavuz. Ex SMS Goeben served in the Turkish Navy until 1950 and also has an association with USS Missouri.
I’d argue Goeben to have been one of the, if not the best big-gun capital ship in history in terms of historical impact.
@@bkjeong4302 I totally agree with you. After the First World War had ended, Churchill said in relation to her role in dragging Turkey into the war, that the Goeben had brought "...more slaughter, more misery, and more ruin than has ever before been borne within the compass of a ship".
And I suppose as a battlecruiser, she wouldn't qualify anyway.
Oh I am surprised you did not include the "revised" Ise ships, you know, where Japan replaced gun power with concrete. Concrete is super battle effective! Many ships were lost through the power of Japanese concrete.
These were designed during the war technically and had full intention of being deployed in all possible roles if need be, including combat.
Lemnos or kilkis, can't remember which, had had it's armament removed and placed in coastal batteries
Clearly the most obsolete pre-Dreadnought still in commissioned service during WW2 was the HMS Victory ;)
Though the least capable was probably USS Constitution instead. (At least, before that German bomber attack left Victory in need of years of repairs.)
@@AlsadiusConsidering USS CONSTITUTION can still set sail, HMS VICTORY is still the most obsolete and least capable pre-dread. Of course, even fully operational CONSTITUTION never qualified as a battleship. So that "honor" still goes to VICTORY regardless.
Hms wellesly was sunk by the luftwaffe
Worst Battleships isn;t really a fair term for ships that were old, obsolete, and used for other tasks. I was hoping for ships that were poorly designed, and were bad at what they were built for. Oh well.
i think that the arkansas is actually a great warship, for the reason, it does bombardments while the fast battleships are engaging the enemy. No point in using a front line ship for ground bombardment. These are great in their role...and lets not forget Surigao strait....another great use of old battleships. Only drawback, the modern front line battleships are just super big AA cruisers for the carriers, the new queen of the fleet.
Which actually means the new fast battleships are flat-out worse than the old battleships, since you just wasted money building new capital ships that can’t be used as capital ships.
@@bkjeong4302 but until Taranto...pearl harbour and the sinking of force Z....they were the queen....to me...those 3 events showed exactly the BBs had finally had their day....afyer that point...complete what you got but no more....we're the Iowa's necessary.. .if they were already started and close to completion...if you scrap...even more money wasted.
@@bernhardholmok9950
Battleships were already obsolete prior to these events: these events just forced everyone to acknowledge that reality.
@@bkjeong4302 the magic words...forced to accept reality.
@@bkjeong4302 magic words...forced to accept reality...up to that point battleship admirals reigned...now carrier admirals took over....and still reign
Of course, the training ship USS Utah was sunk at Pearl Harbor Dec 7 '41. Had the chance to visit the USS Utah Memorial on Ford Islands many years ago. Thx!
The Arkansas, the oldest one, sure pick on the seniors lol
What is it with all these extraordinarily weird comments saying ships like Bismarck and Yamato should be on the list for the most inane reasons imaginable. In the exact same vein as those i could argue Iowa's were in fact the worst ships because they didn't fly, shoot lasers and have 4 turrets, it's completely rediculous.
The Yamato tied up tons of resources, cost so much it was unusable for anything but escort duty and the only time she fired her guns she retreated from a significantly inferior force. Not really a good record for the heaviest and must gunned monster of ww2. Add in 3000+ people who died on board and I really don't know why it's not first on this list.
Bismarck was very poorly designed, as thousands of people have rightly pointed out throughout the years, her FCS cables and other vital electrical cables were above the deck armor, a pretty huge oversight as well as her triple screw propulsion. Yamato on the other hand, was a good ship, for the wrong navy. The IJN had no business keeping around 2 massive, resource hogging vessels of questionable strategic and tactical value
Yeah, those were often rather inefficient ships, but that's not the same thing as being bad ships. Bismarck's poor design left her perhaps ten thousand tons heavier than comparable contemporaries, but they did actually put those ten thousand tons into her, so she was indeed comparable. A Bismarck against a NoCal or a KGV is a pretty fair fight, overall. And those were certainly not bad ships in any way.
