Could an US supercarrier defeat the whole Japanese WWII navy?

on one side america's supercarrier and three escorting ships which make up its strike group packing over 70 aircraft all together on the opposing side the entire Imperial Japanese Navy of world war ii at its peak in 1942 it had over 280 ocean-going vessels the US carrier group gets whisked away to 1942 replacing all of the US Navy forces from said period can one carrier group hold on against Japan or could it even rag the entire Japanese Navy one of the comments we always get is I want to be a youtuber could you help me out addressing everyone in person is impossible but we can recommend Skillshare an online learning community sponsoring this video stick around after our video for some very specific class recommendations let's go back to our Pacific setup the US Navy losing all their ships planes and men they had in one magical moment would be a heavy blow but the technological edge a super Carrier Strike Group offers might just compensate for it this scenario will assume the switch happens in the spring of 1942 the Japanese realized the playground is much more open but don't realize what exactly happened they certainly don't expect a futuristic carrier the Battle of the Coral Sea never happens and the Japanese emboldened by their successes around Indonesia set their sights on the entire Hawaii archipelago but if their Midway battled to be force approached the outlying islands it would get noticed by the US carrier group the e2 aerial early warning planes can see objects far out to the horizon especially large warships while the e2 is labeled as an AWACS like plane another one of its core mission sets is ocean surveillance the planes radar wavelength was chosen to perform well against naval targets if really needed the carrier group could maintain an e2 scanning around with its radar and making sure nothing gets past it for several days before maintenance schedule matters kick in though it's more likely some of the helicopters of the air wing would eight at times when no threat is expected the Air Wing of a strike group carries anywhere from half a dozen to 20 helicopters depending on the size of the strike group they're divided between the carrier itself and escort ships for the purpose of this scenario we will assume one of the most typical peacetime patrol Strike Group compositions to burke-class destroyers one Ticonderoga class cruiser and a dozen helicopters between them and the carrier although supply ships and submarines often time help the strike group in certain missions they're usually not part of the strike group when not needed so in this instance they have not traveled in time with the carrier so what would happen is this Japanese ships would get noticed and aircraft would be sent to confirm the targets the world war ii technology that japanese have would not even alert them to the fact enemy radar is present and watching them then some strike groups would get assembled taking off from the carrier for the Nimitz class ships usually have four strike plane squadrons all this does assume at least several days for both the carrier group and the US nation of that period to actually come to terms with the whole fantastical premise and a new reality of the situation to simplify the US nation accepts its new carrier and the loss of its previous assets and the carrier promptly accepts its role as the sole defender as well as coordinates with the US government let's go back to that strike the Japanese would likely be detected hundreds of miles away from the Midway islands and waves of f-18s would likely be sent the US Navy doesn't currently have LR ASM missiles widely deployed as the weapon only entered early operations stages in October 20 1978 immer cells could be carried by a super hornet most likely the initial strike would be performed by the harpoon anti-ship missiles u.s. planes would likely get pretty close especially the planes that observe the damage with targeting pods but flying at over 40,000 feet that would be completely safe from Japanese interceptors the electronic jamming planes could also join the effort blinding any radars the Japanese might hope to use basically it would be a turkey shoot lighter and unarmored targets such as the carriers could be hit with harpoon missiles the Japanese might use a torso fleet or light carriers in this alternate timeline but each hit from a harpoon missile would be at least as devastating as the bombs that did hit the carriers in the real timeline the bombs hit the ship's ad medium subsonic speeds somewhat slower than the harpoons impact speed and her Poon's might have some propellant left to burn upon explosion there would be almost no way for the Japanese to intercept those missiles as there are too fast and too small to spot visually until it's too late if the first u.s. wave contained ten planes and concentrated fire on the carrier's pretty much all the Japanese carriers would likely end up burning in the real time line most Japanese carriers were destroyed after three to five hits though one was destroyed with a single bomb the US would not use only harpoon missiles the carrier probably doesn't have that many though the exact number can only be approximated given the numbers produced and known operational usage of the missile it's possible each u.s. super carrier on a mission carries a few hundred harpoon missiles the exact composition of what weapons a carrier has is not only secret but is flexible depending on the mission one can only deduce the possible range of weapons based on the disclosed total ordnance weight carried for Nimitz carrier that is 2600 tons keep in mind the figures shown are not likely accurate they're just ballpark estimates of what could be possible after the initial onslaught the Japanese fleet would be in disarray their surface ships were capable of dealing with planes at close distances not with f-18s flying at altitudes of 15,000 feet or more dropping laser-guided bombs with targeting pods assessing the damage and no pressure to go about it quickly weapons usage could be made efficient not wasting many bombs on the same target especially since laser guidance could hit the most crucial parts of the ships the US carrier could launch another two waves while holding a dozen planes for self-protection possibly a hundred more hits could be delivered we dozens of Japanese ships being sunk within several hours the leftover Japanese ships could get maybe a little over hundred miles away before the repeated attacks from the carrier come it is likely some of the ships would eventually escape but the Japanese Navy would still suffer an extreme blow pretty much all of their fleet carriers would be lost as well as over a third of their other large surface vessels perhaps