At the beginning of the Second World War, the Japanese Navy (or, in the Japanese language, Nihon Kaigun, or even Teikoku Kaigun, the Imperial Navy) was arguably the most powerful navy in the world.Its naval aviation corps, consisting of 10 aircraft carriers and 1500 topnotch aviators, was the most highly trained and proficient force of its kind. American pilots fighting for Chang Kai Tchek’s nationalist China under the command of Claire Chennault were soon to realize that also, but their voice was seldom heard.All the pilots, well trained over China, mastered perfectly the tactics combining fighters, torpedo boats and dive bombers. Next to the clash of infantry in Burma, Malaysia, New Guinea and China, it over all was the clash of two navies, with specialized infantry, US Marines and Japanese Navy troops.
Japanese crews and life inside a WW2 IJN submarine – The World War II Foundation. Her opponents in any future During the pre-war years, two schools of thought battled over whether the navy should be organized around powerful battleships, ultimately able to defeat American ones in Japanese waters, or aircraft carriers. For 4 days, uninterrupted raids from the US and British task forces spraying the installations and sinking everything that remained afloat, including aircraft carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers and countless other buildings. The result was that neither ended up with overwhelming strength over its American adversary.A consistent weakness of gunned Japanese warship development was the tendency to incorporate too much armament, and too much engine power, relative to ship size (a side-effect of the Washington TreatyThe China War was of great importance and value to the Japanese naval aviation in demonstrating how aircraft could contribute to the projection of naval power ashore.The IJN had two primary responsibilities during it: to support amphibious operations on the Chinese coast and the strategic aerial bombardment of Chinese citiesFrom the onset of hostilities in 1937 until forces were diverted to combat for the Pacific war in 1941, naval aircraft played a key role in military operations on the Chinese mainland. In 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy possessed 10 battleships, 10 aircraft carriers, 38 cruisers (heavy and light), 112 destroyers, 65 submarines, and various auxiliary ships.In the years following after the end of First World War the naval construction programs of the three greatest naval powers Britain, Japan and the United States had threatened to set off a new potentially dangerous and expensive naval arms race.Many naval leaders in Japan's delegation were outraged by these limitations, as Japan would always be behind its chief rivals. At the begining of World War II, the Imperial Navy had created the finest naval aviation corps in the world. While the marines were distinguished by their tenacity despite a desperate situation at Guadalcanal, the IJN showed by its undeniable success that it had overall tactical mastery, both on land and at sea.In Santa Cruz, the IJN won a victory that was “Pyrrhic” in essence. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) was formed circa 1952-1954 after the dissolution of the IJN. info) "Navy of the Greater Japanese Empire", or 日本海軍 Nippon Kaigun, "Japanese Navy") was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 until 1945, when it was dissolved following Japan's surrender in World War II. Japan continued to build up an ever-growing fleet during the Great War, where a relentless chase against German units took place.
Japan's numerical and industrial inferiority led her to seek technical superiority (fewer, but faster, more powerful ships), qualitative superiority (better training), and aggressive tactics (daring and speedy attacks overwhelming the enemy, a recipe for success in her previous conflicts), but failed to take account of any of these traits. A vast military exercise “without risks” life-size, to check the application of the latest theories born from the joint-arms strategy.When in 1941, the war broke out with the USA, most Japanese pilots were veterans who had indeed under the belt more than 5 years of continuous fighting, including against Chennault’s “Flying Tigers”. These began with attacks on military installations largely in the Yangtze River basin along the Chinese coast by Japanese carrier aircraft.In order to combat the numerically superior American navy, the Japanese had devoted a large amount of resources to creating a force superior in quality.After these successes, the IJN now concentrated on the elimination and neutralization of strategic points from where the Allies could launch counteroffensives against Japanese conquests.In 1943, the Japanese also turned their attention to the defensive perimeters of their previous conquests. This List of Japanese Navy ships and war vessels in World War II is a list of seafaring … A “David against Goliath” who earned surviving crews a rain of presidential citations.