Talk:Akitsu Maru/@comment-14.169.46.188-20141002164553/@comment-201.137.117.40-20141012173128

An amphibious assault ship is a vessel capable of deploy land troops as well as aditional vehicles and aircraft to support the landings without the assistance of troop transports and aircraft carriers, while a regular troop transport requires a dock to unload the troops or in case of a beach assault it lowers the barges carrying the soldiers with poles and cranes, the akitsu maru had a semi submersible deck in the rear of the ship so the barges just sail out of it, the same way the i-400 was the progenitor of modern submarines the akitsu maru is the precursor of the US LHD amphibious assault fleet