The Battleships that should have never been, 1930-1945!

Royal Navy Plan 1930 With Lots of Money Available Because Handwavium. *Admiralty 3-drums produce enough steam each for 20k shp.
Centurion - scrapped. YES, but why the only one!
Iron Duke - Q turret removed, 4 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines fitted, BL 14" Mark VIIs, QF 4" DP & light AA, bow extension a la RM superdreadnoughts.
...
Queen Elizabeth - lose casemate guns & magazines, develop 15"/50cal main gun with high elevation, fit 6 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines, QF 4" AA and light AA.
....
Revenge - scrap all but turrets and nameplate, build proto-Vanguard with 15"/50s, 8 Admiralty 3-drum boilers, geared turbines and lots of AA.
.....
Nelson - Remove 6" guns, replace with more AA, 6 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines for 120,000shp.
....
Hood - Extend fo'c'sle to around B barbette, new superstructure, fit 15"/50s, QF 4" AA, light AA, 12 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines for 240,000shp.
.....
Renown - New superstructure, fit 15"/50s, QF 4" AA, light AA, 10 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines for 200,000shp.
.....
Tiger - Remove Q turret, fit 10 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines for 200,000shp, remove casemate guns & magazines, replace with HA DP QF 4" and light AA.
....
Leopard - build as per Tiger using spare 13.5"s from scrapped dreadnoughts and refits.
.....
Courageous - hurricane bow, 6 Admiralty 3-drum boilers & geared turbines for 120,000shp.
......
Adventurous - build as per the above.
.......
Why would you think of replacing the 15"MKI its both illegal under the treaties and by far the best bit of the QE/R class if you can change it you should build new ships!!!!!!

You have 23 Rebuilds (@1/3 cost of new ship minimum) and 10 new ships.....

For this budget I should be able to buy 7 new Lion class and refit Hood and then build 10 new CVs for a RN, (note that your rebuild will be more than 1/3 more like 1/2 to 2/3 if you want new everything so this is a worse case below, 1/2 would get you 10 new Lions?)

7 Lions far more powerful than anything you have after a rebuild
Hood after full rebuild just about ok to second a Lion
R&R fast to hunt PBs and cruisers
N&R +5 QE slow escort and bombardment force with minimal refits, add any of the 5 Rs you still want as well

10 new CVs
3 C,G&F as training & transport ships with any of the others older ship you want to man.
 
with hindsight ... of WWI ... and in consideration of their available resources ... the KM could build Admiral Hipper-class with 11" guns following French Dunkerque-class all forward facing turrets. and nothing larger for BBs.

The Scharnhorst class OTL was built in response to the Dunkerque class, while the Hipper class was a product of the Anglo-German Naval Treaty of 1935 (so they're pretty much railroaded into building treaty type cruisers, even though some do have misgivings about them*).

yes. I understand what WAS built in response to the French BBs (which were built, partly, in response to earlier German Panzerschiffe) but was suggesting a smaller alternative to the Scharnhorst-class by arming a Hipper sized ship with 11" guns. they would be shorter ranged than famous "pocket battleships" but much faster. the KM would have 8 modern ships with 11" guns to complement a u-boat-centric fleet.
 
Why would you think of replacing the 15"MKI its both illegal under the treaties and by far the best bit of the QE/R class if you can change it you should build new ships!!!!!!

You have 23 Rebuilds (@1/3 cost of new ship minimum) and 10 new ships.....

For this budget I should be able to buy 7 new Lion class and refit Hood and then build 10 new CVs for a RN, (note that your rebuild will be more than 1/3 more like 1/2 to 2/3 if you want new everything so this is a worse case below, 1/2 would get you 10 new Lions?)

7 Lions far more powerful than anything you have after a rebuild
Hood after full rebuild just about ok to second a Lion
R&R fast to hunt PBs and cruisers
N&R +5 QE slow escort and bombardment force with minimal refits, add any of the 5 Rs you still want as well

10 new CVs
3 C,G&F as training & transport ships with any of the others older ship you want to man.

