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Japanese Army vessels and ships
Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 3:07 am
by m10bob
http://www3.plala.or.jp/takihome/vessel.htm
Akitsu Maru carried landing craft and 26 airplanes.
RE: Japanese Army vessels and ships
Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 3:42 am
by JWE
It's kinda funny that the IJA took the lead in the development of amphibious technique for the Japanese Military. Go figure.
RE: Japanese Army vessels and ships
Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 8:19 am
by el cid again
These ships originally were designed with flying off decks so that air units could quickly be moved ashore during assault operations. Those ships could not recover and were not aircraft carriers. Later in the war there was a conversion to full flight decks and very light aircraft were flown without arrester gear: observation planes and autogyros (the Ka-1 being the first rotary wing aircraft in the world with a combat mission as such). Both the Ki-76 and the Ka-1 carried a pair of 60 kg DC. There is no known case of a kill - but aircraft do often succeed in preventing submarine attacks on friendly ships without scoring any kills.
RE: Japanese Army vessels and ships
Posted: Sat May 19, 2007 7:27 pm
by JWE
Golly, you think that's why they were called Landing Craft and Aircraft Transporters (actually I believe the Japanese designation of the Akitsu-Hei type most accurately translates into "conveyor of aircraft and tank on-board landing ship").
RE: Japanese Army vessels and ships
Posted: Sun May 20, 2007 1:10 pm
by m10bob
INtersting the Army had their own patrol and attack boats.
Most books had listed them as belonging to the Navy.