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National Archives #80-G-339841
Midget submarines
were small submersible craft with limited range and firepower. Because
of their very limited endurance, they were typically carried close to
their target by a mother ship, which was often a conventional
submarine. However, the Japanese
converted some of their seaplane
carriers (such as the Chitose
class) to carry midget submarines.
Japanese midget submarines were typically manned
by a crew of two or three and carried two small torpedoes. The British also experimented with
midget submarines, but their X-craft
were armed with timed charges rather than torpedoes.
Japanese midget submarines were developed to be used during the Great Decisive Battle that dominated Japanese
strategic thinking. However, some thought seems to have been given to
coastal defense as well. Offensive-minded Japanese tacticians
pressed for their employment at Pearl
Harbor, Sydney, Diego Suarez in
Madagascar, and other heavily
defended harbors. Predictably, these
missions proved suicidal, but at
Diego Suarez the submarines did
succeed in sinking a merchant ship and damaging battleship Ramilles. A number of midget submarines were deployed to Okinawa but were destroyed by air strikes on 30 March 1945, before they could go into action.
The British deployed a number of XE-class
midget submarines to Brisbane in
April 1945. Their crews trained until July, when five of the midgets
were
transported by mother submarine to cut telegraph cables off Hong Kong and Saigon and to attack Japanese heavy cruisers at Singapore. The midgets managed to
severely damage heavy cruiser
Takao.
References
CombinedFleet.com (accessed 2007-12-17)
Morison (1959)
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