Super Battleships and the progress of technology.

[Guest]

According to the US Strategic Bombing Survey only a few percent of the bombs dropped in WW.II hit within five miles of their target.

Altitude bombing of ships underway is a fool's errand.

Until guided glide bombs were developed in late 1942. The battleship Roma went kaboom as a result of altitude bombing from 20,000 feet altitude and 11 miles horizontal distance.

Chuck

[Guest]

Incidentally, rocket boosted glide bomb deployed against the Roma is said to be able to penetrate the 12" of deck armor, thus capable of easily defeating the citadel of any battleship ever built, including Yamato.

Thoughts were thrown around various somewhat ungrounded quarters near the end of the war to the effects of building battleships with 12" deck armor (70,000 tons, carrying a measely armament of 6 16" guns in order to facilitate the deck) until it was pointed out it was a relatively trivial exercise to build bombs to penetrate that too.

- Chuck

[Filipe Ramires]

I fail to understand why you keep speaking of Strategic Bombing. I have yet to met a single aircraft-carrier that can put 100 B-17s, B-24s, B-29s, Lancasters in the air. Strategic Bombing is far different from carrier strikes. Carpet bombing is the most useless tactic against ships moving...either you use dive-bombing or torpedoes.
Yes, carriers and strategic bombing can take out refineries and factories. Of what use are those industries if they have now raw materials to work with. Some one needs to carry them home...merchant ships...and guess who will be hunting them most of the time???

Admirals you speak. Strangely they didn't learned their lessons properly in WWI either way ASW would be boosted between the wars and Britain would haven't had to pass for the same or worst they did in late WWI when Unrestricted Submarine Warfare was installed. They failed to realise how menacing the submarine could be and again the situation did show up in much more catastrophic ways. Yeah, build big ships with big guns and planes....nevermind the small ones that keep sinking your supplies all the time.

[Jack Ray]

Chuck wrote:

Thoughts were thrown around various somewhat ungrounded quarters near the end of the war to the effects of building battleships with 12" deck armor (70,000 tons, carrying a measely armament of 6 16" guns in order to facilitate the deck) until it was pointed out it was a relatively trivial exercise to build bombs to penetrate that too.

Sounds like "Plan Catherine".

Jack

[Werner]

The new generation of explosively formed projectiles can penetrate armor or other materials equal to hundreds or thousands of calibers in thickness. No armor in the world is safe from such a weapon.

[Laurence Batchelor]

I fail to understand why you keep speaking of Strategic Bombing. I have yet to met a single aircraft-carrier that can put 100 B-17s, B-24s, B-29s, Lancasters in the air. Strategic Bombing is far different from carrier strikes. Carpet bombing is the most useless tactic against ships moving...either you use dive-bombing or torpedoes.
Yes, carriers and strategic bombing can take out refineries and factories. Of what use are those industries if they have now raw materials to work with. Some one needs to carry them home...merchant ships...and guess who will be hunting them most of the time???

You fail to think holistically and thats too naval-centric!
Carriers win back the islands to base your strategic bombers on!
They indirectly lead to an ability to implement strategic bombing.

I mentioned nothing about carpet bombing ships at sea did I!
You can only sink merchant ships if the enemy you face has a large merchant fleet, which imports alot, and has scant defensive ASW forces to protect everything effectively.
I ask again how can you stop the Industrial base of the Continential United States?
And don't tell be about stationing U-boats off the Eastern Seabornd, that was preying on largely non convoyed coastal traffic or ships bound for England set against a fully lit coastline!

If you wish to strangle America's Industrial capabilty come on how do you achieve it? yes thats right with the the more flexible weapon which can work agaisnt any type of modern nation naval air power and/or strategic bombing.

Admirals you speak. Strangely they didn't learned their lessons properly in WWI either way ASW would be boosted between the wars and Britain would haven't had to pass for the same or worst they did in late WWI when Unrestricted Submarine Warfare was installed. They failed to realise how menacing the submarine could be and again the situation did show up in much more catastrophic ways. Yeah, build big ships with big guns and planes....nevermind the small ones that keep sinking your supplies all the time.

