USS West Virginia BB-48 Model

USS West Virginia (BB-48) was the U.S. Navy's fourth and final Colorado-class "super dreadnought" battleship, and the second American warship named for the "Mountain State."  The 33,000-ton ship was built by the Newport News shipyard in Virginia and armed with eight 16-inch guns in four turrets, sixteen 5-inch guns, almost a hundred anti-aircraft guns, and two torpedo tubes.  It was commissioned in 1923 and won four gunnery medals during the interwar period, including one for an exercise simulating an attack on Hawaii.  In 1940, the battleship was transferred to the Pearl Harbor naval base in the hopes it would deter a Japanese attack.

When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, USS West Virginia was torpedoed in the air raid and began leaking fuel and taking on water.  USS Arizona (BB-39), the most notable ship to be sunk in the attack, was so close its fire spread to USS West Virginia, whose own fuel caught on fire while the water damage shut down communications inside the ship.  With Captain Mervyn S. Bennion dying of shrapnel wounds and executive officer Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter abandoning ship, Commander J.S. Harper became the acting captain and ordered the crew to continue firefighting until 2:00 PM, when he saw no alternative but to evacuate and let the battleship sink.  Not everyone heard the order to abandon ship due to the communication problems, and at least 66 sailors managed to survive in the shipwreck for a few weeks before dying of starvation and asphyxiation.

In May 1942, as America prepared to wage war against the Axis Powers, the U.S. Navy refloated the wreckage of USS West Virginia and spent the next couple of years repairing and rebuilding the battleship.  Its first combat assignment was the liberation of the Philippines in the summer and fall of 1944.  To support the invasion of Leyte, USS West Virginia shelled the coastal city of Tacloban, destroying Japanese artillery and facilities.  During the Battle of the Surigao Strait, it "crossed the T" and helped sink the Japanese battleship HIJMS Yamashiro and prevent the Japanese from trapping the Allied forces in a pincer attack.  Thanks to radar fire control, the U.S. Navy could attack the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) from a very long range and leave the Japanese unable to effectively counterattack.

As the Allies began to liberate more of Asia and the Pacific, and move closer to Japan in their "island-hopping" strategy, the Japanese became increasingly desperate and fanatical, and launched "kamikaze" suicide attacks against the U.S. Navy.  USS West Virginia was a frequent target for kamikaze planes as it worked to liberate the Philippines, but its hundred anti-aircraft guns shot down most planes, and none of the kamikaze attacks that even struck the battleship could sink it.  After working on the Philippines, USS West Virginia shelled Iwo Jima in February 1945, destroying a large portion of the Japanese defenses, and then spotted the U.S. Marines raising the American flag over Mount Suribachi.

Now that Iwo Jima had been taken, it was time for the Allies to move even closer to Japan and capture Okinawa.  USS West Virginia sailed there in March at the same time the Japanese sent their largest battleship, HIJMS Yamato, on a suicide mission to attack the U.S. Navy, but USS West Virginia avoided having to face the "super dreadnought" as the U.S. Navy sank HIJMS Yamato in an intense air raid.  Throughout the spring and early summer, it shelled the Japanese defenses and covered the U.S. Army's landings on the island.  In August, it began sailing toward Japan after the Emperor and government agreed to surrender, and witnessed the official Japanese surrender to the allies aboard USS Missouri (BB-63) in Tokyo Bay on September 2.  As part of the postwar demilitarization of America, USS West Virginia was decommissioned in 1947, and was eventually scrapped in 1959.  This model of the battleship as it appeared during World War II was on display at the Shizuoka Hobby Show.