Comments by "Gregory Wright" (@gregorywright4918) on "The Drydock - Episode 213 (Part 1)" video.

A sub-caliber round might fly faster and a bit further, but it will be smaller when hitting and thus cause less damage to surface ship. On the AA side, at first the 5inch was the only thing they could fit the VT fuse into. Later they managed to get it down to 3inch, but that was too late for most battles.
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Nagumo was aware that he was the side-show, not the Decisive Battle. His job was to cause enough damage that DELAYED the US fleet from coming west for six months. He more than accomplished that, he didn't understand air combat effects very well, and he thought he was preserving the secondary part of the Japanese fleet for the future Decisive Battle. Kurita was exhausted, ill-informed (especially about supposed air support), unable to recognize what he was facing, and skeptical about the chance of success anyway.
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Sorry, mate, Callahan was killed on San Francisco, Scott on Atlanta. Look it up.
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Irn Bru...
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@tomdolan9761 Was that at Philippine Sea or Leyte Gulf? I'm not in my library...
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And dirt is a far more giving material than ship bulkheads...
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It was "his waters, his country"...
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As I recall there was a tanker shortage, plus the difference in fleet speed the task force would have to make if you added battleships to a force of cruisers and destroyers. Distance from Fiji to Noumea is around 850 miles or over three days steaming, both forces were scratch groups so the battleships could not have caught up with them once orders issued.
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@stevevalley7835 I think the old BBs were kept near well-stocked bases like SF, Pearl and Fiji during 1942; traveling between them at convoy speeds was not much of a stretch, as long as the other end had land-based fuel tanks. Moving up to the front lines would have drawn a lot more fuel, as the consumption goes up (logarithmically? exponentially?) as the average steaming speed increases. Putting an old battleship on the front lines is going to take the amount of fuel 3-4 cruisers would require. Plus both sides were holding the heavy, slower battleships back for the Decisive Battle. Colorado and Maryland were the only two operational 16inch Standards, since West Virginia was being rebuilt. I doubt King or Nimitz would want them risked.
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There was a whole element of Japanese tactical thinking that tried to use deception and maneuver to surprise an enemy and defeat him quickly. The classical "rules of war" emphasize simplicity and massing of force, which is what the US used to blunder their way to victory.
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Not really - a depth charge is a tin can with a bunch of explosive inside, there is no real shrapnel effect in water. Your likelyhood of actually hitting anything is pretty low, it is the explosion in the water nearby which creates a pressure wave that overwhelms the hull strength if close enough. You would be wasting a lot of expensive shells for little effect.
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@calvingreene90 You are talking about shells from battleship guns, right? Flying horizontally? As opposed to a depth charge which is dropped vertically over the stern or shot out to the side to drop vertically, timed by the destroyer captain to be as close as possible to overhead, and with depth settings at the last moment based on sonar readings as it passes over? How will those shells land anywhere near where the sub is if there is no ship overhead to target it, or determine the appropriate depth?
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@calvingreene90 There was no communications protocol in effect to communicate one ship's sonar readings to another ship, much less a battleship, and no battleship was equipped with sonar. Most battleship guns would only elevate to 20 or 30 degrees, and I have not seen any reduced-charge tables for putting shells into the water within sonar range of a battleship (or cruiser or destroyer for that matter). They will still be moving mostly horizontally when they hit the water, so they will not sink directly down. And there were no battleship or any other gun shells that had depth fuzes. Hedgehog was proof that the RN understood that their sonar only worked if you drove your destroyer directly at the sonar return. It worked by firing out AHEAD of the destroyer, where the sonar still had a fix on the location. There was some lag time between when you lost the fix as you went over the sub and when the depth charges got down to the right depth. The sub could maneuver in that time. But Hedgehog cut that time down, and it also worked by only exploding if it hit a solid hull, not at a guessed-at depth. It was a supplement to depth charges, not a replacement.
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Try a combination of the two videos USS Texas Foundation made before the move, along with the couple that Ryan from USS New Jersey made during the move explaining what they did to prepare. I think his second one was better.
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They would pour cold water down the inner tube as they heated the outer liner, which would cause the two to separate just a bit (most of the time). If that didn't work they would have to bore it out.
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Yes - no reinforcements...
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Nor did the Japanese ships turn back when they had the chance to rescue survivors, nor did the Japanese navy preposition subs in the area with the job of looking for survivors. Not all Halsey's fault (despite his others).
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You are presuming that Halsey would have done exactly the same things when facing different situations, which is unfair. If they had seen three gigantic battleships rather than two, they probably would have devoted more forces to the attack, and pursued them more vigorously even when they reversed. As to making any serious difference, I would doubt it because the main fight was aerial rather than surface.
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@metaknight115 I don't buy it. If Halsey had seen three giant battleships coming at him, and only one was sunk, he would not have proceeded north to face Ozawa, who he knew was a diversion anyway. He would have stuck around for more aerial attacks on Center Force. He would also have activated Task Force 34 to block the strait. The follow-on strikes would have learned from the debriefing on the Musashi's sinking, and target Yamato and Shinano more deliberately. The torpedo bombers would concentrate on one side rather than spreading their attacks on both sides (note that that was one lesson they applied to Yamato at Ten-Go). Plus, the ships would be lower on AA ammo. I think BOTH Yamato and Shinano would have been crippled or sunk. If Shinano had survived the war as a battleship, I think she would have ended her life as a target for carefully measured battleship and aerial attack in 1946.
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@tomdolan9761 Shinano's watertight doors were not fitted or tested when she was sunk because she was on her way from Yokosuka to Kure, where she was supposed to be completed and have all the doors and seals tested. If you look at the pace of her construction, the IJN put her work on pause from December 1941 to July 1942, due to the apparent fragility of battleships after Force Z was sunk. They were working with a reduced force only hard enough to get her ready to leave the drydock. Then they picked it up after Midway, but left many of the battleship features like the barbettes in place (though they did not fit the whole armored belt). They were expecting to finish her by April 1945, but put a rush on it after Philippine Sea in June 1944. If you look at build dates, Yamato took 33 months to launch and 49 months to be ready to commission at Kure, and Musashi took 32 months to launch and 52 months (and a week) to be ready for commissioning at Nagasaki. Shinano was laid down at Yokosuka in May 1940. Since it was a different shipyard I would not expect "builders efficiencies" to accrue, so say around 33-34 months to launch and around 52-54 months to be ready to commission. That is a launch date around March 1943 and a commissioning date around September 1944, presuming they did not pause her work after Force Z went down. As I recall, Yamato was not "ready to fight" after commissioning, requiring another three to four months for completion and training. Musashi is recorded as still receiving secondary guns and radar after her commissioning, not being considered ready for another four months. So I don't think Shinano could have made Leyte Gulf, even if she had been pushed forward as a battleship like her sisters.
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@metaknight115 Again you are postulating a significant increase to Center Force, but not giving Halsey a chance to change his reaction. I just think that's unfair, even if it is a "what-if".
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I was thinking about an overhead hoist as well, perhaps an X-shaped grabber to grab and drop the breech in place. I was wondering what those two wooden blocks on the deck were for.
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