@@Alsadius Actually yeah, it kinda is, because cost efficiencies and logistics are just as important factors to the success of any weapon system as having big guns and thick armor. And the Bismarck's being so large and so overweight made them very expensive and resource intensive ships for the capabilities they offered. The costs of the two Bismarck's was nearly as much as three scharnhorsts, and building three scharnhorsts with six 15 inch guns would have been more flexible and useful. Their cost was about 80 million USD at the time they where built, which was a third again more than the $60 Million North Carolina's built at the same time, and a North Carolina has better than even odds of killing a Bismarck, and is far better suited to fighting the war she was in due to her vastly superior AA. KG V is even cheaper, costing roughly 40 million USd to build at the time, or almost half the construction cost of Bismarck. When the KGV is roughly half the cost of Bismarck, but basically matches the latter's capability, that makes a big strategic difference.
@@ryuukeisscifiproductions1818 I agree with what you're saying, and that's a fine list to make someday. But it's a different list than the one Ryan was trying to make.
always a great show. thanks
Thanks for a interesting video. As an Norwegian I thougth of Panser skipene (Panzer ship) Norge og Eidsvoll when I saw the headline. Eidsvoll got sunk by germen destroyers before she was able to fire her guns, and Norge after fireing a few shot without hitting anything. So I'm happythey where on your list.
Väinämöinen did not have to be given to the Soviets post war, she was offered to reduce the amount of money that the Soviets wanted from Finland. If I recall corrently giving her to the Soviets got a million off from war reps. Also when her sister sank the survivoirs were supposedly reffered to as "Ilmarinen's Swimming Team". As for the shiups that should have been on the list, the Kongos.
Let me put it this way. In 1942, if you asked a US Navy admiral whether he wanted four 20 knot Standards or four 30 knot Kongos, he'd have likely chosen the Kongos. Speed was life in WW2, and fast capital ships were generally much more valuable than slow ones in every theatre.
Vainamoinen would have been useful as a coastal bombardment vessel similar to a monitor. Might have also been useful as a heavy escort for a convoy to provide protection against a heavy cruiser or pocket battleship.
Kongos are not regarded as a bad design for the period by serious literature. Sure it has some drawbacks in armour as all battlecruisers but they were the most used IJN Battleships. Kongo is vastly superior in usefulness to f.e. the Courbet which was designed at the same time. How can you even chose them as worse than the ships in the list?
Because the Kongos had questionable survivability compared to the ships in the list. In WWII their armor was still worse then Renown and Repulse's armor, after upgrades, and unlike every ship on the list they were thrown into front line combat where they got battered into oblivion. It's likely that the standard battleships would out perform the Kongos by the sheer fact that they have armor. The only time the Kongos perform well in the war is in a night operation against US forces that have heavy cruisers as their largest ships. The only factor going for them is speed, but even then if they actually encounter any serious threat there is a large chance they won't return. The entire design is flawed in this period and has it's capabilities over hyped.
@@HMSPrinceofWhales53p The Kongos were the IJNs most useful and to some extent only useful battleships. They at least fought. The rest were sunk without accomplishing anything after the war was already lost.
Uss Oklahoma should be on the list. It hadn't done above 17 knots since 1938 (vs 20 for rest of battleline) due to being the last of US battleships with reciprocating machinery instead of geared turbines. Every time it went out it spent rwo weeks aftarward in Harbor repairing engines. Performance at Pearl Harbor was less than stellar. Only New York with its reciprocating engines was possibly worse. At least Arkansas had turbines.. Oklahoma was not even part of Kimmel's Bait Div
Texas was performing shore bombardment at D-Day by thumping around on her triple expansions.
Texas has triple expansion reciprocating engines.
TCG Yavuz - formerly Yavuz Sultan Selim, and prior to that SMS Goeben - a WWI German battle-cruiser which was transferred to Turkey. It was still in service during WW II
Goeben doesn’t deserve to be on this list, given that she had a bigger impact on world history than possibly every other capital ship since then combined.
Α small contribution from Greece regarding the Battleships Kilkis and Lemnos. Both were inactive by the early 30s. Lemnos was partially dismantled as its guns and pieces of armor were used to build the naval forts of Aegina Island. You can find photos online of the main turrets installed there. Kilkis on the other hand remained intact. During the 1935 Greek coup d'état attempt, when the conspirators commandeered ships of the Greek navy, including the armored cruiser Georgios Averof, the minister of the navy ordered on the 5th of March for Kilkis to be hastily towed from Poros island where it was docked to the Naval Base of Salamina with orders to prepare it to counter Averof in case it is needed. Reserves were recalled to man it and by the 14th of March the ship reported that it was able to steam under its own power and fire its guns. It is worth noting that by then the navy didn't have charges for the guns of Kilkis so they improvised by adapting charges for the guns of Averof. After the failure of the coup, Kilkis remained inactive again in Salamina with a skeleton crew. During the early stages of WWII in Greece it was reportedly used as a floating antiaircraft battery and auxiliary bunker. Rear Admiral Epaminondas Kavadias who was the Commander in Chief of the Greek Fleet, mentions in his memoirs that he considered the possibility to move it to Alexandria if Greece fell to the Germans as was the plan to be implemented for the rest of the fleet. He realized that the ship is obsolete but he didn't want to leave any ship that could be remotely useful (including the armored cruiser Georgios Averof) behind. The conditions in Greece did not allow him to act on that intent though and as we know both Kilkis and Lemnos were sunk by German bombs.