even several submarines as they would be hunted by US helicopters use ships would likely keep the distance so as not to be ambushed by a luckily positioned submarine besides going for Midway Japanese forces of the real-time line also performed assaults further north attacking Kiska and Attu islands near Alaska thing is the Japanese up north would likely be alerted some of the Japanese ships from the Midway battle would radio in what happened to their northern force since that force also had lots of slower supply ships and transport ships that needed protection the northern Japanese fleet could flee at relatively slow 11 knots the u.s. fleet could steam at a very high speed of possibly 25 to 30 knots weather permitting but another issue arises with great speed fuel usage skyrockets while the carrier itself uses nuclear fuel the escort ships do not they are limited to a certain range the u.s. fleet might catch up after some five days by which time the Japanese might already be quite close to the Japanese mainland and enjoy the added protection of multiple submarines and possibly hundreds of Japanese planes they might even be able to set up an ambush of course the Japanese might go in multiple directions using roundabout routes they could separate their fleet the actual chance is that the US carrier could find and engage most of the Japanese Northern Fleet before it reaches the Japanese mainland are slim and for what so US escort ships could spend a little over 40 percent of their fuel just to reach the Japanese mainland the u.s. fleet would indeed be severely limited by fuel going to mainland Japan would mean a lot more fuel would be needed for a return to any sort of a base say at Pearl Harbor especially because Hawaii would still be without any real defenses so there presence there might be of utmost importance instead of a chase if the Aleutian Islands do get invaded the carrier and its escorts might eventually sail at ten knots or so and help retake the islands for that to happen some new assets would need to be created or repurposed for the US Navy such as transport ships which would take quite some time one destroyer and some helicopters might be left around Hawaii for added protection a single Berk could still be quite dangerous for any Japanese fleet while her pawns might not be available anti-air missiles also have anti-ship capabilities the more numerous sm2 missile is range limited due to radar horizon as some six has its own terminal guidance system and a longer range when guided by a helicopter in the mid flight stage another option is the penguin anti-ship missile launched from a helicopter it's range is more than adequate against world war ii forces with a fair sized warhead while a carrier going solo without any escorts could provide the u.s. with great flexibility and speed its anti-submarine protection would be severely limited if it did that there would be no outside perimeter of ships and earth owners both hull mounted ones and towed behind ships and the overall number of anti-submarine helicopters would be lower possibly by half with just one crucial asset the US side would be unlikely to risk its carrier in offensive ops without escort while world war ii subs are primitive compared to modern threats it is still possible that in certain weather conditions and littoral waters the periscope would not be detected in time especially with fewer helicopters flying around the carrier while the slow Japanese subs could not hope to catch the carrier if the carrier went near Japanese mainland a silent waiting sub may get lucky as the carrier stumbles into its range the Japanese would have upward of 50 more submarines left which would not be a harmless force in home waters against a lone carrier minefields would also be a concern for a lone carrier trying to approach the Pennines lands without as many helicopters to sweep for them combined with a fuel issue all that would likely prevent the u.s. from going too close to the Japanese mainland but the likely targets besides the Aleutian Islands might be liberating the Wake Island and possibly even Guam dog wom due to its distance might be too much of a waste fuel wise how much could the carrier Air Group help in retaking those islands its planes could perform upward of 50 strike sorties per day dropping possibly 200 or more guided bombs per day with targeting pods available searching for targets and assessing the damage would be fairly easy so Japanese forces on the islands might be quite pinned down as the u.s. infantry disembarks added firepower might come in the way of ships main guns leaving one destroyer to defend Hawaii two ships could lay some decent fire on the island while helicopters might be vulnerable to enemy fighters it's more than likely a surprise for a strike would wipe out most of the Japanese planes on the ground and the remainder would be dealt with by f-18s air combat wouldn't be fair once again Japanese planes in the air would have no way of knowing they're being targeted and both heat-seeking and radar such as cruise missiles from decent distances besides bombs which are quite plentiful on a carrier another limiting factor would be a V Asian fuel carried nimitz-class carriers have enough fuel for roughly up to 1500 aircraft sorties that means that 70 aircraft strong Air Wing might hope to fly for two to three weeks with one sortie per plane per day overall securing the Aleutian Islands then wake then Guam might be doable at 10 knots speed just enough for the carrier to return to Pearl Harbor perhaps leaving another destroyer and some helicopters at wake or Guam for defense after that the remaining escort would be out of fuel and most probably the aviation fuel on the carrier itself would be very low so what happens at that point depends on what one allows for in this scenario if the carrier group is to receive no help from the US World War two forces it would eventually be game over the Japanese would slowly regain courage and advance along the front upon seeing there is little u.s. resistance as the US Navy of the time is being rebuilt from scratch they might go on defensive again the carrier would be ill-advised to try and hunt down the remaining Japanese carriers and battleships as a search would require too much fuel modern carrier and its planes would simply be too limited by their supplies with the carrier group out of the picture Japan would surely advance much much more than it would otherwise but eventually the US Navy would get rebuilt and ultimately pushed the Japanese back rebuilding would take time though ships themselves could be fairly quickly replaced u.s. already had many under construction in 1942 the emergency shoveling program turned out literally thousands of various tanker cargo and transport ships even