JMSDF Kure Museum (Iron Whale Museum)

The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force Kure Museum (海上自衛隊呉史料館, Kaijō Jieitai Kure Shiryōkan), popularly known as the Iron Whale Museum (てつのくじら館, Tetsu no Kujira Kan), is a public relations and educational facility of the JMSDF located at 5-32 Takaramachi, Kure City, Hiroshima Prefecture. Opened on April 5, 2007, with free admission, the museum stands on the historic waterfront of Kure — a city inseparable from over a century of Japanese naval history.

The museum's most iconic feature is the decommissioned submarine Akishio (あきしお, SS-579), a Yūshio-class diesel-electric submarine displayed on land adjacent to the museum building. The Akishio was laid down on April 15, 1983, at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Kobe, launched in January 1985, and commissioned into JMSDF service on March 5, 1986. After 18 years of active service conducting surveillance, patrol, and training missions, the submarine was decommissioned on March 3, 2004. In September 2006, the 76.2-meter-long, 2,250-ton vessel was lifted from the water by a large crane ship and transported to its current display position. Visitors can enter the submarine from the museum's third floor and walk through the part of its interior that is open to the public — crew living spaces and the control room, from which the torpedo room below can be glimpsed — and peer through the periscope into Kure Harbor and the Seto Inland Sea.

The museum building itself is a modern three-story structure standing beside the submarine, with one floor devoted to each of its three themes.

The first floor introduces the history and mission of the JMSDF and its deep roots in Kure. The city served as the seat of the Kure Naval District (呉鎮守府, Kure Chinjufu), established in 1889 as one of the Imperial Japanese Navy's four major naval districts. The Kure Naval Arsenal became the IJN's largest and most technically advanced shipyard, building capital ships including the battleship Yamato. During World War II, Kure was the Combined Fleet's primary anchorage and logistics hub. In the war's final months, massive American air raids devastated the naval base and surrounding city — carrier-based strikes on July 24-28, 1945, sank or heavily damaged most remaining warships at anchor. The first-floor exhibits trace the transition from this wartime destruction through the postwar establishment of the JMSDF in 1954, with Kure continuing as a major naval base.

The second floor is dedicated to Japan's postwar minesweeping operations, one of the most dangerous and least recognized chapters of Japan's recovery. During World War II, the United States military deployed over 12,000 mines in Japanese waters as part of Operation Starvation, effectively blockading Japan's home islands and the Seto Inland Sea. After the war, these mines — acoustic, magnetic, and contact types — posed a lethal hazard to shipping and reconstruction. Japan's minesweeping force, the direct predecessor of the JMSDF, was established specifically to address this crisis. Operating with limited equipment and sometimes adapting fishing vessels for the task, minesweepers conducted what was called 'kamikaze minesweeping' — deliberately detonating mines at extreme personal risk. The work cost the lives of 79 personnel and took decades to complete. The museum displays actual recovered mines, full-scale reproductions, diver suits used for underwater mine detection, machine guns used to detonate surface mines, and a section of a minesweeper's deck. The exhibits also cover the JMSDF's participation in international minesweeping operations, including the clearing of mines in the Persian Gulf following the 1990-1991 Gulf War.

The third floor focuses on submarine operations, covering the history of submarine development in Japan, construction techniques, torpedo technology evolution, antisubmarine warfare tactics, crew training, and rescue operations. A highlight is the recreation of living spaces inside a submarine, giving visitors a sense of the confined conditions endured by the 75-member crew during extended underwater deployments. The museum's café, also on this level, serves authentic submarine curry rice (潜水艦カレー) — the Friday curry tradition maintained aboard submarines to help crews keep track of days during long submerged patrols.

The JMSDF Kure Museum stands directly across the street from the Yamato Museum (大和ミュージアム, officially the Kure Maritime Museum), which focuses on the city's wartime naval history and features a 1/10 scale model of the battleship Yamato. While the two museums are separate institutions with distinct focuses — the Yamato Museum on Imperial Navy history and the JMSDF museum on postwar maritime defense — together they provide a comprehensive narrative spanning from the height of Imperial Japanese naval power through wartime destruction to Japan's postwar maritime renaissance. The two museums, along with the nearby JMSDF Kure Naval Base (the direct successor of the Kure Naval District), form the core of Kure's naval heritage corridor, recognized as part of the Japan Heritage route celebrating the city's maritime military history.