Stopping torpedos by ditching your plane in front of them. Wow. And six torpedos in one volley. The sub commander gets the Mike Ehrmantraut award for no half measures.
If they were the US Made "Mark 14" torpedo's, they were notorious for running too deep, the magnetic proximity detonators not working, and as a last insult, even the contact detonators had a habit of not detonating on contact, in one tragic instance the gyro failed and it turned in a circle and sank the sub firing it, and they were basically just dead weight while being carried on a sub, so, I'm betting the sub commander was happy to send off as many as he could, as quick as possible.
@@Internutt2023 this was June, 1944. Most of the Mark XIV issues had been solved by then. The Albacore’s Captain had wanted to swing around and unload his stern tubes as well. It was a new Japanese Fleet Carrier. The Highest priority target. But he had to start dodging destroyers and never got back into firing position.
@@kdrapertrucker as an example of what happens when the sub is able to come around and also Fire it’s stern tubes, we have the IJN Unryu. Another first of it’s class new Carrier. While enroute to oppose American landings in the Philippines it crossed paths with the USS Redfish. She similarly fired a full spread of 6 and got 2 hits. One hit square admidships just below the bridge island, that flooded the engine spaces and shut down propulsion. As the carrier neared a 20 degree list the crew was ordered to all assemble on the flight deck for an orderly evacuation to the destroyers. They assembled on the flight deck and were treated to an almost 40 minute speech and poetry recitation by the Admiral, in praise of their wonderful ship. Nobody noticed that in that time the Redfish had shaken off the destroyers hunting her and had come round to unload 4 more torpedoes. At least one hit, and impacted the space where Unryu had been storing several dozen Ohka suicide piloted Rocket Bombs. Detonating them all. Each at full fuel load was roughly a 2000lb bomb. This blew the bow off the ship. She pitched forward near vertically and sank in under a minute. Of her 2000+ crew most of whom were standing on the flight deck ready to abandon ship, only around 160 survived. The fate of the Taiho and Unryu looked at side by side is the near perfect microcosm of the state of the Japanese Navy in late ‘44. Helpless, clueless and unable to swim.
My grandfather was in the Battle of Lette Gulf .The fact that he was quiet about it most of his life and didn't share it until he was in his late '80s. Kind of blew me away but the stuff he shared with me I can see why. That was quite the naval battle that happened and it doesn't get talked about enough, especially the stuff that was going on with the amphibious landing cruise and what was going on there. I don't know if you've done one on that battle, but it would be nice to see you do a real in-depth one on it if you haven't already. Thank you for the good work. Love your channel
(1) As others have pointed out, there weren't 1,650 officers. The total ship's complement was 2,150 officers and enlisted men. Officers are not the same as enlisted men. These are two different categories of sailors (personnel). The video correctly says "1,650 officers and men [shorthand for 'enlisted men']" at about 9:44. (2) In NO sense were 1,650 sailors (officers and enlisted) sacrificed to save the ship. The ship was not actually saved, and the 1,650 weren't employed in any manner that would trade them for the ship.
@@SkyWriter25 Ha ha yeah. Apparently there's not much footage of the actual Taiho so almost 100% of the footage is of other ships. But it sure is weird that the Japanese had the Enterprise (CVN-65) so long before the U.S. built it!
Wires were placed aft. Middhip, and foredeck. The theories being. Aft is normal. Midship is in theory used when the foredeck is clear of aircraft. And foredeck is for aircraft landing in the opposite direction when the ship is sailing away from the wind. Some u.s. carriers had them forward. But deemed useless except for biplanes. Those built with them, had them removed in overhauls. That is like the hangerdeck side shooting catapults. Deemed not useful as they took far to long to reload another aircraft. These too were gone quickly in the war. Most of those decisions were left to the captains in preplanning the scheduled overhauls. And most had better use of the space.
@@badmutherfunster I remember a few nights on the flight deck where the last aircraft to trap and tiedown was an E2-C and they missed all four wires over and over and over again. It will of course be the one night they might secure from flight ops early enough to catch midrats and eat an actual hot meal.
A big difference between American and Japanese naval doctrine at the time was a focus on damage control. American doctrine states that everyone is part of damage control, and if the ship takes a hit, then everyone who isn't firing back works to mitigate the damage. Japanese doctrine was that you had your posting, and you didn't deviate from your duties. There was a damage control team that would handle repairs as a fully trained unit. The American method was better at reducing ship losses since there was no worry of the damage control team being unable to reach the area affected or to be wiped out in an attack. The Japanese method was more efficient early on when training was better, and there were more seasoned veterans in the ship to effect their orders. In a few cases, that discipline of the Japanese crews to not leave their station to put out fires or stop flooding is what doomed the entire ship.
Early in the war, like Midway, the japanese didn't have damage control. It wasn't till later that they developed damage control... but still nowhere near as good as the Americans.
I don't believe that "every man is damage control" became the USN standard until the carrier fires during the Vietnam conflict. There were distinct DC teams during WW2.
Not to mention that the various systems on US ships were far more redundant than on Japanese ships. A single hit on a Japanese ship could rupture a water main for firefighting, which would disable all of the fire hoses across the ship. Or a single hit could/would knock out internal comms shipwide. American ships, meanwhile, had redundancy across all those systems. A hit ruptured a fire main? Just isolate it and the the segments on either side will pick up the slack until the rupture could be repaired. Internal comms were the same way.
Bear in mind- Taiho was the only fleet carrier in the Japanese Navy that could be considered comparable to the Essex Class of the United States. Taiho took one torpedo from USS Albacore and was a total loss. That same year, an Essex class carrier took similar damage. The USS Intrepid took one torpedo during Operation Hailstone and, while rendered out of service for a few months, ultimately survived and still exists today as a museum Truly, the damage control made the difference
Speaking of that, I couldn't bring myself to finish this video. The reason, is because at the beginning of the video every time a mention was made about how Taiho was sunk, the video showed an Essex class carrier burning. When the video got to the part where a Yorktown class carrier was shown, I gave up. I've read history for far too long to put up with cheap parlour tricks.
