The Ships of Brawling Battleships Steel: Japan Battleship Fuso

Laid down on March 11, 1912, launched on March 28, 1914 and commissioned on November 8, 1915, Fuso carried a main armament of twelve 14 inch main guns mounted two per turret; two centerline superfiring forward, two centerline superfiring aft and two centerline amidships that could fire to both sides. The Fuso was the name ship of a two-ship battleship class. The class was propelled by American coal-fired turbine engines that had oil-fired supplementary burners. The 14 inch guns qualified this class as “super-dreadnoughts” in the vernacular of the day. Compared with the contemporary Pennsylvania class in the United States Navy, they were faster with better compartmentalization but less heavily armored and lacking the very effective American “all-or-nothing” armor protection scheme. The word “Fuso” was an ancient Chinese name for Japan. With the exception of some destroyers sent to the Mediterranean, watching for a few German commerce raiders and transporting troops to occupy German Pacific colonies, the Imperial Japanese Navy avoided action during World War One. Fuso went into the yards twice during the 1930s for modernization which, among other changes added new turbines with all oil-burners, increased her speed to over 24 knots, gave her a distinctively ugly “pagoda” tower foremast, added torpedo bulges and thicker horizontal armor, and increased displacement to around 34,000 tons. The Japanese Navy started World War Two with the best-trained and highest-morale crews in the world, especially when engaged in night actions, and they had better torpedoes than any other nation. They were deficient in radar development, effective anti-aircraft techniques and long-range gunnery. During World War II, Fuso sortied rarely and avoided real combat until her and her sister ship Yamishiro and all but one of their consorts were all sunk in an inferno of torpedoes, cruiser shells and battleship (California, Maryland, Mississippi, Tennessee and West Virginia–Pennsylvania did not fire as she could not obtain a clear target) big guns at the Battle of Surigao Strait on October 25, 1944. This was the last battle in history where battleship fired on battleship.

See other Japanese battleships: Ise, Kwachi, Introduction