Best British interwar fleet?

I'm curious to see the direction the IJN would take with cruisers. Prior to OTL WNT, the preference was for small (by displacement if not dimensions) but very fast cruisers, designed to operate as scouts and destroyer flotilla leaders. IJN CLs also typically carried lighter gun armament but much heavier torpedo armament than their contemporaries.

IJN heavies subscribed to the "qualitative superiority in the face of quantitative inferiority" principle, and almost every class suffered from excessive topweight and poor stability in a bid to mount more guns and achieve higher speeds than USN heavies.

Also, regarding Kanto, one of the reasons Amagi was so heavily damaged is that work on her was halted, and then she was being prepared for carrier conversion. Had Amagi been more complete, depending on how complete, she would have been structurally stronger and sustained less damage.

That also leaves the question of what the IJN would convert to carriers...
Past the 5500-tonners, the Japanese had a tendency towards one-ups-manship starting with the Furutakas, which were intended to outclass the Omahas. It's why I think they'd go for big 10" cruisers in the face of lots of American 8" cruisers, especially with the aforementioned tendency towards "qualitative superiority in the face of quantitative inferiority". No light cruisers for a while, especially if they complete those last five Sendais.

Owari was scheduled to be in the Yokosuka slip once the earthquake hit; the conversions would likely be the last pair of Amagis, Atago and Takao.
 
In many way a slightly larger(and faster with a bit more armor) Des Moines class cruiser with a fourth turret is the best super cruiser design since it will bury its foes in shells at realistic battle ranges and can still be built and maintained in reasonable numbers.
Yes indeed, and up scaled des moines could literally drown any enemy cruiser in 8 inch shells.
But unless you get autofiring going alot quicker bigger guns will be preferred.
Of course a ship being fitted out is a terrible fire hazard so she still might not survive in a salvageable form.
I suppose? If cranes fell or her or if she was in drydock it's possible she'd be damaged.
I don't know about a huge fire hazard though. It'd certainly be increased by a decent margin compared to...not an earthquake circumstances but I'd be more worried of her getting damaged in drydock. Any ships on the slipways are in pretty grave danger though.
 
Past the 5500-tonners, the Japanese had a tendency towards one-ups-manship starting with the Furutakas, which were intended to outclass the Omahas. It's why I think they'd go for big 10" cruisers in the face of lots of American 8" cruisers, especially with the aforementioned tendency towards "qualitative superiority in the face of quantitative inferiority". No light cruisers for a while, especially if they complete those last five Sendais.

Owari was scheduled to be in the Yokosuka slip once the earthquake hit; the conversions would likely be the last pair of Amagis, Atago and Takao.

That's what I was thinking as well; in a TL I'm writing, that's what happened with Atago and Takao while the earlier pair had their construction slow-walked so they could receive heavier armour and all oil-firing boilers.

Now that I think about it, if you really tried to sell the bill of goods hard, you could tell the Fleet Faction "There! You have your Eight-Eight!"

Eight battleships:

2x each: Fuso, Ise, Nagato, Tosa

Six Gun Battlecruisers:

4x Kongo, 2x Amagi

Two Full-Deck Aviation Battlecruisers:

2x Atago
 
The Mark 16 got introduced I think in 1944/45.

Super heavy shells were introduced in the early/mid thirties. This same program developed new shells for pretty much every major gun system in the USN. For example, the 16" AP shell went from 2,200 pounds to 2,700 pounds. The 8" went from 260 to 335. The 12" went from 870 pounds to 1,140 while the 14" went from 1,400 to 1,500 pounds.

And as you mentioned, in a weight limited ship, the lighter gun has a huge advantage. A theoretical British cruiser armed with 8x9.2" has to devote 224 tons of weight allotment for the main battery. An American cruiser armed with 9x8" only has to devote 153 tons to is armament. The weight is such a huge advantage that the American ship could mount 12x8" and still only have 204 tons devoted to it's main battery.
Yes but that is comparing the Mark X 9.2" Gun (28 tons), which entered service in 1900, with the Mark 12 8" Gun (17 tons), which entered service in 1939.
It is entirely possible to make a similar comparison between the RN's Mark VIII (17.5 tons), which entered service in 1927, and the USN's Mark 9 (30 tons) which entered service also in 1927.
An RN vessel with 8 Mark X 9.2" has to devote 224 tons to its Main Battery, a USN vessel with 9 Mark 9 8" has to devote 270 tons to its Main Battery.
(With the experimental, never entered service, Mark X 8" Gun, the RN got the weight down to 12.5 tons)
Could the RN have developed a lighter 9.2" Gun, quite probably. The Mark XI was not a very successful gun, there were issues with reliability, accuracy and barrel wear. However, with a longer barrel, 50 compared to 47 calibre, it was actually very slightly lighter. The first Italian Naval Model 1924 8"/50 gun weighed 29 tons, the later Model 1927 8"/53 weighed 25 tons.

