"If you take copper as a mirror, you can dress properly; if you take the ancient as a mirror, you can know the rise and fall; if you take people as a mirror, you can see the gains and losses."
I like to watch movies, especially films adapted from real events, because this kind of film is a history, has a strong sense of substitution and can cause the audience to think, and the real events that can be adapted into movies show its significance and value.
I'm used to looking for some information about the film every time I watch a movie, so I just list the real events and history behind the film to give readers, and this series will be updated from time to time based on the films I have seen.
You can think of this series of articles as a guide to movies or as an exploration of real events, but I wrote it for a hobby, and you can increase your knowledge after reading it.
In 1933 (Showa 8), the contradictions between Japan and the European and American powers intensified, and they began to embark on the road of military expansion. The Ministry of the Navy secretly plans to build the world's largest warship. However, the province is not monolithic, and there are people who oppose this plan. Rear Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto believed that in future naval battles, aircraft were the mainstream, and that building giant warships was a waste of the national budget, and he wanted to recalculate the battleship quotations himself, but all the information about battleships was tightly hidden by the "shipbuilders". More importantly, there are no competent people in the military department to help. As a result, Yamamoto took a fancy to the once-in-a-century genius mathematician Kanae nao of Tokyo Imperial University. He loves math, hates the military, and doesn't know how to be flexible. He stubbornly refused Yamamoto, but Yamamoto's astonishing words touched him- "If a giant warship is built, Japan, which is too confident in its own strength, will definitely go to war." Because of this sentence, He was determined to enter the huge power center of the Imperial Navy alone. Genius mathematician vs Navy, an unprecedented battle of minds began. In the midst of pressure and obstacles, Kana discovers the contradiction between huge investments, construction costs, and quotations, and gradually approaches the secret of the giant battleship, which is called "Yamato".
Disclaimer: Based on the manga of the same name by Noriko Mita, the film tells the story of the genius mathematician Sugi Nao, known as the "Archimedes of Japan", in the 1930s who discovered a hidden conspiracy in the Japanese Navy's shipbuilding program, interpreting the Yamato's past and present life from a new perspective. The details in the film are purely fictional and there are no similarities. So today we will not discuss the details of the film, but only briefly talk about Japan's naval strategy and the construction of the Yamato.
Part I: Three Reasons for Building yamato-class battleships
Reason 1: Imperial Ambition The Washington Naval Treaty signed by the five countries in 1922 stipulates that the displacement ratio of the capital ships of the United States, Britain, Japan, Italy, and France (battleships and battlecruisers) is 5:5:3:1.75:1.75, the displacement of a single capital ship must not exceed 35,000 tons, and the caliber of the artillery must not exceed 406 mm. However, during World War II, japan owned two Nagato-class battleships built before the treaty had been in service for more than 20 years and were too old to take on heavy responsibilities and fight at sea. In 1934, before the treaty was abrogated, the old Empire of Japan proposed plans to build a large battleship. In January 1934, when Japan revised its imperial defense policy, it officially listed the United States as a hypothetical enemy. In June 1936, when the national defense policy was revised again, it clearly put forward the strategy of interception against the United States. The imperial Japanese navy's strategy for fighting against the United States in the western Pacific was to eliminate the main force of the US Far East Navy at the beginning of the war, destroy or seize the bases on which the US Navy operates, and then annihilate the fleets reinforced by the US mainland. To this end, the Japanese Navy chose the sea west of the Ogasawara Islands as the intended battlefield for a decisive battle at sea, and formed a sea strike force with battleships as the core to intercept the FORMATION of American ships at sea. The Navy developed an armament replenishment plan (i.e. Plan 03) in 1937 and formally decided to build 2 A-140f5 plan ships (then known as Ship 1 and Ship 2). On November 4, 1937, construction of the No. 1 ship began at the Wu Navy Yard.
Washington Naval Treaty
Reason two: the spirit of the nation In the days of the construction of the Yamato, there was a saying within the Japanese Navy that "Egypt has pyramids, China has the Great Wall, and Japan has the Battleship Yamato." It can be seen that the Yamato is the representative of the national spirit, I mentioned above in the "History Behind the History Series 17 - Men's Yamato" that the Navy is a proud service, the most honorable of all the services, and many times the naming of battleships has a special meaning, such as naming the country's founding fathers, famous places, famous events, etc. Moreover, the Navy's warships can be named after being retired or sunk with new warships, a spirit of inheritance that other services do not have. So Japan's original intention in building the Yamato was to stir up Japanese nationalist sentiment and show its muscles to the great powers.
