Washington Treaty: Japan says no, America builds up, the UK...does what?

Must admit I've never heard of that. Could have been something argued by a government to give an excuse for not constructing specific escort vessels.
It wasn't (I presume you're thinking of the "10-Year Rule"?), it was a doctrinal issue. IIRC, USN shared it. No idea where I saw it, tho. (Blair's Silent Victory tickles at memory cells, but don't bet on it.)
True but it also means their available to be switched elsewhere, along with the larger capacity to support them. If Britain had x DDs say, to be split between various roles and got into a war with a Germany that had virtually no capital ships then you could transfer some DDs from fleet duties to elsewhere, such as convoy escorts.
That was true OTL RN & IJN (RCN, too, to a degree; less so USN, 'cause they got a lot of both), & escort always got short shrift. SOs were looking for fleet actions, not escort duty.
not sure why people seem so certain that would be the case?
I'm presuming not much changes in how the war starts (given a lot of temporal inertia), so conflict with Britain. Butterfly that, I'll readily accept a lesser U-boat threat.
Interesting. I knew about the problems with Harris and BC in getting the radars. Didn't realise that there were problems with the Canadian Naval leadership not being willing to develop/use such weapons.
Have a look at van der Vat's Atlantic Campaign for how it influenced, or The Great Naval Battle of Ottawa for the detailed story.
That's what I was thinking of.... As such, while DDs would have been better the DEs were available when needed. With a more capable construction capacity plus the lack of the desperate need for new capital ships possibly in TTL you might have seen Canada produce the DEs while the UK produces the DDs that would be needed to win the war against the U-boats more quickly.
That sounds good, but I have some doubts Canada was capable of producing DEs, even. DDs were out of the question; the technical skills didn't exist, which was why I suggested transferring a handful of DDs (ex-RN or ex-USN). If you'll accept a bit more vision for Britain's & Canada's government (& Newfoundland's too; still independent OTL, BTW), & in reaction to the Depression (tho it's a bit Keynsean for the balanced-budet fanatics of the OTL '30s), how about expansion of shipbuilding around Halifax & St John's? OTL, a lot of work couldn't get done close to the sealanes, 'cause the Canadian gov't had concentrated on Central Canada (where the votes were...). Maybe some expansion of Canadian technical capacity, on things like gyrocompasses? Too much to ask for RN to actually licence a DD or 2 for construction in Canada? (I mean, too far-sighted, but also a bit improbable, IMO.)

I'm not sure it's possible without ASB, but getting RN ASW SOs to listen to the OR guys when war starts, or (better still) do more realistic interwar trials, would be a big help. Maybe the best answer is (somehow...) prevent Appleyard's 1917-8 paper on ASW from disappearing into the maw, & instead have it become the RN bible for ASW interwar. Most of the things RN re-learned had been done already in WW1; with that strongly in RN's "corporate memory", getting SOs to listen when OR says a/c DCs are set too shallow, or convoys should be 80-100 ships, not 40, should be much EZr. That being true, you can reduce the demand for 'vettes & DDs. Add in OR warnings about slow convoys being at highest risk (not taken in, IIRC; could be OR missed it), or prewar exercises demo it, you might get some DDs transferred to RCN.
 
That's why I'm not bothered by the idea that Congress might loosen the purse string enough for the 1916 programme to be completed, or even a follow on. Not only would the US be building a large number of ships that were to a degree already obsolete and imposing a considerable economic burden on themselves but I think they would not pose a military threat.