Instead of Bretagne, i would put the older italian battleships of the Conte di Cavour and perhaps also Andrea Doria classes into the list. While they were much heavier modernized than the french ships, they had originally 305 mm guns bored up to 320 mm but without armouring them against the new calibre as far as i know. The Bretagne class was armed from the beginning with 340 mm guns and armoured against them.
Also i would mention the spanish Espana-class somewhere in the list.
I could be wrong, but I think the French old dreadnoughts would have been slaughtered by the Italian Andrea Dorias and Cavours. The older French battleship guns were very short ranged.
I disagree. The whole point of the Italian rebuild program was to turn the Cavours and Dorias into a problem that could not be solved by a Bretagne. A rebuilt Cavour may only have had armour just about adequate to resist the old French 13.4" guns, but it was also a good six knots faster than a Bretagne could shoot considerably further making it a far more useful ship. They also would have stood a fair chance facing off against a Dunkerque.
The speed advantage the Italian battleships had is hard to ignore. They could close and open the range of a potential battle as easily as they wanted. A Cavour or a Doria can engage or disengage according to it's liking, while a Bretagne is forced to fight because it's slow. During WWII the biggest limiting factor older battleships faced during operations was their slow speed. The British R class was only good for convoy escort, while their less armoured but faster counterparts, the Renown class battlecruisers were far more operationally viable vessels.
For a comparison, the HMS Royal Sovereign was bigger, faster, more heavily armed and armoured than the Bretagne, yet, in the Battle of Calabria, opposed to the Giulio Cesare and Conte di Cavour, Cunningham dismissed it as a "constant source of anxiety".
Espana class should be on the list as they would not be able to stand up to larger old dreadnoughts. But the Cavours and Dorias would outrange the Bretagnes and the Arkansas. It would be like the Falkland Islands where von Spee couldn't get close enough to Sturdee to hurt him. Also, plunging fire at long distance made vertical armor less significant in battleship engagements. Most old dreadnoughts had insufficient deck armor.
Yamato and Musashi both belong on the list - not because they were inherently bad, but because by choosing to invest in them the Empire of Japan gave up at least 4 (and probably more like 6) Shokaku class aircraft carriers.
Alternatively: the Shinano, which was the worst combination of battleship and aircraft carrier (it was laid down as a Yamato-class battleship but converted to an armored aircraft carrier).
Japan never could have built 4 more Shokakus by not building the Yamatos, because the amount of available building materials wasn’t the limit they faced in the first place. They literally didn’t have enough building spaces that were big enough to build that many extra Shokakus at once (there is a reason the Japanese started planning the smaller Unryus even before PH, because while the Shokakus were great carriers they were just too large and took far too long to build for Japan to be able to build up its carrier forces quickly, regardless of whether the Yamatos existed or not).
At most they’re getting another 2 Shokakus by not building the Yamatos.
I didn't know that some US Navy battleships still had lattice masts during WWII. I always thought it was unfortunate that such amazing, technologically advanced and very expensive warships would be so quickly rendered obsolete, sometimes even before their commissioning. The USS Arkansas was a good example of the US Navy maximizing the limited effectiveness of their old pre-war fleet by using them as convoy escorts and occasional shore bombardment.
Great topic.
As a personal opinion, the worst battleship was the "one" so invested in national mystique that it couldn't be risked in actual combat until inevitable. Symbols have two faces, they either inspire or they are part of a dynamic in decreasing morale. Those battleships remaining at dock had taken resources that could have been put into a squadron of frontline destroyer actually fighting the enemy.
Which one(s) are you thinking of? Even ones literally named after the country, like Yamato, tended to see a fair bit of combat.
@@Alsadius Yamato and Musashi are what he's talking about, yep. They did see combat, but it was far too late to make any difference. In 1942 and 43, those ships could've been devastating, as Allied carrier ops weren't developed enough or numerous enough to beat them, and the Iowa's weren't ready yet.
