Of course a ship being fitted out is a terrible fire hazard so she still might not survive in a salvageable form.She was scheduled to be finished in November 1923, so going by previous classes she would have been launched
Of course a ship being fitted out is a terrible fire hazard so she still might not survive in a salvageable form.She was scheduled to be finished in November 1923, so going by previous classes she would have been launched
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.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...
Yes indeed, and up scaled des moines could literally drown any enemy cruiser in 8 inch shells.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.
I suppose? If cranes fell or her or if she was in drydock it's possible she'd be damaged.Of course a ship being fitted out is a terrible fire hazard so she still might not survive in a salvageable form.
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.
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.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.
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?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.
Seems that at the start the 9.2" is the better gun in the abstract
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....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.
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.I'm assuming the quake halts further capship construction on Japan's part, yes.
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.....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.
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".
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.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
The Sverdlov class cruisers would disagree with that
Of course a ship being fitted out is a terrible fire hazard so she still might not survive in a salvageable form.
That tends to happen when a ship being built falls off its supports.I understand her hull was deformed, so they would've had to start over anyway.
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.
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.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
battleship guns, shove it into the battleline oh dear it's exploded
They would make Swiss cheese of each other if the Lexingtons were dumb enough to stick around and duke it out.That's what they were building the Lexington class for. Against Renown, Repulse or the Kongos, they'd have made Swiss cheese of them.
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.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.
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?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.
The Alaskas are a bad example of super cruisers for a few reasons. Call up CalBear and he'll find several more..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 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.They would make Swiss cheese of each other if the Lexingtons were dumb enough to stick around and duke it out.
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.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.
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