 A postcard of Iwate at speed, circa 1905–1915
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| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Name | Izumo class |
| Builders | Armstrong Whitworth, United Kingdom |
| Operators |  Imperial Japanese Navy |
| Preceded by | Asama class |
| Succeeded by | Yakumo |
| Built | 1898–1901 |
| In commission | 1900–1945 |
| Completed | 2 |
| Lost | 2 |
| General characteristics | |
| Type | Armored cruiser |
| Displacement | 9,423–9,503 t (9,274–9,353 long tons) |
| Length | 132.28 m (434 ft) (o/a) |
| Beam | 20.94 m (68 ft 8 in) |
| Draft | 7.21–7.26 m (23 ft 8 in – 23 ft 10 in) |
| Installed power |
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| Propulsion | 2 shafts; 2 triple-expansion steam engines |
| Speed | 20.75 knots (38.43 km/h; 23.88 mph) |
| Range | 7,000 nmi (13,000 km; 8,100 mi) at 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph) |
| Complement | 672 |
| Armament |
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| Armor |
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The Izumo-class cruisers (出雲型装甲巡洋艦, Izumo-gata sōkōjun'yōkan) were a pair of armored cruisers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) in the late 1890s. As Japan lacked the industrial capacity to build such warships herself, the vessels were built in Britain. They were part of the "Six-Six Fleet" expansion program that began after the defeat of China during the First Sino-Japanese War of 1894–1895. The sister ships participated in three of the four main naval battles of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905—the Battle of Port Arthur, the Battle off Ulsan and the Battle of Tsushima—but played a much more minor role in World War I.
Iwate was first used as a training ship in 1916 and remained in that role for most of the rest of her career. Her sister, Izumo, was mostly used for training during the 1920s, but became flagship of the IJN forces in China in 1932. She was involved in the Shanghai Incident that year and in the Second Sino-Japanese War that began five years later. The ship was used in the early stages of the Philippines Campaign during the Pacific War until she struck a mine at the end of 1941. Izumo joined her sister as a training ship in home waters in 1943. Both ships were sunk in a series of American air attacks on the naval base at Kure in July 1945. Their wrecks were refloated after the war and scrapped.