Heavy cruiser Kumano's early battles showed her durability and reliability Incidentally Kumano is a bit unlucky. Why is that? In the Battle off Samar her bow was blown off; since she was no longer fit for battle she had to return to Japan. On the way back she was mistakenly fired upon by friendly forces and had to endure 15 waves of attacks from over 100 American planes. Furthermore, a concentrated volley from an ambushing submarine damaged her bow which only had stop-gap repairs, and after that, a typhoon visit. In the end, Kumano was sunk by torpedoes launched from carrier-born planes during her retreat in Coron Bay of the Philippines. All of these incidents probably contributed her reputation of misfortune. However, when you look through history and see how many battleships and carriers was sunk by just a few torpedoes, you would think that it's a miracle that the slim-bodied lady, Kumano, was able to endure so many attacks. It's unfortunate that Kumano was not able to return to Japan, but if this column could pass on Kumano's spirit of fighting to the bitter end even while smoking and with her bow ripped off to the modern Admiral then that would be great. Come, let's all welcome Kumano back!!!

Where does Kumano’s beauty came from ? Kumano is the youngest of the Mogami class. Many incidents during her construction changed her to this ideal form. First is the London Naval Treaty devised to stop the arms race in warship construction. To conform with this, her design is made so she will be equipped with 15cm guns as Light Cruiser, and then refitted with 20cm guns and reclassified as Heavy Cruiser when Japan withdraw from the treaty. So Mogami class’ slender form can be traced back to their design as Light Cruisers. Reflecting the design, electric welding and light metal are used generously to reduce the ship's weight. "It's meaningless if you can't score a hit", yeah, something like that. By the way, around that time, an incident happened. Just before Kumano's construction, the torpedo boat Tomozuru capsized in an incident later known as the Tomozuru Incident. The cause of this incident is the top heavy design resulting in bad rolling performance. This incident resulted in improvement of rolling performance on the IJN fleet. Following this, Kumano is equipped with hull bulges. In addition, the overimposed deck armour of Kumano made her shorter than Mogami and Mikuma. After that, another incident happened. Admirals must have looked up for this one, the Fourth Fleet Incident. In this incident, Kumano’s sister ships Mogami and Mikuma suffered heavy damage from typhoon. Mogami suffered serious cracks to her hull. Because of this, the strengthening of Mogami class' hull is initiated. At that time, Kumano is still in construction, so she's finished with all the modification her sister ships received. * Although Japan doesn't sign the Second London Naval Treaty, the ship designers tried to abide to the rule in treaty and thus attempted to reduce weight of the Mogami class, making them light cruisers. Unfortunately this made the ship unstable and weak, their welding cracks from just firing their own guns. Seeing specification of the Mogami class, Royal Navy's Director of Naval Construction commented that the Japanese are either building their ship from cardboard or they're lying about the weight.

An Upper-class lady True to her appearance, she's an upper-class-lady-type fleet girl. She was born in Kobe. She keeps her hair in a fluffy ponytail and ends her sentences with "desuwa" or "but not?" She's a wonderful fleet girl who talks to us Admirals gracefully. Even though she's an upper-class lady she takes an interest in the foods of us plebes; from her time announcement lines it sounds like she's waiting for convenience store sandwiches. When Kumano sorties as the flagship, she does so elegantly with sandwiches and bottled black tea in hand and that's just wonderful. She visits day spas, takes afternoon naps (?), and concentrates on improving her feminine abilities but there's another side to her. During battle, she uses a voice only heard on battlefields and shows off a wonderful side of her that's fully intent on crushing the enemy while not caring for a trace of grace. On the topic of remodeling, shes can become an Aviation Cruiser, which doesn't exist in history. Many Admirals are engrossed with this wonderful upgrade and are aiming for it. If you send her on the Kiss Island Withdrawal Operation over and over again with the intention of damaging her clothes then you might get disliked.

I won't lose when it comes to body curves!

Ugh... my bow has been taken off.

Do your best!

I don't have much ammo but I'll share some with you! Return to Japan!

Uh, seems like I'm the chubbier one.

Kumano - Heavy Cruiser Displacement: 12,000 tons Length: 200m Beam: 20m Installed power: 152,000 shp Speed: 35 knots Armament: - 20cm twin gun turrets - 12.7cm anti-aircraft guns - 25mm anti-aircraft guns - 61cm multiple torpedo tubes and others Aircraft complement: reconnaissance seaplanes Crew: 894 Other ships in class: Mogami, Mikuma, Suzuya Participated in: - Battle of Midway - Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands - Battle off Samar and others

Flight decks... There are some that look like this, huh... Possibly a parody of Kodoku no Gourmet manga Episode 1.