Get Our Extension
Select Wikiz in another Language
DeutschEspañolSuomiFrançaisItaliano
Settings
A
A
Text Highlights
Notes/Citations
Edit on Wikipedia

Share This Article

About Wikiz About Us Cookies Policy Terms & Services Privacy Policy Contact Contact us Enjoying Wikipedia Content? DONATE TO WIKIPEDIA
Enjoying Wikipedia Content? DONATE TO WIKIPEDIA

Japanese cruiser Chōkai

From Wikipedia, in a visual modern way
Japanese cruiser Chokai in 1942 at Chuuk Islands.jpg
Chōkai at anchor at Truk, 20 November 1942. Battleship Yamato can be seen in the left background
History
Empire of Japan
NameChōkai
NamesakeMount Chōkai
BuilderMitsubishi
Laid down26 March 1928
Launched5 April 1931
Commissioned30 June 1932
Stricken20 December 1944
FateScuttled after gunfire/bomb damage in Battle off Samar, 25 October 1944
General characteristics
Class and typeTakao-class cruiser
Displacement15,781 tons
Length203.76 m (668.5 ft)
Beam19 m (62 ft)
Draught6.3 m (21 ft)
Propulsion130,000 hp (97,000 kW)
Speed35.5 knots (65.7 km/h)
Range8,000 nautical miles (15,000 km) at 14 knots (26 km/h)
Complement773
Armament
Aircraft carried2
Aviation facilitiescatapult
For other ships with the same name, see Japanese ship Chōkai.

Chōkai (鳥海) was a Takao-class heavy cruiser, armed with ten 20 cm (8 in) guns, four 12 cm (5 in) guns, eight tubes for the Type 93 torpedo, and assorted anti-aircraft guns. Chōkai was designed with the Imperial Japanese Navy strategy of the great "Decisive Battle" in mind, and built in 1932 by Mitsubishi's shipyard in Nagasaki. She was sunk in the Battle off Samar in October 1944. Chōkai was named for Mount Chōkai.

Discover more about Japanese cruiser Chōkai related topics

Takao-class cruiser

Takao-class cruiser

The Takao-class cruisers (高雄型) were a class of four heavy cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) launched between May 1930 and April 1931. They all served during World War II.

Heavy cruiser

Heavy cruiser

The heavy cruiser was a type of cruiser, a naval warship designed for long range and high speed, armed generally with naval guns of roughly 203 mm (8 inches) in calibre, whose design parameters were dictated by the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930. The heavy cruiser is part of a lineage of ship design from 1915 through the early 1950s, although the term "heavy cruiser" only came into formal use in 1930. The heavy cruiser's immediate precursors were the light cruiser designs of the 1900s and 1910s, rather than the armoured cruisers of the years before 1905. When the armoured cruiser was supplanted by the battlecruiser, an intermediate ship type between this and the light cruiser was found to be needed—one larger and more powerful than the light cruisers of a potential enemy but not as large and expensive as the battlecruiser so as to be built in sufficient numbers to protect merchant ships and serve in a number of combat theatres.

Imperial Japanese Navy

Imperial Japanese Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 to 1945, when it was dissolved following Japan's surrender in World War II. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) was formed between 1952–1954 after the dissolution of the IJN.

Kantai Kessen

Kantai Kessen

The Decisive Battle Doctrine was a naval strategy adopted by the Imperial Japanese Navy prior to the Second World War. The theory was derived from the writings of American naval historian Alfred Thayer Mahan. In the Decisive Battle Doctrine the Japanese navy would win a war by fighting and winning a single, decisive naval action. The idea gained broad acceptance following the Russo-Japanese War, where a well-trained, smaller Japanese naval force gained a decisive victory in the Sea of Japan at the Battle of Tsushima, defeating the Imperial Russian Navy of their rival the Russian Empire, a western naval power. Operational plans thereafter were influenced by the effective naval gunnery Japan demonstrated at Tsushima.