No, not one Japanese carrier was comparable to the Essex class carriers. The Taiho didn't even compare well with previous Japanese carriers like Shokaku. Taiho displaced 30,000 tons but carried only 65 aircraft. Shokaku displaced 25,000 tons and carried 72 aircraft. Essex carriers displaced about 30,000 tons and carried 90 aircraft. Aircraft are the hitting power of carriers; i.e. more aircraft the greater damage a carrier can deal. The best allegory, the Japanese carriers were like battleships with 12 inch guns against the Essex class battleships with 16 inch guns. Guess who wins?
I wish to be totally honest with you. I have subscribed to all of your dark channels, I rarely comment. As a amateur of all things of history your channel is one of my favorites contemporary fact based informational videos I have come across. I'm 60 years old and have seen many historical videos. As a veteran I thank you. As a viewer I commend you.
I agree with the other reply. Very nice comment. Although due to no fault of their own, the nature of the dark docs channel’s amount of research they need to do does make them more susceptible to errors when researching. So I’d 100% recommend reading the comments on every video since they usually miss something or other. (Not trashing them, just want to help lol) Thank you for your service by the way! Cliche but I mean it.
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway by Jonathan Parshall goes into depth on Japanese damage control. It played a significant role at Midway.
Midway was when OH&S was set aside for expedience and well it cost a Nation the War in a sense! (im certain the Yanks would of done ok if they had of lost there but war would of stretched out longer)
@@ibeatyoutubecircumventingy6344 By the end of the war, the US had built 17 Essex class carriers. I believe 24 were built by the end of 1946. They absolutely would have been fine. The US never had to fight at Midway. It was in bomber range of the Hawai'i air fields. Japanese shipping capacity was already stretched before Midway. They decided to fight because they felt they could win and they knew new carriers were coming down the line. However it wasn't the loss of the carriers that were important, it was the loss of the experienced air crews. Halsey didn't understand this. Japan still had aircraft carriers at the end of the war. By the end of 1943 they had lost half of the original Kido Butai and had to use flight instructors in the field, which also impacted training. The Mariana's Turkey Shoot proves this point - the Japanese pilots were terrible.
@@recoil53 exactly. Germany suffered the same fate. Lots of planes,no pilots(or fuel) Fighter pilots were throw into battle with as little as 7 hours training. The veteran luftwaffe pilots said they always died right away.
Some of the at-sea footage in this video appears to be USS Hornet and USS Lexington, not IJN Taiho. Hilariously, there's also a little footage of the nuclear powered USS Enterprise {with its very distinctive square control tower) thrown in for good measure a little past four minutes in! :D
I agree, the video of a carrier coming through an open bridge, is I believe, of an Essex class carrier, coming out of the Fore River Shipyard, in Quincy, Massachusetts. Several Essex class carriers were built there. As I sit here typing this I am only a little more than a quarter mile from the Shipyard, that particular bridge was dismantled around the year 2000.
I’ve also noticed a lot of the same footage in different videos that aren’t so much related but I just figured there can only be so fun footage to use and recycle. Still love the history and channel
That was one of the most important example of the success of the US Navy from what I have read, the USN level of training and experience in damage control.
It wasn't only the training. Japanese carriers, much like the aircraft they carried, seemed to be designed by people with only offense in mind and who never really gave much thought to the ability to take damage and continue fighting. Think of it like a fighter who can punch hard, fast, accurately, & repeatedly but who also has a glass jaw and goes down after taking just one good hit on the chin. That seemed to be Japan's design philosophy during WW2. It's remarkable to think just how difficult it was to sink Japanese battleships like Musashi and Yamato and then think just how easy it was to sink their aircraft carriers. The Akagi went down from one solid hit with a 500lb bomb dropped by Dick Best at the Battle of Midway!
@@futuresonex In Musashi and Yamato's case - it was their Armor that kept them floating. Plus, when Musashi was attacked, both sides were hit. Thus, prolonging the flooding effect. By the time they got to Yamato, they realized that they should concentrate on one side, thus capsizing Yamato rather quickly.
Before getting into that, please realize that US aircraft had more powerful engines and their dive bombers carried BOMBS TWICE AS BIG as the Japanese counterparts. Loss of Taiho was embarrassing but so was the loss of Lexington...
You do realize there is a clip of the U.S.S. Enterprise CVN-65 just around 4 minutes in. Her island is unmistakable. Would have been nice if the US had her for the battle of the Philippine Seas... 😀
Mickey,, hell why stop there, let's get the Enterprise ncc-1701 into The fray,, a warp equipped deep-space- capable heavy cruiser of the Constitution class would come in really handy for wiping out the entire Japanese archipelago with 16 phasor bursts LOL...
@@micnorton9487 I don't know if you read all of my comment, but the reason for it was that there was footage of CVN-65 included with the WWII footage in the video. For some reason, I don't think she was there at the time... As far as NCC-1701 goes, she can't interfere due to the possibility of changing history and removing their future selves. See the episode "City on the Edge of Forever". Definitely one of the finest Star Trek episodes ever.
@@MickeyMouse-lo4sy DAMN you're right of course but still,, knowing Kirk's penchant for breaking the prime directive,, if he thought he couldn't get back to the future LOL, maybe he might defeat the Japanese Navy just because a certain place in the Sea of Japan would have been the only perfect place to actually land the Enterprise in the ocean, and still be close enough to land to get people ashore and make arrangements and things etc ... After that,, as we learn from the planet with the Romans, 100 men armed with phasers could take out the combined armies of what's left of the Japanese empire...
