British Rearmament Before World War 2

[Dorknought]

The problem wasn't money. With the Pound as the worlds reserve currency it was never going to be a problem.

The problem was time. Not how long to the war but how long will the public be set upon disarmament? As it was, rearmament was funded by debt, not raising taxes. The public could be made aware of the threat of bombing but while the population expected the RAF to defend cities first, RAF priorities were:

1. our bases
2. means of producing our aircraft
3. cities

This explains the population going OMFG they are bombing London and the RAF went 'awesome'.

The RAF's real problem was that aircraft were being designed to fit in with possible treaties that never occurred. This also impacted the Fleet Air Arm as if numbers were controlled then this comes out of the RAF quota.

The army were told for 20 years - you will not be sent to the continent to fight - plan accordingly. The idea that the army could be involved in a another continental war was anathema to voters. Not until March 1939 were the Army told - you will be sent to the continent to fight - plan accordingly.

The RN funding from the Washington treaty to the end of the 1920's was akin to the Dreadnought pause in 1906-08. In 1909 it had a burst to reestablish the lead over Germany. In 1930, funding dropped further due to the impacts of the London Treaty. The LNT was a disaster for the RN. They were restricted in Destroyers without having the submarine banned. The KGV's should have been laid down in 1931 to replace overage tonnage, not 7 years later.

To be ready by 1939 requires GB to start 1929 and it has to be a firm understanding by the electorate that disarmament has failed.

The cost to be truly 'war winning' is staggering. Britain spent £2.78 billion on the strategic air offensive. This amount represents around 10 percent of the £28.7 billion that the British government spent during World War II and 12.19 percent of the £22.8 billion Britain spent on defence. The £2.78 billion cost of Bomber Command’s campaign was also 5.57 percent of Britain’s total National Income for the entire war period.

GB military needs to be big enough and ugly enough by the late 30's to show the Nazi's 'don't fuck with me'.

 

[Capt Thunderbolt]

Prioritise defence of supply lines, the Channel, Suez, the Rock, India and Malaysia are all major suppliers for the UK, invest abroad to make canneries more prevalent in food producing regions, anything to increase the amount of food available to these regions for sale. Increase production for Coastal Command and the Fleet Air Arm, place great emphasis on scouting and reconnaissance operations to persuade the Old Guard to relax a little. Plan more for the 'Freak Navy' that became a reality. Germany cannot keep pace in production of Naval assets, so how exactly no one thought they might play the sneaky game is beyond me.

Aircraft production and numbers are locked into peace agreements.

Numbers needed to be kept in line with France and other.

However IMHO, maritime aircraft should be under a separate tally. The RN needed to be smarter and get the RAF to offload carrier air, so the Air Ministry could maximise RAF, and get the RN out of their hair.

The flow on is an earlier FAA. The multi factorial issues could be reduced. Even allowing for the jump from bi-planes, FAA would be allowed to practice Coastal raiding and operating against shore aircraft.

The RN would still need armoured carriers, but reduce side armour and spend more on air defence. A folding wing Hurricane, had being proposed and would allow a point fighter for carriers. FAA would then only need a heavy fighter/ diver and a very robust torp/ bomber.

 

[jsb]

Aircraft production and numbers are locked into peace agreements.

Did any get actually agreed?

 

[marathag]

They were restricted in Destroyers without having the submarine banned

I feel they could have massively cheated here, and no-one else would have cared.

 

[CalBear]

The problem wasn't money. With the Pound as the worlds reserve currency it was never going to be a problem.

The problem was time. Not how long to the war but how long will the public be set upon disarmament? As it was, rearmament was funded by debt, not raising taxes. The public could be made aware of the threat of bombing but while the population expected the RAF to defend cities first, RAF priorities were:

1. our bases
2. means of producing our aircraft
3. cities

This explains the population going OMFG they are bombing London and the RAF went 'awesome'.

The RAF's real problem was that aircraft were being designed to fit in with possible treaties that never occurred. This also impacted the Fleet Air Arm as if numbers were controlled then this comes out of the RAF quota.

