How would lower-caliber gun destroyers, such as the Akizuki-class, Battle-class and Daring-class fare against their contemporaries?

A segment on the uss maine would be awesome

what ship design or individual ship is most worthy of the meme "go home, your drunk"?

For some time in battleship design it seems everybody and their grandmothers were adding underwater torpedo tubes, which were then invariably removed during refits. Was there any specific incident(s) that caused this shift in thinking?

If you had to build a navy with ships from 1906-1945 with all historical numbers from those classes built which classes would you chose. You can have (2CV,2BB,2BC,3CA,3CL and 4DD) this is the number of classes you can choose for each ship type. Eg bismarck class and nelson class would give you 4 ships for BB's

she has been found off of Samar at 20,406 feet down

@@robertyoung3992 They THOUGHT it was her....it was only in the last couple of weeks that they found the main hull and confirmed it. Fitting that she sits upright and proud.

@@samsignorelli and further than anyone has gone before

@@aaronstorey9712 Yep

I did my finals paper for American military history on the Battle of Leyte Gulf last semester, and I made sure to mention the Fletcher class battleship USS Johnston.

_It's roll and toss and pound and pitch_ _And creak and groan, you sonuvabitch!_ _Oh, boy, it's a helluva life on a destroyer...._ Fair winds & following seas!

which one

@@rickreeve1246 687 Uhlmann

Thank you for sharing your sea story and for your service.

*Battleship if you take into account the battle of Samar.

ousou78 Nobody thought the Fletchers were battleships at Samar; they thought they were cruisers, then were forced to reassess them as destroyers later in the engagement.

They certainly fought like battleships at Samar. Managed to get under Kurita's skin.

@@KlunkerRider Rip Sammy B Roberts

@@joshuaolejasz9590 Sammy wasn't a Fletcher class though. It wasn't even in the main destroyer class either.

Hi Mike, My dad was also a crew member aboard the Twiggs. He never spoke of his experiences on the Twiggs or the Gwin (DD -433), another destroyer sunk, this one at Guadalcanal. Of course, the men were not allowed to give any details but through numerous love letters my mother saved I am able to piece together what my dad was feeling during the battle at Okinawa especially. All of my mother's letters to my dad were lost with the Twiggs. If you have any photos or experiences you can share with my brother and me would enjoy them. I will be happy to do the same. William A. Johansen

I’d say the second-best destroyer of the war. Because the Gearing exists. Which has a lot of Fletcher DNA regardless.

@Alexander Challis very interesting. launching a ship is an art in itself.

Actually, very few Gearings were completed before the war ended.

As a retiree of the USCG, I’ve learned to discount all official comments on how great a ship is/was. The “truth” of a ship’s value is in the number of that class that was actually built and commissioned. The official shpiel concerning the USCG SES type/EL DORADO class of patrol boats was that those were the greatest idea since sliced bread. The govt only built/commissioned 4 in total. This tells one that there were too many problems with the design and thus operational costs were too high.

@@living2ndchildhood347 and you are correct sir. As a retired Navy Chief and historian, I can assure you that the Fletcher class was one of the best destroyers ever built. The fact that 175 were commissioned between 1942 and 1944 speaks volumes. Additionally, the Allen M. Sumner and Gearing classes that followed were simply improved models of the Fletchers although not in as many numbers.

Dad said his ship would ride over one wave and go under two in heavy seas. He was in the Typhoon that sank three Fletchers with nearly all hands and bent the forward flight deck of a fleet carrier. "The ships rose and fell in the mountainous seas. The mighty New Jersey hung in the troughs and then slowly righted herself, lurching and laboring to the tops of swells. “No one who has not been through a typhoon can conceive its fury,” reported Halsey. “The 70-foot seas smash you from all sides. The rain and the scud are blinding; they drive you flat-out, until you can’t tell the ocean from the air…. At broad noon, I couldn’t see the bow of my ship, 350 feet from the bridge…. This typhoon tossed our enormous ship as if she were a canoe…. We ourselves were buffeted from one bulkhead to another; we could not hear our own voices above the uproar.” Admiral Carney voiced “grave doubts” that the battlewagon would survive, while Halsey feared for the fate of the destroyers. “What it was like on a destroyer one-twentieth the New Jersey’s size I can only imagine,” he said. He was right. The smaller ships were the worst hit, and the destroyer crews underwent a nightmare as the rising winds and seas tossed their craft around like toys. Caught near the storm center, the Hull, Spence, and Monaghan capsized and sank with practically all hands."