Damage control was one of Japan's biggest weaknesses. Some were poorly trained, but the biggest issue was they had dedicated damage control teams, actual groups of men dedicated to damage control. Should they be busy with one issue and another arises you land in trouble. Should they be incapacitated in some way, you lost all damage control. Compared to the US where everyone was taught damage control, you could pull men from teams where they weren't needed and put them to repairs
A lot of the combat footage appears to be US Navy made. 3:51)The Type 96 looks like the light machine rifle designed by Benet and Mercie and made by Hotchkiss. The US Army had some. Chambered for the .30 caliber of 1906(30-06) and called M1909. The M1906 had a different shoulder stock and no carrying handle.
3:10 - What was the size of the AA guns. 65 caliber was mentioned, but that is the multiple of the diameter equaling the total length of the barrel ... Oh, Type 98 was 10cm, so barrel length was 650cm (or just shy of 256 inches)
My uncle paul was in that navel battle he was injured and got the purple heart i dont know what ship he was on cause he took his war stories to his grave not even his kids know what hes experienced out there in the Pacific rest in peace uncle paul and all our beloved ww2 brave men
@@smaho27 i agree my grandfather was in the army and he has told me lots of crazy things he was a machine gunner before he got discharged in 1944 from catching malaria bad in the jungle of papa new Guinea he was in the army from 1939 to 1944 pfc adrian e reigle
@@TheRetirednavy92 I thank your dad for his service who knows where we'd be if we lost WW2 I'm just thankful and proud of all our WW2 veterans well all veterans
How exactly does one have a navel battle? Do you somehow fit a weapon's hilt into your navel and try to slice open the other guy's belly? What if your navel is an outie and you can't fit a weapon hilt into it?
I love these videos, just show anything in black & white film since nobody is going to know the difference. Did you see what I think is the nuclear powered US carrier. Possibly the Enterprise?
Damage control was more like firefighting. Flaws in design were not well anticipated. Inadequate training to handle difficult situations. Can't fight a war in this manner.
That one didn't seen very ...easy t follow? Some things just didn't make sense. Was it just me? Anyways, absolutely love your videos. They are usually amazing and pretty easy to follow...once you get used to the "at the speed of sound" narration! 😆. I'm sure it was just me. Thanks again for the awesome videos!!!
An easy fix for the obviously accelerated narration is to simply adjust it to a slower more easy to understand pace by clicking on "settings", and then clicking on the "playback speed" that suits you the most.
A hundred websites exist with that very information. I don't find a listing for USS Bremington. I did find USS Bennington, an Essex-class carrier, not a tanker conversion, from WW II.
Thanks for the video. Japan had more advanced carriers than I thought. The video was only flawed by substituting US carries in some scenes. There is no mistaking the Saratoga and I declare I think I saw the silhouette of the Yorktown class.
When the RN joined the USN in the Pacific, they swapped info, the British learning about advanced damage control from USN experience, and the Americans about fighter control learned during the Battle of Britain.
True, you should not underestimate your opponent. But the Chinese Navy is just transiting from a coastal force to a deep water Navy. The bulk of their ships and subs are coastal. Their first task forces are only now going into the Philippine Sea. Money can build fancy new ships, but as the Russians are showing in Ukraine, fancy toys are just scrap metal without trained men and officers.
Contrast IJN damage control with what happened to the USS Yorktown. When Yorktown was abandoned after being torpedoed by torpedo bombers at Midway, it somehow stayed floating overnight and refused to sink. Damage control teams actually reboarded it and had made headway in reanimating its twenty-five-and-a-half-thousand-ton, bomb-and-torpedo-riddled corpse when an IJN submarine, apparently afraid of the unholy powers of US Navy damage control, gutted it with two more torpedos and finally killed it.
“At the peak of her career”? The IJN Taiho was sunk on her *maiden* voyage, largely by her own inexperienced crew, with a little torpedo help from the USS Albacore, so that’s an *odd* expression to use…
Nice informative video but why would you use a picture of IJN Kaiyo as your thumbnail and while telling of the taiho, why flash pics of other carriers like Essex class and even a pic of nuclear powered Enterprise??
Interesting that most of the film footage is of the Franklin, an American aircraft carrier that should have sunk or exploded, but for incredible feats of damage control on the part of her crew. Just the opposite of what happened to Taiho.
I also heard that because there was steel shortage that the Japanese used wood on most of the interior of their carriers and they were like a match box. Once ignited, they were very difficult to put the fires out.
Hello, Why is there a video clip of the U.S.S. Enterprise CVN-65 shown at 4:12 into the storyline? It’s not Japanese, it was launched a few decades later… 4:13
Fyi. At the battle of Midway the Americans damage control units were dressed in asbestos suites and shields. The Japanese was wearing shorts and shirts.
And the yanks did fire drills. So more I learn about the Japanese in ww2 so more I'm impressed how far they got with their chaotic organisation and complete lack of coordination.
@@ohasis8331 The class problems between officers and crew were well known. To me, we all die if we don't work together and that works better if we communicate openly and train. But that's me.
I understand finding video can be a challenge. But you used video of a Saratoga class US carrier, an Enteprise class US carrier, and an Essex class US carrier. And really, your narrative script. The submarine "launched without warning." Was there any expectation that the sub work announce its intention to sink the carrier beforehand?
Are any of these actually an IJN carrier? I saw the Hornet launching the Dolittle raid an a very new nuke Enterprise plus numerous later war ships maybe one IJN. And that's the Franklin burning
Excellent commentary. The Japanese were very good at copying western technology but did not have the mental experience to use it to its best advantage. This is one of the best examples of this I have seen. Thanks again.
almost ninety per cent of the footage in this video is of US carriers, including a fleeting glimpse of the 1960's nuclear carrier USS Enterprise....we also have some totally irrelevant footage of large calibre battleship guns being fired......why? As there is probably no movie footage of Taiho in existence, why not just settle for showing the still photos of the ship that is the subject of the video, rather than misleading viewers with footage of American ships? I dont doubt for a moment that much of the commentary is accurate, but accompanying it with wildly inaccurate and inappropriate movie footage defeats the object, as so many people simply point out the errors and dont pay that much attention to what is being said............