The army were told for 20 years - you will not be sent to the continent to fight - plan accordingly. The idea that the army could be involved in a another continental war was anathema to voters. Not until March 1939 were the Army told - you will be sent to the continent to fight - plan accordingly.

The RN funding from the Washington treaty to the end of the 1920's was akin to the Dreadnought pause in 1906-08. In 1909 it had a burst to reestablish the lead over Germany. In 1930, funding dropped further due to the impacts of the London Treaty. The LNT was a disaster for the RN. They were restricted in Destroyers without having the submarine banned. The KGV's should have been laid down in 1931 to replace overage tonnage, not 7 years later.

To be ready by 1939 requires GB to start 1929 and it has to be a firm understanding by the electorate that disarmament has failed.

The cost to be truly 'war winning' is staggering. Britain spent £2.78 billion on the strategic air offensive. This amount represents around 10 percent of the £28.7 billion that the British government spent during World War II and 12.19 percent of the £22.8 billion Britain spent on defence. The £2.78 billion cost of Bomber Command’s campaign was also 5.57 percent of Britain’s total National Income for the entire war period.

GB military needs to be big enough and ugly enough by the late 30's to show the Nazi's 'don't fuck with me'.

As mentioned earlier, the Ocean Escort problem has an easy solution, assuming money was made available.

The LNT Article 8 (aka the Gunboat rule) allowed for an UNLIMITED number of vessels between 600 & 2,000 tons. Ships under the Article were not allowed torpedo tubes, were allowed a main battery of no more than four 6"/155mm guns and max speed of 20 knots. In short perfect Ocean Escorts.. Obviously there would be some creativity with the design to allow space/weight for things like "K guns", but the key was there was absolutely no limit on construction. This would allow for an a light frigate like the Flower class corvette or the Grimsby class sloop, except several knots faster and much better armed. This sort of design was eventually built in massive numbers They were, however, permitted to have either one centerline aircraft catapult or two broadside Cats, with a maximum limit of three aircraft carried.

Oddly the opening was not really taken advantage of. The U.S. delegation was the party that championed the Article, yet the U.S. only built two ships of the Eire class.

This sort of design was eventually built in massive numbers by the U.S. with the introduction of the 51 ship Evarts, and 72 ship Cannon classes of DDE, although these DDE class was considerable smaller, at less than 1,400 tons and less well armed with only 3x1 3" guns.

USS Erie (PG-50) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Dorknought]

Oddly the opening was not really taken advantage of. The U.S. delegation was the party that championed the Article, yet the U.S. only built two ships of the Eire class.

The problems for the RN are that in the 1930's:

• they thought they had the submarine beat
• their potential enemies thought they did too.
• the wisdom of convoy was being questioned against the air threat

They even forgot the maths that bigger convoys were better.

The gunboat clause (Article 8) was the flip side of the fight deck cruiser clause. The USN wanted the cruiser tonnage to be taken by the 2nd rate Gunboats freeing it up for flight decks. This doesn't serve the RN very well as the attitude "why build 2nd rate when time gives them to you for free" was still prevalent and sloops were not 'career enhancing'.

Perhaps you could go for something more like the River Class instead of navy spec sloops. Capable of being built in merchant yards as a limited capacity boosting exercise but the need to counter submarines wouldn't be foreseen in something like Battle of the Atlantic scale.

 

[Capt Thunderbolt]

Did any get actually agreed?

The British lead by example, regardless if they signed. It was a defacto budget limit.