Wyoming Horseman If you haven’t read it already, I recommend the book “Halsey’s Typhoon”. It goes into great depth about the incident you are talking about. It’s a great book!

@@mr.narwhal9034Thank you, I will check with my library. Sounds like a good read.

@@wyominghorseman9172 Spence was a Fletcher, Hull and Monaghan were Farraguts.

@@padurarulcriticsicinic4846 Two Typhoons Crippled Bull Halsey’s Task Force 38 As the barometer fell rapidly, the wind velocity rose sharply to 73 knots while 70-foot waves battered the ships from all sides. Some destroyers heeled over on their beam ends with their funnels almost horizontal. Water surged into their intakes and ventilators, shorting circuits, killing power, and leaving them adrift. The ships rose and fell in the mountainous seas. The mighty New Jersey hung in the troughs and then slowly righted herself, lurching and laboring to the tops of swells. “No one who has not been through a typhoon can conceive its fury,” reported Halsey. “The 70-foot seas smash you from all sides. The rain and the scud are blinding; they drive you flat-out, until you can’t tell the ocean from the air…. At broad noon, I couldn’t see the bow of my ship, 350 feet from the bridge…. This typhoon tossed our enormous ship as if she were a canoe…. We ourselves were buffeted from one bulkhead to another; we could not hear our own voices above the uproar.” Admiral Carney voiced “grave doubts” that the battlewagon would survive, while Halsey feared for the fate of the destroyers. “What it was like on a destroyer one-twentieth the New Jersey’s size I can only imagine,” he said. He was right. The smaller ships were the worst hit, and the destroyer crews underwent a nightmare as the rising winds and seas tossed their craft around like toys. Caught near the storm center, the Hull, Spence, and Monaghan capsized and sank with practically all hands. warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/two-typhoons-crippled-bull-halseys-task-force-38/

Unlike some battleships Fletcher looks good from all angles. Dunno why but top-down views of bbs make them look morbidly obese

My great grandpa spent almost the entire war in the US navy. I believe he was on 3 separate ships that were sunk and survived all of them. I need to ask my grandpa more about his service. Sadly he passed away a couple years ago and i deeply regret not talking to him more often

jaddy540 thanks for sharing, and for your service.

Thank you for your outstanding service! In the modern fleet, which means beginning from your time, so many more sailors serve on the carriers and support ships than the gun ships. I can proudly say that a "Tin Can" sailor is a real Sailor.

Order: Fight the Yamato. Fletcher (Johnston): We don't need you to even order us to do that.

O7 Thank you for your service!

Tom Kelly, if you are alive,get in touch with me.Or any of his mates know what his fate was? Jack Gormley, FC school with you.

And it’s named after the captain of USS San Francisco

I love naval history and I'm an Army guy . . . also my like makes 69 likes, I declare victory !

Oh it's perfect, detailed long form audio friendly videos on highly specific portions of naval history

I actually developed my interest for naval history from this channel. I am no expert at all but it is very interesting.

It is indeed a good one to visit. We're fortunate to have some great ships to visit around this area.....You could see the Alabama (South Dakota-class), the Kidd, and the USS Orleck (Gearing-class) in a single day if you wanted, but you should give yourself more time if you really want to explore everything about them. You could even fit in a trip to see the USS Texas in Houston and the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans if you give yourself a long-weekend.

@@mellusk9194 Shame the Orleck has never had the financial commitment it deserves. Its location is also crap.

The USS The Sulivans, at Buffalo, NY, is well worth the visit. Then you can head over to Niagara Falls, the same day!

The USS The Sullivans (DD-537) is here in Buffalo,NY

@@mellusk9194 Orleck is closed and is either awaiting dry dock or is on its way to its new berth in Florida.

It had a weakness it did not have 16" guns😄😄😄

Couldn't get from the after section to the forward section or vice versa without going on deck. My dad served on DD 547 for 22 months.

