[bert]

The Yamato was ineffective at doing anything but taking hits. As I recall it was engaged in battle only once and that was against a pitifully small force of escort carriers and destroyers that actually prevailed.

the Yamato was obsolete the day it slid off the ways.

[GonzoGOP]

the Yamato was obsolete the day it slid off the ways.

The poor performance of the Japanese BBs was also helped by their refusal to use them in shore bombardment roles. The Japanese still looked on the BB as an anti-ship weapon and hence would not use them in the shore bombardment role. The Americans, having learned the hard lesson of Pearl Harbor, realized that the CV was now the primary ship killer and that the BB was basically just a heavy artillery battery and AA platform.

The Straits of Hormuz is not a ship killing role. With the exception of the three Kilos the Iranian navy is a joke and even Iran knows this. This is one of the cases where the primary mission requirement is the ability to soak up damage. In football terms we need to send the big lineman up the middle and not risk the star quarterback.

The threat in the gulf are the ranks of anti-ship missile batteries and artillery along the bottleneck of the straights. No sane admiral is going to put a CVN within range of 155mm shore based guns. As Forrestal and Enterprise proved flattops are flammable. An Iowa class could shrug off 155mm hits with little more than topside damage.