No thats wrong.
The Admiral I speak was obviously not around in WWI!
The Royal Navy made huge advances in ASW understanding in peacetime in the 1920s-30s.
But obviously only such much can be learnt and implemented in peacetime with limited budgets!
They imemdiately initated convoys at the start of WW2, that was directly from WWI war lessons.
Interwar they pumped resources into developing ASDIC and in 1939 I challenge you to point to any other Navy who was better placed to fight an ASW war?
How in the Interwar Period could Britain predict she would be facing a war on 3 fronts? How could she predict the fall of France, allowing bases to be built nearer to the Atlantic.
In WWI U-boats had to get through the choke point of the channel, or prey on coastal traffic, or go around the British Isles.

You need to see a the submarine war in WW2 in the context that the Royal Navy planners could in the 1930s and not through the benefit of hindsight.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Right then Filipe I'll make a start with trying to get my point across in a different manner, and also I'll dispense with all the quotations because that would take an eternity!

Right then, what I'll do is be selective, but I will give some detail.
I will run through some of the key naval battles of WW2 in the early war period.
A period when air power at sea wasn't yet fully perfected, yet submarines had largely still a free rain,
although their numbers would of course increase dramatically as the war progressed.
It took until 1944 for the USN to really get the carrier battle groups, doctrine, fleet train etc it desired.
It also took until about the same period for the RN to get enough modern fleet carriers into commission and sufficiently worked up etc.

As you prefer Pacific war stuff I'll start there. So then baton down the hatches as here we go for Part1!:-

Battle of the Coral Sea - May 7th/8th 1942:
Outcomes - The Japanese failed to make a planned assault on Port Moresby, Papua as a result of US Navy carrier aircraft strikes.
Aircraft from the carrier Yorktown inflicted some losses and damage on shipping and installations at Tulagi.

LOSSES

SUNK
USN
Lexington - Carrier (sunk by Japanese aircraft and the fires spreading)
Sims - Destroyer (sunk by Japanese carrier launched dive bombers)
Neosho - Oiler (sunk by Japanese carrier launched dive bombers)
IJN
Shoho - Light Carrier (sunk by carrier aircraft bombs and torpedoes from Yorktown & Lexington)
Kikuzuki - Destroyer-transport

DAMAGED
USN
Yorktown - Carrier (Damaged from bomb hits and near misses)
IJN
Shokaku - Carrier (damaged by Yorktown's planes)
Okinoshima - Minelayer (damaged by USN submarine, later capsizes whilst being towed)
Yuzuki - Destroyer-transport

Aircraft Losses
USN
66
IJN
c80

The Battle of Midway - June 4th-6th 1942
Outcomes - The Japanese failed to make a planned amphibious assault on Midway Atoll,
as the result of unexpected US Navy carrier strikes which sank all the covering fast carriers.
To the North, in the Aleutian Islands, a second Japanese carrier force covered the occupation of a number of islands, virtually unopposed.

LOSSES

SUNK
USN
Yorktown - (hit and temporarily stopped by Japanese dive bombers from Hiryu, eventually finished off by Japanese submarine)
Hamman - (sunk by Japanese Submarine)
IJN
Akagi - (Set ablaze by aircraft from Enterprise and one from Yorktown)
Kaga - (Set ablaze by aircraft from Enterprise and one from Yorktown)
Hiryu - (hit by U.S. carrier dive bombers and later abandoned)
Soryu - (Set ablaze by aircraft from Enterprise and one from Yorktown)
Mikuma - (set on and sunk by USN aircraft from Enterprise and Hornet of course a submarine attack made her collide with Mogami, but it was aircraft which sunk her)

DAMAGED
USN
Nothing major
IJN
Mogami - (heavily damaged from carrier aircraft from Enterprise & Hornet and took 10months to repair/rebuild)
Arashio � (Medium damage from USN air attacks)
Akebono Maru � (torpedoed by Catalina�s)

Aircraft Losses
USN
150
IJN
253

The Battle of the Eastern Solomans - August 24th, 1942
Outcomes- The Japanese failed to reinforce their land forces on Guadalcanal although the transport unit continued after the carrier action,
and was driven back by the US Marine Corp Aircraft ferried in by carrier. Many consider the carrier action was a tactical 'draw'.