The British Draft Convention
In the spring of 1933 the world had yet to grasp the significance of Hitler’s rise to power, and so HMG plodded on in a vain attempt to achieve disarmament. The abolition of military and naval aircraft was again inserted into the British Draft Convention submitted to the Geneva Conference on 16 March 1933. This was in spite of the Cabinet agreement that total abolition was impracticable. In what may now be regarded as a forlorn attempt to at least appear to be genuinely seeking total air disarmament, HMG proposed the setting up of a Permanent Disarmament Commission to work out the best possible scheme for abolition of military and naval aircraft, coupled with the effective control of civil aviation. Almost as if HMG knew that the above proposals stood little chance of acceptance, an alternative scheme was also proposed, that such a disarmament commission should attempt to fix a minimum number of machines required by each of the participating states. Tentatively a table annexed to the Air Clauses assigned an establishment of 500 aircraft to each of the principal air powers, and proportionately lower numbers for the other states. No mention was made of Nazi Germany, still at that time bound by the Versailles Treaty, which prohibited a German air force.

A ‘let-out’ clause to cover British air control operations was couched in the following diplomatic language. There would be: ‘the complete prohibition of bombing, except for police purposes in certain outlying regions’. This reservation, as has already been pointed out, drew criticism when it was inserted in the draft convention. It was criticized both in Parliament and the Press, and had to be defended in the House of Commons by Anthony Eden on 13 June and again on 5 July 1933. His response was that the matter of imperial policing was a small issue compared with the great political questions, which were holding up the work of the conference. Indeed the work of the conference did not founder on the matter of imperial policing, but rather the impossibility of reconciling French demands for security with the German demands for equality of rights.

The French government had always been nervous that a reduction in the size of the French air force would not be matched by reductions of the air forces of other powers. The French sought security in alliances, which bound powers to act together. In a sense Hitler was demanding the same thing. With what some may regard as righteous indignation, Hitler was claiming that Germany would be insecure unless all other countries reduced their air forces to zero, like Germany.

Excerpt From: "The Royal Air Force: Re-Armament 1930 to 1939" by Ian M. Philpott. Scribd.
This material may be protected by copyright.

Read this book on Scribd: https://www.scribd.com/book/444691676

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

I copied this from the Royal Navy Museum, Portsmouth's copy of the Navy Estimates 1939-40 in 2012.

Unfortunately, I don't have the planned expenditure for 1939-40 handy, but it would have included a substantial sum of money from the Defence Loans Act.

Thanks, that makes a deal more sense than the UK public spending data, which is notable for its broad strokes and omission of such bits of data that add up.

You're welcome.

This is a transcript of Pages 8 and 9 of the Navy Estimates 1939-40 which are dated 15th February 1939. (Royal Navy Museum, Portsmouth's copy.)

It shows the actual expenditure for the 8 financial years commencing on 1st April 1930 and ending on 31st March 1938 and the estimated expenditure for the two financial years starting on 1st April 1938 and ending on 31st March 1940.

I've added the averages for the five financial years 1930-34 and the five financial years 1935-39. As can be seen the average spending before the POD is half the average spending after it.

The spending exclusive of issues under the Defence Loans Act is within a few hundred thousand Pounds of what the table compiled from contemporary Annual Abstracts of Statistics in Post 31 says, including 1939-40, which is £69.4 million in both documents.

According to the Navy Estimates the issues under the Defence Loans Act were:

1937-38 £24,000,000 which matches the Annual Abstract of Statistics​

1938-39 £30,000,000 which is less than the £31,350,000 for that year in the Annual Abstract of Statistics​

1939-40 £80,000,000 which increases the Estimate from £69,399,000 to £149,399,000 which is 115% more.​

​

There may have been Supplementary Estimates between then and the outbreak of war in September 1939.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Following on from Post 48 this I've put Votes 8 and 9 into a separate table. 1937, 1938 and 1939 include the issues under the Defence Loans Act.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

That is simply marvellous data and presented in such a manner as to be clear for analysis and extrapolation.

