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Britain and Japan became Allies early in the 20th Century as Russia and France were threatening their interests in the Far East. Japan studied British naval tactics at that time and bought many of their early warships from Britain. After Britain declared war on Germany August 4th 1914, Japan showed their loyalty by declaring war on Germany August 29th 1914. Japan had around 150 warships in service during World War One, the largest of these being Fuso and the other ship of this class Yamashiro. These were the first battleships to exceed the 29,150 tons of the British Queen Elizabeth class that began entering service earlier in 1915.

Japanese forces took control of German held ports in China early in the war and later captured the German Pacific Islands. Throughout the remainder of that war, Japanese warships were mainly used to escort British convoys and hunt down German surface raiders in the Pacific. America’s tough sanctions on Japan in the 1930s led to them entering World War Two as Allies of Germany. While US troops were landing at Leyte/Philippians October 1944, Fuso and Yamashiro led a convoy through the Surigao Strait to the south of the islands chain. At that time, Japans new battleships Yamato and Musashi led another convoy through the San Bernardino strait to the north of Leyte. In the battle of the Surigao Strait, a combination of US battleships, destroyers and aircraft succeeded in sinking Fuso and Yamashiro. The battles for Leyte ended with Japan loosing 26 ships compared to the US losing six.