LOSSES
SUNK
USN
Nothing major
IJN
Ryujo - Light Carrier (overwhelmed by a powerful air assault from USS Saratoga)
DAMAGED
USN
Enterprise (three direct hits and four near misses)
IJN
Chitose - Seaplane Carrier (damaged by a near miss from aircraft from USS Saratoga)

Aircraft Losses
USN
20
IJN
c90

The Battle of Santa Cruz - October 26th, 1942
The Biggest joint operation undertaken by the Japanese Army and Navy, the result was a strategic defeat on Guadalcanal for the Army,
while the Navy gained a double tactical victory, landing reinforcements and driving off the US Navy carrier force.
Accumulated aircrew losses made this the last major attempt by the Japanese carrier force to contest American amphibious operations for 20 months!

LOSSES
USN
Hornet - Carrier (crippled from air attacks from bombs and torpedoes, survived 5-inch USN shell fire and torpedoes, eventually sunk by IJN torpedoes)
Porter - Destroyer (Most likely, an errant torpedo from a ditching USN TBF Avenger hit Porter and caused her fatal damage later sink by gunfire from another USN Destroyer)
IJN
Nothing major

DAMAGED
USN
Enterprise (damaged from bombs from Vals)
South Dakota (damaged by a 500-pound air launched bomb hit on top of her number one turret)
San Juan (damaged from 1 bomb passing through her stern, flooding several compartments and damaging, though not disabling, her rudder)
Smith (hit by damaged Kate which purposely crashed into her and set her on fire)
IJN
Shokaku (severely damaged by aircraft from Hornet)
Zuiho (damaged by 2 bombs which hit aft. Retires from the battle back to Truk)
Chikuma (severely damaged by aircraft from Hornet)
Akikaze (bombed during this battle light damage)
Tenizuki � (damaged from air dropped near miss bomb)

Aircraft Losses
USN
20 (combat) 54 (Operational)
IJN
c100

Conclusions

As one can easily make out above, carrier air power was king at sea in WW2 in the Pacific.
It was pivotal in every major naval battle, some of which I selected above from the early war period.
Each of these battles had a significant impact on not only the war at sea, but also overall the Pacific Campaign.
Aircraft could sink any size of vessel, they could get through any type of defensive shield e.g. AA, CAP, or ships taking avoiding action.
They could inflict damage in 3 ways, torpedoes, bombs or collision.
In summary then the key was which navy became the dominant carrier force ultimately would go on to win the entire Pacific War.
You cannot make this direct link with the submarine. There place in naval history is an annihilation of Japan�s ability to wage her war as an industrial power.
They disrupted communications and logistics and of course sunk so much of her war material either raw material (grain oil etc) or finished goods (tanks, artillery, aircraft etc).
She was hampered in all her operational movements whenever she tried to move anything around her Pacific territories. Finally of course they sunk warships, but air power was the biggest arbiter at this.
However, all of this weakened Japan, it did not defeat her ultimately. That could only be achieved by taking on her armed forces, defeating those and gaining control of territory, primarily islands for air/naval airbases. The most important weapon to achieve this was air power at sea.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Right then for Part 2 I�ll take a more Royal Navy/European slant.
The list of major warships sunk or seriously damaged by naval air power is most impressive in the European threatre.
One always has to remember both the German and Italian navies moved there fleets around with extreme caution, why? Because they feared the Royal Navy�s FAA capability, something they lacked, but of course they usually feared surface action as they could also be out-gunned in many situations.
This pattern therefore led to fewer encounters between the enemy�s capital ships and the Royal Navy that perhaps could be expected. If we take the early war period to begin with I�ve chosen this timeframe again specifically to handicap air power at sea as it was still in its infancy:-