@@Maritimesgestein Your remark is very offensive!!..My Father was on DD691 Mertz He went thru hell and your making JOKES!?..😡

@@d.owczarzak6888 He's making jokes you know what your Dad&mine went thru,That Typhoon,Submarines,Kamakaze attacks and we have Rodney Dangerfield making JOKES. .

Agree. I like the tribals but they were more pocket cruisers than true destroyers. The fletchers packed a much greater torpedo punch

Still think you should be a special guest of drach on a video or 20!

@@AdamMGTF Well, thanks a lot. It would be an honor if Drach ever asked me to participate.

28mm guns were too light to bring down modern planes, so US Navy ships were festooned with 20mm Oerlikons, why?

@@luvr381 Almost all warships of the period had a 3-layer AA defense system (4-layer if you count the loud casting of aspersions on the pilot's ancestory), with heavy, medium, and light AA armament, the heavy being the main battery on destroyers or secondary mounts on cruisers and battleships. The heavy AA was intended to do shrapnel damage by air bursting in the vicinity of the target at long range, the medium AA was intended to bring down a target with a single direct hit at medium range (more than one hit being a low probability), and the light AA was intended to disable a plane or throw the crew off their aim with tracer fire, basically a last resort. The problem with US ships at the start of US involvement in the war was that the 1.1" was the medium AA, and the .50 cal mg was the light AA. Neither was adequate. The 1.1" was really a light caliber weapon rather than medium and could not usually stop a plane from attacking with a single direct hit (though it might not make it back to its base or carrier), so was replaced by the more reliable and accurate Bofors 40mm which hit a lot harder. The .50 cal mg could not disable a plane with the 2 or 3 rounds that might hit, and was too short ranged so that a plane was likely to have already released its weapon load before the .50 cal mg could score hits. The 20mm, having an explosive round almost 60% bigger than the solid shot of the .50 cal, could do some damage at a sufficient range to interrupt a plane's attack at the last moment if it had made it through the 5" and 40mm. The 3-layer defense was crucial to a successful air defense scheme. With the 5", 1.1", and .50 cal, the US had only a 2-layer defense, with the 1.1" and .50 cal both being light AA. With the 5", 40mm, and 20mm, the US had a true 3-layer defense. There was also the factor that the 40mm required a dedicated director mounting, which limited the number of targets that could be engaged, while the visually aimed 20mms could all be fired individually at whatever the gunners might see. There were many instances of Japanese planes sneaking up on a US formation (for various reasons, radar was not 100% effective) and being engaged by sharp eyed 20mm gunners, at far too great a range to get hits, but the tracers alerted the 40mm directors and a hail of big-boom-bullets immediately followed.

@@luvr381 the 40mm Bofors (1.54”) replaces the l.l”. The 20 mm is simple stand alone gun. The sailor aims the gun which is powered by a blowback system.

It's very impressive seeing ships like that move so fast. Your brain tells you that nothing that big should be able to move like that. I thank your cousins husband for his service.

FYI: From Wikipedia: It was intended that the float plane be used for scouting for the destroyer flotilla to which the ship was attached. It would be launched by the catapult, land on the water next to the ship, and be recovered by the aircraft crane. Pringle was the first of five ships that eventually received the catapult to use it operationally. Due to design problems with the derrick, Pringle could not recover the Kingfisher airplane. Two ships constructed in 1943, USS Stevens and USS Halford, had redesigned derricks.[2] Stevens became the first of the five ships to successfully launch and recover the plane. All were ultimately converted to the standard Fletcher-class configuration. Following shakedown, Pringle joined convoy ON 154 in mid-Atlantic 1 January 1943 to escort the Halifax-bound contingent. While on this duty she was the first U.S. destroyer to use an aircraft with catapult. The float plane was catapulted off to search for enemy submarines. Recovery of the plane in the prevailing weather for a ship the size of Pringle was difficult. The larger ships battleships and cruisers would turn slightly to allow a smoother water landing prior to pick up with the net or crane while ship is moving and sea plane taxi's along ship.

they need Johnson first

@@Revkor Listen... No, LISTEN: to even half-properly represent Johnston, they'd have to give her at LEAST the Conqueror's Heal and the Atlanta's radar, both with improved cooldown, plus an equally Conqueror fire chance, say, after she's done a certain amount of damage in any battle...? I'm not sure that putting her at Tier 8 so she can face Yamatos on the regular is enough balance for that!

