Ships
- IJN Yubari Captain from 20 January 1944
Ranji Oe was a captain in the Imperial Japanese Navy and a member of the Naval Academy’s 47th class. At the opening of 1944 he was already captain of the heavy cruiser Maya. On 20 January 1944 the Navy also made him captain of the light cruiser Yubari, the new post counted as additional duty while he kept command of Maya.
Yubari was a one-ship experiment, completed at Sasebo in 1923 on a compact hull that tried out ideas later used in larger Japanese cruisers. In the Pacific War she worked as a destroyer-squadron flagship. Her earlier captains included Masami Ban and Morie Funaki. Under that succession of command she had taken part in the first attempt on Wake Island, the night battle off Savo Island, and the Solomons fighting of 1943, and she had been damaged by a mine off Rendova and by bombs near Rabaul.
Oe came to her while she was laid up. Yubari had reached Yokosuka on 19 December 1943 for a refit that lasted into the first days of March 1944. The yard strengthened her light antiaircraft battery, replaced a forward 140-millimeter gun with a high-angle 120-millimeter gun, and fitted depth-charge rails at the stern. She was dry-docked for a short spell in January and again from 5 to 25 February, so the weeks of his appointment were spent in the hands of the dockyard.
Takeo Nara was appointed captain of Yubari on 20 February 1944. After the refit Nara took the cruiser to sea, escorting a troop convoy to Saipan and then carrying soldiers on toward Palau. On 27 April, after troops had been put ashore at Sonsorol, the American submarine Bluegill hit Yubari with a torpedo on the starboard side. The forward boiler rooms flooded, a tow failed, and she stayed afloat through the night. Escorts took off the survivors, Nara among them, and on the morning of 28 April 1944 Yubari sank southwest of Palau. That final voyage and the loss of the ship belonged to Nara’s command.
Oe’s connection with Yubari was the month from 20 January 1944, a yard appointment held alongside Maya. The Navy later gave him the rank of rear admiral after his death.