Reason Three: Experience Begins with the 1905 Russo-Japanese Battle of Tsushima, which was in full swing in 1905, with a naval battle breaking out in the Tsushima Strait between the Korean Peninsula and Honshu, Japan. The combined fleet, commanded by Japanese Admiral Heihachiro Togo, was against the Russian Second Pacific Fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Roger Stevinsky. The Russian Second Fleet set off from the Baltic Sea and after a long journey of more than 30,000 kilometers, entered the Tsushima Strait, where the Japanese fleet had already waited. The battleships of the two sides fired at each other at a distance of 6 kilometers, thanks to pre-war training and rare luck, the main guns of the Japanese army shot extremely accurately, and the proper use of tactics eventually allowed the Japanese army to win more with less. 38 Russian warships were sunk 21, 7 captured, losing 270,000 tons of ships, and finally only 3 returned to port, killing 4830 people and capturing 6106 people, while the Japanese lost only 3 torpedo boats and 117 people were killed. This battle also directly laid the foundation for the irreplaceable supremacy of battleships in naval warfare, and the doctrine of cannon giants began to reach its peak. The success of the Battle of Tsushima greatly encouraged the Japanese to worship the giant gun ships, and the battleship directly allowed Japan, an East Asian country, to take down Russia, one of the traditional Western powers, so the Japanese stubbornly believed that the battle with the U.S. Navy in the Pacific still depended on battleships. Coupled with the fact that Japan at that time, due to the limitation of resource endowments, chose the policy of quality over quantity, and assembled the highest technology in Japan at that time, the Yamato class was very simple, that is, the largest battleship in the history of battleships, the strongest armor, the fiercest firepower, the heaviest and strongest battleship. I personally think this is the Japanese think that they are good at calculation, they think that the role of a super battleship must be more than the construction of a few more ordinary warships, if a naval battle breaks out with the US army, instead of disrupting the war, it is better to use the super firepower of the super battleship to seriously damage the US ship, when building the Yamato, the heads of the Admiralty are generals who have experienced the Battle of Tsushima, so the theory of the cannon giant ship is deeply rooted in their minds, and they also dream of firing at the U.S. military at a certain distance. As a result, in World War II, the Japanese and U.S. naval duels were all suffering, causing the U.S. naval aviation to press on the surface of the sea for a meal.
Battle of Tsushima
Part II: The Construction of the Yamato
Judging by the size of the Battleship Yamato, it is perhaps not an exaggeration to say that it was a miracle made of steel. Especially for a country that has only been modernized for less than a hundred years, building a huge battleship with a displacement of nearly double the previous largest ship is undoubtedly a crazy move that the country's overall strength and industrial level are difficult to bear. To this end, Japan did not hesitate to use a large number of strategic materials, including more than 100,000 tons of high-quality steel, and spent a lot of money to add a large number of new equipment to its shipbuilding industry, purchased 15,000 tons of hydraulic presses (16,000 tons) from Germany and three 70-ton acidic open hearth furnaces (according to the data, these equipment cost a total of 10 million US dollars), so as to be able to produce large forged parts including 650 mm thick armored steel plates (used in the main gun turret of yamato ships). Even deliberately deepened the dock of Wu Navy Yard by 1 meter. According to statistics, during the entire construction of the Yamato and its sister ship Musashi, the Japanese spent 150 billion yen (post-war prices) before and after, and the average weight per ton needed to be nearly 2 million yen. It should be known that when the Yamato began construction in 1937, the Sino-Japanese War had already begun, and Japan was really tightening its belt at this time and building the Yamato with the strength of the country.
(The following is quoted from NetEase Military)
In 1937, fishermen off the coast of Kyushu Island in Japan encountered a strange thing: palm fiber, which was not out of stock in previous years, could not be bought at all this year. Palm is a common source of fiber in the region. Every year they buy palm fiber to make palm nets and other fishing gear for use. Palms are not as sought-after as materials as Manila hemp and have never been out of stock. At first, they thought that they had just sold out near their homes, but when they went to the union to inquire, they found out that almost all the palm fibers in Kyushu had been bought overnight. After the local government received the news from the trade union, it was judged that some people wanted to speculate and deliberately hoarded. But all the way down the investigation, only to find that someone bought palm fiber at a price higher than the market price, and all of them bought palm fiber with cash and bought several looms. As for who the buyer was, where the things went, the clues were broken. Interesting is on the other side. The buyer of these things, the buyer of the Mitsubishi Shipbuilding Materials Division, was also confused. No one told them why they traveled all over Kyushu to buy these things that had nothing to do with shipbuilding. Soon, these humble palm fibers will provide cover for the secret construction of the largest battleships in human history: yamato and Musashi.