It allows for the correct data in the following:


1930: 52.274m, 3 6in cruisers, 9 destroyers, 3 submarines, 4 sloops
1931: 51m, 3 6in cruisers, 9 destroyers, 3 submarines, 2 sloops, 2 minesweepers
1932: 50.164m, 3 6in cruisers, 9 destroyers, 3 submarines, 2 sloops, 2 minesweepers
1933: 53.443m 3 6in cruisers, 9 destroyers, 3 submarines, 2 sloops, 1 patrol vessel, 2 minesweepers
1934: 56.616m, 1 aircraft carrier, 4 6in cruisers, 9 destroyers, 3 submarines, 2 sloops, 2 patrol vessels, 2 minesweepers.
1935: 64.887m, 3 6in cruisers, 16 destroyers, 3 submarines, 1 sloops, 2 patrol vessel, 3 minesweepers
1936: 80.976m, 2 battleships, 2 aircraft carriers, 2 6in cruisers, 5 5.25in cruisers, 18 destroyers, 8 submarines, 2 sloops, 1 patrol vessel, 3 minesweepers
1937: 101.892m, 3 battleships, 2 aircraft carriers, 5 6in cruisers, 2 5.25in cruisers, 15 destroyers, 7 submarines, 3 sloops, 3 patrol vessels, 4 minesweepers.
1938: 126.17m, 2 battleships, 1 carrier, 4 6in cruisers, 3 5.25in cruisers, 3 fast minelayers, 3 submarines, 1 aircraft maintenance ship
1939 149.399m, 2 battleships, 1 carrier, 2 6in cruisers, 1 fast minelayer, 16 detroyers, 20 hunts, 2 sloops, 56 corvetes, 20 minesweepers

Further to earlier discussions, a tidbit I’ve had saved on my website from an opinion by a chap from another place:

“With perfect hindsight it is hard to ignore the need for more 300ft, twin screw 20knot escorts early in the war, though having said that

It seems pretty clear to me the RN and Dominion navies should have ordered more Sloops – 1930-1936.

They are essentially unlimited by the London treaty. Their cost is very low - in the 100-200,000 pounds band.

Their main limitation is the dual role minesweeping. This limited their draft – which in turn influenced seakeeping. It also set their power as that required to tow the sweep at 12 knots – which worked out to a top speed of 16.5-17 knots. They dropped the minesweeping role for the Bitterns – added 50% more power for 19knots and produced some pretty useful units – DP AA – asdic – depth charges 1200 tons – but not in enough numbers, and built to warship standards with turbines, not suited to mass production.

Building a full 8 sloop flotilla every year 1930-1936 adds roughly 1 million pounds to each years estimates in terms of construction and repair – as well as spread work through the depressed shipbuilding industry. The end result is over 30 additional ocean going escorts. And there is no need to maintain these additional ship in commission – they can sit in reserve, rotating with the historic ships in commission, foregoing much increase in operating cost.

This leads back to – IMHO – one of the main issues that dogged the RN 1939-1942. Its not the Treaties, its not so much the ten year rule, though the ravages of that were bad – it was rescinded in 1935 and its worse excesses made good 1935-1936 through some supplementary estimates. The worst problem the RN faced between the wars was the drop in its annual estimate from the early mid 20’s plateau of 57-61 million pounds per annum from 1923-1928 (pretty much the Beatty years) through a trough of 1928-1935 with a nadir in 1932 of 50.5 million pounds.

Maintaining the estimates at 57 million pounds through 1928-1935 results in a cumulative additional expenditure of 22 million pounds.

The RN could not do too much more with cruisers and destroyers 1930-1936 because of treaties, but what they could do with this money would include.

* Building a full flotilla of sloops each year – 6 million pounds.

*Avoid economies in cruiser and destroyer programs - 1 million pounds.

*Bring forward the carrier program – laying down Ark Royal in 1931 rather than 1935 – 4 million pounds, to be followed by a second new carrier with the benefit of Ark Royal experience as per historic in the 1934 estimate.