@@Cailus3542he refers to it as the "one" so I'm assuming he meant Tirpitz rather than the Yamato class
@@Cailus3542 the Yamatos were never “shrouded in national mystique”; that’s far more of a thing for the Nagatos (which actually saw significantly less time at sea than the Yamatos, partially due to this reason).
The Yamatos were instead shrouded in military secrecy, to the point that they had zero propaganda value as status symbols (because most people didn’t know about their capabilities) and only entered the Japanese public consciousness after the war. They were never the “prides of the IJN” as they’re too often assumed to have been.
And most importantly; failing to accomplish much if anything of note and being actively harmful for their own navies is the NORM for battleships that entered service in WWII, up to and including the Iowas (the Standards already had shore bombardment covered and cruisers and destroyers already had the fast AA escort role covered; the Iowas were just a waste of money and fuel that took away from other, more useful vessels). Yamato and Musashi get singled out for what’s effectively a universal problem-yes they were worse than useless, but which of their contemporaries weren’t?
Have you heard anything about the Scharnhorst being cursed? I read a short story about it when I was a kid and can't find anything on it
She was actually considered a "lucky ship" - until she wasn't.
I thought Scharnhorst was considered lucky, and her sister Gneisenau was the unlucky one.
If anything, the name was cursed. The armored cruiser Scharnhorst was sunk with all hands in WW1, her sister Gneisenau sank during the same battle, but at least some of her crew survived. Most of the crew also went down with Scharnhorst in 1943, while most of the crew survived when Gneisenau was crippled in port - but most of her crew were transferred to the U-Boats...
The German navy will probably never use the names Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Blucher (also sunk in both wars) again.
There was a Scharnhorst and Gneisenau post war with the West German Navy
@@Knight6831 Yes, you're right - that's a surprise. There were a couple of small ex-British ships renamed S & G. Maybe they named them just to spite the British ;-)
Damn Ryan nice beard! Welcome to the beard club brother! As always love the videos! Just bought uss new jerseys decking ! Looking forward
The Väinämöinen and Ilmarinen aren't even considered battleships in Finnish (or Swedish) but more like an "armoured ship"/armoured cruiser.
But ja in English I've seen them called battleships a lot.
To be fair though, they were never built to fight proper battleships from what I've read, but rather something like the concept of the German Deutschland class. They could outgun most cruisers, but avoid (in their case by going to shallow waters) anything that could outgun them. And close to shore they have coverage from coastal forts.
Not disagreeing with you that they weren't so impressive as "battleships" just saying the Finnish navy doctrine, they weren't intended to perform the role of proper battleships 🤔
Nor-ya. Norge is Nor-ya, phonetically (in English phonetics)
Thanks for the pronunciation correction.I apologize for mispronounced Norge all these years.
probably the US Standard Classes that were still kicking around in 1941, tbh the arizona would have been retired in any other nation because of how old she was but she was kept in service because she had a spot in the battle line
The US standards are newer than the QEs, their retirement, like that of all the battleships that were built before the 30s, was postponed due to the treaties forcing the major navel powers from building any new battleships, thus having to retain, and modernize, their old battleships (and battlecruisers) in order to still have something resembling a battle-line
Other than the Arkansas and the two New Yorks you probably did still not want to get into a one on one fight with the Standards. They had the capability to punish any Axis class except the Yamatos. That also have decent armor. The Colorados outgunned the Bismarcks.and Littorios The Mk 5 had slightly less penetration than than German guns but at battle ranges it didn't make much of a difference.
The US standard BBs were obsolete at the start of the war, but most were at least semi-modernized and actually saw more use than the newer fast battleships did. Arizona was hopeless on December 7th because she had no radar and primitive AA, but her sister Pennsylvania was bristling with radar and AA after she was overhauled in 1943.
Arizona's sister, Pennsylvania earned quite a reputation for gunnery during the war. 12 14" guns is 12 14" guns. The standards were also pretty well armored. Nevada-the class before arizona- also aquitted itself well. Esp on D Day, where she was well respecyed for deadly accurate gunnery. It took 2 nuclear explosions and several battleships using her fpr yarget practice, and STILL needed to be torpedoed to make her sink!
Many standards, inc some sunk in pearl harbor, recieved major refits that thoroughly modernized them. Inc new siperstructures, all new secondary and aa guns, radar, the works. Slow, maybe, but you didnt want to get in a slugging match with them. Not safe to go afyer them by air, either. Look at west virginia in 1945 vs at pearl harbor.
