- Yes
- Maybe
- Unsure
- I don’t think she should be added to the game
Note(s):
Spoiler
- Some values in the specifications may be off since some values may not be included.
- Due to the fact that not many images show Nachi, images of her sisters will be included
Background
IJN Nachi is the 2nd ship of the Myōkō class heavy cruisers, as was standard of these cruisers they were originally built with 10 7.9" inch (200mm) guns in 5 twin turrets, their secondary batter would consist of 6 4.7" inch (120mm) guns in 6 single turrets with 3 per side, the ships also came with 2 7.7mm machine guns in single mounts for their early AA complement, as for the torpedos they came with 12 fixed hull mounted torpedo tubes with 6 per side, the class itself would see 2 major modernizations in their pre war years with the 1st seeing the main gun batteries switch from the 7.9" inch (200mm) guns to the 8" inch (203mm) guns, the secondary battery would see the removal of all the 4.7" inch guns and be replaced by 8 twin 5" inch guns in twin mounts, and the torpedos on the ships would be reworked as the fixed torpedo tubes were removed and the ship themselves saw the addition of 2 quad torpedo tube launchers below the flight deck, the AA armament would also be expanded with the ships also gaining 8 13.2mm machine guns in 2 quad mounts, the 2nd modernization which was less extensive saw the ships receive another 2 quad mount torpedo launchers below the flight deck and the introduction of the 25mm AA gun, of course this doesn’t cover the entire changes made to the ships of the class as they would increase displacement, improve torpedo protection, and so on in the refits and over the 2nd world war like her sisters would see the installation of radar and more 25mm AA guns.
History
1924 - 1941
Nachi was laid down a month after her not yet named older sister Myōkō on November 26th, 1924 in Kure, she would receive her name and be launched on June 15th, 1927, and would be the first ship of the Myōkō class to commission on November 28th, 1928 though she still couldn’t take the spot as the first ships of the class to be completed, in fact the she was not near completion, the reason being why Nachi came into service in a more unusual way is down to politics as it was decided to present her during the Coronation Naval Review for the soon to be Emperor Hirohito and was sent to attend on December 4th and once this had been completed she was sent back to Kure to complete her work so she was actually in a fit state to be a state of the art warship, this work would see her ready for service in April in 1929 though as far as I can tell if you count this as her actually coming into commission as a completed ship she kind of share the title of first ship completed and commissioned of the class with her sister Haguro who commissioned the later part of April though the thing which make it hard to say (from what I could find at least) is that there is no specific date saying when Nachi was completed in April which makes it hard to say weather she is the first ship of the class completed and commissioned or if she is the second one.
Upon her completion she would be visited by now Emperor Hirohito while she was in Kobe for a cruise on the Inland Sea from May 28th to the 29th as part of his tour of the Kansai region of Japan to encourage domestic industrial production. During her time in prior to the Second World War she like her sisters were assigned to Sasebo Naval District where they formed Sentai 4 of the 3rd fleet where they would train together in the 1930’s and in October, 1930 during a naval review it was discovered that gases from the smokestacks were causing problems on the bridge and so as a result the ships had their forward smoke stack lengthened by 2 meters. In February, 1932 she along with her sisters would escort the transports carrying imperial army troops to China during the First Shanghai Incident and in December the ships would see them placed into reserve as the Takao class cruisers were coming into service which took their place of Sentai 4 and saw the Myōkō class make up Sentai 5 and in between the next 2 to 4 years would see the class modernized which saw them become more along the lines of the Takao class with the main battery, secondary battery, torpedo armament either modified, replaced, or entirely reworked as well as the AA battery being strengthened and torpedo protection improved even more with Nachi herself being modernized in 1936. Once this was completed in 1937 she would transport the headquarters elements of the Imperial Japanese Army’s IJA 3rd Division and IJA 6th Infantry Regiment from Nagoya to China on August 20th before undergoing another modernization in December which saw the improvement of underwater protection, strengthening the AA battery, and doubling the torpedo armament.
1941 - 1944
Nachi would find herself at based at the Mako Guard District in the Pescadores Islands during the attack on Pearl Harbor and would see her along with Myōkō form Sentai 5 of the 3rd fleet where they would first deployed to Palau to cover the invasion of the southern Philippines during Operation M and would first cover the landing forces at Legaspi before both ships returned to Palau and then return to cover more landings that month for troops landing at Davao and Jolo. On January 4th while at anchor off Davao the force came under attack by a formation of B-17 bombers which saw Nachi take 1 hit from a 500 pound bomb which caused superficial damage however the damage to Myōkō would see Nachi become flagship while Myōkō went back to Sasebo for repairs.
Nachi would see her next action during the battle of the Java sea where she was joined by her sister Haguro as both ships had been covering landing at Celebes in the Netherlands East Indies, which was then followed by the invasion of Ambon. During the battle she would be in a formation with Haguro as well as with the light cruiser Jintsū, and on February 27th Nachi’s float plane would spot and locate the allied fleet, during the fighting she would sink the dutch destroyer Kortenaer and also indicted gun damage to the cruiser HMS Exeter, later that evening Nachi would score 2 more kills when she launched a torpedo at the Dutch cruiser Java which saw it sink followed by a second torpedo 7 minutes later which saw the other Dutch cruiser De Ruyter, 2 days later she along with her escorts would find the damaged Exeter which attempted to flee however the Japanese ships would sink Exeter as well as one of her escorting destroyers HMS Encounter with the survivor USS Pope escaping only to be found and sunk 2 hours later by aircraft from the carrier Ryujo.