And the issue is more with the turrets, the RN Mark I was 50 tons over design at 205 tons, the USN Twin 8" was 187 tons, the IJN's lightest 163 and heaviest 172 tons.
(USN Triple mounts varied between 247 tons, with the Mark 9, to 313 tons, with the Mark 12. A Lighter Gun does not necessarily mean a Lighter Mount is being used. The 3 Triple mounts, with Mark 12's, on USS Wichita weighed more than the 4 Twins on HMS Cumberland. The 3 Triple mounts on Northampton, with Mark 9's, weighed less! ... In theory using a better turret design, such as the Twin mounts used on Lexington or Pensacola, and with a gun of similar weight, and ditch the questionable requirement for AA capability, a County Class Cruiser could have been armed with the 9.2" Mark X)
 
I agree that the UK would likely go with the 9.2". But by the time the US goes to the 8"/55 Mark 12, they're getting equal if not better performance from a gun that weighs only 17 tons verses the 28 tons of the British gun.
Why are we assuming RN would go for an old gun? They might still use a 9.2" shell but would they not automatically design a new gun for any ship use that's 20 years after the old gun design?
Seems that at the start the 9.2" is the better gun in the abstract
Yes but that is comparing the Mark X 9.2" Gun (28 tons), which entered service in 1900, with the Mark 12 8" Gun (17 tons), which entered service in 1939.
Agreed all of the stats for the old 9.2" can be improved weight and rate of fire mean nothing when you are talking about such an older system v a new one....

I'm assuming the quake halts further capship construction on Japan's part, yes.
If they halt battleship then I cant see them buying super CAs, the battle line is more important. CAs only really started to be built due to lack of ability to build large due to WNT.
How big would a spiritual successor to the Invincible class have to be? 4x2x12 inch guns, all-or-nothing armour against 8" shellfire, engines for 30 knots, VERY limited secondary armaments, though allow space/weight to fit later in order to keep down crew size.
A spiritual spiritual successor to the Invincible class would be more like 16" and protection again large shells, remember that at the time of Is RN shells where crap and could not reliably pen so even her belt was useful.....
Yes G3s are the answer for the scouting and beating up the enemy battlecruiser line role.
But you've a problem. Similar to having Hood go chase down pocket battleships in the South Atlantic the G3s are too valuable to have off raider killing should also be noted with battlecruisers capable of 33 knots you can bet your ass other nations are going to build the cruiser they intend to be merchant raiders to be much faster. What's the answer? A super cruiser. Powerful enough to kick the shit out of any cruiser but not, like the previous battlecruiser concept powerful enough to that admirals say "battleship guns, shove it into the battleline oh dear it's exploded. The battlecruisers of the mid 20s that would be developed after G3 are almost certainly lying going to be far closer to fast battleships which will 100% be needed in the battleline. That means they can't be spared hunting lone merchants in the middle of nowhere it goes back to the original purpose of the battlecruiser minus the "van of the line" tactic. The cruiser killing tactic.
Yeah, and what happened after the raiders were killed? They had BB guns so you stick them in the battleline. We saw the results in ww1 as you said.
If they don't have BB guns they wouldn't be stuck in the battleline. Battlecruisers ala G3s can't afford to be off hunting raiders as I said before because they are no longer battlecruisers but fast battleships they are needed to kill enemy battleships.
So you don't give the Super Cruisers Battleship calibre guns, restrict them to under 12".
12 inch guns or under yes.
After that you really are just wasting your money on something that has battleship guns but can't stand up to a battlecruiser and would need a lot more tonnage devoted to running away from it.
I support the super cruiser concept but it is a narrow window in terms of size, guns and armour, and obviously cost that must be taken into account which is admittedly why the concept is difficult because you have to get the right balance
I don't think the above works, if you build larger ships with 12" guns you are intentionally building SMS Blücher, Scharnhorst & Gneisenau or HMS Defence & Warrior..... smaller guns will not save you if you get misused.
The answer is to build the best you can at the time and then simply send the older ships to fight raider ie send Hood, R&R in WWII as you have four G3 (and probably at least another late 20s class and one mid 30s class as well) sitting in Scarpa/Gib/Alex to do the main fleet work.
Building something that can run from a G3 in a North Atlantic seaway reliably after it has raided for a couple of months (ie unclean bottom and used machinery) is very hard ie they would need what 5+Kn if not more? so a 32Kn would dictate something that can do 37Kn and a real 37Kn at that not just super light on trails 37Kn.....
 