In the American market, few people know the difference between the English ton (2000lb) and the long ton, later known as a "metric" (2200lb) ton. the metric system was not a common term. To explain the difference it was the called short ton 2000 and long ton of 2200 pounds.
That was cool to see in the Video the scene of a Carrier being Towed by Tugs under a Drawbridge ,its the Bethlehem Steel Shipyard in Quincy / Boston. I'm looking at it from my House on the Beach as a Tanker is being guided by. The Shipyard is Completely gone, there is the remains of two Drydocks, even the Drawbridge was Torn down 10 years ago. it sad America doesn't make anything.
The title of this video is ridiculous and deceptive. The ship was not saved, nor was there any willful decision to sacrifice large numbers of people to try to save it.
A video about a Japanese carrier, using shots of what appear to be several US carriers, including the Hornet launching one of Doolittle's B-25s, and even one of the modern Enterprise. When describing the attributes of the Taiho, it would have been better to not use footage of non-Japanese carriers at the same time. Just saying...
David...MAYBE the creator/writers of this video didn't CARE ! The USA WON.....THE JAPS LOST. The idea/concept of "Rubbing-it-in" comes to mind. Look it up !
Well researched? The first of many mistakes is made already in the video title claiming 1650 officers were lost. That’s the total number of sailors lost, in total there were less than 300 officers including air crews. Not to mention they don’t even answer the question posed in the title -why were those men sacrificed? To say these videos are well researched is a joke, these guys just make wikipedia articles into a video format
As beautiful a ship as Taiho was, she was designed to fail. Failing to protect fuel tanks and failing to properly train the crew guaranteed sinking in war time.
Time, supply levels of materials to make ships, planes, and guns, no experienced replacements for the 1000s of casualties, no fuel imports (submarines!), training boys to fly with a broom handle nailed to an apple crate...
Stopping torpedos by ditching your plane in front of them. Wow. And six torpedos in one volley. The sub commander gets the Mike Ehrmantraut award for no half measures.
That's all the bow tubes, he could have swung around and fired his stern tubes as well if he really wanted to bring the pain.
If they were the US Made "Mark 14" torpedo's, they were notorious for running too deep, the magnetic proximity detonators not working, and as a last insult, even the contact detonators had a habit of not detonating on contact, in one tragic instance the gyro failed and it turned in a circle and sank the sub firing it, and they were basically just dead weight while being carried on a sub, so, I'm betting the sub commander was happy to send off as many as he could, as quick as possible.
@@Internutt2023 this was June, 1944. Most of the Mark XIV issues had been solved by then. The Albacore’s Captain had wanted to swing around and unload his stern tubes as well. It was a new Japanese Fleet Carrier. The Highest priority target. But he had to start dodging destroyers and never got back into firing position.
For something that prized you dump the whole arsenal on it just to make sure
@@kdrapertrucker as an example of what happens when the sub is able to come around and also Fire it’s stern tubes, we have the IJN Unryu. Another first of it’s class new Carrier. While enroute to oppose American landings in the Philippines it crossed paths with the USS Redfish. She similarly fired a full spread of 6 and got 2 hits. One hit square admidships just below the bridge island, that flooded the engine spaces and shut down propulsion. As the carrier neared a 20 degree list the crew was ordered to all assemble on the flight deck for an orderly evacuation to the destroyers. They assembled on the flight deck and were treated to an almost 40 minute speech and poetry recitation by the Admiral, in praise of their wonderful ship. Nobody noticed that in that time the Redfish had shaken off the destroyers hunting her and had come round to unload 4 more torpedoes. At least one hit, and impacted the space where Unryu had been storing several dozen Ohka suicide piloted Rocket Bombs. Detonating them all. Each at full fuel load was roughly a 2000lb bomb. This blew the bow off the ship. She pitched forward near vertically and sank in under a minute. Of her 2000+ crew most of whom were standing on the flight deck ready to abandon ship, only around 160 survived. The fate of the Taiho and Unryu looked at side by side is the near perfect microcosm of the state of the Japanese Navy in late ‘44. Helpless, clueless and unable to swim.
My grandfather was in the Battle of Lette Gulf .The fact that he was quiet about it most of his life and didn't share it until he was in his late '80s. Kind of blew me away but the stuff he shared with me I can see why. That was quite the naval battle that happened and it doesn't get talked about enough, especially the stuff that was going on with the amphibious landing cruise and what was going on there. I don't know if you've done one on that battle, but it would be nice to see you do a real in-depth one on it if you haven't already. Thank you for the good work. Love your channel
My father was in the battle of the Leyte gulf as well, and on the assault of the island of Leyte
The Navy battles at that time in lette was crazy
My father was at Surigao Strait. He was Navy from 1937-1957.
Try looking up “The unauthorised history of the pacific war” on this platform….best stuff around.! By far!
@@ut000bs Really? A-WOW!
(1) As others have pointed out, there weren't 1,650 officers. The total ship's complement was 2,150 officers and enlisted men. Officers are not the same as enlisted men. These are two different categories of sailors (personnel). The video correctly says "1,650 officers and men [shorthand for 'enlisted men']" at about 9:44. (2) In NO sense were 1,650 sailors (officers and enlisted) sacrificed to save the ship. The ship was not actually saved, and the 1,650 weren't employed in any manner that would trade them for the ship.
Not to mention that carrier at 4:14. Who knew that the Japanese had an Enterprise class nuclear carrier? 🙄
@@SkyWriter25 Ha ha yeah. Apparently there's not much footage of the actual Taiho so almost 100% of the footage is of other ships. But it sure is weird that the Japanese had the Enterprise (CVN-65) so long before the U.S. built it!
Well its like, clickbait. Ya know?
@@deadlyoneable Yep, it sure is!