*Building up FAA numbers and aircrew reserves - $? Here – Chatfield roughly costed operational embarked aircraft including replacement, maintenance and operating costs at 15,000 pounds per annum. – prices forming an additional squadron in 31, 33, 34, 35 at 2 million pounds. Aircraft are dear.
* This leaves 9 million pounds that could be spent on modernisation of the battlefleet 1930-1936 – an area where the RN significantly underspent the USN and IJN in this era. The RN spent 1940-41 trying to face off the modern Italian fleet in the Mediterranean using hetrogenious squadrons of battlecruisers, modernised QE’s and unmodernised and desperately slow R class ships, leading to multiple situations were a single ship was exposed and isolate against multiple enemy capital ships with the distant support of an 18knot R with short ranged guns. It’s a bit early for modernisations that incorporate DP armerment – but re-machining to re establish original speeds, modernised horizontal protection, modern directors and fire control and increased main armament elevation are possible – and on roughly 2-2.5 million pounds. At this rate we could fit in another 3-4 reconstructions in the 1930-1936 period – giving the RN are far more capable and homogenous battlefleet by 1940.”

 

[Popcorn]

Get rid of all but a couple of the battleships and put the savings into a fleet of fast escort carriers. The increased demand for additional pilots and planes would require a good pipeline for training and manufacturing. Talk Canada into doing the same. When the war starts the uboats will be lucky to make it past the channel. Increased air power can shut down industry on the Rhine. Good luck getting the RN to accept the changes and the politicians to fund them.

 

[marathag]

ly taken advantage of. The U.S. delegation was the party that championed the Article, yet the U.S. only built two ships of the Eire class.

missed opportunity, Hoover cut naval construction, even for already authorized spending.
Should have done more for a Works Program, to keep employment up at shipyards, that would have had some useful effect on the economy.
But he, and advisors, thought cutting was the way back to prosperity.
That never worked in all the times it has been tried.

 

[marathag]

The problems for the RN are that in the 1930's:

• they thought they had the submarine beat
• their potential enemies thought they did too.
• the wisdom of convoy was being questioned against the air threat

but the Erie would have been a better deterrent against potential surface raiders than what the RN used up using for escorts.
a couple Eries frees up the crews and ships that were otherwise manning the old battleships for other roles

 

[marathag]

Get rid of all but a couple of the battleships and put the savings into a fleet of fast escort carriers. The increased demand for additional pilots and planes would require a good pipeline for training and manufacturing. Talk Canada into doing the same. When the war starts the uboats will be lucky to make it past the channel. Increased air power can shut down industry on the Rhine. Good luck getting the RN to accept the changes and the politicians to fund them.

only if the FAA had a better choice of aircraft

 

[Popcorn]

only if the FAA had a better choice of aircraft

I would hope these changes would be a kick in the pants to the designers and whoever is in charge of the approvals.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

Get rid of all but a couple of the battleships and put the savings into a fleet of fast escort carriers. The increased demand for additional pilots and planes would require a good pipeline for training and manufacturing. Talk Canada into doing the same. When the war starts the uboats will be lucky to make it past the channel. Increased air power can shut down industry on the Rhine. Good luck getting the RN to accept the changes and the politicians to fund them.

Politically and doctrinally impossible, not to mention incredibly self mutilating. There is a necessity to think in the manner of the time, not apply 101% hindsight.

Even though battleships were eclipsed in @, Britain still needs them in Norway, the Med, the Arctic and a lot of other places.

Further, the savings would not necessarily flow at once, nor in the same avenues, as you suggest. If politicians slash the RN battlefleet in the 1930s, then the savings aren’t going to the military.

 

[CalBear]

Get rid of all but a couple of the battleships and put the savings into a fleet of fast escort carriers. The increased demand for additional pilots and planes would require a good pipeline for training and manufacturing. Talk Canada into doing the same. When the war starts the uboats will be lucky to make it past the channel. Increased air power can shut down industry on the Rhine. Good luck getting the RN to accept the changes and the politicians to fund them.

That works assuming the British yards adopt the "This guy is either crazy smart or just plain crazy" construction methods that Kaiser Shipyards used. mainly dumping rivets for all welded hulls* when there does not appear to be a need for such a radical change in method considering the known downsides.