This comment aged like the finest wine

Too bad we use Desron and not D’squad

They don't build them like that anymore.

I did my 3rd Class cruise on the USS Robinson (DDG-12) with a 1200# plant and while practicing emergency break away during an UREP practice, the Robison’s fan tail had a lot of shaking too.

Boiler tech onboard U.S.S. Meredith DD-890, the last of the Gearings. And we did a few full power runs, and EVERYTHING shook like crazy!

I both regret, and appreciate, never sailing a boiler. Gas turbines got the shaft speeds enough to rattle us around too though.

I believe that the Fletchers and the Sumner/Gearing classes all have the same propulsion plant.

SOOOOOoooooOO many guns when multiplied over all 175 units

Rahbar Al Haq I hard to have to many gun as long as you use them regularly

Delenn was here.

Drach does like American 2nd amendment AA jibes...

@@micnorton9487 Understandably. There are few things as ridiculous as the misinterpretation of the purpose of the 2nd amendment. - and thousands of people pay for it with their lives each year.

My grandfather was on the USS Halford DD 480 it was one of the other fletchers with a catapult

Yes but they deserve a much longer explication. Hopefully we will see many individual ships highlighted. It should be noted that all fleet destroyers built by the USN until the Spruance class were fitted onto modified versions of this hull.

Little Rock is heavily modified from its original configuration. Converted to a Guided Missile Cruiser in the 1960s and served as flagship for Commander 6th Fleet.

Surely one of the Sailors had to had their feelings hurt at one time. 😭

“Hurt Feelings Report Chits” didn’t come into existence until sometime after the year 2000.

Add THE Fletcher's fifteen battle stars to the total, too.

The Nicholas was named for Major Samuel Nicholas, first commissioned and highest ranking Continental Marine during the American Revolution. Although the Continental Marines were disbanded and the present USMC was founded in time for the War of 1812, Nicholas is considered the ‘first Commandant of the USMC’. The Nicholas (DD449) was sponsored by my aunt, Elizabeth Tryon, at the Bath Iron Works in Bath, ME, in 1942. Later that year, the Nicholas was involved in the Battle of Guadalcanal, near the Solomon Islands. One of the actions the which the Nicholas and her crew distinguished themselves was, during a night battle, when the cruiser Helena was sunk, the Nicholas, under fire, picked several hundred sailors out of the sea. For this and other service during WWII (during which only two crew members were killed), the Nicholas joined her sister ship O’Bannon and the Taylor, to pick up the Japanese delegates in Tokyo Harbor and take them to the Missouri to sign the Treaty that ended the War in the Pacific. The Nicholas also saw service in the Korean and Vietnam Wars and at the time she was decommissioned the Nicholas was the oldest ship on active duty in the United States Navy.

@@corporalpunishment1133 Not funny a LOT of men were lost on Fletchers BRAVE MEN&Your making jokes!😡, Try Rodney Dangerfield!, This is not the place for jokes my Father was almost killed MANY times on a Fletcher.

The Sumner class Laffey, I presume? Since well, there are two Laffeys, the Benson class and the Sumner class.

The USS Kidd is the only USN ship to fly the Jolly Roger as her insignia.

Mark 15 for the the DDs.

Right, but same problems

The submarine service fixed the 14 not the Bureau of Ordanance. ComSubPac got tired of hearing the same excuses an ordered his torpedo shop to investigste the problems. They discovered, then fixed the depth control, contact exploder, and deactivated that worthless magnetic exploder. Then they passed the info to the Surface forces so they could fix the 15.

You mean the USS Samuel B. Roberts on which the crew had bigger balls than the onboard guns? Yeah, I'd like to see that one covered as well.

USS Gray Ghost wait, the Samuel B Roberts was a destroyer escort? I thought it was a battleship! Or a cruiser at least

@@PlaneBoy2520 battleship? I thought it was a space dreadnought?

