I've heard of the Brits, Germans and Italians using mini subs but nothing for the Japanese and Americans. Did they have them?
Japan certainly did, I believe the late war ones were called Kaiten I believe, a quick google search should find some info. Wasn't the first Japanese loss of Pearl Harbour a mini-sub?
the japanese had several kinds during the war. type A was a 46 ton one man that had no power other than its batteries. they were used at pearl and at least 2 sunk there. one was the first combat loss of the war between the US and Japan. they were also used to damage HMS Ramillies at diego saurez armed with 2 18" torps. type B was an improved A with a small deisel engine to charge the batteries. type C was the same with a different power plant type D was an enlarged type with a longer range and a 5 man crew. they were designed for local defense and could be launched by rails, a crane , or from small ships kaiten 1 was a modified long lance torp and was the first true suicide sub in service with the IJN the 2,3,and 4 models were improved 1s with different motors, warheads, and/or ranges. could be land launched or carried by surface shipe or mother subs kairyu was a 2 man sub the could be armed with either 2 18" torps underslung under the hull or a warhead like a kaiten. also for local defense overall the IJN mini subs had very few sucesses [ perhaps 6 - 10 hits and maybe not that many offhand. i can think of perhaps 4 or 5. ] and were hardly worth the effort put into them. total numbers built were in the hundreds and maybe thousands of all types with kaitens making up the vast majority
The japs attacked pearl harbour as one of the subs was spotted on approach prior to the planes turning up. I also beleive that the japs tried some sort of suicide sub in 44/45 which again does not suprise me. Never heard of the US using them. The battles they fought didn't really suit such machines. They were either opperating out of unsecure allied bases in the med or brittain or over too great a distance in the Pacific. FNG
Japanese midget submarine sunk by the USS Ward on the morning of December 7th 1941. Story and pictures can be found at http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/HURL/midget.html
The Americans gave little thought to midget boats; nothing got past a prototype phase. In the early days of the 20th Century, the Japanese developed the Type 1 linked mine. As you might guess, this was two mines chained together. The intent was to create a larger "target" for a passing ship to hit and to double the explosive force. As the rivalry with the USN grew, the mine was planned for open-sea use, dropped by light ships "fleeing" before the numerically superior Americans. I'm not sure exactly what difficulties were experienced with the Type 1, which went through a couple versions, but I'm sure one of them was getting the twin mines to float at an appropriate angle and distance without the chain pulling them together, and they were probably easy to spot and avoid. Hm...if only we could put a crew aboard the mines to direct them actively against the enemy advance. This appears to have been the genesis of the Japanese midget boats. They were highly refined open-sea attack craft. However, their impracticality quickly became apparent. Again, I can't say exactly what the problems were, but I suspect that they involved trying to target the enemy from such a poor vantage point. You may recall kaiten episodes in which the kaiten passed right down the side of the target, even scraping it, and German midget crews also reported problems simply seeing where they were. Hm...what should we do with these midget boats? Some were deployed as local defense, which was probably the best that could be made of them. The most famous missions were those at Pearl and Sydney where the boats were used as covert raiders, probably the worst that could be made of them. They were complex and expensive, and they tended to porpoise after firing--not too covert.
You'd be suprised, but Sydney (Australia) was attacked by the Japanese in WW2! Two midget sub's got in through the nets and there was huge alaram. They were both caught, but they caused an uproar! Tomba
"Two midget sub's got in through the nets and there was huge alaram. They were both caught, but they caused an uproar!" The midget raid sank the accommodation ferry Kuttabul and killed 21 men. "I believe the British did use X craft subs against the Japanese on at least one occasion." They wrecked the heavy cruiser Takao (Actually, she was already a wreck, but the Allies didn't know that.) and also destroyed some communications cables.
The US Navy Submarine Museum in Groton, Connecticut has a Japanese minisub on display in front of it.
