DBWI: Shinano as a carrier?

I was just looking over at the Warship Projects Discussion Boards and some of their talented artists have drawn the RL IJN battleship Shinano if she were converted to a carrier at some point during her construction, possibly in mid-1942. The guys there say she could have held an enormous number of planes...120+, making her roughly as capable as the first post-war US carriers.

Although you could argue that since Shinano was never completed in OTL, it is difficult to say she could have been finished and properly outfitted as a carrier in time to take part in the Pacific War, lets assume that construction proceeds at, say, the speed that Taiho was completed at in OTL. I don't have Jane's or anything like that in front of me right now, but given that Shinano was launched but never fitted out in OTL, is March 1945 a decent date for the commissioning of Shinano as a carrier? What would the IJN do with a carrier that late in the war?

Awesome WI line-drawing:

musashf1.jpg
 
It depends on how early the conversion happens.

If they start very early, it gets sunk at the great marianas turkey shoot.

If its ready by mid-1944, then it is a casualty at Leyte Gulf.

If they get it operational in March 1945, as you posit, then it sinks at anchor.

Shinano would pack a lot of planes (although less than a devoted carrier of her size), but experienced pilots are another matter. So is fuel. one extra carrier makes life that little bit harder for the USN, but this isn't a war-winner.

Could this influence American carrier design, perhaps? maybe it survives the war and becomes a prize? Maybe earlier supercarriers?
 

Bearcat

Banned
Basically what Atreus said. Anything that isn't ready by mid-1943 is just too late. After that, the balance of pilot training tips so harshly against the IJN that there is no real chance of winning a fleet engagement. Wait until late '44 or later and the submarine campaign has cut the Japanese fuel lifeline to the NEI, and its game over, though it still takes a year for the bad news to sink in up in Tokyo.

Some pilot or sub driver gets to say they sunk the biggest carrier of the war, even bigger than the Midways.
 
Douglas,

As Atreus points out, by 1945 it isn't a matter of planes but of pilots. And how many planes could Shinano have operated anyway?

Carrying planes and operating them are not the same thing. That drawing is small admittedly but there doesn't seem to be a real hangar deck.

With a March 1945 launch date, I think she'd be regularly stalked by submarines directed by ULTRA intercepts. There might even be a carrier raid or two on ports where she's been reported. However, I think her most likely fate would be to sunk while providing air cover for the Yamato sortie to Okinawa.


Bill
 
Douglas,

As Atreus points out, by 1945 it isn't a matter of planes but of pilots. And how many planes could Shinano have operated anyway?

Carrying planes and operating them are not the same thing. That drawing is small admittedly but there doesn't seem to be a real hangar deck.

With a March 1945 launch date, I think she'd be regularly stalked by submarines directed by ULTRA intercepts. There might even be a carrier raid or two on ports where she's been reported. However, I think her most likely fate would be to sunk while providing air cover for the Yamato sortie to Okinawa.


Bill

This is actually a really interesting comment, Bill.

I've read on this site before that there was some thought of detaching the American battleline to deliver the coup de grace on Yamato. If the carrier aircraft expend enough munitions on attacking Shinano, perhaps we do get that last great battleship duel, even if it is terribly one-sided?

Of course, given that it was hard enough to find fuel for Yamato and her escorts, it may become a question of which ship gets to go down in glory. Does Shinano get the nod instead of Yamato because she can launch kamikazes from her deck?

EDIT: Perhaps its not important, but are the Bikini tests perhaps slightly less informative if the Shinano hull isn't there amongst the other targets?
 
EDIT: Perhaps its not important, but are the Bikini tests perhaps slightly less informative if the Shinano hull isn't there amongst the other targets?

Nah, there just use the Nagato instead. A shame though, then we wouldn't have her as a museum.....:(
 
I've read on this site before that there was some thought of detaching the American battleline to deliver the coup de grace on Yamato. If the carrier aircraft expend enough munitions on attacking Shinano, perhaps we do get that last great battleship duel, even if it is terribly one-sided?


Douglas,

In a word, no. Calbear, Markus, myself, and a few others have regularly explained what occurred, yet the same old stories continue to surface.

First, the USN didn't think about sending a battleline against, Yamato, they actually planned on it if it proved necessary. Second, the air strikes put Yamato under with relative ease using something around 275 planes and 2.5 hours for the job(1). If those first waves didn't do the trick, the unused planes still waiting on the US carriers had plenty of daylight for a 2nd, 3rd, etc. strike with all available again the next day.