Battle off Samar

Battle off Samar

The Battle off Samar was the centermost action of the Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the largest naval battles in history, which took place in the Philippine Sea off Samar Island, in Philippines on October 25, 1944. It was the only major action in the larger battle in which the Americans were largely unprepared. Ultimately, the Imperial Japanese Navy's First Mobile Striking Force under the command of Takeo Kurita disengaged and headed northwards, and most of the American carriers escaped with the help of rain squalls, smoke screens and intense air attack.

Mount Chōkai

Mount Chōkai

Mount Chōkai is an active volcano located on the southern border of Akita and Yamagata in the Tōhoku region of Japan, and is 2,236 m (7,336 ft) tall. Because of its (roughly) symmetrical shape and massive size, it is also variously known as Dewa Fuji (出羽富士), Akita Fuji (秋田富士) or Shōnai Fuji (庄内富士) depending on the location of the viewer. In addition to being one of the 100 Famous Landscapes of Japan, it is also included as one of the 100 famous mountains in Japan, and famous 100 Geographical Features of Japan. It is surrounded by Chōkai Quasi-National Park. It is also a National Historic Site of Japan, and is regarded as a sacred mountain by followers of the Shugendō branch of Shinto and is popular with hikers.

Operational history

At the start of the Pacific War, Chōkai supported the invasion of Malaya and participated in the pursuit of the Royal Navy's battleship Force Z. During January and February 1942, Chōkai was involved in operations to seize the oil-rich Dutch East Indies and the island of Borneo. Steaming near Cape St. Jacques, Chōkai struck a reef, sustaining hull damage on 22 February 1942. On 27 February, she reached Singapore for repairs.

After repairs, Chōkai was once again assigned to a support role in an invasion, this time the landings at Iri, Sumatra, and the invasion of the Andaman Islands and the seizure of Port Blair a few days later. Afterwards, Chōkai sailed to Mergui, Burma.

On 1 April 1942, Chōkai left Mergui to participate in Operation C, a raid on merchant shipping in the Indian Ocean. First, Chōkai torpedoed and sank the U.S. freighter Bienville, and later on, the British steamship Ganges on 6 April. With her role in the operation successfully concluded, Chōkai returned to Yokosuka on 22 April 1942.

Battle of Savo Island

Chōkai
Chōkai

By mid-July 1942, Chōkai was made the new flagship of Vice Admiral Mikawa Gunichi and his 8th Fleet. She proceeded towards Rabaul. On 7 August 1942, with Guadalcanal having been invaded by the Americans, Chōkai headed for the Guadalcanal waters, with Vice Admiral Mikawa aboard. In the battle of Savo Island, Mikawa's squadron of heavy cruisers, consisting of Chokai herself, and the heavy cruisers Furutaka, Kako, Aoba, and Kinugasa inflicted a devastating defeat on an Allied cruiser squadron. First, Chōkai and Aoba targeted the Australian heavy cruiser Canberra, followed by Furutaka and Kako joining in, and all four ships sank Canberra with gunfire.[1] Following that, Chōkai pounded the heavy cruiser USS Astoria, and as Aoba, Kako, and Kinugasa joined in, Astoria sank.[2] Finally, while other cruisers lit the cruiser USS Quincy aflame and sank her, Chōkai sank the heavy cruiser USS Vincennes with two hits from her long lance torpedoes. The battle of Savo Island was one of the most devastating Japanese naval victories of the war, the four allied heavy cruisers sunk and several more ships damaged or crippled. However, Chōkai sustained several hits from Quincy and Astoria, disabling her "A" turret and killing 34 men. Chōkai returned to Rabaul for temporary repairs. For the rest of the Solomon Islands campaign, Chōkai would fight in an assortment of night battles with the U.S. Navy, sustaining varied, but mostly minor, damage.

Cruiser Chōkai
Cruiser Chōkai

Subsequent action

Relieved as the Eighth Fleet flagship shortly after the final evacuation of Guadalcanal, Chōkai headed back to Yokosuka on 20 February 1943. Tasked with various minor duties for the remainder of 1943 and first half of 1944, Chōkai was made the flagship of the Cruiser Division Four ("CruDiv 4") comprising Takao, Maya, Atago, and Chōkai on 3 August 1944. All four ships took part in the Battle of the Philippine Sea.

