Grik Navy

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Silhoutte of Japanese/Grik CV built on hull of Amagi Class BB.

apanese/Grik CV built from an Amagi class BB.

The Grik Navy is a main naval forces of Grik Empire and it's main expansion weapon. Initially composed of different-size versions of East Indiamen type saIil ships, armed with firebomb catapults, it was eventually improved after the contact with Japanese. The modern Grik navy - composed of ironclad warships, armed with smoothbore artillery - was created. Despite the heavy losses, inflicted upon it during the war with Grand Alliance, the Grik Navy is still one of the major naval powers of the Destroyermen's world, and enormous industrial capabilites of the Grik Empire make possible quite rapid naval construction.

= Ships: =

Grik Indiamen:
The Grik Indiamens were the backbone of Grik Navy from late 1700s and up to 1943. The initial design were obtained from captured ship of Honourable East India Company (one of the three transferred in late 1700s), and eventually reverse-engineered and put in service. Eventually, the Indiamens became the most numerous of Grik vessels, and were used as both warships and cargo ships. The Indiamens were used by Grik Empire to launch invasion and mantain the internal communications inside their empire.

Because the captured Indiamen haven't got any artillery onboard (it was unmounted by the demands of other two Indiamens crews, who feared that the westbound ship may be captured), the main armament of Grik Indiamens were the firebomb catapults and large number of troops for boarding actions. When the Japanese joined the Grik, they taught Grik how to make and use smoothbore artillery. A large number of Indiamen were armed with guns.

A few hundreds of Indiamens were gathered to combine a Great Swarm of Grik, aimed against Lemurians. After the Great Swarm destruction in the battle of Baalkpan, the remaining Indiamen were considered too outdated to be effective warships, and were largerly relegated to transport functions. Currently, Grik Empire build a limited number of Indiamens only for transport operations.

Known ships
 Giorsh  Flag Ship Grik Fleet. Sunk by USS Walker in Straits of Hell.

Modern warships (transferred):
The only modern (transferred from other world) ever comissioned by Grik Empire was the Japanese battlecruiser IJN "Amagi". Currently Grik Empire possessed no modern transferred warships.
 * IJN Amagi  BC Amagi 1925.png

Aircraft carriers:
The abscence of naval aviation was the major disadvantage of Grik Navy, leading to the large losses out of the Alliance's carriers strikes. The only aircrafts that Grik possessed - the airships - were unable to provide aerial cover for the fleet, and their japanese "ally" Kurokawa persuaded Girks that heavier-than-air aircrafts are outside their capabilites.

Hovewer, this statement was a lie, and - unbeknown to the Grik Empire - Kurokawa secretly started the airplane development in his "regency" on Zanzibar. After the retreat of Kurokawa and all his Japanese personnel to Zanzibar in 1944, the carrier-capable fighters and bombers were created, and the development of aircraft carrier was underway. To save time, the new carriers were build on hulls of "Arata Amagi" class battleships. By the late 1944, three "Akagi"-class carriers were in commission and another two were close to completion.

Akagi-class carrier:

 * IRIS Akagi sunk in Operation Outhouse Rat.
 * IRIS Kaga sunk in Battle of Second Madras Convoy.
 * IRIS Soryu sunk in Battle of Second Madras Convoy.
 * Two more unnamed ships nearly completed conversion in Zanzibar were sunk in Operation Outhouse Rat.

Ironclads:
After the defeat of the Great Swarm and start of Alliance counteroffensieve, the Grik Empire - with Japanese help - greatly modernized their navy. A large number of ironclad battleships and armored cruisers were build and comissioned in just a few years. Wooden-hulled and relatively primitive in design, they still were generally more powerfull than any Alliance counterparts, which gave Grik Empire temporary advantage.

Currently, two main classes of ironclad steam warships were produced by the Grik Empire, and one more by Kurokawa's Japanese Empire in Zanzibar:

Arata Amagi-class battleships:

 *  Arata Amagi  Sunk at First Madras [IGS Pb. p 375]
 *  Lugk  Sunk at First Madras [IGS Pb. p 375]
 *  Satsuma  Sunk at First Madras [IGS Pb. p 375]
 * Kongo was the ship Hisashi Kurokawa transfers his flag to at First Madras [IGS Pb. p 376] Possibly one of the BBs left at Madras now in Alliance control.

Azuma-class cruisers:

 * Nachi [DS Hb. p 1] is the ship Kurokawa escapes Madras on.
 * Tatsuma [DS Hb. p 1] is Nachi's surviving consort from Madras.

place holder.