Naval History Forums

So, considering all the ships and the battles they participate, do you guys think that the Battlecruisers in general, from all nations, were flawed, either in concept or design? I'd say the German BCs were pretty much ideal in terms of their balance of speed, firepower, and protection for their tim...

It's already happened in some ways: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/261283-ex-cia-chief-fear-for-environment-stays-us-hand-on-isis-oil-wells I'd consider that a matter of long term strategic planning. We can bomb the wells, but whose going to foot the bill to clean everything up after t...

I would suggest that the climate change aspect is more PR than anything else. More efficient equipment, so long as it doesn't compromise performance, is always desirable as fuel may not always be plentiful, particularly at a local level. It's also good in that it reduces logistical requirements, whi...

And cruiser displacement was restricted at 10.000 tons. Displacement was limited to 10,000 tons, and armament was limited to 8" guns. As such, IMO an upgraded Panzerschiffe that are better protected against 8" gunfire would make some sense with respect to what Germany needed at the time. ...

On a design basis, one could say a substantial tonnage was allocated to diesel fuel (2700 tons), while armor scheme was minimal (Deutschalnd - 80mm belt and up to 40mm armor deck). For Baltic domination, 1500 tons of fuel would have been more then enough, while allocating the rest of 1200 tons to a...

Graf Spee and her sister ships were launched as 10.000 tons ships, and not battleships. They were not included in the Washington Treaty, AFAIK. If Germany is included in the WNT, then Graf Spee is a capital ship by virtue of its 11" guns. That means: a. Germany can't build them. b. Germany bui...

... Historically Britain planned to replace many of her old battleships / battlecruisers with new builds - Lion, Vanguard, KGV. The same would be done by Germany as well, with Bs/Tz proposed as obvious replacements for the modernised Bayerns. True enough, though this could presumably be offset by t...

2. What exactly do you think the relevance of AGNA is under your hypothetical scenario, given that the German fleet is already at a 35 : 100 aka 1.75 : 5 ratio with the UK? PS: Given that AGNA wouldn't make much sense in your hypothetical, that also means German tonnage isn't tied to UK constructio...

... After signing the Anglo German treaty , Britain started building 5 KGVs, 1 Vanguard, 5 Lions, in effect increasing own BB/BC tonnage to ~ 1 million tons (existing 530.000 tons already built + 450.000 tons new builds). 1. Construction of Vanguard only began after the war started, and only 2 Lion...

... I think it's very plausible to reconstruct 5 or 6 WW1 ships in 9 or 10 years (starting , say, with 1930, like other major powers did) with the available resources, then to build 5 or 6 new capital ships from scratch. It's completely different. How different it is depends on the scale/scope of t...

... The main resource, which AFAIK, was not improvable or modifiable in a reasonable amount of time, was dockyard space to build additional capital ships. Launching 5 more capital ships pre-requires having 5 more dockyar-spaces for them, which AFAIK did not exist anywhere in GErmany. I guess anyone...

Building from scratch took them 5 years for 2 Bismarcks and 4 years for 2 Scharnhorsts. With unlimited resources, it's obviously better to build from scratch, but those resources were NOT unlimited. Resources weren't unlimited, but under your scenario, Germany would have more of the most important ...

IMO, the on board risk is being greatly over-stated. How's that? There's no real question about the volatility of pure oxygen, and the historical results are what they are. In any event, I've said my peace and I'm starting to repeat myself at this point. I don't have much else to add, so I'll leave...

It's easier to modernise then to build from scratch. Not necessarily. It depends on what you're starting with, and what you're looking to achieve. Moreover, some things aren't terribly economical to add in after the fact, i.e. an integral TDS. No viable amount of modernization would turn Bayern int...

I'm unsure how this can be categorized as a failure of the torpedo. That's not really my point, though in SoDak's case we can't really say definitively what happened except that it was miraculous that she wasn't blown out of the water. All I'm saying is the "best" torpedo is simply the on...