The Sverdlov class cruisers would disagree with that

The Soviet Navy is confined in narrow seas, Baltic, Black, and Sea of Japan where hostile forces control the choke points to the Oceans. 100 miles from port their out of friendly air cover, and subject to hostile land based air attack. NATO Submarines would be stalking them the moment they leave port. The Arctic is the only exception, but from there they still have to pass through the GIUK Gap, and even the Artic ports are covered by NATO Submarines. So where are these CLs supposed to go? Cruiser raiding, Like WWI, or early WWII? How long would they survive in the N Atlantic, assuming they got there?

These ships were obsolescent before they were laid down. They were part of a building program for a WWII navy, so were about 15 years too late. The Soviet Navy was right in shelving the rest of the Stalin program, and instead concentrating on long range submarines, strike aircraft, and missiles. These ships are a perfect example of preparing for the last war.
 
That's what I was thinking as well; in a TL I'm writing, that's what happened with Atago and Takao while the earlier pair had their construction slow-walked so they could receive heavier armour and all oil-firing boilers.

Now that I think about it, if you really tried to sell the bill of goods hard, you could tell the Fleet Faction "There! You have your Eight-Eight!"

Eight battleships:

2x each: Fuso, Ise, Nagato, Tosa

Six Gun Battlecruisers:

4x Kongo, 2x Amagi

Two Full-Deck Aviation Battlecruisers:

2x Atago

Has anyone worked out a realistic budget and affordability for the as planned 8-8, or what they would get with their actual money? I would love to see hard numbers put the IJN budget and how that drives a real fleet rather than the bankruptcy crap shoot they seemed to spiral into.
 
Has anyone worked out a realistic budget and affordability for the as planned 8-8, or what they would get with their actual money? I would love to see hard numbers put the IJN budget and how that drives a real fleet rather than the bankruptcy crap shoot they seemed to spiral into.

Eight-Eight was itself a compromise- initially the most starry-eyed admirals asked for "Triple Eight", which started as 8-8 all under 8 years old and morphed into two squadrons of eight battleships and one of eight battlecruisers. IIRC, one radical expansion bill near the turn of the century was shot down by the Diet because it would have been 125% of Japan's entire annual budget alone. Eight-Eight, using just the hulls started, pushes perilously close to half of Japan's annual budget. The peculiarities of the Imperial Japanese Diet also reserved seats in the House of Peers for Japan's highest taxpayers- if a lot of them were members of the boards of Mitsubishi and Kawasaki, that would certainly provide a push towards expansion.
 
Regarding 6" vs 8" vs 9.2" in British ships - one of the takeaways from WW1 for the British was that while ships could often take a great deal of damage it only took a few hits to quickly degrade a ships combat effectiveness

In the role of policing the worlds shipping lanes OTL they settled on 6" guns as it allowed them to suitably arm a lighter cruiser allowing them to build/deploy more of them

None of these facts have changed TTL - so unless the other navy's start deploying dozens of Armoured Cruisers - then Britain is going to choose to arm the majority of its Cruisers with 6" guns
 
Regarding 6" vs 8" vs 9.2" in British ships - one of the takeaways from WW1 for the British was that while ships could often take a great deal of damage it only took a few hits to quickly degrade a ships combat effectiveness

In the role of policing the worlds shipping lanes OTL they settled on 6" guns as it allowed them to suitably arm a lighter cruiser allowing them to build/deploy more of them

None of these facts have changed TTL - so unless the other navy's start deploying dozens of Armoured Cruisers - then Britain is going to choose to arm the majority of its Cruisers with 6" guns
I'd certainly see super cruisers being a minority, for GB anyway. 10ish, maybe 15 at the most while light cruisers are pumped out for trade protection. Super cruisers may become the standard flagships for the dominions like Australia rather than the Counties OTL.
 