Wu Naval Shipyard
"If you want to deceive the enemy, you must first deceive yourself" As the absolute main force against the US and British navies in the future, the construction of the "Yamato" class must be carried out in top secret. From hull construction, to hull launch, to docking outfitting, and finally to sea trials. Which of these links leaks secrets, it will lead to the abandonment of previous achievements. But after all, it is a huge ship of tens of thousands of tons, and it is not easy to avoid people's eyes and ears. The Japanese have racked their brains and made bloody money for this. Unlike the Musashi, which was built on a traditional ship's platform, the Yamato, which was first started, was built in a dockyard. The dock itself can cover half of the hull, and it is difficult to see the full view of the hull from the side. But this was not enough, and the shipyard side built a fence with tin sheets around the edge of the dock, and a palm net was hung from the gantry crane. Set up a 1/4 length roof of the dock above the dock to prevent the outside world from knowing the length of the ship, and the whole ship is tightly covered. In addition to the sheltering measures, the employees involved in the construction were required to sign a confidential form and each receive a special pass with a unique number and a photo of themselves. The shipyard is guarded by gendarmes and no one is allowed to enter without a pass or witnesses. Plainclothes police and gendarmes are scattered throughout the city, and if they find employees leaking secrets, they are arrested immediately. In addition, the small hill where the shipyard can see the dock is also guarded by gendarmes, and it is forbidden for unrelated people to wait up the hill. Windows facing the shipyard are closed, and the windows of trains running on the coast and those facing the shipyard are also sealed. There are also walls on both sides of the road and rail lines that can easily see the military port. All unrelated vessels passing through the launch area take a detour, while vessels operating in the harbor are carefully inspected at naval posts located outside the port and the shipyard gives a traffic signal before entering. Under strict secrecy measures, the construction of the hull of the Yamato was completed. After the hull is built, water is injected into the dock to make the hull float. The tugboat then pulls it out of the dock, and throughout the process the Yamato's hull is stripped of camouflage and completely exposed. So how to solve the problem of confidentiality? The Navy's solution was to conduct a joint military exercise in Kure on the day of launch, imposing controls on the citizens and prohibiting anyone from going out. As the saying goes, "If you want to deceive the enemy, you must first deceive yourself." Outside the shipyard, the "participating" troops did not know the true purpose of the "exercise." Inside the shipyard, kiyoshi Sasagawa, the person in charge of the launch site, recalled: "Everyone in the shipyard, including me, didn't know that military exercises were being conducted outside. Originally, the Yamato, as the national symbol of the future of Japan, was supposed to hold a grand launch ceremony, but it was not announced for the sake of secrecy, and only 100 high-ranking officials except workers participated in the ceremony, and the emperor himself did not come. The Minister of the Navy also had to lower his voice when he read the name of the ship, and the whole launch ceremony seemed cold and clear. Fortunately, after such a toss, the "Yamato" hull was finally launched smoothly. However, this is only a phased success, and then it will take a long time to dock on the shore for outfitting operations. During this period, three main measures were taken to prevent the leakage of secrets. First, an integral metal roof was installed on the base of turrets I and II, and turret III was concocted in the same way. This looks like two huge warehouses from a distance. Second, shorten the time that other ships are docked near the hull as much as possible, so as to prevent the length of the hull from being calculated by comparison. Finally, crossbars protruding from the side of the bow were installed on both sides of the ship, with palm nets hanging from them to prevent speculation about the width of the ship. Two of the three measures accounted for secrecy measures for the relevant parts of the turret. Because the width of the ship is related to the diameter of the turret base, after knowing the approximate size of the turret base, the size of the main turret can be deduced, and then the caliber of the main gun can be deduced. The Japanese Navy, which regarded the unique 460 mm main gun as the magic weapon for victory, was naturally cautious about this. Under the protection of strict measures, the Yamato was completed and officially entered service in December 1941.
Part III: The Fall of Yamato
Looking back throughout the 1930s, we will find that the speed requirements of the Japanese Navy for battleships at that time were not based on the ability to accompany the mobile force aircraft carriers as the standard, but followed the traditional textbook artillery warfare idea, that is, "the fastest speed to meet the enemy", which was determined in order to seize the T-line horizontal position as soon as possible. After the Battle of the Sea of Japan, the statement of "Japanese Mahan" Akiyama Masayuki that "because the combined fleet had a speed advantage of 3 knots, it achieved a naval victory" had a great influence on the design of Japanese battleships after that. In the Navy, this kind of thinking was admired by the die-hard "Battleship Faction" of the Nineteenth-century Oriental "Post-80s" fans who grew up smelling the smoke of the Battle of Tsushima, headed by Prince Fushimiomiya Hiroyuki, Chief of the Navy, Censor, Minister of the Navy, and Ryozo Nakamura, Minister of the Admiralty.