@@johnshepherd9676 Have you by any chance gone through any sources that aren't incomprehensibly biased towards "fug yeah 'murica battleships can just take on just about anything" A Colorado does not outgun the Bismarcks and Littorios just because "muh gun is bigger", that's a reach so far you could grab the moon with it because by that logic Furious could easily outgun Colorado because it had an 18in gun. None of the American standards are on par with the modern Axis battleships, North Carolina is the first matching them.
Lemnos appears to have had its guns removed prior to the war, being used as a barracks ship.
The Ganguts were built w their guns able to elevate to a high arc so they could engage at very long range. As a battleship they were up to the job.
Honestly they're kinda underrated and had some cool features in some areas, pretty neat imo.
I feel kinda bad for saying this, HMS Hood. Her aft deck was too low to the water and she had been run ragged during the interwar years and had been in desperate need of repair and refit by the time WWII rolled around.
Hood absolutely does not deserve to be on this list. She was the closest thing in the world to the WWII-gen battleships up until said ships came into service, and unlike them she has the advantage of not being strategically obsolete upon commissioning due to entering service long before the carrier era.
There’s a far better argument for putting New Jersey herself on this list than for putting Hood on this list, on the grounds that New Jersey was strategically wasteful and pointless by the time she entered service while Hood wasn’t.
Easily exploding proves that it was a battlecruiser. The proof of the pudding is in the eating.
@@bkjeong4302 The criteria for being on the list was not during time of first commission it was during WWII and by WWII Hood was in terrible shape, her engines for example were in such bad shape that she had trouble reaching 26.5 knots let alone her designed top speed of 32. I am not saying that she was a bad ship, in fact she was quite good at time of commissioning, what I am saying is that due to her poor material condition by the time WWII she had no place being on the front lines and that is why I am saying that she may have been on a list like this.
Also her quarterdeck was quite wet in anything other than a flat calm this is known and is generally considered a bad thing for an ocean going warship and was the primary reason for the removal of her catapult.
@@adamdubin1276 I thought Hood's catapult was mid-ships...
@@gregorywright4918 According to the 1941 refit yes, however she never received that refit, in her 1929-31 refit she received a catapult on her quarter deck however it could not be used in anything other than a flat calm and any aircraft aboard would be waterlogged or washed away by the time they could be launched.
I love the Giulio Cesare in WoWs but modernizing a 12 inch battleship to 13.5 was insane waste of money. Can have a whole list of ships that may have been good but were terrible in terms of value per $ spent
The Cavour class modernization was actually not bad. She was turned from an old warship unfit for modern service, into a new warship ready to serve. The Italian battlefleet was quite bad, and the amount of money spent was quite lower than the development, construction, etc of a brand new battleship
Well most Axis ships comes there by default (moneywaste). BTW the guns were bored out to 12.6 inch not 13.5.
Pre-Dispersion Nerf, I would take out my Cesare to complete BB Missions. It would take one or two battles only.
The money spent on the modifications was pretty close to amount that would have bought brand new littorios. And the modifications took much of the working resources that would have been better spent on the new ships.. those four became fine looking ships, but terribly bad investments all in all. Could have bought two or three more littorios on the same money and resource.
And after all modification they were nothing like a match against the QE`s, for example…
@@andersreinholdsson9609
Try “building new battleships in WWII in general was a waste”. 27 out of 29 of them failed to justify their existence.
Now, if Magic Spoon would create a Saturday Morning Cartoon Channel to augment their cereals!
Hood was from a performance point of view one of the worst "battleships" (if a coastal defence vessel can be classified as a battleship, then a battle-cruiser should qualify, as well)
I'd say the Kongo class "battleships" should be on this list, as well…..they basically weren't battleships, they were still battlecruisers. Starting off their life as battlecruisers, they were allegedly uparmored to fast battleships, but only their deck armor was made thicker, and they still carried 8-inch belts. Two ships of the class were lost because they were basically battlecruisers being used as battleships. Hiei was crippled by 8-inch cruiser shells, something, say, Yamato would have survived. Kirishima was sunk by USS Washington, when again, Yamato probably would have survived the encounter.
Actually, the Kongos were some of the most useful battleships of WW2. Their combination of speed, firepower and armour was excellent, giving the IJN a critical capability that the US Navy lacked until late 1943. 30 knot battleships were precious during the war for all navies. Yamato certainly would've survived Washington's pummelling and likely annihilated both her and South Dakota, but Yamato wasn't fast enough to get there. So long as you recall that the Kongos were really battlecruisers, they were superb assets, much like the three British battlecruisers.
I would say Kongo itself may be an exception.
Yamato may not have been sunk by 20 16" hits at short range, but I doubt it would have been very effective.