This channel sucks for this exact reasons. Getting key details wrong. Also terrible narration.
14 arresting gear wires, I guess that speaks volumes as to how many experienced pilots they had lost by then.
Wires were placed aft. Middhip, and foredeck. The theories being. Aft is normal. Midship is in theory used when the foredeck is clear of aircraft. And foredeck is for aircraft landing in the opposite direction when the ship is sailing away from the wind. Some u.s. carriers had them forward. But deemed useless except for biplanes. Those built with them, had them removed in overhauls. That is like the hangerdeck side shooting catapults. Deemed not useful as they took far to long to reload another aircraft. These too were gone quickly in the war. Most of those decisions were left to the captains in preplanning the scheduled overhauls. And most had better use of the space.
Try and catch the 3rd wire if not ,meh, 11 more to go at 😂
@@badmutherfunster I remember a few nights on the flight deck where the last aircraft to trap and tiedown was an E2-C and they missed all four wires over and over and over again. It will of course be the one night they might secure from flight ops early enough to catch midrats and eat an actual hot meal.
A big difference between American and Japanese naval doctrine at the time was a focus on damage control. American doctrine states that everyone is part of damage control, and if the ship takes a hit, then everyone who isn't firing back works to mitigate the damage. Japanese doctrine was that you had your posting, and you didn't deviate from your duties. There was a damage control team that would handle repairs as a fully trained unit.
The American method was better at reducing ship losses since there was no worry of the damage control team being unable to reach the area affected or to be wiped out in an attack. The Japanese method was more efficient early on when training was better, and there were more seasoned veterans in the ship to effect their orders. In a few cases, that discipline of the Japanese crews to not leave their station to put out fires or stop flooding is what doomed the entire ship.
Early in the war, like Midway, the japanese didn't have damage control. It wasn't till later that they developed damage control... but still nowhere near as good as the Americans.
I don't believe that "every man is damage control" became the USN standard until the carrier fires during the Vietnam conflict. There were distinct DC teams during WW2.
Not to mention that the various systems on US ships were far more redundant than on Japanese ships. A single hit on a Japanese ship could rupture a water main for firefighting, which would disable all of the fire hoses across the ship. Or a single hit could/would knock out internal comms shipwide. American ships, meanwhile, had redundancy across all those systems. A hit ruptured a fire main? Just isolate it and the the segments on either side will pick up the slack until the rupture could be repaired. Internal comms were the same way.
And the Japanese doctrine was that the officers ran the ship while the crew were largely uneducated conscripts.
Just like how every US marine is a rifleman, every US sailor is a firefighter.
Bear in mind-
Taiho was the only fleet carrier in the Japanese Navy that could be considered comparable to the Essex Class of the United States.
Taiho took one torpedo from USS Albacore and was a total loss.
That same year, an Essex class carrier took similar damage. The USS Intrepid took one torpedo during Operation Hailstone and, while rendered out of service for a few months, ultimately survived and still exists today as a museum
Truly, the damage control made the difference
Intrepid took a kamikaze hit as well
Speaking of that, I couldn't bring myself to finish this video. The reason, is because at the beginning of the video every time a mention was made about how Taiho was sunk, the video showed an Essex class carrier burning. When the video got to the part where a Yorktown class carrier was shown, I gave up. I've read history for far too long to put up with cheap parlour tricks.
@@briankorbelik2873 Why is there a Bear in your mind?
When In NYC come visit the Intrepid, it's worth the trip !
No, not one Japanese carrier was comparable to the Essex class carriers. The Taiho didn't even compare well with previous Japanese carriers like Shokaku. Taiho displaced 30,000 tons but carried only 65 aircraft. Shokaku displaced 25,000 tons and carried 72 aircraft. Essex carriers displaced about 30,000 tons and carried 90 aircraft.
Aircraft are the hitting power of carriers; i.e. more aircraft the greater damage a carrier can deal. The best allegory, the Japanese carriers were like battleships with 12 inch guns against the Essex class battleships with 16 inch guns. Guess who wins?
I wish to be totally honest with you. I have subscribed to all of your dark channels, I rarely comment. As a amateur of all things of history your channel is one of my favorites contemporary fact based informational videos I have come across. I'm 60 years old and have seen many historical videos. As a veteran I thank you. As a viewer I commend you.
Aww. That’s a sweet comment. 😘
@@DAD_979 thank you.
I agree with the other reply. Very nice comment. Although due to no fault of their own, the nature of the dark docs channel’s amount of research they need to do does make them more susceptible to errors when researching. So I’d 100% recommend reading the comments on every video since they usually miss something or other. (Not trashing them, just want to help lol)
Thank you for your service by the way! Cliche but I mean it.
@@nitrous_god missing something is not necessarily a problem, hell I've been missing something all my life 🙄🤪👍
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midway by Jonathan Parshall goes into depth on Japanese damage control. It played a significant role at Midway.
Midway was when OH&S was set aside for expedience and well it cost a Nation the War in a sense! (im certain the Yanks would of done ok if they had of lost there but war would of stretched out longer)
@@ibeatyoutubecircumventingy6344 By the end of the war, the US had built 17 Essex class carriers. I believe 24 were built by the end of 1946. They absolutely would have been fine.
The US never had to fight at Midway. It was in bomber range of the Hawai'i air fields. Japanese shipping capacity was already stretched before Midway. They decided to fight because they felt they could win and they knew new carriers were coming down the line.
However it wasn't the loss of the carriers that were important, it was the loss of the experienced air crews. Halsey didn't understand this. Japan still had aircraft carriers at the end of the war. By the end of 1943 they had lost half of the original Kido Butai and had to use flight instructors in the field, which also impacted training. The Mariana's Turkey Shoot proves this point - the Japanese pilots were terrible.
@@recoil53 exactly.
Germany suffered the same fate.
Lots of planes,no pilots(or fuel)
Fighter pilots were throw into battle with as little as 7 hours training.
