No WWII: Effect on Aircraft Carriers?

Still hindsight, OTL budget battles led this philosophy to show up among some navies (but not others), without real combat to vindicate it this may not be considered the proper philosophy by the people doing the buying

Without a war on the horizon priorities would be different as the main enemy for the RN and USN is not the Germans and Japanese but the RAF and USAAC

Marginalizing the perceived effectiveness of aircraft against ships is the best way to fight that particular battle

To avoid WWII you need an early POD, certainly pre 1938, probably pre 1933, maybe even pre 1930 or pre 1920

That is a lot of scope for things and policy to change, and would butterfly all the building programs you mentioned
 
Not so the UK programmme is essentially a 1935/7 programme - the first since the end of the treaty era.

There is no war on the horizon and the RN first priority is carriers. That’s laid down in 37 – so designed and materials ordered and workforce mobilised significantly earlier - the KGV get laid down in 39. It is very clear that the priority at least for the RN from the early 30’s is CV. for capital ships anyway.

From 1922 the size of navies is governed by the treaties and, with no war on the horizon we know what the build policies were (don’t) and that remains in effect until 35/6.

With the USN the first two Vinson acts prioritise aircraft production, not carriers but aircraft to equip the existing carriers and link a/c production to total tonnage. It don’t matter what you build, you get more a/c

The idea that late interwar admirals were prioritising BB over CV construction for political reasons is fantasy - at least as far as the USN and RN are concerned. Both the USN and IJN had crazy men claiming that a/c could do things that were simply not possible in the 20’s and blaming it on outmoded admirals (and since one of them owned an aircraft company he might be biased) but by the mid 30’s it is clear that the CV is a major weapon system and that there were not enough in any fleet.

Your argument seems to be that without the Washington and London Treaties there would be more and more modern BB, possibly that depends on overall economics and is probably unlikely given the world situation at the time. Even if it is the case there would still be some CV construction probably on a ratio of 4:1.

The probable result of that though is NO BB construction from around the mid 30’s as the one clear reason for the South Dak, Iowa and KGV series was speed improvements to keep up with the CV and cruiser force.
 
You need money to build aircraft carriers and money is short in a peaceful world. If the Germans, Japanese and Italians keep on building battleships, the US, UK amd Russia will do the same, so less money going into carrier production.
 
1930's Germany was rearming and Japan was acting belligerent and aggressive and had invaded Manchuria in 1931

To avoid a major war, like the OP wants, then you need a non nazi German government, which would not have rearmed as quick, and you need a non militarist Japan, which would not have done that or acted belligerent, and getting that requires a twenties or teens POD, if not earlier

This leaves the only belligerent acting nations as Italy (planning on building 4 new Battleships) and the USSR (Planning on building 16 new Battleships), as they are the only countries that would act aggressive but do nothing with it

The butterflies involved in achieving this are Mothra sized in terms of political and military shakeups

You could have the view you are preaching win out and no new BB in favor of CV

Or you could have a backlash against aviation being a panacea solution

Or you could have land based aviation completely take over

Or you could run into a middle ground

Never underestimate the butterfly effect, what happens is purely up to authorial fiat and chance

In short my argument is that no one course is assured and the specifics of the TL determine what gets built
 
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You need money to build aircraft carriers and money is short in a peaceful world.
Battleships are more expensive in materials alone, the Illustrious class carriers displaced 23,207 tons standard, compared to 38,031 tons for the KGV class battleships, and were also a couple of knots faster flat out. Oh and BTW the Japanese were very close behind the British in carrier development, despite still being at least somewhat wedded to battleships.
 
Until Taranto, Pearl Harbor, and the loss of Repulse and Prince of Wales most naval 'experts' believe it was impossible for a battleship to be sunk by planes. The fact that the Yamato and Bismark were both built shows that navies were still fixated on the Battleship, and believed they were more powerful than carriers. The fact Churchill sent Repulse and Prince of Wales without air cover into waters controlled by Japanese land based air is another example of the belief that moving battleships could not be sunk from the air.

And this happened AFTER the BRITISH raid on Taranto.
You're forgeting that Force Z was supposed to include a carrier but it had a small navigational error and was damaged running aground. You could argue Hermes should have loaded a squadron of Fulmars and filled in but she was next to useless for anything byt convoy duty.

Churchill could have ordered Force Z to wait for the Carrier in either Ceylon or Perth but the Australian Government was quite rightly screaming for Singapore to be re-inforced. In the end the RN ran out of resources. They had too much to do and not enough ships to do it with. That said Admiral Philips was a fool heading north without air cover. Air cover that the RAF had arrainged but he didn't ask for until it was too late.
 
MUC it depends when we are talking about if we are looking at the 1920’s then BB will be built. Which was the whole point o the Washington treaty – to stop a dreadnought race between the victorious allies of WW1 and its in everyone’s short term interest to have these treaties.

Even without a war threat the main navies will be undertaking massive building programmes purely to replace worn out ships, the naval treaties artificially kept things moving slowly.

When the treaties expire it’s the mid 30’s that’s when the RN, USN and IJN CV programmes begin, at that time the RN was designing the next series of CV and prioritised construction. The IJN building Hiryu, Soryu , Zuikaku and Shokaku, and Hiyo Junyo as well and the 2 Yamato’s and rebuilding Kaga and Akagi and the South Daks are waiting until 39 to be laid down i.e after 4 CV

Each of these navies is fully aware of Lanchester’s law. They know that except in relation to each other they have a comfortable cushion in gun line numbers and have no need to respond to a build in obsolescent ship types by minor navies.

Italy until 1936 is covered by the treaties and of the 4 new BB Vittorio Veneto and Littorio were laid down in 34 so we know the RN response, build carriers. The Project 23 BB were laid down in 39 and nowhere near completion, of these one is in the Black sea and no threat to anyone, one is Baltic so will have fun getting to an operational area and two are Archangel, the plan was for 8 by 42 (laid down) and the rest by 47. The USSR was well on its way to building an obsolete dreadnought fleet.

There is no real need for a massive response by the RN or USN (or IJN for that matter) to new entrants in the BB field. Each of these navies is fully aware of Lanchester’s law. They know that except in relation to each other they have a comfortable cushion in gun line numbers and have no need to respond to a build in obsolescent ship types by minor navies.

We also know that every exercise by a carrier using Navy prove the importance of Carriers. Once the first tranche of new purpose built carriers come into service – which will be in the mid 30’s because of aircraft developments it will be apparent to anyone using them that they are the capital ship, force projector and general all around rats ass of the sea.

And cheaper
 
Lots of stupid ideas get floated in peacetime and built/implemented, with 15+ years of butterflies building new battleships for longer is a stupid idea that seems much more likely than most

Never underestimate human stupidity involving politicians and military procurement

Given this the presence or non presence of new BB's is up to the writer
 
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Why Build

You do realise that the KGV were designed in 1928, they are what the RN would have been building and probably with a 14' gun with no treaties

But its getting off point the question the Carriers without WW2, my point is that carriers are a consequence of interwar aircraft development, mainly engine. The effects of WW2 are on carrier design and air group not on the existence of the beast in the first place. Once you reach that point in the mid 30's the fleets with carrier experience will start to swapout the BB for CV.
 
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