Battle of Leyte Gulf

CruDiv 4 was part of Admiral Takeo Kurita's large fleet of IJN battleships, cruisers, and destroyers that took part in the various engagements of the Battle of Leyte Gulf at the Philippines.

CruDiv 4 suffered a harrowing submarine attack on 23 October 1944, with the sinking of Maya and Atago (which was Kurita's flagship though he survived), while Takao was left permanently crippled, leaving Chōkai as the only undamaged ship of CruDiv 4.

Chōkai was then transferred to Cruiser Division Five, where she survived an air attack on 24 October 1944, while the battleship Musashi was sunk.

Sunk in the battle off Samar

On the morning of 25 October, Chōkai engaged an American force of escort carriers, destroyers, and destroyer escorts in the Battle off Samar. During her approach to the US escort carriers, Chōkai was hit several times on the port side amidships by 5"/38 caliber guns of this force's escort carriers and destroyers.[3][4] It was believed at the time that one of these hits may have set off the eight deck-mounted Japanese Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedoes; however, RV Petrel's expedition in 2019 found Chōkai's torpedoes still intact.[5][6] An explosion was observed aboard Chōkai before a TBM Avenger from Kitkun Bay dropped a 500 lb (230 kg) bomb on her forward machinery room. Fires began to rage and she went dead in the water. She was scuttled later that day by torpedoes from the destroyer Fujinami (11°22′N 126°22′E / 11.367°N 126.367°E / 11.367; 126.367Coordinates: 11°22′N 126°22′E / 11.367°N 126.367°E / 11.367; 126.367), which also rescued some of her crew. Two days later Fujinami was itself sunk with the loss of all hands, including the Chōkai survivors.

Discover more about Operational history related topics

Pacific War

Pacific War

The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War, was the theater of World War II that was fought in eastern Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, including the vast Pacific Ocean theater, the South West Pacific theater, the Second Sino-Japanese War, and the Soviet–Japanese War.

British Malaya

British Malaya

The term "British Malaya" loosely describes a set of states on the Malay Peninsula and the island of Singapore that were brought under British hegemony or control between the late 18th and the mid-20th century. Unlike the term "British India", which excludes the Indian princely states, British Malaya is often used to refer to the Federated and the Unfederated Malay States, which were British protectorates with their own local rulers, as well as the Straits Settlements, which were under the sovereignty and direct rule of the British Crown, after a period of control by the East India Company.

Dutch East Indies

Dutch East Indies

The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies, was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which came under the administration of the Dutch government in 1800.

Borneo

Borneo

Borneo is the third-largest island in the world and the largest in Asia. At the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, in relation to major Indonesian islands, it is located north of Java, west of Sulawesi, and east of Sumatra.

Andaman Islands

Andaman Islands

The Andaman Islands are an archipelago in the northeastern Indian Ocean about 130 km (81 mi) southwest off the coasts of Myanmar's Ayeyarwady Region. Together with the Nicobar Islands to their south, the Andamans serve as a maritime boundary between the Bay of Bengal to the west and the Andaman Sea to the east. Most of the islands are part of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a Union Territory of India, while the Coco Islands and Preparis Island are part of the Yangon Region of Myanmar.

Port Blair

Port Blair

Port Blair is the capital city of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a union territory of India in the Bay of Bengal. It is also the local administrative sub-division (tehsil) of the islands, the headquarters for the district of South Andaman and is the territory's only notified town.

8th Fleet (Imperial Japanese Navy)

8th Fleet (Imperial Japanese Navy)

The 8th Fleet was a fleet of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) established during World War II.

Rabaul

Rabaul

Rabaul is a township in the East New Britain province of Papua New Guinea, on the island of New Britain. It lies about 600 kilometres to the east of the island of New Guinea. Rabaul was the provincial capital and most important settlement in the province until it was destroyed in 1994 by falling ash from a volcanic eruption in its harbour. During the eruption, ash was sent thousands of metres into the air, and the subsequent rain of ash caused 80% of the buildings in Rabaul to collapse. After the eruption the capital was moved to Kokopo, about 20 kilometres (12 mi) away. Rabaul is continually threatened by volcanic activity, because it is on the edge of the Rabaul caldera, a flooded caldera of a large pyroclastic shield.