The veteran luftwaffe pilots said they always died right away.
@@recoil53 bro tell me you know about midway without telling me you know not of what occurred.
@@recoil53 I guess it was good that the code breakers were doing good work.
Some of the at-sea footage in this video appears to be USS Hornet and USS Lexington, not IJN Taiho. Hilariously, there's also a little footage of the nuclear powered USS Enterprise {with its very distinctive square control tower) thrown in for good measure a little past four minutes in! :D
I agree, the video of a carrier coming through an open bridge, is I believe, of an Essex class carrier, coming out of the Fore River Shipyard, in Quincy, Massachusetts. Several Essex class carriers were built there. As I sit here typing this I am only a little more than a quarter mile from the Shipyard, that particular bridge was dismantled around the year 2000.
I Believe You. I've Caught Discrepancies In Many Of His Videos & Read About Them In The Comments, As Well. Thank You.
I’ve also noticed a lot of the same footage in different videos that aren’t so much related but I just figured there can only be so fun footage to use and recycle. Still love the history and channel
Good thing the IJN didn't have the Enterprise🤯
Perhaps someone can find video of Taiho?
Damage control training made the difference between damaged American carriers that limped home for repairs, and damaged Japanese carriers that didn't.
That was one of the most important example of the success of the US Navy from what I have read, the USN level of training and experience in damage control.
It wasn't only the training. Japanese carriers, much like the aircraft they carried, seemed to be designed by people with only offense in mind and who never really gave much thought to the ability to take damage and continue fighting. Think of it like a fighter who can punch hard, fast, accurately, & repeatedly but who also has a glass jaw and goes down after taking just one good hit on the chin. That seemed to be Japan's design philosophy during WW2. It's remarkable to think just how difficult it was to sink Japanese battleships like Musashi and Yamato and then think just how easy it was to sink their aircraft carriers. The Akagi went down from one solid hit with a 500lb bomb dropped by Dick Best at the Battle of Midway!
@@futuresonex In Musashi and Yamato's case - it was their Armor that kept them floating. Plus, when Musashi was attacked, both sides were hit. Thus, prolonging the flooding effect. By the time they got to Yamato, they realized that they should concentrate on one side, thus capsizing Yamato rather quickly.
Before getting into that, please realize that US aircraft had more powerful engines and their dive bombers carried BOMBS TWICE AS BIG as the Japanese counterparts.
Loss of Taiho was embarrassing but so was the loss of Lexington...
The U.S did have some quality damage control in WW2. Outstanding work from those sailors.
Man’s inhumanity to man. It was necessary but still so brutal. This Channel content is consistently great.
Excellent presentation. Thank you. You produce first-class mini-documentaries.
You do realize there is a clip of the U.S.S. Enterprise CVN-65 just around 4 minutes in. Her island is unmistakable. Would have been nice if the US had her for the battle of the Philippine Seas... 😀
I was just about to add this very same comment. Wasn’t there a movie where a modern aircraft carrier was time warped back into WWII. Final countdown?
@Joseph Gates yes, that's the movie. The carrier portrayed is the USS Nimitz, CVN 68.
Mickey,, hell why stop there, let's get the Enterprise ncc-1701 into The fray,, a warp equipped deep-space- capable heavy cruiser of the Constitution class would come in really handy for wiping out the entire Japanese archipelago with 16 phasor bursts LOL...
@@micnorton9487 I don't know if you read all of my comment, but the reason for it was that there was footage of CVN-65 included with the WWII footage in the video. For some reason, I don't think she was there at the time... As far as NCC-1701 goes, she can't interfere due to the possibility of changing history and removing their future selves. See the episode "City on the Edge of Forever". Definitely one of the finest Star Trek episodes ever.
@@MickeyMouse-lo4sy DAMN you're right of course but still,, knowing Kirk's penchant for breaking the prime directive,, if he thought he couldn't get back to the future LOL, maybe he might defeat the Japanese Navy just because a certain place in the Sea of Japan would have been the only perfect place to actually land the Enterprise in the ocean, and still be close enough to land to get people ashore and make arrangements and things etc ... After that,, as we learn from the planet with the Romans, 100 men armed with phasers could take out the combined armies of what's left of the Japanese empire...
Another excellent episode Sir, thank you!!!🙏👌⚓
Damage control was one of Japan's biggest weaknesses. Some were poorly trained, but the biggest issue was they had dedicated damage control teams, actual groups of men dedicated to damage control. Should they be busy with one issue and another arises you land in trouble. Should they be incapacitated in some way, you lost all damage control.
Compared to the US where everyone was taught damage control, you could pull men from teams where they weren't needed and put them to repairs
Another excellent presentation!! One of the highest quality channels on YT.
The battle of the Philippine Sea proved that in Naval Aircraft carrier warfare of WW2 numbers don’t count for shit, experience is what matters.
Thank you for sharing
🏆💪🙏🇺🇲🎖️
This was truly a formidable ship.
A lot of the combat footage appears to be US Navy made.
3:51)The Type 96 looks like the light machine rifle designed by Benet and Mercie and made by Hotchkiss. The US Army had some. Chambered for the .30 caliber of 1906(30-06) and called M1909. The M1906 had a different shoulder stock and no carrying handle.
3:10 - What was the size of the AA guns. 65 caliber was mentioned, but that is the multiple of the diameter equaling the total length of the barrel ... Oh, Type 98 was 10cm, so barrel length was 650cm (or just shy of 256 inches)
Keep up the awesome work!
Is that a silhouetted image of the USS Enterprise (CVN-65) at the 4:14 point in this video?
ญี่ปุ่นหนึ่งในชาตินักรบ
Excellent vid.
