Nagato class Battleships 1920–46

<p><b>An </b><b>illustrated study of Japan’s Nagato-class battleships: the IJN’s powerful super-dreadnoughts, which were heavily modernized to fight in World War II.</b> <br><br>Illustrated with the author’s much-acclaimed 3D reconstructions, naval researcher Stefan Draminski offers a technical and operational study of <i>Nagato </i>and <i>Mutsu</i>, Japan’s most powerful battleships of the dreadnought era. <br><br>They were the world’s first battleships to mount 16-inch guns, and signalled Japan’s determination to build a fleet that qualitatively outmatched the world’s leading navies. Entering service in the 1920s, they would be heavily modernized before the outbreak of the Pacific War, which <i>Nagato </i>would start as Yamamoto’s flagship for the Pearl Harbor attack. Both ships were present at the Battle of Midway, and though <i>Mutsu </i>would be sunk by a magazine explosion in 1943, <i>N</i><i>agato </i>fought at Philippine Sea and Leyte Gulf, before being modified again and moored at Yokosuka as an antiaircraft battery. The last Japanese battleship afloat on VJ-Day, <i>Nagato </i>was sunk in 1946 at Bikini Atoll in the <i>Crossroads </i>nuclear test. <br><br> Drawing on Japanese-language sources and original documentation, this is a concisely detailed account of these formidable battleships, superbly illustrated with archive photos and artwork showing the ships through their careers and in action.</p>