The WORST Warships Ever Built

What major types of ships do you know? Probably the first ships that come to mind are battleships, frigates, and of course, aircraft carriers. The latter, by the way, are considered the largest ships and reach gigantic sizes, for example, the largest ships of this class owned by the United States reach 1089ft (332m) in length, 131ft (40m) in width and 239ft (73m) in height, which can be compared to the size of an average shopping center.

Given that the first Nimitz-class aircraft carrier was created by the United States in 1975, at the height of the Cold War, the USSR was not able to stand aside and actively worked on its aircraft carriers, which resulted in Project 1143 carriers, the most interesting of which can be considered the aircraft carrier "Admiral Kuznetsov".

But in the video we will also tell you about other equally unsuccessful warships. Enjoy.

[jimnoort]

The Yamato was not hit by a torpedo during Midway. It was far to the rear of the rest of the fleet and never came within the range of planes and no submarine sighted her. The Battle of the Philippine Sea was in June 1944, not 1943

[ВасилийМорозов-лх]

6:34
While the Sevastopols/Ganguts weren't the best ships of their time, the linear arrangement makes some sense for the 1910's naval thinking:
1) Pre-WWI battleship design was still dominated by linear tactics, meaning that any major fleet action involving battleships was to be fought in a line with several ships turning all their turrets in the same direction and following one after another. This means that broadside power was prioritized over forward aiming.
2) This allowed for minimum superstructure which minimized unarmoured and thus HE-suspectible area. The Russian naval architects feared HE shells after Tsushima.
3) By distributing the turrets along the deck, the design didn't concentrate too much weight/recoil stress/explosives into the ends of the ship, allowing for better structural integrity of the hull and survivability of the individual turrets.

[nijssenphilip]

If you give an explanation about the vasa, go and visit the museums in Sweden. The cause of the loss of vasa was: 1. A fatal 2nd gust of wind. 2. The ballast (120 tons), too little to keep the ship stable. 3. The 64 guns, had to deal with it because they were all 24 pounders instead of half using 12 pounders. 4. The lower gun ports were open, which was unusual as the crew was still getting used to the ship. The sister ship (de Äpplet) is of the same construction and has served for 30 years without any problems.

[Diego-zzdf]

The Pr. 1143 was the Kiev-class carrier, Kuznetsov was the 1143.5 and it was a very different design. The Kuznetsov's problems are mostly related to the poor financial situation of the Russian Federation, but the design itself seems to be solid. The People's Republic of China bought and finished its sister ship, the Varyag (renamed Liaoning) and built another one of their own, the Shandong. They advanced the design forward with their newer Fujian. Going back to the Kiev-class, one of those was sold to India, who renamed it Vikramaditya, giving it a full modernization and upgrade and it's still in service. So the soviet aircraft carriers weren't such bad designs (the Kievs in their original form probably were, being a missile cruiser-aircraft carrier hybrid that underperformed on both categories, but once the Admiral Gorshkov/Vikramaditya was modernized with a full-length flight deck, it proved itself a solid design) but the consequences of the collapse of the USSR left them in the hands of a navy that just couldn't maintain and make proper use of them. Had the Admiral Kuznetsov been sold to China, it probably would've turned into a proper aircraft carrier.

About the Gangut class you're just dead wrong. Those ships were very well-armed for their time and the odd turret placement wasn't that unique, with other contemporary classes doing the same. They also proved themselves quite useful during WWII as heavy artillery batteries for the defense of their ports. Regarding their history, you frequently confuse their original form with the soviet-era modernization, you make claims about their contemporaries without showing any and your statement on their guns is wrong, with the russian 305mm cannons being quite good for their time, better than those of other nations. Again, you say they practically didn't see combat when in fact they were used during WWI and the Russian civil war, while also seeing extensive combat during WWII during the sieges of Leningrad and Sevastopol.

Regarding the Yamato, the ship itself was a solid design. That the Japanese navy failed to use it properly doesn't make it one of "The WORST Warships Ever Built", which was the title of your video. The amount of punishment both ships of its class managed to withstand before sinking proves how sturdy their design was and compared to other battleships in its weight category, they were superbly armed and armored. Their hull design also incorporated several developments in shipbuilding techniques to improve their performance. Again, all in all, you're just wrong.

The Vasa is indeed one of the worst warships ever built, but you say nothing about how it got to be that way. The original design was much smaller, simpler and lighter, but the swedish king made last-minute demands for a larger ship with more guns. instead of making a new design, the original was just made longer and taller, making it too unstable and heavy. Because the design changes came from the king himself, ship designers couldn't make changes. That's also why nobody was punished when it sank right after being loaded and made to set sail.

Your use of pictures or 3d graphics to depict the ships you're talking about is a matter of its own because you're wrong on almost all of them. You use the Kiev-class to depict the Kuznetsov, you put Yamato's turrets on the Gangut, you regularly show the SMS Blucher when talking about it, once you even show the Blucher with smoke coming out of its aft conning tower as if it was one of its funnels, you regularly confuse the as-built Ganguts with how they were after they received an extensive modernization in the 1930s, you show the Yamato surrounded with ships that had nothing to do with it, like a sunken Taihō aircraft carrier and a Kongo-class battlecruiser, facing off against a fantasy battleship design and two modern american supercarriers, and use a Russian Borodino-class battleship while talking about the USS Massachusetts.

