Chuck (I do wish you'd log in) the internal fittings and the tactical employment of the ships are what we are referring to. One only needs to look at the administrative organization of the fleet in 12/41 to see what we're talking about.Anonymous wrote:Okay, I grant you that Oyoda was intended to be headquarter to submarine flotillas. But as far as light cruisers go, that is the only exception. All other Japanese light cruisers were destroyer leaders. (There were only 2 distinct groups - The 20 or so more or less similar 5500 tonners of WWI era, and the 4 new ships completed in 1942-43) There were no light cruisers-sea plane tenders. The 29 knot 10,000 ton sea plane tenders of IJN were not cruisers. They were strictly sea plane tenders.
The most important job of 2/3 of the cruisers were to concentrate, coordinate and report scouting data from submarines and seaplanes (based on islands). Remember, in the 1930s secure frequencies had ranges of 100-500 miles. The destroyer leaders were the ones which were scheduled to get a massive torpedo armament on the outbreak of war.