My uncle paul was in that navel battle he was injured and got the purple heart i dont know what ship he was on cause he took his war stories to his grave not even his kids know what hes experienced out there in the Pacific rest in peace uncle paul and all our beloved ww2 brave men
The pacific war really doesn’t get the light it deserves. It was no doubt brutal
@@smaho27 i agree my grandfather was in the army and he has told me lots of crazy things he was a machine gunner before he got discharged in 1944 from catching malaria bad in the jungle of papa new Guinea he was in the army from 1939 to 1944 pfc adrian e reigle
Like my dad, he was with the 6th army and only would say how he hated the Japanese until his death.
@@TheRetirednavy92 I thank your dad for his service who knows where we'd be if we lost WW2 I'm just thankful and proud of all our WW2 veterans well all veterans
How exactly does one have a navel battle? Do you somehow fit a weapon's hilt into your navel and try to slice open the other guy's belly? What if your navel is an outie and you can't fit a weapon hilt into it?
Narrator "For Fire safety, the Taiho had ..." Me, 'The Taiho had fire safety?'
2023-09-07 .... great presentation ... thanks
Incredibly with an the damage & fume build up the Captain didn't order Abandon Ship. Sad so many died from his negligence
Thank you again that was interesting.
Why is CVN-65 Enterprise in 4:14? also the AA guns looks like 5 inch twin on the Essex and 20mms
Very interesting detail about this carrier.
Really AMAZING footage, as always. Thank you.
I love these videos, just show anything in black & white film since nobody is going to know the difference. Did you see what I think is the nuclear powered US carrier. Possibly the Enterprise?
Damage control was more like firefighting. Flaws in design were not well anticipated. Inadequate training to handle difficult situations. Can't fight a war in this manner.
Please do a video about Laffey (Benson class destroyer DD-459)
One of the days this video will be made
Jeez! The time you spend, asking for a post on the Laffey, you could do it yourself!
The title is misleading. You imply 1650 officers died. But that total is the officers and other sailors onboard the carrier, I suggest fixing it.
A different thumbnail picture would help as well...
That one didn't seen very ...easy t follow? Some things just didn't make sense. Was it just me? Anyways, absolutely love your videos. They are usually amazing and pretty easy to follow...once you get used to the "at the speed of sound" narration! 😆. I'm sure it was just me. Thanks again for the awesome videos!!!
An easy fix for the obviously accelerated narration is to simply adjust it to a slower more easy to understand pace by clicking on "settings", and then clicking on the "playback speed" that suits you the most.
@Tom T thank you! I'm a bit embarrassed to say, I didn't even know I could do that! Appreciate it.
Could you do a video of HMS Glorious along with her escorts, HMS Acasta and HMS Ardent
I like your vids but the video and pic where us CV. Are there any pics or vids from the IJN?
I feel bad. 99.8 percent of the CVs shown where not the Taiho. One was actually a modern nuclear carrier. I feel bad.
Sorry, Karen ! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Glad I'm not the only one to pick up on that. But still a good piece
3:20 Was that supposed to say _11 km_ vertically?
I wish you would have described the deficit damage control
I would love to see info on our navy smallest flat tops. The converted tankers. My dad was on the bremington. So.
A hundred websites exist with that very information. I don't find a listing for USS Bremington. I did find USS Bennington, an Essex-class carrier, not a tanker conversion, from WW II.
Muy buen trabajo
Great video!
Why were you showing all sorts of different aircraft carriers while still talking about the Japanese Tahoe?
To this day, Taihou is still afraid of Albercore.
Having full on panic attacks every time she appears 😊
Thanks Random. That is one of the best I have EVER heard !
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
pretty sure that was footage of the USS Franklin....
Thanks for the video. Japan had more advanced carriers than I thought. The video was only flawed by substituting US carries in some scenes. There is no mistaking the Saratoga and I declare I think I saw the silhouette of the Yorktown class.
Damage control training is still a key part of Navy training. This still separates the USN from Russian and some a lesser extent Chinese navies.
When the RN joined the USN in the Pacific, they swapped info, the British learning about advanced damage control from USN experience, and the Americans about fighter control learned during the Battle of Britain.
I would love to know how specifically is this so for the Chinese navy.
🙂 Don't think your opponent can't learn and improve 🤗
True, you should not underestimate your opponent. But the Chinese Navy is just transiting from a coastal force to a deep water Navy. The bulk of their ships and subs are coastal. Their first task forces are only now going into the Philippine Sea. Money can build fancy new ships, but as the Russians are showing in Ukraine, fancy toys are just scrap metal without trained men and officers.
Contrast IJN damage control with what happened to the USS Yorktown.
When Yorktown was abandoned after being torpedoed by torpedo bombers at Midway, it somehow stayed floating overnight and refused to sink. Damage control teams actually reboarded it and had made headway in reanimating its twenty-five-and-a-half-thousand-ton, bomb-and-torpedo-riddled corpse when an IJN submarine, apparently afraid of the unholy powers of US Navy damage control, gutted it with two more torpedos and finally killed it.
“At the peak of her career”? The IJN Taiho was sunk on her *maiden* voyage, largely by her own inexperienced crew, with a little torpedo help from the USS Albacore, so that’s an *odd* expression to use…
That was her peak though wasn't it? What other engagement did it get into?
Taiho was only completed in 7 March '44 & sunk on her first battle on 19 June '44.
Nice informative video but why would you use a picture of IJN Kaiyo as your thumbnail and while telling of the taiho, why flash pics of other carriers like Essex class and even a pic of nuclear powered Enterprise??
Taiho means "Great Phenix" .....oh the irony....
Could you do a video of the Tirpitz please?
An excellent video in need of a better title. The entire crew were not officers.
The dual purpose guns were 100mm(3.9inch)X65 calibers long not 65 caliber guns.
At the 4:15 mark, is that the USS Enterprise? The world's first nuclear powered carrier?!
At the 5:15 mark, is that the USS Lexington?! WTH?!!!
The many fires fought when ships were attacked was like a impossible battle yet Americans damage control was the difference in many many battles
Interesting that most of the film footage is of the Franklin, an American aircraft carrier that should have sunk or exploded, but for incredible feats of damage control on the part of her crew. Just the opposite of what happened to Taiho.
