#26: IJN Mikasa: The Battleship That Destroyed the Russian Fleet
On May 27, 1905, Admiral Togo Heihachiro's flagship IJN Mikasa led the Japanese Combined Fleet to one of the most decisive victories in naval warfare history. At the Battle of Tsushima, the Japanese destroyed virtually the entire Russian Baltic Fleet, sinking 21 ships, capturing seven, and killing over 4,380 Russian sailors while losing only three torpedo boats and 117 men.
Tsushima was the first modern fleet engagement where an Asian power decisively defeated a European one, reshaping global politics and announcing Japan as a major military power. Mikasa, a British-built pre-dreadnought mounting four 12-inch guns, absorbed over 40 hits during the battle but stayed in action. She is now preserved as a museum ship in Yokosuka, the only pre-dreadnought battleship still in existence anywhere in the world, and remains a powerful symbol of Japanese naval prowess and the era when military technology was rapidly evolving.
