In the 1930s, the sea powers of the world
were designing new and pioneering battleships,
often in secret and ignoring world agreements on restricting the arms race.
German Tirpitz, Japanese Yamato — larger, heavier, and more powerful ships.
The U.S. government decided to build a series of brand-new battleships
to counteract their potential enemies.
The lead ship was named Iowa.
The battleship had three main armament turrets with 406 mm guns,
capable of sending 11 tons of deadly metal into the air per salvo.
Owing to the special design of her bow, the 57-ton ship
was able to speed up to 33 knots— the speed of a motor boat.
Around 140 20 mm and 40 mm AA machine guns were mounted on the ship.
Allied aircraft carriers favored the company of the battleship
for the reliable AA "umbrella" that she provided for them.
The battleship Iowa was commissioned in early 1943.
Its first mission on was to go north…
Naval intelligence felt that the Tirpitz, the German battleship,
may be coming into the North Atlantic.
The battleship Iowa was sent
on an early mission north to block the Tirpitz.
Suppose battleships Iowa and Tirpitz met in battle.
Iowa had higher speed, greater maneuverability,
and longer range of fire.
Tirpitz would be trying to get in close to Iowa,
and Iowa would be looking to keep away,
maneuvering and firing at Tirpitz from a great distance.
Iowa would have definitely won this battle.
But the two naval heavyweight warriors never met,
so we can only imagine how their duel would have ended.
In early 1944, battleship Iowa joined the United States Fifth Fleet,
which operated in the Pacific Ocean.
By that time, US forces were already attacking
Japanese positions on various islands.
The battleship’s role was to provide fire support to landing troops
and escort aircraft carriers during air raids on the Philippines,
the Ryukyu Islands, and Taiwan.
The ship crisscrossing across a lot of these small islands
that are really forgotten now.
At one point they went up to support
MacArthur's landing in the Philippines at Leyte Gulf.
Unfortunately they went the wrong way at Leyte Gulf
and chased a Japanese carrier force that was really a decoy for the landing.
They came back, but a little too late to assist in the Battle of Leyte Gulf.
They missed that one opportunity
to maybe have a contact with the Yamato.
The two ships never met in combat;
and both countries kept their capital battleships
at, shall we say, arm’s length,
kept them at distance, because there was great political risk
to having either one of the ships damaged severely in battle.
Japanese industry, in those days,
simply didn’t have the resources to build ships in large numbers.
The solution was simple: to make huge ships
that would exceed the largest ships of other nations—super battleships.
Battleship Yamato is the biggest battleship in the world.
Her shell velocity was 790 m/s,
while its weight could be up to 1.5 tons.
Such a large gun could inflict very serious damage.
They beat us. The Japanese essentially broke the treaty.
The Iowa, I think (of course, I would probably say this),
would’ve taken the day in a battle against the Yamato.
She had very accurate fire control for a ship of the 1940s.
And I think that would be an advantage for her
if that ship fights such a battle.
It was so accurate that in 1984, when they recommissioned the ship,
they kept the existing system in place, even though they had modern computers.
The Iowa could put a round very, very close to the target,
so accurate that they didn’t need to change it.
Iowa was the most dangerous enemy for Yamato.
If they had met at a range from 20,000 to 30,000 meters,
especially in a one-on-one fight and in fine weather,
Iowa would have no chance of winning.
However, thanks to better radar
Iowa could fight in bad weather and at night.
Powerful guns, high speed, and precise radar
made Iowa a formidable adversary.
If these two battleships had fought each other,
the victory would depend completely on the battle conditions…
We could get in quick and fire.
But then there’s always the lucky shot.
Out of the three superbattleships — Yamato, Tirpitz, and Iowa —
only the latter survived World War II.
But she didn’t only survive, she entered Tokyo Bay with her sistership, Missouri ,
to put an end to the war on August 29, 1945.
During the post-war decades, she returned to the U.S.Navy
several times to serve her country before becoming a museum ship.