In March Nachi underwent a refit in preparation for operation in northern waters which would see her patrol the Kurile Islands from April till May, and on May 26th Nachi left the Ōminato Guard District as flagship of invasion force of Aleutian Islands and would patrol south of Attu before returning to Ōminato on June 23rd before escorting a convoy to Kiska on the 28th and remained in the area until July 7th. Nachi would then undergo a refit on the 14th which lasted until the end of the month which then saw her reassigned to the 5th Fleet with the light cruisers Kiso and Tama and continued to patrol off of Kurile through March in 1943 and was sent as an escort for a reinforcement convoy to Attu from the 7th to the 10th. Later that month while escorting another convoy Nachi would spot an American naval force consisting of the Omaha class cruiser USS Richmond and Pensacola class cruiser USS Salt Lake City as well as the destroyers Bailey, Dale, Monaghan and Coghlan, comparatively Nachi was sailing along with the cruisers Maya, Tama, and Abukuma, and another 2 destroyers, as the engagement opened Nachi was ordered to launch one of her float planes though Maya was not carrying any and Nachi leaving on of her floatplanes behind to be repaired however Nachi was also ordered prior to launching the float plane to open fire by the Vice Admiral in command which resulted in the plane be prepared was damaged by the main guns opening fire which then resulted in the plane needing to be jettisoned off the ship, the last float plane however would for it’s own sake not get disabled by friendly guns and poorly thought through orders and would go on to provide sporting for the ship during Battle of the Komandorski Islands during which Nachi would receiving 5 hits causing which resulted in 14 dead in total and the attempt to reinforce Attu was abandoned.
Following the battle Nachi would undergo another refit in Yokosuka and during which she saw the installation of 8 25mm AA guns and then returned to Paramushiro in May 15th, then from July 10th till the 15th she helped to evacuate troops from Kiska, then in early October while leaving Ōminato Nachi encountered the submarine USS Halibut which fired 4 torpedos of which 1 hit starboard but did minimal damage as it turned out to be a dud and so she remained in Ōminato through until July of 1944. Next she was reassigned to Kure at the end of July and spent August training as well as her AA battery strengthened in September. In October she left for the Philippines as apart of the Southern force during the battle of Leyte Gulf along with battleships Fuso and Yamashiro, the cruiser Ashigara and Mogami and during the Battle of Surigao Strait she would run into Mogami causing severe damage to both ship and force Nachi to Manila for repair the bow, while their on October 29th she was caught along with Kumano at anchor when an air attack from the American carrier force TF 38 and during the attack she received 1 bomb hit as well as being strafed which saw 53 dead and delayed the repair which saw her still her on November 5th which saw 3 waves of attack of which she escaped the first wave however her luck ran out as during the second wave she received 5 bomb hits and 2 to 3 torpedo hits resulting in her bow and stern breaking off and then was hit by another 20 bombs and 16 rockets before sinking with survivors being rescued by the destroyers Kasumi and Akebono.
Specifications: (1943)
Note(s):
- Anything labeled as unclear is either not confirmed as one source may mention it however no other source mentions it
- Some values may be that of a earlier refit if a value is not given
Displacement: 13,300 long tons (13,500 t)
Length: 201.7 m (661 ft 9 in)
Beam: 20.73 m (68 ft 0 in)
Draft: 6.32 m (20 ft 9 in)
Installed power: 130,000 shp (97,000 kW)
Propulsion:
4 × geared steam turbines
12 × Kampon boilers
4 × shafts
Speed: 33.8 knots (62.6 km/h; 38.9 mph)
Range: 8,000 nmi (15,000 km; 9,200 mi) at 14 kn (26 km/h; 16 mph)
Complement: 773
Armaments:
Main Battery:
- 10 x 20.3 cm /50 (203mm) 3rd Year Type Naval guns (5x2)
Dual Purpose:
- 8 x 12.7 cm /40 (127mm) Type 89 naval guns (4x4)
Anti Air battery:
- 16 x 25mm Type 96 AA guns (4x2 & 8x1) (Notice: I may be wrong but it may actually be 6 twin mounts and not 4 however from what I can tell it seems to be 4)
- 2 x 13.2mm Type 93 AA guns (2x1) (unconfirmed: only on source mention this however it is only mention in it’s final refit meaning 1944, that being said they may have replaced the 7.7mm machine guns earlier however it possible these were never present as the only 13.2mm machine guns mentioned by another source being used were in twin mounts and were replaced by 25mm machine guns in 1943)
Torpedo tubes:
- 16 x 610 mm (24 in) torpedo tubes (4x4) (24 torpedos carried total)
Armor:
4" (102mm) NVNC belt inclined 12 degrees
Torpedo bulges with 2.3" (58mm) HT holding bulkhead
1.4" (35mm) NVNC middle deck
1.4" (35mm) NVNC lower deck
3.5" (89mm) NVNC uptakes
3.5" (89mm) bulkheads
1" (25mm) NVNC turrets
Sources
Spoiler
Japanese cruiser Nachi - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myōkō-class_cruiser
The Pacific War Online Encyclopedia: Myoko Class, Japanese Heavy Cruisers
Image Sources: