dont you love how offtopic this forum got xD

The biggest gun the US tinkered with was a 18" 48cal but they deemed it too heavy and too
little more armor penetration for practical use. They also tinkered with a 16" 55 cal it
would have had higher penetration than the 16" 50 pretty much equal to the Jap 18.1" but
the barrel wear was considered to be to excessive for use.

The first and biggest problem was losing the battle in North Africa. No oil= no tanks etc.
And it was mainly the oil shortage that killed Germany as they couldn't use their tanks
effectively anymore. ( think the battle of Ardennes and how the Germans won until they
ran out of fuel and had to abandon tanks )

As for the Russian front, the same happened there, that happened in North Africa. The
Germans moved too fast instead of consolidating their hold, and thus had stretched
supply lines. When they reached Stalingrad, their supply lines were hopelessly
outstretched, and they lost momentum, which lost them the war. ( kind of like what
happened to Napoleon :P )

edit for Russian part

hiler didnt need tro attack russia they should hav finished off britin some how then
you wouldnt have all this stuff happing in the eastern front cause his forces were
split in 3 area france africa then russian if he could have foccussed all his troops in
russia im sure they could have won befor winter and win with supirior numbers or
something

the germans in the war made alot of silly mistakes

The Russians would have rather burned everything then give it to the Germans. Hitler was
foolish to attack Russia and that was his biggest blunder.

To be honest with y'all, were lucky that the russians held off the germans at stalingrad.
That was a pure luck victory due to the weather, that's the only thing that truly saved
the war otherwise the germans would have linked up with the japs and it would have been
one big axis country.

well maby i gusse the germens can build a ship like that but they would have probly
have to beaten the russians and the brits in some for like the battle of britin cause i
think germany had the resources to make that

the japs.... the japs in WWII never even touched ASW so i think a combind fleet
operation could sink any of thare massive ships but the US SUBS were always
destroying the hell out of the japs comercial tradeing and the problem was most of
the resources were in chinia and manchuria and stuff and they were being turning
into what great britin was supposed to be and under heavy bombing ( if they got
the near by islands) i dont think they would build it but if the war was going good for
the japs i gusse they would


but to be honnest i dont know much about germans ships

philip i have no doubt that the H44 and Super Yamato's would have been built if the
war had gone the Axis' way. The Japanese were about ready to build the Super
Yamatos but ran out of oil and steel to build new ships because we cut off their
supplies. The Germans would have had to build something big to counter the threat
of the new British Lions, and that would have been the upper H classes (H40-H44)

very true about the air craft carriers haveing no planes but its not just cause of the
kamikazi attacks its cause of the battle in the coral sea and midway in the coral sea
they lost alot of planes and 1 escort carrier in midway they lost atleast 400 planes
and all thare fleet carriers like he said so the only real naval weapon the japs had
were thare left over battleships some of them just did like suicidel charges

like the yamato the plan was to get near okinawa and beach it(so it cant sink) and
do as much damage as possible to the american fleet and slow or even stop the
invasion

Sgaz (please forgive the misspelling of your name) has brought up some good historical
points and the IJN Fleet. What was said about the ships ending up being irrelevant is 100%
true. However, your interpetation of the IJN doctrine is quite incorrect. Yes, they
understood the importance of airpower. However, they still viewed it as a supporting arm.
The IJN continued to believe that surface ships were the decisive form of combat. In fact,
their plan for destroying the US pacific fleet in pre-war manunvers was to use air power
and torpedoes (SS/DD/CL) to wear down the main US fleet, then for battleship guns to
finish them. Other examples of IJN gun mentality that dominated the fleet.

After all 4 fleet carriers were destroyed at Midway, Yamamato used the 4 CAs in the
bombardment fleet to try and lure TF16 and TF17 closer to the island while he got closer
with his Main Force's battleship guns. Also to note in that Battle is that even after
Nagumo lost 3 of his carriers, he started manuvering with the screen of battlecruisers and
destroyers in an attempt to engage the US carriers! This actually left Hiru behind a bit
and ultimate brought her close enough to be destroyed.

During the campaign in the south pacific, the japanese fought with practically no air
cover. They had superior night fighting and torpedo forms of combat and tried to engage
both the airfields and transports, as well as US surface ships at night. Four major
surface engagements were done with no aircraft. The main force for those engagements were
Hiei, Kirishma and their destroyers and cruisers.

Even late in the war, during the operations in the central pacific, the IJN carriers were
used as a diversion to draw the US fleet into a trap so their battleships could engage. It
was stated that the carriers had no aircraft. This hardly was true as the Japanese used
piles of Zero fighters as Kamakazes all the way to the last days of the war. Conversion of
the Ise class to hybreds was still viewed as supporting the battleship line. The japanese
never gave up on their view that battleships were the main force. Also, it should be noted
that the japanese had no need to build additional battleships as the only losses that they
had early in the war were 2 of the Kongos. Aircraft carrier losses were much, much
heavier. The japanese were so brave and so fatalistic that they threw away assets in
situations without hope. Had they presevered them better, the war would have been a lot
longer.