I pretty much rushed this out in 10 mins before I had to race to get to my fencing club. As for the 15", I would make an extended Mk.I* version to lengthen the barrel to take advantage of newer propellants, and do what everyone else is, and lie through my teeth about it. I was contemplating how to fight Germany's raiders, Italy's cruiser-heavy battle fleets and Japan's complete bushido batshit insane ideas.

So, I wanted the ability to deploy battlecruisers units to run down and destroy all raiders smaller than Scharnhorst and Gneisenau (up to 3 Pocket Battleships, 3 Heavy Cruisers and the best part of a dozen AMCs), these units being formed of a single fast fleet carrier, a battlecruiser, two cruisers and eight fast destroyers.

I also wanted to be able to confront the Italian battlefleet in full force, opening the fight with a carrier strike, closing with fast battleships and cruisers, then concluding with another carrier strike (against ~12 CL, ~7 CA, 4 modernised fast superdreadnoughts and 3 fast battleships).

And last, I wanted to saturate the Indian Ocean, the Malayan area and the Pacific with fast strike forces to drive the Japanese from the sea. This would then allow slower heavy units (the upgraded Iron Dukes, QEs and Nelsons) to smash island strongholds with lengthy shore bombardment prior to troop landings - or simply starving and shelling them.

I agree that my ideas were fairly incoherent and mostly what I'd do with unlimited money. To be honest, I'd probably be looking more at reinforced cruiser squadrons.
 
yes. I understand what WAS built in response to the French BBs (which were built, partly, in response to earlier German Panzerschiffe) but was suggesting a smaller alternative to the Scharnhorst-class by arming a Hipper sized ship with 11" guns. they would be shorter ranged than famous "pocket battleships" but much faster. the KM would have 8 modern ships with 11" guns to complement a u-boat-centric fleet.

Because of the Anglo German Naval Agreement (which was needed at the time for Germany to at least give the appearance that they are not challenging the RN in unconventional ways) the political loophole known as the "pocket battleship" has been closed. So they could not build additional "pocket battleships" even if they wanted to (which, given the quote from Conway and later plans to actually build successor commence raiders, many in the German Navy did want to do that). Your plan will literally make it obvious to the UK that Germany was planning a war against them years before it was obvious OTL, and that's not good for German military planning of the early to mid 1930s.

The OTL Hipper class has plenty of flaws, but that's off topic so I'm not gonna go further on that, but they (and basically the bulk of the Germany surface units of the interwar period) were as much a geo-political decision as a strategic one.
 
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I just wanted to talk about 3 things that I often see on these type of threads

Rebuilds, reusing turrets and whatever calibre the British end up using for the treaty and any post treaty BBs

Rebuilds:

I have a great amount of fondness for the Grey lady - as far as I am concerned she and the Big E were the greatest warships ever to grace our seas

But here is the thing - I would - without hesitation not rebuild her in the early/mid 30s if said rebuild impacted the creation and delayed the commissioning of new fast battleships and other modern ships such as the KGVs, Illustrious and even the Lions

Warspite due to treaty limits does not impact this so 'phew' she can be rebuilt - however the other 3 were rebuilt during this period 1936-42

HMS Queen Elizabeth 1937–1941

HMS Valiant March 1937 and November 1939

HMS Renown September 1936 - Aug 39

Now it seems to me that it could if they applied themselves the British about 4 years to build a KGV from keel laying to raising the white ensign and the rebuilds took about 3 years! Roughly - war and competing needs for resources had an impact.

I do wonder given the then British shipbuilding industry struggle to support all the shipbuilding efforts whether the resources would have been best spent on the KGVs (Lions?) and the Carriers - perhaps with all rebuild projects started and finished before any potential impact on new shipbuilding projects.

A clear example of this was the Italian rebuilds and their impact on the ability of the Italian industry to support the building of the New fast battleships of the Littoral class which were delayed till late 1940. Its often mentioned that certainly the last 2 rebuilds delayed the completion of the 3 modern BBs and that in Battle the rebuilds struggled vs unmodernised Revenges and the modernised Warspite.

Reuse of Turrets in a new modern hull:

It's such a compelling idea

Rip out the Mk1 turrets from any of the British Battleships and plonk them into a new modern hull rinse and repeat 12 times - bish bosh - job done - 12 shiney new Vanguards and look at all that time and treasure saved.....knight hood please!