Italian Navy

Littorio (Hit by 3 torpedoes from Swordfish at Taranto repairs took 4 months)
Vittorio Veneto (Hit by one air launched torpedo from an Albacore which meant she stopped and took on 4,000tons of water)
Caio Duilio (Hit by 1 torpedo from Swordfish aircraft at Taranto repairs took 6 months)

French Navy

Richelieu (attacked by Swordfish from Hermes on July 8, 1940. A torpedo hit below the armoured deck, disabled the starboard propulsion shaft, and the flooding caused her stern to touch bottom. She was pumped out after a few days and made seaworthy for emergencies.)
Dunkerque (sustained damage by aircraft from Ark Royal whilst at Mers-el-Kebir. 2 near misses hitting ships alongside and the 2nd setting off depth-charges ripping a large hole inside her which the 3rd torpedo then exploding close to the bulkhead between 2 compartments meant the hull was opened from bilge to upper deck and the ship quickly settled on the bottom. It took 3 months to make the hull watertight again)

Thus the above were all torpedoed and put out of action by carrier launched Swordfish & Albacore aircraft between June 1940 and May 1941. At Taranto the Italian Fleet lost half its battleship strength in 1 night from a small force of only 21 Swordfish (2 of which were shot down). Their [the RM�s] �fleet-in-being� diminished in importance and the Royal Navy increased its control of the Mediterranean. Taranto is the perfect example which shows even with minimal resources the results can be devastating from air power. This is in juxtaposition to that old adage that some on here have tried to imply at me which is �ah well carriers cost so much� I don�t deny this, but Taranto proves even with scant resources they can achieve far more against major warships than submarines can.

I think the words of the greatest Ssa Captain since Nelson should be heeded gentlemen �Taranto, and the night of November 11-12, 1940, should be remembered for ever as having shown once and for all that in the Fleet Air Arm the Navy has its most devastating weapon" CIC Mediterranean [at the time, later Admiral of the Fleet] Andrew Browne Cunningham, 1st Viscount Cunningham of Hyndhope, KT, GCB, OM, DSO A Sailor�s Odyssey. He makes no mention as the submarine as a Navy�s most potent weapon! His naval background was in Destroyers so he has no vested interest in air power.

Furthermore in this early war period we can also note the following capital ships were both sunk as a direct result of naval air power:-

Bismarck (The decisive blow and which swung the fate of the ship was due to carrier launched Swordfish strike aircraft hitting her and jamming her steering gear and rudder)

Conte Di Cavour (Sunk at her moorings at Taranto and required extensive salvage work and these were incomplete when Italy pulled out of the war in 1943)

Both of the above were �modern battleships� (ok Conte Di Cavour was a modernised WWI warship, but 60% of her was all new from her extensive reconstruction, though I grant you her torpedo defense and AA were def not upto 'modern' standards) even so not bad for the old stringbag was it!
So then what modern Battleships did submarines sink on the high seas of European waters?

Barham was not fully modified and that tragic loss was due to the destroyer screen thinking their contact was a shoal of fish and not attacking it, such a fatal error!
Royal Oak was a sitting duck in harbour exposed via inadequate harbour defences. The other ship U-47 targeted she missed and she even had to have 2 stabs at sinking Royal Oak as she initially hit her anchor chain. The Royal Navy sinks a few more block ships (which was subsequently done only a few weeks later at Churchill�s insistence) and you negate the possibility for submarines to ever to re-enter the Royal Navy�s main Home Fleet anchorage for the rest of the war. Much harder to stop air attacks on Scapa isn�t it!
But then again as the DKM doesn't have fleet carriers, then that threat is never there to be utilised.

If that isn�t enough for the action hungry amongst us then through a Swordfish torpedoing and crippling Pola, Zara & Fiume were sent back to assist her. As a result the night Battle of Matapan is upon the Royal Navy, something Cunningham had been hoping and training for. Result the sinking of these 3 RM Heavy Cruisers, which could not have come about had the Swordfish from Formidable not precipitated this chain of events.

