Saturday, 4 October 2014
What was Operation Ten-Ichi-Go? ~All about the 天一号作戦
Ships that participated in the Ten-Ichi-Go:
The 2nd Mine squadron of the 2nd Fleet protected Battleship Yamato.
Of the 9 ships that went, 5 of them sank, and 981 people died. The other 4 ships rescued survivors and returned to Sasebo.
How they were layed out:
The famous destroyer Fuyuzuki rescued survivors from Kasumi and returned to Sasebo. Fuyuzuki was half wrecked. Kasumi couldn't move anymore.
Notes on the pictures of ships... 帰還 means it returned
沈没 means it sank...
More information can be seen on Wikipedia, if you search a little.
Anyway, it was basically a fight between ships and aircraft. The aircraft won, and we now know that ships are no match for aircraft. This fight is known in Japan as 坊ノ岬沖海戦.
The main power used to be the Battleship, and then the importance of aeroplanes moved it to aircraft carriers. Now, the most important ships are nuclear powered submarines. To fight it, one must have other submarines or destroyers.
Cruisers and gunboats don't mean much nowadays.