battleship guns, shove it into the battleline oh dear it's exploded

Actually this is a bit of an aberration. The first Dreadnought Armoured Cruisers we’re armed and armoured to catch armed liners and fend off guns of 7 to 8” caliber. The turret layout was optimised for chase, not broadside fire. 6” belt is good at 45 degree or greater inclination. Then what happened is what happens with every weapon system, the best counter is itself. The like for like happened with HMS Lion being a reply for the Molke, now the fighting in line came into focus but at much faster speeds and as a preliminary to the main battle. The RN worked out this wasn’t a good idea and developed the ‘fast wing’ QEs and the Battle Cruiser Squadron was to be split into mixed cruiser squadrons to not fight the 1st Scouting Squadron but report and observe. This was on the eve of WW1, the result of exercises not combat but the dumb admiral trope persists.

Fast forward to G3 and they fill the ‘lmperial Cavalry’ role against a super cruiser probably negating their construction and with their 50,000 tons full load keeping the cruiser sweet spot at 8000-10000 tons. The need for 8” is to reach the horizon. The 20,000 12” armed 35 knot super cruiser is a death trap. If you need a station flagship then a Hawkins would do.
 
Australia was willing to pay for a battleship in the 30s. They can inherit a Cat or R.

We got super cruisers OTL. They were called Alaskas and look how loved they were. Everyone who looked at a super cruiser post HMS Invincible said nah except for the limited French and the unlimited Americans.
 
That's what they were building the Lexington class for. Against Renown, Repulse or the Kongos, they'd have made Swiss cheese of them.
They would make Swiss cheese of each other if the Lexingtons were dumb enough to stick around and duke it out.
 
Past the 5500-tonners, the Japanese had a tendency towards one-ups-manship starting with the Furutakas, which were intended to outclass the Omahas. It's why I think they'd go for big 10" cruisers in the face of lots of American 8" cruisers, especially with the aforementioned tendency towards "qualitative superiority in the face of quantitative inferiority". No light cruisers for a while, especially if they complete those last five Sendais.
Or the IJN, with 8 'modern' battlecruisers are probably going to view the US 8" cruisers are not warranting their own separate cruiser construction programme (itself probably largely sacrificed to help pay for the main fleet units). I'd say that the IJN views their light cruisers as fairly expendable in this scenario.
 
Actually this is a bit of an aberration. The first Dreadnought Armoured Cruisers we’re armed and armoured to catch armed liners and fend off guns of 7 to 8” caliber. The turret layout was optimised for chase, not broadside fire. 6” belt is good at 45 degree or greater inclination. Then what happened is what happens with every weapon system, the best counter is itself. The like for like happened with HMS Lion being a reply for the Molke, now the fighting in line came into focus but at much faster speeds and as a preliminary to the main battle. The RN worked out this wasn’t a good idea and developed the ‘fast wing’ QEs and the Battle Cruiser Squadron was to be split into mixed cruiser squadrons to not fight the 1st Scouting Squadron but report and observe. This was on the eve of WW1, the result of exercises not combat but the dumb admiral trope persists.

Fast forward to G3 and they fill the ‘lmperial Cavalry’ role against a super cruiser probably negating their construction and with their 50,000 tons full load keeping the cruiser sweet spot at 8000-10000 tons. The need for 8” is to reach the horizon. The 20,000 12” armed 35 knot super cruiser is a death trap. If you need a station flagship then a Hawkins would do.
So what you're saying is the fast wing role was put on the QEs and the battlecruisers relegated to cruiser leaders. So the new battlecruiser roles are raider hunting and leading cruisers squadrons. Fast forward that 10 years. G3s are the fast van, what's going to be the cruiser killers and cruiser leaders. Hood, R&R?
Australia was willing to pay for a battleship in the 30s. They can inherit a Cat or R.