Thanks to ULTRA, the US knew Yamato was going to sortie. While exact times and positions are hard, especially at sea, the US planned to counter the sortie via several methods. In order the methods were subs, aircraft, and finally the battleline with each in turn intercepting the battleship in turn further from Japan and closer to Okinawa. The sub interception missed, the carrier interception didn't, and so the battleline interception wasn't needed.

In hindsight, it's was next to impossible for Yamato and her escorts to avoid the carriers.


Bill

1 - Which means for this DBWI that only another ~275 planes and 2.5 hours would be needed to put the Yamato-class Shinano under and the US had both the planes and time to do so.
 
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In the OTL, Shinano was rebuilt as a carrier for replenishment purposes, rather than being a Fleet Carrier. As such her own airgroup was to be small and mainly composed of fighteraircraft and only a limmited number of bombers, mainly intended to be used in an ASW role.

As "guests" the carrier could hold at least an additional airgroup of some 120 planes, mainly on her vast deck, but a few stored in the foreward part of the hangar, since the after half was allocated for her own airgroup. These planes were to be flown in as replenishment of the airgroups of the Fleet Carriers, giving them the opportunity to carry on, without the need to return to port to resupply their airgroups.

In reality, Shinano never carried aircraft, due to the already mentioned difficulties in getting enough trained pilots to fly these. During her first and only voyage from the buildersyard to Kure, from Yokosuka, she carried no aircraft and was only used as a transport for six Shino Suicide boats and 50 "Okha" Suicide rocket planes.

The main problem for the vast ship was that she was never considered a Fleet Carrier, sicne this role was thought to be for the fast 34 knot Taiho class and its successors, together with the surviving older Shokaku class. At a maximum of 27 knots, since her propulsion was not updated after reconstruction, she was simply too slow to keep up with the fast Fleet carriers, but could very well be used as a replenishment ship, simmilar to HMS Unicorn.

Another point of interest is that the ship was to retain her heavy scale protection, although placed a bit different from being a battleship. Her deckarmor was the heaviest of any carrier ever, given the lessons of the Midway Battle. She supported an armored flightdeck and had a thick main armored deck below, although not in its original place, but moved up to the original weatherdeck level. Sidearmor was heavy too, but much less than intended on her battleship origin. The problem was her inexperienced crew, who could not do much against damage, given their poor training and lack of equipment on her only voyage.
 
In the OTL, Shinano was rebuilt as a carrier for replenishment purposes, rather than being a Fleet Carrier. As such her own airgroup was to be small and mainly composed of fighteraircraft and only a limmited number of bombers, mainly intended to be used in an ASW role.

As "guests" the carrier could hold at least an additional airgroup of some 120 planes, mainly on her vast deck, but a few stored in the foreward part of the hangar, since the after half was allocated for her own airgroup. These planes were to be flown in as replenishment of the airgroups of the Fleet Carriers, giving them the opportunity to carry on, without the need to return to port to resupply their airgroups.

In reality, Shinano never carried aircraft, due to the already mentioned difficulties in getting enough trained pilots to fly these. During her first and only voyage from the buildersyard to Kure, from Yokosuka, she carried no aircraft and was only used as a transport for six Shino Suicide boats and 50 "Okha" Suicide rocket planes.

The main problem for the vast ship was that she was never considered a Fleet Carrier, sicne this role was thought to be for the fast 34 knot Taiho class and its successors, together with the surviving older Shokaku class. At a maximum of 27 knots, since her propulsion was not updated after reconstruction, she was simply too slow to keep up with the fast Fleet carriers, but could very well be used as a replenishment ship, simmilar to HMS Unicorn.

Another point of interest is that the ship was to retain her heavy scale protection, although placed a bit different from being a battleship. Her deckarmor was the heaviest of any carrier ever, given the lessons of the Midway Battle. She supported an armored flightdeck and had a thick main armored deck below, although not in its original place, but moved up to the original weatherdeck level. Sidearmor was heavy too, but much less than intended on her battleship origin. The problem was her inexperienced crew, who could not do much against damage, given their poor training and lack of equipment on her only voyage.

What is wrong with you? It's a frickin' DBWI!
 
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