And Ching Lee may have decided to stick around a little longer with that juicy of a target to be had.
@@mikespangler98 Yamato's belt was vulnerable to 16-inch super heavy shells at 5,900 yards away, her barbette and turret armor were still immune to them, meaning her turrets would not be penetrated, nor was Washington capable of causing a magazine explosion. At that range, Yamato could penetrate what, 20, 21, 22-inches of steel. Her only way to actually sink Yamato would be to cause enough flooding, and Yamato could probably ignite Washington's magazines long before Washington could caused enough flooding damage to sink Yamato.
You have quite the knowledge on battleships sir knight. I wonder why?...
Why did you have to do my states ship like that, Arkansas is the only battleship to ever fly and do a backflip
lol, I have never heard it stated in this way.
Bear in mind, under the washington/london treaties anything greater that 8" main armament is a capital ship. Even if they aren't ships of line
You didn't added our chilean BB Latorre, which sailed during the WWII successfully keeping Chile's neutrality but otherwise no much inversion was put on the ship. It blew a turret on the 50's and soon after was sold to Mitsubishi for breaking up.
I don't think it was really that bad. After Pearl Harbor there were some in the U.S. who wanted to try to buy it.
There are a lot of people commenting who are incredibly out of their comfort zone on this specialist channel of battleship devotees.
Some predictions: Bismarcks and Yamatos. Despite all their technical prowess, Germans didn't really know what they were doing with them and they never really stood a chance. As for Yamatos, they burned fuel like there's no tomorrow, something the Japanese were tight on, what forced them to watch a lot of the war effort from the sidelines. Both classes being the cases of wasted potential, although fortunately for the free world
Bismarcks and Yamatos? Yes. I approve this message.
Not even close lol
Disagree, they were just not used correctly.
None of the modern battleships belong on the list.
@@TTTT-oc4eb
I’d argue ALL of them (not just the Bismarcks and Yamatos, but literally all of them) belong on this list.
I recently watched the documentary “Under Seige” about the Uss Missouri. How is the Uss New Jersey prepared to deal with a similar situation?
She has a guard on the land side and can not generate her own power.
I like that we follow Ryan's lead and call 'Under Siege' a "documentary" lol.
U.S.S. Oklahoma is the worst American battleship. She was slower than her sister due to having triple expansion engines instead of turbines. Due to the being jilted engine wise Oklahoma had a shorter fuel range and struggled maintaining the standard speed of 21.5 knots. Also Oklahoma was unpopular with the officer corp due to her shortcomings.
With the round turrets and low fretboard, the Danish Peder Skram shows that it has some lingering design effects from the Civil War USS Monitor.
If you consider just costs and what it achieved, the Yamato did not do too good.
Costs including the insane fuel consumption
I would not put the British battlecruiser HMS Hood on the list because her war time career was short but her peace time career was longer
Using that logic, the Iowas were among the worst as well. In fact, every US battleship besides Washington, Massachusetts, and the six Surigao straight battleships were some of the worst, They certainly did nothing besides shore bombardment and escorting duties.
@@metaknight115 They did shore bombardment and escorting duties.
@@Tuck-Shop Stuff that could be preformed far easier and far cheaper by cruisers and destroyers.
I was not aware of the Dutch, Danish, Swedish or Finnish Vansmoinen. The K & L Greek ships were at war Italy for several months prior to German attack.
Thought the Arkansas was a bold and accurate call on your part. Like other old American ships (WW-1 built four-stack destroyers and S-class and earlier submarines, they saw some combat and lots of training bullets, freeing newer destroyers and subs for more aggressive combat roles. But when we had nothing else, they served better than would be expected.
Just a query from overseas Are the boilers or engines on USS Iowa ever started for testing purposes ????
In a way, I agree with the Arkansas being on the list. 12 12-inch guns. Alaska had 9 12-inch guns and could run around 10 knots faster.
But for the job it was used for, it was perfect or close to it. They really needed every gun they could put in for shore bombardment and convoy escort.
The biggest problem is the Arkansas escorting convoys. It should be pretty good against a pocket battleship. It would not be good against a normal battleship. Bismarck would have pretty much laughed at it.
But a better worst battleship would be the pocket battleship. A battleship that could be beaten by heavy cruisers do not need to be called battleships.
Still, although it would have certainly been destroyed, the Arkansas's potential sacrifice would have enabled the convoy to likely get away get to its destination. Also, it is possible it could have damaged whatever ship it was opposing. It could have made it turn tail and run or potentially be destroyed by a stronger Allied force. It's like chess. Sometimes a pawn has be sacrificed to get the king!!