Aril, The Random Guy on KZfaq nah fam, that’s a starship

tamenga88 Yamamoto knew about American industrial capacity, but he still thought Japan could win if they acted fast. He wasn’t in favour of Japan going to war at all, but since Japan went to war anyways, he thought the US had to be defeated so they wouldn’t interfere, hence PH. But in reality, the smart thing to do would be to go for the European colonies and force the US to take the fight to Japan sooner (before they could build up).

All three were lost primarily because they were low on fuel and had been unable to refuel due to the weather. In the light condition they were in, they were riding higher than normal and capsized in the monstrous seas. They winds were far greater than 100 mph and seas exceeded 60 feet.

One has become a naval museum in Veracruz Mx.

Hey, check your family tree: if you are related to Walter S. Sullivan, Jr. (first Communications officer on board FLETCHER and later the science reporter for the New York Times) then welcome to the FLETCHER family!

@@afletchermansson4418 that's nice but I was adopted and my Dad being the Sullivan along with his five brothers and four sisters all raised in Brooklyn Ny. The changes are remote😊

The LCS is on its way out. A new Frigate class is in the works to replace the LCSs. They were a waste of money and couldn't defend themselves from a fly!

I mean the Fletcher is just about the best dd in the game period (and yes, I personally consider it better in most situations than several T10s). People like to pull the "jack of all trades master of none" on her, but in each of the "trades" she's still in the top few.

@@Nikarus2370 when you have 175 of them, they don't need to be individually best at anything. The Bismarck was the best armed and armoured BB in the world. It was hit by hundreds of shells, dozens of bombs and torpedoes, and still didn't sink until sink until her crew scuttled her. But she still sunk.

@@naverilllang >The Bismarck was the best armed X Doubt

Well said. By looking at most modern designs today they would be classed as flush decks.

You don't have to wonder if you would check. A total of *three* destroyers of the Fletcher and Farragut classes--USS Hull (Farragut) , USS Spence (Fletcher), and USS Monaghan (Farragut)--capsized and sank during *one* typhoon, Typhoon Cobra, in December 1944. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Cobra Compared to the Japanese kamikaze/special weapons attacks in the last 12 months of the war, this is hardly a blip in damage. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Allied_vessels_struck_by_Japanese_special_attack_weapons

The 3 destroyers lost in the typhoon had nearly empty fuel tanks, but they were ordered by the big wigs not to take on seawater ballast, because they were hoping for a lull, when they could refuel again.. The captain of a ship has the final say in preserving his ship. They should have ordered all the fuel to be pumped to one tank, then ballasted the empties with water. If so, they probably would have survived. My ship, USS Twining,DD540,was the last ship to be refueled, before re- fuelling was called off due to too dangerous,just before the storm hit big time.Every ocean-sailing captain knows that a basic rule is that "When the barometer drops a ta certain speed in a certain time, YOU ARE SAILING INTO A TYPHOON/HURRICANE". Halsey, and every Annapolis grad in that Navy knew that, but did nothing about it. All we needed at the time, was for one of them, with balls, to say,"Admiral, don't you realize we are sailing into a typhoon/hurricane?"

@JAG You better check again: Kamikaze were deadly in the Pacific: These totals include ships which were struck on multiple but separate occasions. For instance, USS Ticonderoga and USS Franklin were both hit twice and USS Intrepid suffered a total of five kamikaze hits. Eliminating this multiple counting, the total number of major USN warships struck were 9 aircraft carriers, 2 light carriers, 16 escort carriers and 15 battleships. The great majority of these ships were hit during the Okinawa campaign, with 24 ships being sunk and 198 damaged. My dad was on the USS Louisville CA 28 from 1943-46 and she was hit 3 times in the Pacific with 51 sailors buried at sea along with Rear Admiral Theodore Chandler. These totals do not include the destroyers hit and damaged either.

Sea water ballasting sucks (done it) so I get why it was delayed. But in the end, it should have been done and I'm surprised it wasn't .

the only Fletcher lost in Typhoon Cobra was the USS Spence

What freeboard

p s also on the philip 498 until decommed the fletcher was 445

The best heavy cruisers, built when heavy cruisers were obsolete. Much like how the Iowas were the best battleships (I do rank them above Yamato) built when battleships were obsolete