The four vessels of the Suffren-class were based on the Duquesene-class, though each was built to slightly different standards as lessons were learned from the preceding ship. Their hull form was ...
Continuing the Bf 109’s legacy, the Fw 190 soon gained the attention of Allied pilots in Europe as it cut a swathe across the sky. A big, radial-engine fighter, the Fw 190 was capable of using bru...
The Gloster Gladiator represented the final generation of biplane fighters before being made obsolete by the appearance of the Hurricane, Spitfire and Bf 109. In 1937, the Fleet Air Arm decided th...
While serving as commerce raiders, the Scharnhorst-class Battleships (or battlecruisers), Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were responsible for sinking over 105,000 tons of allied shipping in a single cr...
Though laid down and launched before the start of the war, the Graf Zeppelin was never completed or commissioned, and it never saw action.
Whilst four aircraft of the class had originally been pla...
Launched on St Patricks Day 1938, HMS Belfast was one of ten Town-class vessels and the first vessel of the Royal Navy to be named for a Northern Ireland town. She initially operated as part of th...
The first WWII mission of Dido was the escort the carrier, Furious to West Africa in November 1940, before spending four months on convoy escort duty in the Atlantic. She then joined operations in...
Laid down in 1937 and commissioned in 1941, HMS Duke of York was a King George V-class of battleship. She had the distinction of transporting Winston Churchill across the Atlantic to meet Franklin...
An early aircraft carrier of the Royal Navy, HMS Eagle was originally a super-dreadnought of the Chilean Navy (named Almirante Cochrane), laid down in 1913, but was purchased by the Royal Nav for ...
At one time, the HMS Hood was the largest and possibly most famous ship in the world, representing the supremacy of British sea power. Though attached to Home Fleet, the Hood took part in the sink...
Neptune operated during her World War II service with a crew predominantly composed from the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy, but also a large proportion of South African personnel. In late...
HMS Warspite was a Queen Elizabeth-class battleship of the Royal Navy. Built during the early 1910s, she served in the First World War, including at the Battle of Jutland. Modernized in the 1930s, ...
Submarines: The Kaidai-7-class, or KD-7, was developed in the late 1930s, following on from the preceding KD-6 class. With a surface range of 8,000nm at 16kts, and a submerged endurance of 50nm at...
For centuries, Japan's policy of seclusion (sakoku) saw it concentrate on coastal defences in order to repel foreign vessels. However, with the advances other maritime nations were making, it event...
Built as a training cruiser for the French Marine Nationale the Jeanne d'Arc was both floating school and combat capable warship. During WWII she formed part of a flotilla taking French gold to Ca...
Essentially an enlarged Fubuki-class, the Kagerō-class hull design was scaled up to overcome earlier design deficiencies. As a result, the Kagerō-class was the equal of any of its contemporaries i...
Köln was the third of the Königsberg-class of light cruiser, operating between 1929 and 1945, initially under the Reichsmarine and subsequently the Kriegsmarine. In the 1930s she served as a train...
Kongō (金剛, “Indestructible Diamond”), named for the mountain, was the first battleship of her class, serving in both the first and second world wars. At the time of construction in the early 1910s...
The lead ship of her class, Königsberg had a similar operational history to that of her sister ships like Köln (see above), operating as a training vessel until the outset of World War Two. She spe...
The Kriegsmarine had to be virtually rebuilt after the First World War. Forbidden to own capital ships and submarines, Germany nibbled away at first one clause of the Treaty of Versailles, then ano...
Submarines: A long-ranged submersible, the Type IX was the most successful U-boat of the war, with each vessel averaging over 100,000 tons of shipping sunk. One Type IX, U-107, made the most succe...
At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Marine Nationale of France was a powerful force with modern battleships, which should have been a major asset to the Allied cause. The rapid fall of Fr...
Preventing attacks on defenceless merchant ships is the other main role of the navy, and it was her that the war was fought, day in and day out, by the humble corvette, frigate and destroyer escor...
The second of the four Mogami class heavy cruisers, Mikuma was completed in 1935 but quickly underwent refits to replace her main turrets with twin 203 mm guns. Her former weapons, triple 155mm gu...
The third of the Admiral-Hipper-class of heavy cruisers, Prinz Eugen was named for Prince Eugene of Savoy, and 18th century Austrian general. She saw action during the German operation Rheinübung ...
Submarines: Compared to a German Type VII C submarine, the Marcello-class were much larger, displacing 1,060 tons versus 769. Speed and range between the two classes were almost similar, but the M...
The Royal Navy of Great Britain was the world’s greatest navy at the outbreak of the Second World War. However, Britain went to war with mainly First World War-vintage vessels. Since the Royal Navy...
Submarines: Designed for use in North European and Mediterranean waters, the S-class was manoeuvrable with a noted ability to crash dive extremely quickly. Combined with a large salvo of torpedoes...
The German capital ship Scharnhorst was the lead of her two ship class, launching in October 1936. She was armed with a main battery of nine 28cm C/34 guns in three triple turrets. Though plans we...
The four vessels of the Suffren-class were based on the Duquesene-class, though each was built to slightly different standards as lessons were learned from the preceding ship. Their hull form was ...
When launched, the Surcouf was the largest submarine in the world, only surpassed in the Second World War by the Japanese I-400-class submarine.
Her intended role was that of commerce raider and h...
The heavy cruiser, Suzuya, is believed to be one of the deepest shipwrecks on record at (a yet) unconfirmed 27,600 feet. She met her fate at the Battle of Leyte Gulf when she was beset upon by car...