Obviously I�ve not covered the many Royal Navy carriers sunk by U-boats, Eagle, Courageous, Ark Royal you can come back on me on those.
The latter is a poor design fault and complete cock up at Gibraltar with the tugs being sent!
Eagle was a masterly attack as without doubt to penetrate the Pedestal convoy took some doing.
Courageous is just plain silly misuse of resources, in the early war period when the carrier's role is still not fully known.

If we now leap ahead in time towards the end of the war.
Both Britain and America have had time for their shipbuilding industry to build them the offensive navy they most desired.
Was that a fleet based around the submarine? No of course not!!! It was carrier air power of course.
The result with now the opposite of Taranto, you have massive air power by 1944-45 and can instigate a devastating prolonged air power campaign over the Japanese home islands. This clearly demonstrates that carrier forces, armed with the best available aircraft, fully supplied and worked up could successfully wage a war of attrition against a modern nation just like submarines had been doing for the proceeding years in the war.

The added ability though is again naval air powers better FLEXABILITY as these massive carrier task forces can not only target maritime targets, they also do a massive amounts of damage on airfields, road/rail systems and shipyards all from about 2,000 naval aircraft. I could go on and detail some of the highly successful operations by the BPF in crippling some of the largest refineries the Japanese had e.g. Operations Cockpit, Transom, Councillor and Pedal, but I think the lessons would be the same I�ve already explained at length!
Just as an aside Carrier-based aircraft supported every major amphibious operation from landings in Norway in April 1940 right through to the re-occupation of Singapore in September 1945. In RN terms the only real exception was Dunkirk. In the Pacific where the US took the whole sea/air power to the ultimate level their entire prosecution towards final victory rested on this doctrine. Without the powerful carrier task forces for both distant strike capability and also for inshore support victory would have been won at an almost unacceptable cost in life and material.

WW2 proved that AIR POWER at sea had the greatest FLEXABILITY, and thus was the superior weapon at sea over all others.
The Submarine was the most COST-EFFECTIVE weapon, but it just could not do half the things which air power could.

P.S. after all that typing I need

[Dave Wooley]

Laurence you keep hammering away at the basic but ill thought tenet that the carrier is the ultimate war-winning weapon. The facts just do not support this view
1 Carriers are theatre weapons not strategic
2 A carrier is used as an instrument of power projection
3 A carrier can provide support for land assault
4 Carrier are vulnerable assets.
5 The present generation CVNs are not ASW platforms
6 There are very few ASW carriers now in service.
7 The most important battle of the entire war and the longest was the Battle of the Atlantic. If the Allies had lost that battle the net result to the entire strategy and direction of the war would have been quite different.
. There is no doubt the Japanese were at the weakest in the ASW role and at their most vulnerable The USN exploited this weakness with gusto. The facts are clear on this the USN submarine was a war winning weapon that proportionally had a greater effect on the outcome of the war in the Pacific than the vulnerable carrier .

One of the main reasons the U-boat was defeated by the May of 1943 was the high level of Ultra intelligence. If you know were and when you adversary is going to strike you have the upper hand. You can then deploy or re-deploy your assents to meet the challenge.

Submarine
1 The latest generation of submarines are almost undetectable and leave no signature for any ASW group to lock onto.
2 In any future conflict SS, SSN and SSGN would pose serious problems for any re-supply from the US to Europe
3 The dominant strategic weapon is the SSBN.
To sum up given all that has been said the facts that you espouse regarding the place the carrier as the number one naval weapons platform just does not add up The facts are there to contest any points that you may have regarding this view . The carrier is not and has never been a strategic weapon To put it bluntly the carrier is a floating airfield nothing more. By the way as a model maker the carrier is king
Dave Wooley

[Filipe Ramires]