Except....it was not as easy as that

For one thing the Royal Navy was shocked to its DNA over its exploding Battlecruisers during WW1 so any opportunity to address the issues that led to exploding ships would be taken

And so the reused turrets were modified to MK1'N' standard which among other things such as improved anti flash interlocks the propellant and shell handling was reversed with either the propellant now at the bottom of the turret or (as in the case of Vanguard and Hoods proposed 1942 large repair) moved to separate magazines - low in the ship.

All these changes required use of (for each turret) one of the 9 remaining large gun pits in the UK to effectively rebuild those turrets to the MK1'N' standard - this of course means that those gun pits cannot be used to build other new turrets such as those required for the KGVs and the Lions

The other thing is that the tolerances of 1913 are different to those of 1936 as are the engineering methods - this creates issues when marrying up old 'modernised' turrets to new hulls

These rebuilds take time and at the end of the day did not save all that much treasure relative to a new modern turret

New British guns/turret:

Due to the changes made to the Royal Navy's DNA as a result of exploding capital ships whatever gun/turret arrangement was chosen for the KGVs/Lions is going to have fanatical scales of anti flash and other forms of protection built into the design which is on occasion going to cause mechanical issues

There are 2 types of opinions - that which believes the RN was absolutely correct in pursuing this course of action.....and those who are wrong!

So the idea that had the RN gone 15" or 16" instead of 14" those problems suffered by POW (who had yet to have completed working up - and actually never completed a full work up) would have gone away is a fallacy and one only has to look at the problems suffered by the NelRods main guns and the 8" guns on the County's that both took nearly a decade (during peacetime) to resolve to understand these issues.
 
Replace Bismarck and Tirpitz with more Pocket Battleships plus cruisers and destroyers. And landing craft if Sealion is a serious option...

The aim of building Bismarck and Tirpitz was to create a battlegroup, which was to also include pocket battleships and heavy cruisers but like everything else the Nazi Government had no tactical or strategic common sense to use them which lead to their complete waste.
 
real life doesn't work with this kind of game statistics
considering there have been loads of ships that exceed those stats by a wide margin

This, therefore, contributes to his hypothesis. In terms of lifespan, Battleships are the equivalent of today's aircraft carriers.
 
I just wanted to talk about 3 things that I often see on these type of threads

Rebuilds, reusing turrets and whatever calibre the British end up using for the treaty and any post treaty BBs

Rebuilds:

I have a great amount of fondness for the Grey lady - as far as I am concerned she and the Big E were the greatest warships ever to grace our seas

But here is the thing - I would - without hesitation not rebuild her in the early/mid 30s if said rebuild impacted the creation and delayed the commissioning of new fast battleships and other modern ships such as the KGVs, Illustrious and even the Lions

Warspite due to treaty limits does not impact this so 'phew' she can be rebuilt - however the other 3 were rebuilt during this period 1936-42

HMS Queen Elizabeth 1937–1941

HMS Valiant March 1937 and November 1939

HMS Renown September 1936 - Aug 39

Now it seems to me that it could if they applied themselves the British about 4 years to build a KGV from keel laying to raising the white ensign and the rebuilds took about 3 years! Roughly - war and competing needs for resources had an impact.

I do wonder given the then British shipbuilding industry struggle to support all the shipbuilding efforts whether the resources would have been best spent on the KGVs (Lions?) and the Carriers - perhaps with all rebuild projects started and finished before any potential impact on new shipbuilding projects.

A clear example of this was the Italian rebuilds and their impact on the ability of the Italian industry to support the building of the New fast battleships of the Littoral class which were delayed till late 1940. Its often mentioned that certainly the last 2 rebuilds delayed the completion of the 3 modern BBs and that in Battle the rebuilds struggled vs unmodernised Revenges and the modernised Warspite.