big item ships were commissioned in large numbers post 1942 so it is evident that the u.s. Navy actually grew several fold during the war the existing assets of the spring of 1942 were not the majority of the total US forces by the end of the war so the rebuilt US Navy would have overtaken the entire Japanese Navy by 1943 or so it would take time to train new sailors though especially considering the experienced core of the officers and engineers would not exist so that would take another year or two to get to some usable proficiency levels for comparison the Japanese shipbuilding from 1942 onward was fairly small so the Japanese would eventually be stripped of their gains in the Pacific and sheer numbers would still prevail nuclear bombs would likely be used in much greater numbers over the course of 1945 until the eventual surrender but how about the scenario where World War two u.s. does help the carrier force as much as possible not only fighting alongside it but also with the u.s. nation supplying the carrier new arresting cables and various parts might be made jet fuel to could be made by 1942 the u.s. did produce basic jet fuel used for the b-59 fighter compared to today's jet fuel it's still fairly similar being kerosene based and providing enough energy density various additives for flashpoints anti-freeze longevity etc are different but with some fuel from the future to be sampled it's entirely plausible a good-enough variant of the jet fuel could be produced by the end of 1942 so the Jets would fly and ships would run even if at lower efficiency what could not be duplicated is weaponry all the guided missiles and bombs once they run out could not be replaced reverse engineering might take a decade even to get the most basic guidance comparable to early Cold War TAC it's likely planes would at some point have to rely on world war ii era unguided bombs another issue that would surely befall the US forces from the future is maintenance aircraft and the ships are meant to perform for several months then receive maintenance at depots off carrier while various subsystems would work a few months longer than they are usually maintained for eventually the planes would start falling out to disguise World War two jet engine tech is simply not advanced enough to provide the required spare parts for the engines similar issues would impact electronics even with the best effort it's unlikely those aircraft would be able to fly for much longer than half a year certainly under a year of combat ops running out of guided weapons the planes might rather be used as high flying sensors the forces from the future would face other issues as well a good part of their bombs are satellite-guided those would take a hit in precision having to rely on their inertial navigation systems long-range strikes with Tomahawk cruise missiles would not really work as satellite navigation is the main guidance method small infrared sensor on the nose is for target assessment only and terrain contour matching system would not work over the ocean navigation might be a big issue overall both the ships and planes rely on GPS for navigation nowadays with ground signal stations providing backup navigation of course in 1942 there would be no satellites nor compatible ground stations to provide signals perhaps within a year or more some new ground beacon system could be devised to help ships based on Lauren still super hornets would not easily know where they are and might at times get lost and crash into the sea the carrier group if it gets new fuel might after high for your venture out towards the mainland Japan but stand-up strikes would not be that easy air launched missiles rely on GPS for mid-course guidance and self guidance for terminal targeting only so their range would suffer greatly also the self targeting would not work without building up a prior photographic database of new targets for the image correlation software that the targeting system uses ultimately even the few hundred laser-guided bombs and upward of a thousand not so precise inertially guided bombs would not be enough to Japanese production there's just too many dispersed targets and various items can always be made anew certainly factories would have pauses in their production shipyards as well but when the good bombs do run out flying lower to maintain some decent hit rate would have to be done and this would likely prove to be too dangerous even though f-18s might fly twice as fast as the Japanese interceptors at low altitudes some lucky hits might still happen and even if some serious damage is made in the initial months there'd be no US Navy to transport the troops to Japanese mainland and actually exploit those paralyzing attacks from the carrier to sum it up a supported carrier group with new fuel and at least dumb bombs could keep Japan in check and prevent it from further expansion though actually invading further islands especially once close to the Japanese mainland would likely have to wait a few years for the US Navy to get rebuilt and retrained as shown the massive industrial effort the u.s. showed in the world war two would overshadow most of the benefits of one advanced carrier group so the war would end pretty much the same way perhaps several months later being a youtuber is the full-time business especially when you're animating videos as we do you have to grow a business really and know what works and doesn't on YouTube we too had some learning videos helping us through Skillshare for example the famous youtuber Jazza has this quite informing class stand out and make money on YouTube we recommend going through all of it he even covers the rates sponsors are willing to give you and this sponsorship you're watching is a testament to the accuracy of his claims and many of you will find this tutorial helped for how to make an animated YouTube video going through the learning process ourselves we can tell you that it would have been easier if we first watched a video like this years ago it covers everything from directing your video designing items to technical stuff like creating shapes for animations Skillshare has thousands of other classes too they cover all sorts of creative topics or business related questions you might have Skillshare online learning community is quite affordable premium annual membership will basically get you what you'd get in one-on-one workshops for less than $10 per month since Skillshare is sponsoring this video they were kind enough to give anyone signing up via the link in the description below a two month free trial if you want to learn how to design animate or be a youtuber we'd say they're worth checking out and remember being calm a talk about hypothetical Wars but only real peace can bring us all together [Music]