I guess this is worst then to speak with a brick wall.
You point out the famous battles which can be counted as very few compared with the hundreds of attacks made against convoys and task forces by submarines. At least 3000 ships perished at the hands of submarines in the Atlantic and eventually some 2000 more in the Pacific and I am being very pessimist with the numbers.
I don't even see the point of your effort to put those small battle reports here. I've been reading and studying all those battles for over then 15 years. I have books here you know. Apparently "wingy historians" tend to favour these battles because they were big clashes between carrier task forces but when it comes to speak of convoy battles and others apparently they know very little. They also count the other battles and most of the times with much more serious consequences. Sinking Japanese carriers was bad but to sink the supplies on the way home to be used in the war effort is worst...the war machine simply doesn't work if you don't have the fuel to move the ships and planes or the steel to produce them.
It's just like I said in my first posts. There are schools of thoughts that simply want to deny credit to the submarine when they deserve all of it after what they achieved during the war. The very same thing when the carrier showed up and the "traditional" admirals were reluctant to admit its efficiency. I guess the same happens regarding the submarine. I'm sure you are welcome to such group.

[Foeth]

Just an observation, but the point of the discussion was whether or not battleships would still be built if the war was delayed as there were two trains of thought. Funny that we should see two of them right here and that's with hindsight, a luxury one did not have 70 years ago.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Well I'm not a big carrier fan or submarine so I have no bias unlike some here.
If anything I like my big guns!
But from my studying of WW2 for 15 or so years the single most important war winning weapon at sea was flexability and the mobility of power projection across the globe.
This is what air power gives you.
It's the most flexible instrument of war at sea, it just can do so many things a submarine cannot. A submarine in WW2 is very poor at sinking other submarines, it just cannot forefil the role of supporting a amphibious operation which is a prerequisite when outside the umbrella of land based air cover.
It cannot provide close in support beyond the beach-heads for the troops.

All of the most significant naval battles in WW2 all hinged on air power at sea, including largely the defeat of the U-boats in the Atlantic.

Sinking Japanese carriers was bad but to sink the supplies on the way home to be used in the war effort is worst

I disagree, say you attack a IJN convoy of 6 ships in 1942 and sink 2-3 of them with subs, the other 3 still get through to port.
How long will it take for Japan to replenish this deficiency?
It might mean in 1942 she just digs deeper into her oil/food reserves, or they deplete at a quicker rate.
What does she do use 9 ships the next month? in the expectation 3 more will be sunk? (if she has the spare tonnage of course!)
Whereas if you sink one of her fleet carriers it is total denial to the enemy of a much more valauble and irreplaceable resource.
Even if you just deplete the airgroup, that will take much longer to replenish once again!

Furthermore if we use this same example of 6 IJN ships in convoy and this time all of them are tankers. Lets say once again your Gato sinks 3 of them and the other 3 reach port.
Now Japan still has 3 tankers to ferry her oil with. Of course she's lost 50% of what she wanted say for that months qouta.
Now compare that with 1 air attack on the refinies, say some of those late war BPF operations I mentioned above.
One of those I forget which one denied 66% output for 6-months of Japan's largest SE Asia refinery.
All that from just 1 air attack! Which is the more effective?
It's simple its more productive to hit at the nodes of the oil system supply system (refineries) rather that the transport infrastructure (the tankers).
The effects mean that no oil can be supplied from that well via land, air or sea to any part of the Japanese empire.
They also take a long time to rebuild and they are more of a total denial of a resource to the enemy.

What subs try and do is whittle down/grind down culmulatively a nations Industrial/military capacity. They are brillant for it, as I keep saying they are the most cost-effective weapon on the high seas.
But time and again air power at sea is more flexible and is thus the supreme weapon, its just hard to achieve for many nations because it requires massive inputs.

A question if I may, now Britain doesn't import as much raw material as she did back in the days of empire or in the early part of the 20th century; now most of what is transported is by air-freight (apart from oil and a few other things); now since the 1950s she is now a self-sufficient food producing country brought on by the intensification of her agriculture industry i.e. she has since become an exporter rather than importer of foods stuffs; does this now mean that a submarine blockade on her merchant traffic would be much less effective than in the days of late-WWI and WW2?