Guadalcanal

Guadalcanal

Guadalcanal is the principal island in Guadalcanal Province of Solomon Islands, located in the south-western Pacific, northeast of Australia. It is the largest island in the Solomon Islands by area, and the second by population. The island is mainly covered in dense tropical rainforest and has a mountainous hinterland.

Battle of Savo Island

Battle of Savo Island

The Battle of Savo Island, also known as the First Battle of Savo Island and in Japanese sources as the First Battle of the Solomon Sea , and colloquially among Allied Guadalcanal veterans as the Battle of the Five Sitting Ducks, was a naval battle of the Solomon Islands campaign of the Pacific War of World War II between the Imperial Japanese Navy and Allied naval forces. The battle took place on 8-9 August 1942 and was the first major naval engagement of the Guadalcanal campaign and the first of several naval battles in the straits later named Ironbottom Sound, near the island of Guadalcanal.

Japanese cruiser Furutaka

Japanese cruiser Furutaka

Furutaka was the lead ship in the two-vessel Furutaka-class of heavy cruisers in the Imperial Japanese Navy. The ship was named after Mount Furutaka, located on Etajima, Hiroshima immediately behind the Imperial Japanese Navy Academy. She was commissioned in 1926 and was sunk 12 October 1942 by USS Salt Lake City and USS Duncan at the Battle of Cape Esperance.

Japanese cruiser Kako

Japanese cruiser Kako

Kako (加古) was the second vessel in the two-vessel Furutaka class of heavy cruisers in the Imperial Japanese Navy. The ship was named after the Kako River in Hyogo prefecture, Japan.

Wreck

Chōkai sits upright in 5,173 metres (16,972 ft) of water on the edge of the Philippine Deep. RV Petrel discovered the wreck of Chōkai on 5 May 2019 and dived it via ROV on 30 May 2019.

Source: "Japanese cruiser Chōkai", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, March 20th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_cruiser_Chōkai.

Enjoying Wikiz?

Enjoying Wikiz?

Get our FREE extension now!

Download Extension

Further Reading

USS Quincy (CA-39)

Battle of Savo Island

Type 93 torpedo

Japanese cruiser Chikuma (1938)

Gunichi Mikawa

Battle of Cape Esperance

Japanese cruiser Furutaka

Japanese cruiser Tenryū

Takao-class cruiser

Japanese cruiser Atago

Japanese cruiser Maya

Japanese cruiser Nagara

Japanese cruiser Suzuya (1934)

Japanese cruiser Kinugasa

Japanese cruiser Kako

Japanese cruiser Jintsū

Aritomo Gotō

Japanese cruiser Aoba
References
  1. ^ Frank, Richard (1 January 1992). Guadalcanal: The Definitive Account of the Landmark Battle (Illustrated ed.). Penguin Books. pp. 37–38. ISBN 978-0140165616.
  2. ^ Morison, Samuel (30 January 1949). Struggle for Guadalcanal: August 1942 - February 1943 - Volume 5 (First ed.). Little, Brown and Company. pp. 226–227. ISBN 978-0316583053.
  3. ^ Hornfischer, James D. (March 2005). The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors: The Extraordinary World War II Story of the U.S. Navy's Finest Hour, p.308-310. Bantam. ISBN 978-0-553-38148-1.
  4. ^ Hackett, Bob; Sander Kingsepp (2018). "IJN Chokai: Tabular Record of Movement". Junyokan!. www.combinedfleet.com. Retrieved 8 August 2019.
  5. ^ "H-060-3 The Search for USS Johnston". H-Gram. Naval History and Heritage Command. 20 April 2021. Petrel also found the Japanese heavy cruiser Chokai
  6. ^ IJN Chokai. RV Petrel. 25 October 2019 – via Facebook.
Bibliography
Categories

The content of this page is based on the Wikipedia article written by contributors..
The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence & the media files are available under their respective licenses; additional terms may apply.
By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use & Privacy Policy.
Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization & is not affiliated to WikiZ.com.