Steve

Interesting lins from the UK rep on the Washington Treaty Reevaluated study on the Bob Hennemon's Battlecruiser board a while back

i.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]If the US were to be hostile, or ambivalently neutral, towards the UK and the Empire, it would be in our best interests to have as many SoDaks and Lexingtons started or built as possible (“Bind my enemy with chains of gold”). These twelve ships would be:
a. Expensive to build;
a.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Technologically obsolescent;
b.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Making an already unbalanced fleet even more top-heavy with battleships and battlecruisers;
c.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Out-designed by the RN’s new ships;
d.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Too slow (SoDaks) to be able to pick a range at which to fight against the next generation capital ships, or too fragile to remain in range of a fight (Lexingtons) with one;
e.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Too complicated to easily rebuild to modern (1920’s) standards;
f.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Expensive to rebuild;
g.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]This would also ensure that the USN had twelve ships that were drains on the US Treasury, and were also:
h.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]Unpopular politically with the Republican party,
i.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]A drain on operating expenses,
j.[FONT=&quot] [/FONT]But too new to replace by scrapping.
 
It wasn't (I presume you're thinking of the "10-Year Rule"?), it was a doctrinal issue. IIRC, USN shared it. No idea where I saw it, tho. (Blair's Silent Victory tickles at memory cells, but don't bet on it.)

Wasn't think of the 10 Year's Rule but there was a lot of political obsticals for new construction.


That was true OTL RN & IJN (RCN, too, to a degree; less so USN, 'cause they got a lot of both), & escort always got short shrift. SOs were looking for fleet actions, not escort duty.

They got a lot once wartime production clicked in. However again the desire to have the prestige roles, plus by some accounts King's Anglophobia meant that escorts initially got a low priority there as well.

I'm presuming not much changes in how the war starts (given a lot of temporal inertia), so conflict with Britain. Butterfly that, I'll readily accept a lesser U-boat threat.

It all depends on so many thinks that often people follow the same lines to avoid too many butterflies. Probably going to be some German revanchement at some point but how it develops and whether it gets beyond an aggressive Germany getting flattened in some Munich type clash is anyone's guess.

Have a look at van der Vat's Atlantic Campaign for how it influenced, or The Great Naval Battle of Ottawa for the detailed story.

Will try but I spend so little time reading nowadays.:(:(

That sounds good, but I have some doubts Canada was capable of producing DEs, even. DDs were out of the question; the technical skills didn't exist, which was why I suggested transferring a handful of DDs (ex-RN or ex-USN). If you'll accept a bit more vision for Britain's & Canada's government (& Newfoundland's too; still independent OTL, BTW), & in reaction to the Depression (tho it's a bit Keynsean for the balanced-budet fanatics of the OTL '30s), how about expansion of shipbuilding around Halifax & St John's? OTL, a lot of work couldn't get done close to the sealanes, 'cause the Canadian gov't had concentrated on Central Canada (where the votes were...). Maybe some expansion of Canadian technical capacity, on things like gyrocompasses? Too much to ask for RN to actually licence a DD or 2 for construction in Canada? (I mean, too far-sighted, but also a bit improbable, IMO.)

Historically I know more about production for the Australians than the Canadians but I think they tended to prefer having their ships built in Britain rather than at home simply because it was so much cheaper. [At the time British shipyards were the cheapest and most efficient in the world, strange as that seems now:(].


I'm not sure it's possible without ASB, but getting RN ASW SOs to listen to the OR guys when war starts, or (better still) do more realistic interwar trials, would be a big help. Maybe the best answer is (somehow...) prevent Appleyard's 1917-8 paper on ASW from disappearing into the maw, & instead have it become the RN bible for ASW interwar. Most of the things RN re-learned had been done already in WW1; with that strongly in RN's "corporate memory", getting SOs to listen when OR says a/c DCs are set too shallow, or convoys should be 80-100 ships, not 40, should be much EZr. That being true, you can reduce the demand for 'vettes & DDs. Add in OR warnings about slow convoys being at highest risk (not taken in, IIRC; could be OR missed it), or prewar exercises demo it, you might get some DDs transferred to RCN.

Definitely. A fair amount was remembered from WWI, including the early restoration of convoys, although lacking enough escorts. However more had to be re-learnt or learnt from new - such as counters to U boats attacking on the surface at night.

Steve
 
Definitely. A fair amount was remembered from WWI, including the early restoration of convoys, although lacking enough escorts. However more had to be re-learnt or learnt from new - such as counters to U boats attacking on the surface at night.