We got super cruisers OTL. They were called Alaskas and look how loved they were. Everyone who looked at a super cruiser post HMS Invincible said nah except for the limited French and the unlimited Americans.
The Alaskas are a bad example of super cruisers for a few reasons. Call up CalBear and he'll find several more..
But at the end of the day the ships they were designed to go kill just didn't do what was expected. The Japanese didn't go for commerce raiding in the sense Germany did in ww2. They also lacked flagship abilities. They were the size of the Scharnhorsts.
They would make Swiss cheese of each other if the Lexingtons were dumb enough to stick around and duke it out.
The Lexingtons were the definition of a glass jaw. The Americans took exactly from jutland, said hey look none of the 9" armour belts got penetrated so clearly we should put a 9" belt on our battlecruisers. Nobody seemed to notice initially that hey all the german battlecruisers had 11 inch guns and every battlecruiser since has had 15" guns or higher surely we should armour against that instead? Which seemed to dawn on them later in construction.
In almost any fight with an enemy battlecruiser apart from the G3s it would be a case of who hits first.
 
Or the IJN, with 8 'modern' battlecruisers are probably going to view the US 8" cruisers are not warranting their own separate cruiser construction programme (itself probably largely sacrificed to help pay for the main fleet units). I'd say that the IJN views their light cruisers as fairly expendable in this scenario.
Again, same problem the Brits run into: the Japanese only have six battlecruisers (the last two Amagis are unlikely to be completed as battlecruisers) and the Americans were seriously considering thirty 8" cruisers. And while the Japanese don't have the trade protection issues the Brits have, they were very interested in counter-scouting and breaking through American cruiser screens. The former is what led to the Furutakas to outfight the Omahas, and the Japanese aren't simply going to stand pat on that front with 8" cruisers being cranked out; the latter is what their CAs were actually supposed to do in their Kantai Kessen plan.

Compounding the issue is that the Japanese were very fond of using battlecruisers as a fast wing of the battle fleet. While the Kongos would probably be used in distant action, the Amagis are going to be tied to the battle fleet and thus held back.
 
Regarding 6" vs 8" vs 9.2" in British ships - one of the takeaways from WW1 for the British was that while ships could often take a great deal of damage it only took a few hits to quickly degrade a ships combat effectiveness

In the role of policing the worlds shipping lanes OTL they settled on 6" guns as it allowed them to suitably arm a lighter cruiser allowing them to build/deploy more of them

None of these facts have changed TTL - so unless the other navy's start deploying dozens of Armoured Cruisers - then Britain is going to choose to arm the majority of its Cruisers with 6" guns

I think your observations are spot on. Navies build ships to meet their specific needs. The RN has lots of water to cover, and the advantage of many bases, so they need, and can support lots of smaller ships. That's also how they can use guns with short barrel lives, they have many bases to replace them in. The USN for example needed to operate far from home bases, but this is something everyone here already knows. Let me make another point about the efficacy of building armored cruisers.

From pre WWI to WWII naval guns, and shells improved, and the range of combat greatly increased due to more advanced fire direction. It became harder, and harder to design a ship with enough armored protection to resist a similar caliber shell that they themselves carried. Greater range made this even harder because plunging fire made more deck armor necessary. That's why it was easier to design a reasonable armored CL on a 10,000 ton hull, then a CA. No one had prewar CA's that could resist 8" shells. The USN Baltimore Class, post treaty CA's were 4,000 tons over the preceding Treaty USS Wichita. An armored, or super cruiser with 9.2" guns would be nearly 20,000 tons. How many ships of that size would any interwar navy build?

Not even the Americans would build them, just where would they fit in their naval doctrine. The reason the USN built the "Large Cruiser" Alaska Class, (Over 30,000 tons,) was faulty intelligence, that the Japanese were building super cruisers. Interesting that U.S. Naval intelligence underestimated the size of the Yamato's. If they'd know they would've completed the last 2 Iowa's, and given the Montana's a higher priority. Really would have been a waste of resources, more Essex Class Carriers would've been more useful.

Along those lines what about a TL with no WNT where the USN converted all 6 Lexington's into carriers? That would be a real Black Shoe vs Brown Shoe battle. What would an international Carrier race look like? How many could the RN build, or convert? Would the RN take back the Fleet Air Arm? How would the Japanese respond. The French converted an old Battleship into a Carrier, in the late 30s loaded out with American Vindicator Dive Bombers, a plane that was unfairly maligned. It did good service as a land based DB, during the Battle of France. Everyone had large ships suitable for conversion, including Liners. During WWII Italy was converting 2 liners, but didn't finish them in time. This TL would certainly see an acceleration in the development of naval aviation. Any thoughts?
 
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