Osprey Publishing continues expanding its New Vanguard series. This is installment #187 and it focuses on the Japanese Light Cruisers (the 5,500 ton class). Even when the title refers to the WWII period, the book covers the development and modifications to that class since the early 1920s.

The Light Cruisers were designed and launched as Destroyer Flagships or Submarine Squadron Flagships. As such, aerial reconnaissance, anti-aircraft protection, and space for squadron staff were specific requirements in this class, in addition to the standard offensive armament consisting mainly of torpedo tubes.

As it played out, by the onset of WWII, several of these ships were outclassed – both in speed and offensive armament – by the destroyers they were supposed to lead. Therefore, several ships in this class were converted into other roles, which they performed well, but were not outstanding in them, either.

This Model Art Special edition exclusively covers the battleship Yamato (and, in a limited fashion, her sister Musashi). With the exception of one short translated section covering the operational history of Yamato, the text is entirely in Japanese. However, the beautiful photography and numerous illustrations speak for themselves. The selection of articles is roughly divided between historical information and model illustration and building techniques and includes:

Monday, April 15th, 1912 – While on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, New York, the White Star ocean liner RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic Ocean as a result of striking an iceberg. The tragedy resulted in the loss of 1,517 lives and forever impacted the Ocean liner industry. Billed as the largest passenger ship in the world [at the time], the Olympic-class Titanic was referred to as “unsinkable” due to its compartmented sections and watertight doors. Design flaws, however, rendered these features useless. During the night of April 14th, the RMS Titanic struck an iceberg along her starboard side, causing the rivets which held her steel hull plates to break. This opened the hull along multiple compartments, something the designers had not foreseen.

Over the past year or so, we have seen a new supply of USS Arizona kits in all scales, from Trumpeter, Dragon, and Hobby Boss. A popular scale seems to be 1/700 scale, where we have also seen a kit of the USS Pennsylvania. While both ships had generally the same look up till Pearl Harbor, the Penn later underwent extensive changes. My great uncle had the privilege of serving his country with the United States Navy, and was assigned to the USS Pennsylvania. On December 7th, he was at Pearl Harbor while the Penn was in drydock. He survived Pearl and continued on the Penn through the entire war, and was still with her up until she was scuttled after being used as a target ship for nuclear tests. (My uncle was actually part of the skeleton/scuttling crew and was the fourth to last person to set foot on the mighty ship.) With my family’s ties to the Pennsylvania class, I naturally purchased all of the recent model releases.

As Osprey says, “This book is number 40 in Osprey’s 'Duel' series, which provides accounts of machines of war pitted against each other and the combatants who operated them.” If you are interested in the Civil War, this book is unusual in that it discusses an aspect of the ocean war that is seldom covered in any detail in most Civil War histories. This was the transition period when navies were changing from wood ships to steel and to explosive projectiles. Three single-ship actions were fought during the American Civil War between Union cruisers and Confederate raiders.

This volume focuses on the most famous, that between the CSS Alabama and the USS Kearsarge in 1864 off Cherbourg. It focuses on the crew, the tactics, the commanders, and the weapons used at the time. It is complete with photos and diagrams along with a complete description of the battle.