AHC: Keep Scapa flow as the main base of the RN

A lack of votes will make it hard, it was only ever really the wartime anchorage with the main repair functions to the south.
 

SsgtC

Banned
The best you'll see if Scapa Flow somewhat modernized to provide better accommodations and entertainment for crews if/when their ships are there
 
The best you'll see if Scapa Flow somewhat modernized to provide better accommodations and entertainment for crews if/when their ships are there
I would add two things off the top of my head,
- I would think a airbase to defend the Orkney's could be sold as a civilian airport in peacetime?
- Blocking the channels (probably cheaper than OTL wartime work) better than OTL would save Royal Oak?
 
I would add two things off the top of my head,
- I would think a airbase to defend the Orkney's could be sold as a civilian airport in peacetime?
- Blocking the channels (probably cheaper than OTL wartime work) better than OTL would save Royal Oak?

Did the Orkney even need a civilian airport at thattime?
 
Someone has only today mentioned on another board that the Royal Navy regarded Faslane, less than an hour from Glasgow, as intolerably remote, whilst the Hebrides (about as easy to get to as Orkney) were considered so inaccessible that the Australian outback was chosen for a rocket launching site instead.
 
As already stated, the location is far too remote. Given the wind down after WWI and then post WWII in terms of fleet sizes it isn't cost effective. Regardless of how good an anchorage it is, transporting crews and stores all the way there just wouldn't be justified every time budgets get slashed. The best you could probably hope for is a cold war requirement to support operations in the GIUK gap and to help protect the northern flank of mainland Europe.

As jsb rightly states, it would come down to votes. I worked for part of a nationalised industry in the early 90's and our subsidiary site was acknowledged as both cheaper and better quality work than any others doing the same work but it was closed and a.n.other kept open because of the need to retain or win votes in the other, larger town. Compared with Portsmouth, Southampton or Faslane, the need to keep an expensive remote harbour would give way to the politics of the day, probably much sooner than the 90's. Votes and all the subsidiary benefits amongst the larger communities would win, even over practicality.
 
As someone from Australia, i'm struggling to understand your concept of things being too far away. I mean, its only 1,200km from Orkney at one end of the UK to Southampton at the other end, and that is by Road. I mean, Sydney to Darwin or Perth is almost 4,000km by road.

Then again, I also fail to understand the English definition of a heatwave.
 

SsgtC

Banned
As someone from Australia, i'm struggling to understand your concept of things being too far away. I mean, its only 1,200km from Orkney at one end of the UK to Southampton at the other end, and that is by Road. I mean, Sydney to Darwin or Perth is almost 4,000km by road.

Then again, I also fail to understand the English definition of a heatwave.
Yeah, we struggle with that in the US in too. Considering New York to LA is over 3000 miles, hearing that less than 600 is too far strikes us as a bit odd
 
StevoJH and SsgtC, do you have the Scots in the way though? :)

Seriously we British are now very different from the people that sent out the likes of Scott, Shackleton and Dr Livingston. We seem to have fallen into a little island mentality unfortunately.
 

cpip

Gone Fishin'
Yeah, we struggle with that in the US in too. Considering New York to LA is over 3000 miles, hearing that less than 600 is too far strikes us as a bit odd

I think the phrase is, "In Britain, 100 years is a short time and 100 miles a long drive; in America, the reverse." I suppose that applies to Australia and Canada as well.
 

SsgtC

Banned
StevoJH and SsgtC, do you have the Scots in the way though? :)

Seriously we British are now very different from the people that sent out the likes of Scott, Shackleton and Dr Livingston. We seem to have fallen into a little island mentality unfortunately.
No, but the Mid West is. And several really inhospitable deserts...
 
As someone from Australia, i'm struggling to understand your concept of things being too far away. I mean, its only 1,200km from Orkney at one end of the UK to Southampton at the other end, and that is by Road. I mean, Sydney to Darwin or Perth is almost 4,000km by road.

Then again, I also fail to understand the English definition of a heatwave.

On th either hand you can actually drive from Sydney to Perth, drive up to To scapa is a tad damp.
 
The UK is based on old infrastructure though, it might be a hundred miles drive which im sure is easy in the wide open spaces of the US and Australia on new decent roads that are well laid out, it's not like that in the UK, even now many main roads go through town centers and it only gets worse as you head north in the UK.

There are very few good roads past Edinburgh and Glasgow, certainly no motorways and the A roads are all single carriageway and quite narrow. There is very little space for new roads or even road improvements even if you could get permission.
 
1930

The admiralty decide to develop Scapa flow as the main anchorage for the home fleet. The FAA is given back to the RN under the condition that the aircraft for the navy's aircraft carriers come from their budget.

Three runways are built two are concrete for what the admiralty hope is asw aircraft.
 
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