Is6 Yamamoto
The main conflict in this film is between the carrier faction and the battleship faction of the Japanese Navy, and there is a lot of dispute between the two sides over whether to build an aircraft carrier or a battleship. This is basically in line with the fact that in October 1934, the Japanese Navy launched an argument within the construction of the Yamato type battleship, which led to an outbreak of controversy between the battleship faction and the aviation faction, the former still insisting on battleships as the main force of naval warfare, while the latter advocated replacing battleships with aviation as the core combat force of the navy. In 1934, the result of the great controversy between the battleship faction and the aviation faction within the Japanese Navy was the birth of the "Maruko Plan". The "Maruko-san Plan" could not be said to be unimportant to naval aviation, and the two Most Outstanding Japanese aircraft carriers in the Pacific War, "Shōzuru" and "Mizuru", were born, but the super battleships 'Yamato' and 'Musashi' were still ranked before the two cranes, and the "aviation main soldier" faction was defeated in the end. However, according to the various factors at that time, the chances of the 'main aviation army' faction winning the polemic victory without the actual experience proved were indeed extremely slim. This requires the Japanese Navy to completely subvert its operational theory, and it requires the transformation of the naval industrial system. During this period, Yamamoto said helplessly to his subordinates: "To change the rigid idea of iron cannonism in your mind, there is no other way but to show your achievements, and you should train and study harder." Genda Shi even said dismissively: "The real reason for the Big Ship Giant Cannon Faction to oppose change is not to worry that what they have learned in their lives will become useless, and they will not have to be promoted or even lose their jobs?" ”
At the end of the Pacific War of World War II, in order to understand the siege of Okinawa, the combined fleet let the Yamato be the main force to participate in the special operations, hoping to make it stranded on Okinawa as a permanent battery, it can be imagined that if the Yamato really rushed to the open sea of Okinawa, with his 460 mm cannon, the U.S. casualties on the island should be more than Iwo Jima. But fortunately, the Yamato had no aircraft escort, and even the largest battleship had only one way to die under the siege of the fighters. There were a number of reasons for the sinking of the Yamato, but the most important reason was that the Japanese aviation was exhausted through a series of battles on Midway, Coral Island, Leyte Gulf, and Mariana, and could not be replenished, so it was no longer able to escort the battleships.
U.S. seaplanes are rescuing people
Another detail in the film is that the US aircraft was forced to land on the sea after being shot down on the Yamato, and after the pilot parachuted, it was not long before it was salvaged between a seaplane and rescued. The officers and men on the Yamato had worked hard to shoot down the plane, and before they could cheer, they fell into depression again. The aircraft can be rebuilt, but the loss of the pilot is the most important loss, the Americans can have a seaplane for escort rescue in the process of attack, the strength of this and that, must be doomed to the Japanese will be dragged to death by the war of attrition, so this battle is doomed to lose from the beginning.
After the end of World War II, some people have estimated the gains and losses of the Yamato battleship, and concluded that if Japan saves the production capacity, manpower and funds for the construction of the ship and its three sister ships, it will be about enough to produce 12 Wyvern-class or 6 Shōzuru-class aircraft carriers, and even if this expected half of the effect is achieved, the Japanese Combined Fleet will be enough to form an overwhelming advantage over the US military in the early stage. The Yamato, a steel totem created by Japan's national efforts, ultimately accelerated Japan's defeat, and in a deeper sense, Japan was actually defeated in the Pacific War by the dream that had long been eliminated by the times.
As for the ending of the film, "The real purpose of building the Yamato was to be sunk on the battlefield and to wake up Japan." That is the author to give it a self-justification and seemingly quite grandiose reason, if the purpose of the construction of the Yamato is really to make the Americans dry and sink, so that the people of the country should have rushed to the front line in the Battle of Midway, so that even if it was sunk, it is more decent to die, and it can wake up the Japanese people earlier, rather than running to Okinawa at the last moment to do a senseless suicide charge.
Friends who have played real-time strategy games should know that no matter how bad the character you use, as long as you can have the ability to continue to explode, even if you bury it, you can kill your opponents, and the United States built a total of 155 aircraft carriers of various types in World War II, and the number of other types of warships is countless. Even if Japan had chosen to build more aircraft carriers instead of building two super battleships, Yamato and Musashi, the Americans would have been under more pressure in the early stages of the war, and the result would have been the same.
American shipyards during World War II
Fortunately, there is no history if, from the various films filming the Yamato, we can vaguely see the Japanese people's nostalgia for the glory of the former empire, but also, the only country in the world that has attacked the United States, they still have some small proud capital. But it is only a nostalgia, a politically and militarily emasculated sovereign state, the right to dream.
History Behind history series 17 - The history behind the Japanese movie Yamato of Men
History Behind History Series 16 – The History Behind the American Film The Wind Whisperer
History Behind History Series 15 (Part 2) – The History Behind the American Film Book of Iwo Jima