The term ‘Pocket Battleship’ was an invention of the pre-WW2 British press. Germany never called them that, instead using the term ‘Panzerschiff’, which translates to ‘armored ship. They were later re-rated as heavy cruisers, or ‘Schwerer Kreuzer’, which better matched their actual capabilities. In contrast, the German word for battleship is ’Schlachtschiff’.
@@DABrock-author ,personally I've always considered them to be the WWII version of Armored Cruisers. Kind of a step above Heavy Cruisers but obviously below Battlecruisers. At least that's what I think they should be called!
@@albertoswald8461 Yep, and that’s exactly what I called the equivalent ships built by Texas in my ‘Republic of Texas Navy’ alternate history book series. Great minds think alike?
Do you have any information to share on the proposed Alsace-class of France and the H-39 of Germany?
I have this video on an audio loop for when I can't fall asleep.
A little surprised you didn't mention the Swedish Battleship vastergotland. Understand that was slower than the Frozen snot off of a elephant. Another pretty bad Bond was the Soviet October Revolution. I heard that at it one engine problem after another.
Both appeared on the list - the Swedish one as an honorable mention (since Sweden didn't actually take part in WW2), and the Russian one as part of the Gangut class.
Are you smoking somthing, Swedish capital ship is named after norse gods, royaltys, variants of the name Sweden, and singel class ships have name like manliness, province name like Västergötland was reserved for destroyers.
One funny aside the 12 inch shell reminded me of was something the USS Johnston did while on shore bombardment. Bob Hagen, the Johnston's gunnery officer, saw a Japanese officer with a sword on the beach, swung the guns around, and absolutely obliterated the man with a 5 gun 5 inch broadside.
Captain Evans called him and said something along the lines of "superb shooting. But try not to waste so much ammunition on one man."
God "last stand of the tin can sailors" might be my favorite book of all time.
Also Texas using her main battery to shoot individual German snipers.
"Why do I hear a freight train? Why is it getting louder? Oh, hi God."
Couple of things: before he reported aboard the Johnston, Bob Hagen had been the radar officer on the USS Aaron Ward during the fighting around Guadalcanal, and was badly wounded when the Ward took a hit from a 14" shell.
You might look up the stories of the destroyers providing close in fire support off Omaha Beach on D-Day. One of them so close in that she had maybe two feet of water under her keel, noticed a tank bouncing 3" rounds off a heavy German emplacement covering one of the draws where roads led off the beach. So the ships gunnery officer told the 1-5 and 2-5 mounts to take the emplacement under fire on local control using 5" AP. They pretty much obliterated it, and not long after a platoon from the 116th Infantry took the emplacements on the other side of that particular draw from behind.
@@blakekirk5009 that sounds awesome, do you have any recommended books or resources?
@@colinmartin9797 - There are copies of an AAR online. I've misplaced the URL, but searching for "Destroyers at D-Day" outghtt to turn it up.
I would have to ad the Ise-class battleships after they put that stupid flight deck that removes two turrets, blocks the firing arc of two more, and is still too small and too poorly placed to operate aircraft.
what's interesting for the Surabaya is that the Dutch sure as hell made a good ocean going coastal defense ship
I am going to add the Kongo class, as battlecruisers that were reclassified as battleships after their interwar rebuilds. They had really good main guns, and were the heaviest Japanese ships that could keep up with the carriers. The problem is as a carrier escort the Japanese 25 mm made their presents "so what?".
They escorted and supported several landings in the war, but all those before Guadalcanal could have been done by cruisers in retrospect. Now at guadal canal they did shine at sure bombardment, and we're critical to the early, highly effective bombardment mission of Hendwrson Field on Guadalcanal. Also the Japanese 14-in shells could destroy any kind of American entrenchments that they hit.
The problem was they're 8-in armor belt, at its thickest, and 10-in turret faces. They were still underneath that thin metal a mid World War I designed British battle cruiser. They had a glass jaw.
Bad enough that American cruisers and destroyers so damaged Hiei that she had to be scuttled by the Japanese the next day due to continuous daytime error attacks. Then the kashima was the one "battleship" at the next trade, which long was Chevy heavy cruisers blazed away at two American fast battleships .
Due to a totally incompetent head engineered that wired the new four-way redundant circuit breakers open in such way as guarantee failures, the South Dakota was not very effective in that fight. Her hits against the South Dakota created very little effective damage. Then the North Carolina opened up, the oldest of the new style fast battleships.
