Never is a very strong word, just what better carrier in the world would you like to challenge say HMS Furious or Argus in 1918?You are doing a lot of fancy footwork to avoid the fact the UK never had the best carriers in the world.
Never is a very strong word, just what better carrier in the world would you like to challenge say HMS Furious or Argus in 1918?You are doing a lot of fancy footwork to avoid the fact the UK never had the best carriers in the world.
great reference, something you wrote.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Naval_Air_Service
The most basic references
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_German_Navy
go to airpower for the german navy link.
Germany Has her African and pacific colonies in this time line .
Never is a very strong word, just what better carrier in the world would you like to challenge say HMS Furious or Argus in 1918?
They show the British clearly had quite a substantial force regarding naval aviation in WW1.So what do you think these links show? You have to add a bit more detail. The RNAS existing does not mean that the Germans did not have quality land based naval aviation. It does not change that the German aviation industry generally had a win during the war. And that in a German win scenario where there is ample funding for the navy, that that Germany will not continue and expand this lead.
Note: Even in a German win, I don't consider even flat naval spending a given.
I think there may also be some confusion. It is my position that at any point from 1914 to Today that either the IJN or the USN has the best carrier based aviation. The UK is not in the discussion. My related position is that in WW1, that Germany as the best land based naval aviation. And that in WW2, the best land based naval aviation is either Japan (early) or the USA (later). The UK is not a leader here. I have no strong position on who had the best land based naval aviation from 1920 to 1938.
Because the UK was testing ships with a different armor philosophy, be like using tests on predreadnoughts to get a rule for dreadnoughts, get a flawed result. The 14" armed All or Nothing US ships were better armored than 15" armed British ships (unless you count Vanguard), so a rule created for one would not necessarily hold for the others. If nothing else different nations judge survivability versus ones own guns by different standards, and those standards can change as combat ranges change.I am not so sure why you think the "All or Nothing" invalidates the UK test. They are are response to UK test and lesson from battles. I will leave out steps, but it roughly as follows:
- As we move into the modern age (dreadnought age), ships were armored to defend against their main gun. i.e. 12" gunned ship can take a bunch of 12" shells. It was often what is called "medium" armor or probably more accurate "all around" armor. The engines, the main magazines, and the gun turrets were protected to this standard. So even if heavily pummeled, the ship should be able sail back to port for lengthy repairs. Now I am not so sure this is true, but it was believed.
- Gun technology advance faster than armor. Or put another way, it is much easier to build a good 16" gun if you can build a good 12" gun than to figure out how to do medium armor versus a 16" gun.
- Post war test showed the rule of thumb of "Two gun size down can't survive in battle".
- IOTL, there is a emerging understanding that you can't effectively medium armor a 15" or 16" ship. All or nothing armor is a response to this understanding. So it the concept of "immunity zone". These reaction to the findings in the studies that I cited plus other factors highlight the process.
- There is an open debate on this forum about if the Japanese 18" gun was a quality gun. I have no strong view on this matter.
- My position is that if all/most major powers have built 18" guns, then yes, 15" ships are obsolete and likely death traps. The USA 16" seems to be the most popular 15" or 16" gun on this board, so to take an example. If the USA builds a 18" gun with the same quality and then builds a Montana class or bigger ship with said guns (8X18"), the the QE are death traps if used in the main battle line. So in the battle where 5 Montana line up against 5 QE or R, I would not expect the QE to survive. 3" is a lot in gun size. Would you expect a 12" gunned British dreadnought to be able to out slug a QE? In a 5 on 5 battle of these type of ships, how damaged do you think the QE would be? Would you expect any of these QE to be sunk? Same idea.
And once again, you are talking about the Japanese navy during WW2.Here is the issue. I have looked a lot of projections of performance before battles. They are almost never correct, so I put a lot of weight on actual performance. Which battles did these ships win that will impress me?
Also "Japan is best" is not equal to "UK is bad".
Japan had a well organized campaign where the carrier worked well, then a lack of targets for the rest of the war. Japan 1-0-0
UK had a 1914 attack that did nothing. Then to the Ottomans it loses a carrier to gross stupidity. And the British had some big plans for 1919. So to put in football terms, the UK was 0-1-1 for the war but saying the off year acquisitions would have been a championship team in 1919. And the loss was a blow out. I need a couple of clear UK carrier battle wins to get the UK in the conversation.
Astrodragon. I have seen your type of challenge before. And I used to respond and spend several hours writing long, cited replies. Then, generally speaking, the other side will not respond with any cites of their own. I have concluded that this is a waste of my time in more than 90% of cases. And it makes the thread less enjoyable for others.
As to "But then, what do I know about British Naval Aviation, right?", I guess I will have to be blunt. I do not consider you an expert in British naval aviation. Have you done something that I don't know about such as publish well know books on this topic? Or have you taught at the US Naval Academy? Have you reached flag rank in a major navy of the world? I know this sounds harsh, but most of the sources that I have read on this topic are either primary sources (fought in the battle being discussed), are widely accepted sources (Churchill, Official British Pre-war Naval review, tenured professor of warfare) or they have both achieve the rank of Captain and fought in a war by command a cruiser or larger ship.
We fought the battle out last summer using SEEKRIEG rules and the British Battle Cruisers got sunk to the last ship
Most Germans ships were damage but they were able to get home . There loses were almost historical . It was like the Computer hated the British fleet for 4 of the British BC exploded with Turret hits and 2 of the QE went up with golden BB shots .And? What toll was exacted on the German High Seas Fleet?
Most Germans ships were damage but they were able to get home . There loses were almost historical . It was like the Computer hated the British fleet for 4 of the British BC exploded with Turret hits and 2 of the QE went up with golden BB shots .