I'm sad I bought SHIV

[tater]

I just told you the facts.

The Imperial Japanese Army commandeered about 1/3 of jap merchant shipping. Guns were placed on most all. The Imperial Japanese Navy commandeered arund 1/3 the the jap merchant marine. Guns were placed as well. The remaining ~1/3 would have had guns placed sort of hit or miss.

Typical IJA transport:

Look at all the AA. Also a couple short, 3" deck guns.

Another IJA transport, 8 guns:


IJA Nagara Maru—in game with what, 2 guns? Real ship had EIGHT guns (her sisters similarly armed way in excess of SH4 as well). This is how she looked during the initial invasion period in 1942:


IJA ship in 1942—16 guns.



Armament means guns, depth charges, etc. Not armor, or damage control. The vast majority of jap ships sank with 1 torpedo hit, though some survived many hits. While most armament in terms of gun counts was AAA, the standard small AA was 13mm (0.50 cal more or less) at the start, and quickly updated to 25mm guns. The other guns were Dual Purpose (DP) guns that could be used vs surfaced subs, OR elevated for AA use. Jap merchant ships also frequently had hydrophones, and depth charges, though the latter were not dropped in any aimed way, just thrown over the side to scare subs, apparently.

IJA ships were typically filled with troops, so small arms would be in vast supply. A surface sub would face withering small arms fire if it was dumb enough to try for a daytime surface engagement, or even use the deck gun at night. Typical night-surface engagements were high speed torpedo boat tactics. Race through while firing as many tubes as possible while NOT shooting deck guns that would give your position away. Jap merchants would blaze away into the darkness.

Many more:
http://ww6.enjoy.ne.jp/~iwashige/modellist.htm

Originally Posted by Bothersome

... It was my understanding that merchant ships were built to move cargo and not built for surviving battles at sea. If it was ship worthy enough to survive high waves and weather that was expected, it was built to those specifications. So a merchant ship was generally very susceptible to sinking from taking torpedo damages. Basically, the ship may be rusty and in need of some repair and spit and polish. But, if it could haul cargo, then it sails, even if it is only one torpedo away from sinking...

Merchant ships could also prove remarkably tough and some cargos helped keep a damaged ship afloat even as other doomed a torpedo victim to rapid sinking. The vast majority certainly had watertight compartments and in some cases double hulls, double bottom's and hulls reinforced for operations in ice were incorporated into the original design.

The comments about the crews may be generally accurate but also lack context, Navy crews were disciplined and trained to save the ship but merchant seaman were inculcated into saving themselves. When the best chance of the latter coincided with doing the former they were capable of outstanding feats of damage control that are known and probably many that are unknown because they might not have been ultimately successful.

As for defensive guns, many ships, particularly passenger liners built pre-war outside the USA were government subsidized and had areas of the decks strengthened to take guns built into the design for use in the event of war. This was common in the British merchant marine and since much of Japanese maritime practice mirrored that of the UK it is reasonable to infer that they did something similar. Tater's links certainly point that way.

[Admiral8Q]

Cool info Tater! Thanks for that post!