The reason that rebuilds were almost as long as actually building new ships was because for all intents and purposes, those rebuilds were new ships in pretty much everything except for the hull. Usually the full rebuilds (depending on the country) contains:
-new boilers and/or turbines
-new secondary armament (usually swapping out some to all of the original casemate mounts and guns for new turreted DP guns
-loads of additional AA guns
-new fire control, range finders
-larger superstructure to mount said fire control, range finders, etc.
-[for some] modification to turrets to allow higher angle of elevation, thus longer range
-[for some] lengthened hull (for better form for higher speeds to take advantage of the higher power from new boilers)
-some other stuff I probably left out

As for the reason why this was done might be a few:
-lingering effects of the Washington and London Naval treaties, which also did limit when countries could start laying down new battleships
-limited number of slips, especially when the new generation of battleships are a bit larger than the older ones
-costs. Every penny saved counts, especially during the great depression
-sunk costs. Many of the ships have went through numerous refits spread out over the course of close to 2 decades. It wasn't obvious when the next war might start and those battleships were already here and now.
 
Replace Bismarck and Tirpitz with more Pocket Battleships plus cruisers and destroyers. And landing craft if Sealion is a serious option...

I wrote an outline of a TL on that battlegroup, very intriguing and complex story, I got to late 1942 or early 1943 and never finished it because of time and some pieces of information I could not find. I will finish the outline after I finish university but the information was a huge obstacle but that has never stopped me. :cool:
 
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yes. I understand what WAS built in response to the French BBs (which were built, partly, in response to earlier German Panzerschiffe) but was suggesting a smaller alternative to the Scharnhorst-class by arming a Hipper sized ship with 11" guns. they would be shorter ranged than famous "pocket battleships" but much faster. the KM would have 8 modern ships with 11" guns to complement a u-boat-centric fleet.

Because of the Anglo German Naval Agreement (which was needed at the time for Germany to at least give the appearance that they are not challenging the RN in unconventional ways) the political loophole known as the "pocket battleship" has been closed. So they could not build additional "pocket battleships" even if they wanted to (which, given the quote from Conway and later plans to actually build successor commence raiders, many in the German Navy did want to do that). Your plan will literally make it obvious to the UK that Germany was planning a war against them years before it was obvious OTL, and that's not good for German military planning of the early to mid 1930s.

my plan is to build a turbine ship approx. 18 - 20k tonnes in reality as opposed to Scharnhorst which started there and grew (for no tangible benefit)

the "pocket battleship" was threatening because of diesels long range, have already mentioned deleting that feature.
 
my plan is to build a turbine ship approx. 18 - 20k tonnes in reality as opposed to Scharnhorst which started there and grew (for no tangible benefit)

the "pocket battleship" was threatening because of diesels long range, have already mentioned deleting that feature.
The tonnage grew due to the need to put in a 3rd triple 11in gun turret:

Conway's all the World's Fighting Ships 1922-1946 said:
Much more than any other capital ship of any other navy, the two units of the Scharnhorst class were a compromise of political, military and technical requirements. Hitler's original conception was a ship processing the same armaments and speed as the 'pocket-batttleships' but having a displacement of 19,000 tons, the increase being taken up by superior protection; the Kriegsmarine's viewpoint was that such a vessel, carrying only six 280mm guns, would be an ill-balanced design - at the very least a third triple turret was required, even though this would raise the displacement figure to 26,000 tons. Hitler rejected this idea because he did not want to draw criticism from Great Britain by breaking the Versailles Treaty;... ... The Kriegsmarine regarded the vessels as a reply to the French Dunkerque class.

The Anglo-German Naval agreement allowed a maximum calibre of 16in, and Hitler soon had second thoughts, ordering the ships to be equipped with 380mm (15in) guns; but as the 280mm triple turret was readily available and the development of a new 15in turret would take some years, he agreed that the two vesels should have 11in weapons initially because he urgently needed capital ships for his political ideals. The ships would be upgunned at the earliest opportunity. The 380mm twin turret was later to be used for the Bismarck class - which was therefore tied to this mounting as other navies were settling on 16in as the ideal battleship calibre.

The eye towards upgunning at a later date might have also influenced the inclusion of a 3rd turret, among other things. So those were the anticipated benefits at the time (it didn't pan out, but that's not something they could have foreseen).

