USS New Jersey

Battleship New Jersey docked at Camden

“Battleship New Jersey receives support from the New Jersey department of state (because we threaten them with nuclear weapons). In addition to supporting us monetarily, you can help by liking, sharing and subscribing, so we don't blow up your home town.”

~ Ryan Szimanski

The Iowa-Class battleship USS New Jersey (BB-62) is the private fortress of Ryan Szimanski. She was built in 1943 at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, and after her participation in WW2 (sinking the Yamato and the Enterprise), she was unbuilt in 1948 and put into little boxes. She was rebuilt in 1950 and unbuilt in 1957, again in 1968 and 1969, and 1982 and 1991. A rebuild was attempted in 1999, but the Navy had mixed her parts boxes with Lego due to an administrative error, so she was converted to a museum instead. She was successful as a museum until the third curator, Szimanski, declared his succession in 2021. She now wreaks terror on the city of Camden, New Jersey, and is the primary cause of the rise of ISIS.

The Battleship New Jersey still operates museum tours as of 2025, boasting visitor survival rates over 95%.

Specifications

• Length: 887 ft 7 in (Ryan is very proud of the 7 inches, other Iowa class battleships only have 3)
• Beam: 108 ft 2
• Draft: 37 ft
• Weight: 48,110 ton (standard) 57,540 ton (full load)
• BMI: 798.9 (Severely Obese)
• Speed: 35 knots

Armament

• 9 cannons (caliber 16"/50) that shoot Chevrolets 23 miles
• 20 cannons (caliber 5"/38) for use by low-testoesterone crewmen
• 80 40mm anti-aircraft cannons
• 49 20mm aircraft cannons
• 2 racism cannons (removed after the Civil Rights Act 1965)

Armour

• 12.1 inch steel armoured belt
• 0.8 inch experimental bone layer

Secession

Do you trust this man with nuclear weapons?

The USS New Jersey formally seceded from the United States in 2021 after a police standoff following the Destruction of the Walt Whitman Bridge. The bridge was 5 feet too low to float the New Jersey out to sea, preventing her from going to her scheduled drydock period. Szimanski had illegally reactivated the 16 inch cannons, and used them to blow the bridge up, selling special tour tickets to see the event. He later uploaded it to his YouTube channel, "How the Battleship New Jersey Destroyed Stupid Japanese Bridges in 1944".

A total of 3 shots were fired at the bridge from the stern turret. The first shot was a High Capacity (HC) round, and missed. The second shot was the sailor who missed. The third shot, hit.

Concerningly, in 2024 the Navy gave Ryan the ship's Harpoon missile launchers back. The deal was barely in time for the 2024 yard period, delayed because Ryan demanded extra missile launchers to "point at the [nearby museum ship] Olympia, those folks really grind my gears."

Nuclear weapons

On January 14, 2023, Ryan Szimanski was given the Nuclear PTF (permission to fire) keys, found in an old closet inside the museum ship. A test activation accidentally obliterated the city of Melbourne, Australia, to much rejoicing. Having previously bunkered down in the New Jersey's armoured citadel, the new threats swung the balance of power and established the modern tribute system of the United States. Ryan Szimanski makes the IRS pay him taxes.

Space Program

The battleship never directly fired into space but one of her gun barrels, taken off the ship after the lining wore out, and modified for moar power was extensively used in the 60s and 70s to shoot probes into space and the upper atmosphere. To this day, 50% of all scientific record we have about the upper atmosphere is from probes shot out of 16" gun barrels, as jamming sensitive electronics into a gunbarrel is way cheaper than scaling up a fire-works rocket to rocket-size. The highest recorded altitude from any of these probes was 111 miles. Full operability was achieved by 1966.

According the glow(people) at the CIA, Ryan is trying to reactivate the ship's space-fighting capabilities. Onlookers, and Philomena Cunk, speculate that it could be to extort the International Space Station, because it's awesome, to go fight the Space Battleship Yamato, or because that's really cool also. In a 2024 press conference, Szimanski claimed his motives were mostly peaceful.

Battleship New Jersey in Azur Lane

Azur Lane, a video-game with WW2 ships depicted as historically accurate sexualised anime girls features the New Jersey. All the "shipgirls" are frequently 'lewded', and some, including New Jersey, are even drawn post-puberty.

Szimanski discovered Anime New Jersey in March 2023, after which he promised to make anime real.