One final question if I may, from 1945-2007 what civil or military conflicts, UN peacekeeping operations, humanitarian rescues, amphibious landings, or out and out conflicts at sea have submarines been pivotal in or for?
The cold war detterent factor I suppose.
But also I can only think of the sinking of the Belgrano where they were actively used and pivotal in the conflict at sea.
Air Power at sea well I could make a list as long as my arm!

Ultimately though, I suppose if some of you draw the conclusion that the submarine was the best weapon at sea in WW2 and for me I draw the conclusion it was air power at sea, then I suppose we will just have to agree to disagree.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Getting back to the question at hand, if these superbattleships were being built is it right to assume that as they get ever larger, their radius of action will increase? or is that just wishful thinking?

Also would Germany enlarge the Kiel canal? America the Panama canal?
and the Royal Navy fianlly upgrade her drydocks scattered around the globe which always constrained her battleship designs from the early 1930s onwards?
hmm food for thought, ontopic this time!

[Guest]

Getting back to the question at hand, if these superbattleships were being built is it right to assume that as they get ever larger, their radius of action will increase? or is that just wishful thinking?

Also would Germany enlarge the Kiel canal? America the Panama canal?
and the Royal Navy fianlly upgrade her drydocks scattered around the globe which always constrained her battleship designs from the early 1930s onwards?
hmm food for thought, ontopic this time!

Newer American battleships typically have much better radius of action than average, due to conscious effort to enlarge fuel capacity to support pacific operation, and to the fact that American ships used the most advanced (next to German one) steam plants that enjoyed substantial efficiency advantages. Last class of American battleship - Montanas - are impassable through Panama Canal. Americans had planned on building an entirely new sea level Canal through Honduras to support newer, larger warships. The canal was canceled at the end of the war, and American super carriers have been rounding cape horn ever since.

The German H-class battleships were intended to have an all-diesel power plant of exceptional fuel efficiency, plus a prodigiously fuel capacity, to achieve a radius that would allow them to steam almost all the way around the world at 19 knots. Their intended range was not only unmatched, but in a different league all together from anything else ever seriously contemplated. They were intended to become roaming concentration of naval power that could strike anywhere against Britain's extended supply line. Kiel Canal would have some bends straightened to allow the passage of their long hulls. But their hull has very broad but shallow, so they did not need deepening of ports and canals for operation.

Japanese had intended to adopt a half diesel, half steam plant for the Yamatos and their follow on class to achieve exceptional range. At the last moment they abandoned the diesel engines because they could not achieve what they deem to be the necessary level of reliability. So the originally intended steam plant was doubled and the diesel engines dropped. I believe these engines groups were split up and distributed to new naval auxiliaries. As it turns out the steam plant is quite conservative and not extremely efficient. Her design fuel load was large in absolute terms but not large relative to her size (consequence of Japanese failure to accept the benefits of liquid loaded torpedo defense compartments). So her range was not entirely adaquate for the type of pacific operation she was called upon to do. The Japanese started on a enormous parallel infrastructure project to support these ships, involving the construction of an entirely new yard, the dredging of multiple port approaches and channels, and tremendous capacity expansion at many existing yards and docks.

The Soviet super battleship's range is unknown to me. The powerplants were ordered from Switzerland, and could have been quite efficient. Constructing and supporting these ships certainly involved tremendous infrastructure expansion. The Ukrainian slip way upon which one of the vessel was built was itself being constructed at the verysame time as the ship. When the Germans invaded the channel to connect the end of the slip way with open water has not yet been dug, so the essentially completed hull could not be launched to escape the Germans because it would have slid onto dry land. In Leningrad an enormous slip ways was built to support the construction of two of these superbattleships side by side, and to enable the construction to continue in arctic winter, the slip way was housed in a single, enormous enclosed and heated hanger whose roof beams formed the tracks of the traveling crane used for the ship's construction. The hanger is the same size as 3 Hindenburg hangers laid side by side.

- Chuck

[Guest]

I think it is fair to say that had WWII been delayed another 10 years, the major powers would have revolutionized their basic naval infrastructures to support much much larger warships.