Steve

Convoy by John Winton and Business in Great Waters by John Terraine are very good books in what was lost and ignored during the interwar period.
 
Do any of these sources inspire any good PoDs or potential butterflies that could prevent this loss of institutional knowledge?
 
Interesting lins from the UK rep on the Washington Treaty Reevaluated study on the Bob Hennemon's Battlecruiser board a while back

i.If the US were to be hostile, or ambivalently neutral, towards the UK and the Empire, it would be in our best interests to have as many SoDaks and Lexingtons started or built as possible (“Bind my enemy with chains of gold”). These twelve ships would be:
a. Expensive to build;
a.Technologically obsolescent;
b.Making an already unbalanced fleet even more top-heavy with battleships and battlecruisers;
c.Out-designed by the RN’s new ships;
d.Too slow (SoDaks) to be able to pick a range at which to fight against the next generation capital ships, or too fragile to remain in range of a fight (Lexingtons) with one;
e.Too complicated to easily rebuild to modern (1920’s) standards;
f.Expensive to rebuild;
g.This would also ensure that the USN had twelve ships that were drains on the US Treasury, and were also:
h.Unpopular politically with the Republican party,
i.A drain on operating expenses,
j.But too new to replace by scrapping.

PMN1

Fully agree. Have read that as well, some time back. Not just too complicated from what I understand but simply not having the stretch capacity to enable much reconstruction. Which would mean if still in service in a late 30's/40's time period and involved in a war with a modern foe they would have difficult installing large amounts of AA guns or passive defence against bomb attacks. Not sure how their torpedo protection rated?

With operating them it is also interesting that the USN had great problems getting manpower for their historical fleet even at the height of the depression. If they had a markedly larger force then manning them outside war would be very difficult.

The main point for me is that you need something highly unlikely for a situation where the US decides to attack Britain. If you get something like WWII then barring extremely dense leadership the US will recognise its very much in its interest to have Britain doing a lot of the fighting for it. As such I can't see any losses for Britain in the Washington Treaty failing, especially if a continuation of the alliance with Japan occurs as that would prevent or at least delay the threat from Japan and the rise of Japanese militiarism.

Steve
 
Do any of these sources inspire any good PoDs or potential butterflies that could prevent this loss of institutional knowledge?

Alratan

Difficult to say with ASW knowledge. I don't know enough about the details and as pacifichistorian says its not very glamorise so such areas tend to get neglected. Possibly something that ends WWI a bit earlier or otherwise stops the RAF being formed so the RN keeps the FAA [Fleet Air Arm]. This would not only means a much better chance of the RN keeping its lead in carrier aviation or at least keeping up with the two mian rivals but would give the navy far more martime air knowledge and influence. As such there is less incentive to minimise the potential of air power and a lot more experience of its use. Could lead to some form of CVE programme being developed markedly earlier along with more and better patrol a/c and weapons.

For the surface units ASW capacity more difficult to say.

For killing the Washington Treaty fairly easily. Something means that the Hood class are actually completed somewhat earlier so the RN has 4x40kton ships entering service in ~1920/21. Because Britain knows it still has a lot of old ships and that the Hoods don't fully incorporate wartime experience it will still want new ships, especially with the US and Japan fielding 16" gunned ships. However the extra 160ktons of new British ships will make it very difficult to get tonnage agreements at anything like the low levels the US wanted. Their size means that the US will want to complete more of their 1916 programme, principally the larger SD or Lexington classes, which will mean that Japan will also want to build more and Britain will be even more disatisfied at a post-Hood holiday. As such no agreement is reached and everything falls apart in mutual recimination. This leaves the way for the G3's to be built to counter ships the USN and IJN are trying to build.:D:D

Steve
 
They probably won't be able to go for anything bigger and better than Bismarck because of limited capacity and loss of experience at ship design so the RN would be in a much better relative state].
Not as much as you would first think.

In 1920~21 German invested [Bought] in Dutch shipyards, and hundreds of German Naval Architects and Ship Builders were hired by these German/Dutch Yards.
During the 30's when Germany started Rebuilding it's Fleet, Most of these returned to run the new German Yards.
 