Could you do a video of RMS Lusitania please
Could you do videos of the Musashi and Yamato and Shinano please
Loved this.
What a wild ride it's been. Praise the Lord we've seen it all.
Could you do a video of the Scharnhorst please
I also heard that because there was steel shortage that the Japanese used wood on most of the interior of their carriers and they were like a match box. Once ignited, they were very difficult to put the fires out.
Hello,
Why is there a video clip of the U.S.S. Enterprise CVN-65 shown at 4:12 into the storyline? It’s not Japanese, it was launched a few decades later…
4:13
Fyi. At the battle of Midway the Americans damage control units were dressed in asbestos suites and shields.
The Japanese was wearing shorts and shirts.
And the yanks did fire drills.
So more I learn about the Japanese in ww2 so more I'm impressed how far they got with their chaotic organisation and complete lack of coordination.
WOW !
Sure, but who died from cancer 40 years later?
@@recoil53 Certainly not the guys who died from fire! Checkmate, Americans!
Could you do a video of HMS Hood and the Bismarck please
IJN damage control just sucked
A good script of the carrier. Just the video has a mix of different aircraft carriers. Including some frames of USA carriers.???
Could you do a video of HMS Barham please
Design flaws and badly trained crew and there you are. Just another example of the IJN's problem with the nuts and bolts over the bows and arrows.
I think the arrogance of many of the officers played no small part.
@@ohasis8331 The class problems between officers and crew were well known. To me, we all die if we don't work together and that works better if we communicate openly and train. But that's me.
@@ohasis8331 EXCELLENT POINT !
The wording of the title could be a little better. There wouldn't have been 1650 officers on a carrier.
What is up with the Enterprise (CVN 65) at 10:16? and the other US WW2 American Carriers
Could you do a video of HMHS Britannic please
Well... I would sacrifice 17th century officers to save my aircraft carrier too.
4:14 The nuclear-powered, angled-flight-deck configuration of Taihō.
Could you do a video of HMS Prince of Wales on HMS Repulse please
I understand finding video can be a challenge. But you used video of a Saratoga class US carrier, an Enteprise class US carrier, and an Essex class US carrier.
And really, your narrative script. The submarine "launched without warning." Was there any expectation that the sub work announce its intention to sink the carrier beforehand?
I'm sorry but I have to ask, why did you include clips of Enterprise ( both actually), Lexington, Hornet and others?
Wow👍 short work indeed
Can you see in the famous profile shot of the IJN Taiho how LOW this new armoured carrier sat in the water bc of its new, heavy, flight-deck armour?
You Can't Hose down a Boiling Boiler !
I have to hose down my wife.
Could you do a video of in the MV Wilhelm Gustloff
Are any of these actually an IJN carrier? I saw the Hornet launching the Dolittle raid an a very new nuke Enterprise plus numerous later war ships maybe one IJN. And that's the Franklin burning
Excellent commentary. The Japanese were very good at copying western technology but did not have the mental experience to use it to its best advantage. This is one of the best examples of this I have seen. Thanks again.
Think some of the footage was of a usns air craft carriers, leaving the fore river ship yard, boston tow boat and Doan tug boat company assisting !
Your headline is both incorrect and foolish
almost ninety per cent of the footage in this video is of US carriers, including a fleeting glimpse of the 1960's nuclear carrier USS Enterprise....we also have some totally irrelevant footage of large calibre battleship guns being fired......why? As there is probably no movie footage of Taiho in existence, why not just settle for showing the still photos of the ship that is the subject of the video, rather than misleading viewers with footage of American ships? I dont doubt for a moment that much of the commentary is accurate, but accompanying it with wildly inaccurate and inappropriate movie footage defeats the object, as so many people simply point out the errors and dont pay that much attention to what is being said............
In the American market, few people know the difference between the English ton (2000lb) and the long ton, later known as a "metric" (2200lb) ton. the metric system was not a common term. To explain the difference it was the called short ton 2000 and long ton of 2200 pounds.
That was cool to see in the Video the scene of a Carrier being Towed by Tugs under a Drawbridge ,its the Bethlehem Steel Shipyard in Quincy / Boston. I'm looking at it from my House on the Beach as a Tanker is being guided by.
The Shipyard is Completely gone, there is the remains of two Drydocks, even the Drawbridge was Torn down 10 years ago. it sad America doesn't make anything.
Wow-the Taiho was entirely crewed by OFFICERS? Maybe that was the problem.
The title of this video is ridiculous and deceptive. The ship was not saved, nor was there any willful decision to sacrifice large numbers of people to try to save it.
100% agree!
A video about a Japanese carrier, using shots of what appear to be several US carriers, including the Hornet launching one of Doolittle's B-25s, and even one of the modern Enterprise. When describing the attributes of the Taiho, it would have been better to not use footage of non-Japanese carriers at the same time. Just saying...
David...MAYBE the creator/writers of this video didn't CARE !
The USA WON.....THE JAPS LOST. The idea/concept of
"Rubbing-it-in" comes to mind. Look it up !
Very well researched and extremely detailed.
Well researched? The first of many mistakes is made already in the video title claiming 1650 officers were lost. That’s the total number of sailors lost, in total there were less than 300 officers including air crews. Not to mention they don’t even answer the question posed in the title -why were those men sacrificed? To say these videos are well researched is a joke, these guys just make wikipedia articles into a video format
As beautiful a ship as Taiho was, she was designed to fail. Failing to protect fuel tanks and failing to properly train the crew guaranteed sinking in war time.
Time, supply levels of materials to make ships, planes, and guns, no experienced replacements for the 1000s of casualties, no fuel imports (submarines!), training boys to fly with a broom handle nailed to an apple crate...
Could you do a video of HMS Ark Royal please
The Taiho also had a type 13 air warning radar