It would also require the FAA getting a halfway decent fighter, something that could handle the Ju-88 and He-111 (the Sea Gladiator was marginal against the Do-17, but was actually slower than the Luftwaffe's other "schnell bombers" especially the Ju-88. Otherwise the CVE are ducks on a pond while in range of Luftwaffe land based air. The RAF is not going to hand over a fighter with a Merlin until they have a gun to their head, which is exactly what happened with the early Sea Hurricane used on the CAM ships.

There is also the LNT I & II to consider. The Exchequer was desperate to keep the treaty structure in place, knowing that once it went away naval construction costs would skyrocket. That puts a hard ceiling on any construction of January of 1936.

*While vastly faster to construct, close to 50% faster than riveted hulls, welded hulls of the era were effectively "disposable". The technology was literally developing as the ships were built, They needed far less highly skilled workers (which would have been a HUGE issue considering the power of the labor movement in peacetime yards) but the welded joins were also much more prone to failure over relatively brief periods.

 

[Fuzzy Dunlop]

If the sloops you are referring to are similar to these ones https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algerine-class_minesweeper they don't seem much of an improvement over the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower-class_corvette which were starting to be built by 1939. And the Flower Class corvette was barely adequate for service in the North Atlantic. The RN needed more destroyer escort type ships for that job.

But the problem AIUI was nobody, including the Admiralty, was expecting France to fall giving the Germans ports along the Atlantic. The RN was planning on a war where U-boats would have to transit through the North Sea or the English Channel to reach the Western Approaches. And the corvettes were designed to operate in those locations. Not the mid-Atlantic. Building corvettes or sloops instead of DEs was the wrong decision for the right reasons at the time.

There are many good ideas suggested in this thread that would have benefitted the British going into WW2. But many are only apparent with the benefit of hindsight. For example, was there anybody on the RN planning staff that was seriously considering in 1935 to 1939 the defeat and occupation of France by Nazi Germany in the near future?

2nded.

Even the RAF Fighter Command under Dowding were planning for the defense of the UK based on the premise of air attacks coming from Germany not the rest of Europe.

That's why he went for a 54 Sqns minimum.

Ref: Dowding and The Battle of Britain by Robert Wright (1970)

 

[Fuzzy Dunlop]

Here's one for a Royal Navy perspective.

Fleet size (https://www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignRoyalNavy.htm) 1939

7 Aircraft Carriers
15 battleships/battlecruisers
66 Cruisers
184 Destroyers

Is there some way to allow a change from 1930 to rejig the fleet to the following.

Scrap the battleships (average complement 1,300/1,400) and replace them with an extra 15 Ark Royal/Illustrious class instead?
Scrap the 66 Cruisers (average complement 800) and replace them with an extra 264 Destroyers?

It depends though on the cost, the UK's shipyard capacity . . . . and a bit of foresight on behalf of the Admiralty.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

That is simply marvellous data and presented in such a manner as to be clear for analysis and extrapolation.

Thank you.

This is my table of warships ordered for the Royal Navy under the 1930 to 1939 Estimates.

Notes

• The table doesn't include ships in these categories that were ordered by the Dominions and India. However, it does include the 3 Amphion class cruisers that were built for the RN 1933-36 and sold to Australia in the late 1930s.
• Minor War Vessels = escort destroyers, sloops, patrol vessels, fleet minesweepers and the first 56 Flower class corvettes.
• 1939-40 only includes ships ordered to the outbreak of World War II.
• At one time each of the building programmes for the financial years 1938-39 and 1939-40 were to include 7 submarines, 2 aircraft carriers, 2 battleships, 7 cruisers and 16 fleet destroyers. However...
  • 1938-39 was cut to 3 submarines, one aircraft carrier, 2 battleships, 7 cruisers and no fleet destroyers.
  • 1939-40 was cut to 4 submarines, one aircraft carrier, 2 battleships, 4 cruisers and 16 fleet destroyers. Furthermore, the submarines and 2 of the cruisers weren't ordered before war broke out.
• I don't know if any minor war vessels were planned for 1938-39 and then deleted when that year's building programme was "rationed".