All in all, this video is a waste of time.

[desoldier]

Yamato wasn't the worst battleship. In fact she was one of the best battleships ever created. She had one of the strongest main batteries even put in a warship and also she had super good armor. But she came too late when the age of battleships had end and the age of naval aviation had started. She had lost her purpose in the war. If she was laid earlier in the war, she would have brought many victories against other battleships.

[johnstirling]

Why would a Sevastopol battleship built in 1911, (pre WW1) have anti aircraft guns as described? This was before aircraft were considered a threat to battleships.

[evensgrey]

You forgot the Yamato's participation in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the most ludicrously badly fought naval battles in history, in which the Japanese managed to take their third total kicking in three battles. By a force that the Yamato's TURRETS outweighed, but none the less managed to totally savage the Japanese force, largely because the skippers of the seven destroyers and destroyer escorts took the attitude that, "You're going to kill us, but by God, we're going to make you BLEED!"

[thelatiosmaster]

As soon he mentioned Yamato as worst, I quitted.
Yamato problem wasn’t the ship itself: yhe war tattics changed for the war she was build for and was poorly strategicaly used

[FLJBeliever]

Ironically, the namesake of Admiral Kunestov was known for his rigorous high standards in training and maintenance.

He also picked fights with the NKVD, pushing the bullies around, and was a threat to Stalin on more than one occasion, but Stalin couldn't touch him in ANY way.

[souljahxl]

"Carriers aee the largest ships."

Oil tankers:

[AndrewGivens]

I just don't get this weird modern hatred or mocking of the USS Massachusetts
She was built to the same design as two other ships, both of which fought with distinction at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba. If I recall correctly, one of them - USS Oregon? - managed to steam an enormous distance at a high average speed to join the fleet in time for the battle (which the USN won with no losses of ships).
This class were explicitly designed as 'Coastal Battleships', yet proved themselves able to operate in the open seas just as any other nation's first-class battleships. They also proved capable of serving for years and years - until obsolete - without once capsizing due to their unbalanced guns.
This whole singling out of the catastrophe-averse Massachusetts is pure bunk. I don't know where it comes from, but if you were to believe YouTube, you'd think her a worse design than the Captain.

[piotrrowecki]

Nice video, but....

so many mistakes (for example: Gangut's secondary armament was for defense against mines???? You stated that twice!!!) and wrong assumptions taken out of context. Adding to the comments about Yamato (WW2 era battleships in general) being outdated and useless, you completely ignored when she was designed, build and commissioned. Back then airpower nor submarine has proven - beyond a shadow of a doubt (yes, there was Mitchell's aircraft sinking a stationary and crew-less dreadnought in ideal circumstances, mine and submarine has also sunk a number of battleships during WW1 and after: Spanish civil war) - a successful countermeasure against a battleship. There were no atomic weapons nor other assets that could guaranteed a battleship kill anytime anywhere. Until advent of rockets and nuclear weapons, as long as one side in any conflict had a working and modern (or modernized battleship) the other side had to have a battleship to counter it.. AND it does not matter if they engaged each other or took any combat missions at all. Fleet in being was sound and proven strategy throughout history and is reflected even today. There are number of countries with nuclear weapons and thousands of warheads today, yet only two were ever used in combat and it happen in earlier half of the last century. So according to your logic nuclear weapons are just a huge wast of money and resources, since nobody uses them...

[TomD]

The Massachusetts is currently in shallow water a mile or two outside the Pensacola Inlet, partly above water at low tide. I catch bait fish around it all the time.

[nathanshoaf]

Yamato actually sunk the USS gambier bay

[andrewdurand]

The Ganguts weren't that bad. They couldn't fire more than one turret forward or rearward, but if a battleship has the T crossed to it where it must fire multiple turrets forward or rearward it's already screwed.

[enolastraight]

I'm not entirely sure if the Sevastopol really is worth of being a "worst warship". While it was only used as a glorified gunboat, it still was not that bad for the time when it was laid down. Also, its' 305 mm/52 guns were some of the best weapons of that caliber for the WW1.

[zwtsch]

bro putting yamato turrets on sevastopol😳

[renatocamurca]

Purely considered as a battleship concept, the Yamato was perfect, but it was a magnificent machine out of its time. If we consider the Iowa, it is worth asking why they carried 16-inch guns since their main mission was anti-aircraft protection for aircraft carriers. Considering the design, the Yamato was an offensive weapon and the Iowa a defensive weapon, since the USA had several OBBs with enough firepower to destroy defenses on land.

[thailandgxd]

HMS Captain is ironclad warship that put her main turret under the deck

[dreamingflurry]

You are short selling the Yamato! Yes it was destroyed because it had no air-cover, no real escort etc. - but it took a lot to sink it, dozens of bombs, several torpedos etc. (so she was durable and if she had gotten in range then she'd have eaten the likes of the Missoury etc. for breakfast!