Channel: Binkov's Battlegrounds

Views: 2,772,103

Rating: 4.7624679 out of 5

Keywords: Nimitz carrier, Ford Carrier, US navy, Midway, Battle of Midway, Time travel, ISOT, Alternate history, IJN, Japanese navy, Imperial Japanese navy, F-18, Superhornet, A6M, Mitsubishi Zero, 1942, Pacific war, Binkov, Binkov's Battlegrounds, WWII, Final Countdown Movie, USA

Id: 474RR1ETgyk

Length: 21min 16sec (1276 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 22 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/BearFLSTS]

Back in the late 80’s there was a paperback book series called “The 7th Carrier” that was sort of the opposite case. Supposedly, a 7th Japanese carrier lost its bearings on the way to Pearl Harbor and wound up stuck in the Arctic ice. 50 years later a satellite system that emits an Electro Magnetic Pulse shuts down the modern world by knocking out all devices with transistors and/microchips. At the same time the 7th Carrier breaks free of the ice and the 70-80 year old Japanese sailors coming steaming home with what is know the deadliest military vessel and aircraft on the planet.

[u/Bertations]

“The Final Countdown”. Watch it!

Splash the Zero

[u/zeusmeister]

This concept is done in a series of novels I read awhile back. Basically, it takes place in the near future so the aircraft carriers, weapons and armor used are slightly advanced from what is available now. A multinational force of American, Japenese and Indonesian warships are sent back right before the Japenese attack on Pearl Harbor. They end up staying and a lot of the plot deals with how various governments use the tech...how knowledge of future events is exploited and how a segregated, Male dominated American society deals with black and female officers.

It's actually pretty good. I think there are 3 books in total.

[u/benjamindees]

The US built an oil tanker every four days during WWII, so running out of fuel is a dumb scenario.

[u/jbrandyberry]

Logistics win extended wars. Can't run a tank that doesn't have fuel. Can't refuel a tanker if you don't know where to go. Can't deliver fuel if you don't know where the fuck you are going. Can't load up on fuel from the smoking remains of a depot. And if you do, now you have to make your way back to the tanks.

[u/jbrandyberry]

Rome Sweet Rome.baby.