IJN Sōryū - The Forgotten Pearl Harbor Carrier

For my second Pearl Harbor Week video, we turn to the least remembered of the Kido Butai. Sōryū, which for better or worse, tends to get overlooked. The other members are, for various reasons, better known. Leaving Sōryū the odd one out.

A shame, because she gave good service. Even if it was, in the end, fairly short.

Her story ranged from early service off China, to the famous Pearl Harbor attack, and less famous raids on Darwin and Ceylon. Before it ultimately came to its fiery end, at the Battle of Midway. We'll be looking at all of that in this video.

Along with some...quirky preliminary designs.

Further Reading:

[SignsOf_Merit]

We sure remembered to say hello at

Fantastic research and commentary.

[ph]

Soryu has a Yorktown sized hull with Ranger level protection.

[DragonShadowfire]

Fun fact, I actually have an artifact from the USS Raleigh. It’s a baseball medal awarded to the ships crew during a navy tournament in 1939. I can’t recall if she lost any crew during the attack, but I never knew it was Sōryū’s torpedo bomber that did the damage.

I also have a silver sugar dish given as a gift during the launch ceremony of Hiryū, so my goal is to eventually have an artifact from every member of the Kido Butai. Cheers for covering such an often overlooked carrier of the IJN!

[philipmiller]

The carrier Kaga was hurt worse at Midway. Hit by 4 or 5 bombs.

[mbryson]

Thank you for showing the eatly possibilities for _Soryu._ I've always found the various possibilities for Treaty-era carriers fascinating.

[marcusp]

I have seen several of your videos and have enjoyed them all. This one on Soryu was very informative. Thanks for doing splendid work on your videos.

[ChrisLove]

That picture of the Edsall with the huge splashes all around her always trips me out. Insane photo.

[Verbindungs]

Great video. I always regret the Japanese were so secretive about its ships and have so few contemporary images of them.

[takashitamagawa]

It should be mentioned that in spite of the contorted path SORYU took in its design phase she turned out to be very effective as an offensive platform and the Japanese were very pleased at the result. She became the archetype for the later Japanese purpose-built fleet carriers including SHOKAKU and ZUIKAKU, which were enlargements on the SORYU design with more robust protection. Her sort-of-sister HIRYU that followed her had improvements on SORYU's design but the port side island located near amidships caused a number of problems for her flight operations compared to the earlier SORYU.

[stuartaaron]

The cross section illustrated from 6:06 to 6:34 appears to be for the Hiryu because the "funnels" go to starboard, while the island is on the port side.

[markmaki]

Heh - i was just reflecting the other day how Soryu sure seems like the 'also ran' in Midway lore.

[JohnnySmithWhite-wdey]

Lexington and Saratoga both originally had 8 X 8 inch guns in 4 twin turrets. 2 before the Island and stack and 2 behind.
So the carrier and cruiser combination was alive and well in America. The C in CV comes from C for cruiser and V for fixed wing aircraft.

[josephhungerford]

Very interesting topic plus size reminds me of Yorktown 😅 with a good history background.

[waynedavis]

Very interesting video. I really like the videos on the smaller navies.

[philcleaver]

informative Her Aircraft certainly hammered Darwin and also I think WA

[Yakko]

I'm guessing being an AA gunner on the starboard side aft of the fennels was undesirable.

[wesleyjarboe]

Too many people assume that Adm. Ngumo withdrew from Pearl Harbor for tactical considerations, such as low fuel or fear of US submarines. That doesn't fit the pattern.

From Pearl Harbor, to Savo Island, to Samar island, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) consistently withdrew when there was no further armed opposition. The Japanese Army followed a corrupted version of the code of Bushido which allowed atrocities such as the Rape of Nanking. The IJN, on the other hand, seems to have followed the original code, in which it was considered dishonorable to kill an unarmed opponent.

Just my two cents worth on the subject.

[HACM-mkqx]

The photo cited as Soryu should be her since her island wasn't as squat as the Shokaku twins and Unryu class.

[davidmurphy]

Nice write-up and audio presentation. Better selections of imagery for the presentation.

[frankskive]

moar wooden shipwrecks
love the vids tho