As for your plan (both the slots for OTL Hipper and Scharnhost classes being used for ) you would still have to either not sign the Anglo German Naval Treaty, blatantly violate it before the ink was dried, or covertly violating it on the go. Mainly because the treaty forces the Germans to build treaty type heavy cruisers even though they don't really want that type. Also I'm not sure if your proposed ship would fare well against the Dunkerque class (and never mind the Richelieu class, which will probably still be built, if only to counter the Italian battleships being constructed).

Yeah that treaty is a pain in terms of railroading the Germans into building a conventional fleet that will be measurably inferior to the RN, because otherwise it would mean the RN would have to deviate their usual building plans to compensate an enemy who decided to build a fleet for less conventional way of naval warfare.

As for why the treaty is important for Germany at the time (even though Hitler is infamous for breaking the treaties he signed and his promises) was that in the few years that he adhered to the treaty it was in Germany's advantage to do so (as in stalling for time for rearmament, it and other similar arms treaties) as well as the vain hope that he might not have to fight against the UK.
 
a turbine ship approx. 18 - 20k tonnes in reality as opposed to Scharnhorst which started there and grew (for no tangible benefit)
The AGNT like all the treaties did not actually limit total battleship displacement it limited the number of 35,000t ships each nation could have so building anything less is a waste of your treaty tonnage as you cant split it (unless you are France or Italy in original WNT).
 
Reuse of Turrets in a new modern hull:

It's such a compelling idea

Rip out the Mk1 turrets from any of the British Battleships and plonk them into a new modern hull rinse and repeat 12 times - bish bosh - job done - 12 shiney new Vanguards and look at all that time and treasure saved.....knight hood please!

Except....it was not as easy as that
If you give the RN more cash you can make it easy, you just need to spend far more in the 1930-36 period.

Simply have the RN rebuild all or most of its 15" ships like the USN/IJN did as soon as the 1LNT makes it clear that they will need to serve another 10~ years.

Once you get to 1 JAN 37 (or really some time planning in 35/36) and can lay down new you have already have rebuilt the old mounts and have them available on the QE/Rs if not a few spare on dockside. This then makes it potentially possible finish a small class of emergency battleships from 1 JAN 37 - to the start of WWII in 39 with ready to use old guns/mounts.
 
If you give the RN more cash you can make it easy, you just need to spend far more in the 1930-36 period.

Simply have the RN rebuild all or most of its 15" ships like the USN/IJN did as soon as the 1LNT makes it clear that they will need to serve another 10~ years.

Once you get to 1 JAN 37 (or really some time planning in 35/36) and can lay down new you have already have rebuilt the old mounts and have them available on the QE/Rs if not a few spare on dockside. This then makes it potentially possible finish a small class of emergency battleships from 1 JAN 37 - to the start of WWII in 39 with ready to use old guns/mounts.

Yep have any rebuild project completed before the 1LNT runs out in late 36

So Hood, Refit and Repair along with the 5 Queens all deep refitted - skip the Rs

That should more than cover it as well as keeping those necessary ship building industries for such ships operational

Probably have to start in 1930ish if you can overcome the problems

Money, Money and Money so I am not sure if it can be done

Dammit where is NOMISYRRUC when you need him?
 
This, therefore, contributes to his hypothesis. In terms of lifespan, Battleships are the equivalent of today's aircraft carriers.
Super carriers today are a product of the only navy that matured the aircraft carrier and is still able to afford that capability.

1920's era carriers had to handle 3-4 generations of replacement aircraft that had to fit the carrier's lifts, catapults, deck space and hangars. As land based aircraft grew without these constraints so the 1st generation carriers became limited and liabilities. The 1st generation carriers also suffered from limited avgas supplies as requirements were underestimated. The staying power of a carrier is not how many aircraft it carries but how many sorties it can run. What drove large airgroups was the 'pulsed' nature of an airstrike (lots of action in 10 minutes - not sustained hours on end gunfire) and that carriers could only range and launch half their airgroup at one time.

Todays super carriers have to last 50 years and will still have 2-3 generations of aircraft that have generally maxed out with land based aircraft and are equivalent in performance.

The Naval Disarmament treaties in the 20's and 30's artificially constrained battleships and stretched out their lives. All it did was defer replacement spending that was all pushed into a late 1930's window that put pressure on the remaining ship building infrastructure.
 
