Hi, this is TOMEKO getting more energetic on Friday.
Since my posts are
about nasty topics such as BIG TITS and other junk stories and they could make blog readers think TOMEKO is crazy, I decided to write a cool one.
In the past, there used to be some rules on naming military vessels of the former Imperial Japanese Navy like the following.
1. Battleships must be named after old countries in Japan.
Ex. YAMAYO, MUSASHI, MUTSU, ISE, HYUGA, and so on.
2. Destroyers must be named after weather or season.
Ex. YUKIKAZE, AKIKAZE, HATSUHARU, ASASHIO, YUUGUMO, and so on.
3. Heavy cruiser (so-called first-class cruiser) must be named after mountain.
Ex. FURUTAKA, AOBA, MYOUKOU, TAKAO, MOGAMI, and so on.
4. Light cruiser (so-called second-class cruiser) must be named after river.
Ex. TENRYUU, AGANO, NAGARA, KAWACHI, SENDAI, YUUBARI, and so on.
5. Carrier might be named after things related with the sky such as dragon and bird.
Ex. SHOUKAKU, UNRYUU, OOTAKA
These names look quite cool, don't they ?
For your information, the naming of foreign ships is also interesting, but maybe next time.
Anyway today's topic is this.
IJN Fast Battleship Haruna (Plastic model)
This ship was named after Mt.Haruna in Gunma prefecture but it is actually a "battleship." Then why was a name of mountain used for the battleship? This is because Haruna was going to be built as a heavy cruiser at a planning stage.
We can find the same cases. I heard that Shinano (carrier) had been going to be built as a battleship, for example.
Kongou, Hiei, and Kirishima are the same case as Haruna. These battleships are all named after mountain, not old countries. Mt.Hiei is the mountain which is well-known for armed monks, isn't it?
The construction of Haruna started quite a long time ago, in 1912. It is before the era of the Pacific War. Surprisingly Haruna is a battleship in the era of World War 1! The reason why the vessel type of Haruna changed from heavy cruiser to battleship could be due to the Taikan-Kyohou-Shugi(*1) which was widespread throughout the world. I have a deep emotion to know that the battleship in that era survived World War 2 and Haruna was finally scrapped after the end of World War 2.
(To tell you the truth Haruna was terribly hit and bombed, and therefore it rarely went to battle lines.)
It is a very battle-experienced and tough veteran.
The story of Haruna is very attractive to me and is pushing me to think I should try to build a vessel plastic model kit.
(*1)The Taikan-Kyohou-Shugi literary means the Big-ship-and-Big-gun-ism, which was a fad between the early 1900 and around 1920 throughout the world. In Japan, YAMATO and MUSASHI were built based on the Taikan-Kyohou-Shugi.
Unfortunately, during the World War 2, the world came to put emphasis on fighters, and at the same time the importance of carriers increased. Of course, battleships were still useful to some extent, thinking about anti-ship firepower and guard ability for carriers and fighters. Unfortunately, however, a battleship itself is wide-open against fighters and therefore it was very vulnerable outside air supremacy. (This point is referred to as the reason why YAMATO sunk and exploded. )
If you want to store more of knowledge, we recommend
the correct materials.