Type 3 Ka-Chi
In service 1943 - 1945
Based onType 1 Chi-He (derived from)
A large amphibious tank built for the Imperial Japanese Navy, with detachable bow and stern pontoons and a raised commander's position for sea passage.
Built byMitsubishi Heavy Industries
Development history
The Navy, not the Army, drove Japanese amphibious armour, and the Ka-Chi was its heaviest effort: a Chi-He-derived hull sealed against water, fitted with bolt-on flotation pontoons fore and aft and a tall trunk over the engine deck so the vehicle could swim from a submarine or landing ship and shed its floats on the beach. It was a genuinely capable design, able to make around 10 km/h in water while carrying a 47 mm gun. Fewer than twenty were built, and by 1943 Japan was defending islands rather than assaulting them. Most were lost in transit or destroyed without action; the amphibious effort is better remembered through the smaller Type 2 Ka-Mi.