The American 16-in super heavy shells punch through the armor on the Kirshima like it wasn't they also penetrated the water down lower on the hull and still punch Ii nf right through the sides
I cannot agree with your assessment of the two German ships KMS Schleswig Holstein and KMS Schlesien.
Yes, the ships were already obsolete in the First World War.
But the German Navy made the best of it.
They became training ships and saw more military action in World War II than the 4 modern battleships of the German Navy, they were used as artillery support at the start of the war and then Operation Barbarossa, as well as during the retreat of German troops.
In addition, they were successfully used as icebreakers in the Baltic Sea during the winter months.
I would only use the designation, 'Worst Battleships of World War II', for ships that had done nothing and were practically unused.
That is not the case with these two ships.
The two ships, which had received the German nickname The Iron of the Baltic Sea, did their work from the beginning of the war until its end. that does not deserve the designation Worst.
And with these two ships you have to knock the english-speaking area, the german books about these ships, around their ears again.
The Imperial Navy, which built these two ships, as well as the Kriegsmarine, never classified these two ships as battleships.
the German designation is 'Lienienschiff'='Linenship' not 'Schlachtschiff'='Battleship'.
Although not actually battleships I would like to nominate the Alaska's. Yes they are a large heavy cruiser. But the general public seeing a picture of one would likely describe them as a battleship. Given that they look like an Iowa or North Carolina in profile.
Hi Ryan! I thought you would have included the Cesare and Cavour (maybe not the Duilio and Doria, they were a bit better). Although i'm italian, and although i find them absolutely beautiful, i think their conversion/refit/rebuilding was mainly a huge waste of money.
I disagree, after their rebuilds they were fast enough to present a modest problem for the Royal Navy in the Mediterranean as they could escape any of the older battleships the RN were prepared to commit to the theatre and were an overwhelming threat to the British cruisers that could run them down. This was, of course, not enough to achieve any long term success, but the Regia Marina was able to effectively contest the Mediterranean for a while and the presence of Cesare and Cavour was an important part of that. Without their rebuilds these ships would have been utterly useless, unable to outrun or outfight even the oldest Battleships in the Royal Navy.
They would also have been much more useful against the French Navy, which is who the Regia Marina was preparing to fight. Duilio and Dora were less successful because their rebuilds were completed too late, but the idea was sound.
Not really.
The refurbishment costs of the four WWI Italian battleships had been (Augusto de Toro, "Dalle Litorio alle Impero", bulletin of the Italian Navy, March 2012):
Giulio Cesare: 160,499,000 Lire
Conte di Cavour: 161,499,000 Lire
Caio Duilio: 302,572,000 Lire
Andrea Doria: 302,969,000 Lire
For a comparison, a brand new Littorio costed 800,000,000 lire, A Zara class cruiser, from 106,000,000 Lire (Zara) to 114,700,000 Lire (Pola)
So, the four battleships costed, all toghether, like a single Littorio and an heavy cruiser. The Caio Duilio and Andrea Doria had probably been a waste of money (but that's true for about all the WWII battleships), but the Giulio Cesare and Conte di Cavour costed toghether about as much as three Zara class cruisers, and that was very convenient. For how much the Zara was a good cruiser, in a 2 vs. 3, the two battleship would have pulverised the Zaras.
There wasn't an imperative to build new ships when the refits were started. Only when france started new battleships did the RM have to respond
You would call an 8,1 inch armed sub 10000 ton design a battleship? Eidsvold and Norge were not battleships.
They gave the RN the numbers but would it have been useful to scrap a couple of R class battleships so we could have got the Lion class started earlier or used the 15" guns in a stop-gap class like the WOWS "Monarch" class? Built to KGV specification but using spare guns a la Vanguard but 10 years earlier. If the new 16" guns for the Lions couldn't be ready in time, scrap three R's, modernise two, build two extra KGVs but with nine 15" guns, Monarch and Orion.
They'd never be ready in time for the war. The Rs were still useful for secondary roles. Dismounted Turrets waiting for hulls that will probably never be completed would have been completely useless.
UK had no money in the 1930s (remember the pay for RN staff being cut?) Also, the governments of the UK in the 1930s were very anti-military and pro-appeasement. There was, literally, a lack of political will to re-arm until it was too late.
Old don't mean you throw it away TEXAS served in all theaters, and ARKANSAS won four battle stars.
The Sverige class was built to fight in a three ship formation together with destroyers to fight off the Russian/Soviet ships.
Dude, I had the GI Joe aircraft carrier. Man I miss that thing. If they had made a battleship………. Wow just the thought……. I want one…