Yep have any rebuild project completed before the 1LNT runs out in late 36

So Hood, Refit and Repair along with the 5 Queens all deep refitted - skip the Rs

That should more than cover it as well as keeping those necessary ship building industries for such ships operational

Probably have to start in 1930ish if you can overcome the problems

Money, Money and Money so I am not sure if it can be done

Dammit where is NOMISYRRUC when you need him?

Any chance you can keep HMS Tiger around as well to give the RN another fast ship? Maybe not a deep refit but something along the lines of what Repulse got OTL? My thinking is you could then form two fast task forces with two of the BCs and two of the fast CVs (the Follies and HMS Ark Royal) in each one. Then as the war progresses Tiger can either be relegated to limited duty or sent to the US for more extensive work to keep her active.
 
Yamato/Musashi. Build 4-5 Taihos or 5-6 Shokakus using the steel wasted on them.

Not enough slipways or trained constructors.

Better to think in terms of what can be made with means and time allotted. Two giant carriers.

South Dakota class and North Carolina class

I would replace them with......the South Dakota class and North Carolina class (stay with me)

I would not trigger the escelator clause but instead 'spam them out ASAP' with the original 14" gun armamanet they were originally intended to have

Going to 16" I feel compromised an otherwise good design treaty limited design - and there was no Battleship vs Battleship clash that I know of where having 14" over 16" would have had any difference - it was purely political and arguably delayed the construction of those 6 vessels.

Leave the 16" to the Iowas in the same way that the British left it to the Lions (okay they eventually decided not to build them and they were not needed - but then arguably neither were the Iowas) and get the 6 Modern fast Battleships in service earlier.

Same again. By the time these ships are designed, the USN knows the carrier is the future. So build carriers.

AS I recall 230 small warships were laid down in the 1930s up until the end of 1939.Then in the following years there were hundreds more.

http://navypedia.org/ships/germany/ger_list.htm

As above shows in 1940 KM had over 400 vessels in their fleet [not including V-Boat] , so they had enough sailors.


Not enough slipways or trained constructors.

Someone with more knowledge of submarine operations should chime in here, but I'm not sure if all sailors are psychologically suitable for submarine service, especially on those cramped old diesel boats.

The Germans used coal miners as a shortcut. Got 40,000 of them murdered. Emphasis on the word "murdered".

The U-boat war was a sad affair. Some of those responsible for leading it, had a lot to answer for. Kind of mirrors the USN experience.
 
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Any chance you can keep HMS Tiger around as well to give the RN another fast ship? Maybe not a deep refit but something along the lines of what Repulse got OTL? My thinking is you could then form two fast task forces with two of the BCs and two of the fast CVs (the Follies and HMS Ark Royal) in each one. Then as the war progresses Tiger can either be relegated to limited duty or sent to the US for more extensive work to keep her active.
For a tank, longevity meant armour (Matilda II - front line service 1939-1945), for a capital ship it was speed (everyone wants Tiger).
 
Japan only pulled out on Feb. 24 1933?
Would GB not really have to give notice for the LNT (and prepare designs and long lead time items anyway) so we are talking about laying down in 35 minimum IMO. Not that this would not give RN a very strong fleet by 39.....
Prefer yes but in 37 or 36 when you have to make the decision you don't have airborne radar and cant know that you can sink a battleship at night in the Atlantic during northern hemisphere winter.....I simply think you then get into big trouble when Hood and an R class try to stop Bismark and fail what do you do escort every convoy with N or R?

Yeah, I can probably only gain 2 years not the 5 I'm reaching for. The US thought about pulling out of the 5 Power Treaty (5:5:3 WNT) if Japan wasn't going to abide by the 9 Power Treaty (China). This was about 1932 or 33. Instead, the US recognized the Soviet Union and that pi55ed the Japanese off more.
 
For a tank, longevity meant armour (Matilda II - front line service 1939-1945), for a capital ship it was speed (everyone wants Tiger).

Well as they say in any number of sports, "you can't teach speed." Seriously though, it mainly just requires a RN admiral to conclude that fast BCs/BBs are useful partners for fast aircraft carriers for a variety of reasons. I don't think it's a reach, the French came up with the Force de Raid concept but unfortunately Bearn was the weak link in that chain.
 
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