Incidentally, near the end of WWI, the Germans were already building segmentable floating docks with 80,000 ton capacity. I believe one of these survived WWII and was acquired by the USN as a prize, and it supported US super carrier opeartion for a time, at least through late 1980s.

Just why the Germans needed a 80,000 ton dry dock in 1918 seems open to interpretation.......

[JWintjes]

Had WW2 been delayed for another 10 years or so, no H-class battleship would have seen action, for Germany would have been thoroughly bankrupt by early 1940.

Virtual history is fine - these days it's almost en vogue among historians. But throwing out all of your methodology before coming to conclusions means that these conclusions have no more worth than theories about engagements between cruisers armed with rapid-fire guns and gargantuan battleships.

I voted "no" for a number of reasons, one being the simple fact that the economies of the late 1930s were by and large (with the US being probably the sole exception) unable to support the elargement programs we're talking about.

Another reason is that carrier aviation might not have developed as rapidly as it did during the war, but developed it would have nonetheless. If you look at the state of the FAA in 1938 and compare it to 1928 you get an impression of what might be in the offing in 1948 after another decade of peaceful procurement.

Jorit

[JWintjes]

I think it is fair to say that had WWII been delayed another 10 years, the major powers would have revolutionized their basic naval infrastructures to support much much larger warships.

With what, if I may ask?

Germany had not completed the transition to a fully motorized, let alone mechanized force in 1939. Faced with the decision either to build a superbase for some huge battleships of questionable value or to acquire enough trucks to pull every gun the artillery had, what would have happened?

Jorit

[Werner]

You don't believe Hitler's government would have been forced to make good on those promises of consumer appliances and automobiles for the people? After all, the German people had endured a generation or more of privation and hardship at the hands of the war machine in Ww.I and the ruthless Versailles victor's terms after the war.

Time to fix the roof and buy mama a washing machine.

[JWintjes]

You don't believe Hitler's government would have been forced to make good on those promises of consumer appliances and automobiles for the people? After all, the German people had endured a generation or more of privation and hardship at the hands of the war machine in Ww.I and the ruthless Versailles victor's terms after the war.

Time to fix the roof and buy mama a washing machine.

That is exactly my point - Germany didn't have the economic power to do both, was already almost bankrupt by the end of 1939 and would have been totally broke in the early 1940s. Which would probably have caused internal upheaval.

Jorit

[Guest]

I think it is fair to say that had WWII been delayed another 10 years, the major powers would have revolutionized their basic naval infrastructures to support much much larger warships.

With what, if I may ask?

Germany had not completed the transition to a fully motorized, let alone mechanized force in 1939. Faced with the decision either to build a superbase for some huge battleships of questionable value or to acquire enough trucks to pull every gun the artillery had, what would have happened?

Jorit

Hitler would have picked battleships. I know because in real life, he did. Hence H-class were laid down, and German Navy was granted much enlarged steel quota to support Z-plan, and Hitler would have given his right arm for the H-class to be completed by 1944, and would hugely miffed when KM would only promise 1946.

Since Germany has little navy to speak of, her naval build up would not be that difficult on her economy because most of resources can be devoted to the build up, and not to the maintenance of the existing fleet. For Germany building 6 H class and the unbalanced assortment of supporting ships to materialize the supposedly balanced fleet of Z plan would be a far smaller imposition than British plans to build 5 KGV, 4 Lions, and the much more balanced assortment of support ships. Germany didn't need to devote 2/3 of her budget and ship yard resources to maintenance of existing fleet.

Incidentally, the steel allotment granted for the construction of Z-plan, 70,000 -100,000 tons a year for 10 years, is small compare to German total steel industry output of over 20 million tons. The naval allocation could at most be used as an excuse for failure to motorize, it could not be a real reason.

It may be that had war not broken out, Z plan may be modified or some of its peripheral elements may be sacrificed for overall multi-service build up, but I ssupect Germany will pursue that magnitude of build up to near its ultimate conclusion.