Japanese Submarine Operational Errors in World War II: Will America's SSNs Make the Same Mistakes?

Abstract

A detailed review of the Japanese Submarine Force before and during World War II reveals a remarkable similarity with America's contemporary fleet of nuclear fast attack submarines (SSNs). As U.S. operational leadership struggles to resolve many of today's submarine command, control, and force utilization issues, they can look to the lessons of the Imperial Japanese Navy. In failing to adequately address submarine operational control structure, in assigning submarines to missions for which they were neither designed nor practiced, and in failing to perceive the importance of emerging technologies, Japanese leadership condemned their underseas force to devastating losses with little to show for a substantial national investment. This paper reviews the inadequacies of the Imperial Navy's operational design and reveals how America may be poised to repeat Japan's dismal submarine wartime performance.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 20, 1996
Accession Number
ADA311710

Entities

People

  • Donald D. Gerry

Organizations

  • Naval War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Antisubmarine Warfare
  • Attack Submarines
  • Boats
  • Classification
  • Detection
  • Littoral Warfare
  • Marine Transportation
  • Military Operations
  • Naval Operations
  • Naval Warfare
  • Navy
  • Oceans
  • Second World War
  • Submarine Warfare
  • Submarines
  • Task Forces
  • United States

Readers

  • East Asian Political and Security Studies within the Soviet Union
  • Educational Psychology
  • Maritime and Naval Warfare Studies