"Interwar British Battleship Design" Topic

" the past few years a great deal of information has been published about battleships and their design; probably more than for any other type of warship. In the process the post-WW1 vessels of the Royal Navy have been criticised in comparison with contemporary foreign ships, a criticism all the more pointed because of the unquestioned superiority of the RN's battleships in the Great War. It is perhaps time to take a brief look at these arguments and their validity.

The two classes we are referring to are of course the l6in. gunned Rodney and Nelson and the five l4in. gunned vessels of the King George V class. The argument goes that the l6in. ships, with their 23 knot speed, were too slow to be effective in WW2 when battleships were required to operate with fast aircraft carriers. Furthermore, X turret, tucked away behind and below B turret, was of limited use as it could only fire on or close to the beam. It is therefore suggested that these ships would have been far more useful if X turret had been deleted and the weight and space saved used to provide more powerful machinery for higher speeds.

The KGVs, on the other hand, were (just about) adequately fast at around 28 knots but are criticised both for lack of gun power (as every other nation building battleships at the time went for at least l5in. calibre) and for the reliability of the main armament. The almost complete breakdown of the Prince of Wales' fire in the action against the Bismarck is notorious; perhaps less well known were the similar if less severe problems suffered by the King George V in the second action against the Bismarck, and the Duke of York when she sank the Scharnhorst; that is, in every action against enemy capital ships…."

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Armand

Captain Lindemann and Admiral Lutjens could not be reached for comment.

(smile)

Armand