Talk:IJN Amagi

Speculations:
Thinking about the "Amagi", I tried to speculate something about her origins:

Well, what we knew about the "Amagi"? It was, by the main details, exactly the same "Amagi"-type battlecruiser, exep only her main armament. For the ship of more than forty thousand tons, the five twin 10-inch turrets seems clearly undergunned; actually, this is the weakest battleship armament since the start of dreadnought's era. Especially strange is is for Japanese, that favored friepower and actually tried to fit as much weapons on their warships as possible!

The main explanation given is the "loophole" in Washington Treaty, that allowed the Japanese to complete her as represented. The problem is, that there isn't such "loophole"... at least in our vesrion of the Treaty. Of course, it is possible that in Destroyermen original world the Treaty wasn't exactly the same as in our, but i prefer to consider this as the last possible explanation, not the first one.

The "loophole-in-treaty" thing may explain the calibre, but not the number of guns. For her size, the "Amagi" could carry five triple-, or even quadruple 10-inch turrets, which would gave her fifteen-to-twenty main guns. And THIS armament would be much more adequate!

So, it seems that not only the calibre was the forced solution, but the nomber of guns either. For some reason, the Destroyermen's japanese were forced to use the existing 10-inch two-barreled turrets - probably taken from the old "Satsuma"-class intermediate battleships - on the new battlecruiser?

Considering that, I came with this possible explanation:

- The Washington Treaty allowed the immediate replacement of the capital ships, accidently lost.

- If the Japanese accidently lost one of their battleships or battlecruisers after the treaty was signed, they, of course, would want to replace it as soon as possible. For example, with one of their "Amagi"-class battlecruisers.

- But the problem was, that the Treaty specially forbade the completion of already laid ships. This means that according to the Treaty, the Japanese would be forced to scrap their already partially-complete ships, and laid new as replacement!

- The Japan may argue that it's outrage - to force them spend additional money just to replace their accidently-lost ship in accordance to the Treaty, when they have near-complete hull already. After all, Japan isn't exactly very rich country in 1920-th.

- The USA, for their point of view, would be clearly unwilling to let Japan complete one of their "Amagi"-class battlecruisers. The US navy already have enough problems with the "Kongo"-class and "Nagato"-class, because they were much faster than any US battleship. Also, the US goverment may suspect, that the loss of Japanese ship may not be actually "accidental", but merely a plot to obtain rights for completing the new battleships under the pretense of "replacement"

So, eventually, both sides made a compromise - the Japanese were allowed to complete "Amagi", but her armament was supposed to be smaller than 12-inch guns. Because the Japan Navy already have a lot of good twin 10-inch turrets from "Satsuma"-class battleships, they just placed them on "Amagi". Probably, the Japan Navy hoped to re-arm her with 16-inch guns as soon as the Treaty limist would be cancelled... but for some reason this didn't happen (the Japan cannon industry almost hit a bottleneck in late 1930th, building the enormous 18-inch guns for "Yamato"-class, and really have nothing to spare on other battleships) and the "Amagi" steam toward Javan Sea with her pathetic 10-inch armament.

P.S. Hm, isn't it possible that this was exactly the reason, why captain Kurokawa gone nuts? :) After all, he commanded the weakest armed capital ship in whole world! For the ambitious japan navy officer, to serve on something armed as "Amagi" should be almost painfull. :)

Fonzeppelin (talk) 04:54, July 25, 2015 (UTC)

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You may wish to post this on Taylor's site remember to sign off in talk with four '~' you get this with your name: Pokermind (talk) 04:47, July 25, 2015 (UTC)

Oh. Sorry. Forgot about that!

Fonzeppelin (talk) 04:54, July 25, 2015 (UTC)