How did the battleship Yamato fall?

When it comes to the naval battle of World War II, people will think of huge battleships. A huge cannon looks terrible, and a movable sea fortress is alive. The most famous battleships in Europe in World War II were the German battleship Bismarck, the British battleship Prince of Wales and the American battleship Missouri. These are some battleships with strong fighting capacity in those days. But none of them were the largest and heaviest battleships at that time, so which country had the largest and heaviest battleships? How did it fall? Let's get to know each other.

There is a saying: one punch can kill a person and one punch can kill a person are different concepts. Why is it different? The former regards men as sandbags and stands and calls you. The latter means that people beat you, and if you beat them, you kill them. Obviously, the latter is much more difficult than the former!

Back to today's topic, the largest tonnage warship in Japanese history and world history-Yamato. To say that this ship is a bit like those samurai in the late Tokugawa shogunate. One word, chicken ribs! In other words, the symbolic meaning is greater than the actual meaning. Battleships with modern significance (mechanical power, walking guns, armored hull, high tonnage) were produced in the late19th century. Battleship, as the main naval vessel, has shown great power in famous naval battles such as Lisa (Italy), Wu Jia (China and Japan), Duma (Japan and Russia) and Jutland (Germany and Germany).

Therefore, in the 20th century, especially after World War I, the "ship-gunship doctrine" represented by battleships was highly respected by European and American powers. In order to compete for hegemony, naval powers all over the world compete to build battleships, which leads to the increasing tonnage of new battleships, the thicker caliber of main guns and the thicker protective armor ... The competition has reached a white-hot level, even the Washington Naval Treaty and the Washington Naval Treaty, which specifically limit the global arms race. As a country with strong self-esteem, Japan is not far behind. Japan's shipbuilding level has been continuously improved since the Meiji Restoration, and by the Showa era, Japan has become one of the world's shipbuilding powers.

However, Japan, an island country, is poor in resources, and its scientific and technological strength still lags far behind that of Britain and the United States. Moreover, under the conditions of war (1Japan launched a full-scale war of aggression against China on July 7, 937), Japan still built this unprecedented powerful warship at all costs. To this end, Japan has spent a lot of money to add a lot of new equipment to its shipbuilding industry, and purchased 15000 ton hydraulic press and three 70-ton acid open hearth furnaces from Germany. These equipments cost about100000 US dollars, enabling them to manufacture large forgings including 650 mm thick armored steel plates (used by the turret of Yamato main gun), and specially deepened the dock of Wu Haijun Factory by 65438.

In the whole construction process of the Yamato ship, the Japanese spent 65.438+05 billion yen (post-war price), with an average weight of 2 million yen per ton.

During World War II, the Japanese Navy had a joke that there were three most useless things in the world: the Egyptian pyramids, the French maginot line and the Japanese Yamato.

Yamato was born at the wrong time, just in time for the rise of the aircraft carrier. Carrier-based aircraft dominate the ocean, and the principle of "big ship and huge gun" is declining. Yamato did nothing during the whole war.

1in April, 945, the Yamato was sent to Okinawa to carry out a special attack mission, with no aircraft escort and no fuel for returning. At that time, the joint fleet suffered heavy losses and had no strength. As the flagship Yamato, it only symbolically proves to the world that the Japanese navy is still fighting. On April 7, the Yamato was sunk by American aerial bombs and torpedoes on the southwest coast of Kyushu Island, and nearly 3,000 officers and men on board served as cannon fodder.

Then, why is such a "mighty and magnificent" big meeting so vulnerable?

As we all know, battleships basically have no anti-submarine capability, and they all rely on destroyers to provide protection. There is nothing to say in this respect, all countries are the same, close to zero.

In the battle of Okinawa, in order to enhance the air defense capability, Yamato has loaded 25mm cannon with 162 doors. Among them, 52 seats are for three people and 6 doors are for single people. The number is really amazing, but the actual combat effect is not satisfactory. Old military fans know that the cannon of the Japanese navy is powered by 15 rounds of ammunition, and it is a three-fold cannon. One person operates the cannon to rotate, one person fires, three people press the ammunition, and three others stand by, which makes eight people.

The operation is complicated and the ammunition takes up space. Fifteen bullets must have a bullet gate. When fighting, for the sake of efficiency, we can only put the empty bullet brake on the ground and install the bullet brake directly, saving time.

It is conceivable that during the battle, the ship was not only full of shells, but also full of empty shells. Because there are only 15 bullets in the door, usually when the trajectory is corrected to the flight path of the aircraft, the bullets have been finished. After changing the bomb brakes, the plane flew to the other side. Compared with the chain ammunition replenishment method, the difference is not one level.

So there is nothing wrong with the battleship Yamato dying in the other air force.

As the warship with the largest displacement in the history of the world, the Yamato was once the national symbol and pride of Japan. However, as the last "life-saving straw" carrying Japanese militarism, this huge ship, known as "the world's first battleship" and "the savior of the Japanese empire", made Japan tighten its belt and make every effort to make ends meet, but eventually accelerated Japan's failure.

In a deeper sense, in the Pacific War, Japan was actually defeated by the dream that had already been eliminated by the times!