Listen to stevep, there is no chance of the British building battleships for the US, or the reverse. Neither nation is going to spend precious tax dollars to support the steel workers and ship builders of any nation but their own.

France might or might not wind up with a slightly stronger navy, Italy, due to economic and ship building constraints, probably won't.

The RN spent most of the period between the wars on the wrong track when it came to carriers, with the result that British carriers in 1939 were badly outclassed by the American carriers, and an emphasis on new battleships strikes me as having an alarmingly good chance of worsening this trend.:eek:


Canada's economy was in no shape for a substantial fleet at this time. Indeed, at one point during the Depression the Canadian government announced a massive(80%!) cut in the RCN and this was averted only by the RCN's nuclear option of threatening to pay off the entire fleet, which would have left Canada with pensions and such costs...and no navy.
 
Do any of these sources inspire any good PoDs or potential butterflies that could prevent this loss of institutional knowledge?
Not AFAIK. You get a problem in RN & RCN (IJN, too, BTW) of SOs being generally technically/technologically incompetent. (RAF too.) Their grasp of the technical/technological issues was poor, so they underestimated the needs & complexities. That goes back quite a few years (before the OTL WW2-current SOs took over, at least), so... It was an issue in training & selection, as I understand it.

One possibility has occured to me, tho I don't know how credible it is: put a former submariner, like Horton (Naismith?), into a senior position sooner. Not just CinCWA, but something like CinCDestroyers, or whatever the SO of ASW would be. He'd probably need to be a bit famous from WW1 (whence Naismith), so he'd make Admiral a bit early to make him elligible.

The Brits ended up, almost by accident, with the best system: co-operation with technicians/scientists, who knew what was possible, & could talk to the SOs, who knew what was needed, & would at least listen. (This didn't apply in Japan or Germany, & applied to a much lesser extent in Canada.) The U.S. eventually took this & effectively institutionalized it, as OCRD/OSRD (don't recall what they stand for, sorry; they're the top research/development organs), which oversaw most of the U.S. weaps development in WW2. It probably explains why the U.S. came up with so many intersting weapons that would actually work.

I'd add the Brits did one other thing right in this area (something the U.S. has forgotten...): they accepted "second best, tomorrow" in preference to "the best we can get, next year".
 
The RN spent most of the period between the wars on the wrong track when it came to carriers, with the result that British carriers in 1939 were badly outclassed by the American carriers, and an emphasis on new battleships strikes me as having an alarmingly good chance of worsening this trend.:eek:

I think the saving grace for Britain in this scenario is that it would affect the other naval powers, especially the US and Japan more than Britain. By the time of the treaty most of Britain's WWII carriers were already built or in the process. As such the main loss would be Ark Royal. For the other powers, if there was a big-gun race, it would be far less likely for them [especially the Japanese] to spend resources on converting BC hulls to carriers. Even if they did get built the pressure on budgets would probably mean there is a lot less available for developing tactics and equipment. Not to mention the big gun elements would have even more prestige.


Canada's economy was in no shape for a substantial fleet at this time. Indeed, at one point during the Depression the Canadian government announced a massive(80%!) cut in the RCN and this was averted only by the RCN's nuclear option of threatening to pay off the entire fleet, which would have left Canada with pensions and such costs...and no navy.

Interesting story. Sounds far too accurate a depiction of a deomcracy in peace time. Especially one with no clear threat.

Steve
 
POD to trigger Japan breaking off talks...

Suppose that a Japanese code-breaking team suspects that American and British experts are good enough to break their codes, and someone higher up listens to them. So, they prepart to both find out, and deal, if they are being read. So, they send some coded messages to the Washington negotiators to try to flush this out. Since there was some suspicions that someone was reading their mail, they also equip the team with some one time pads or fresh, use only once, codes.

Well, they discover that the Americans or British are reading their mail. But, rather than do the smart thing of using this to their advantage, someone with an overly touchy sence of honor and more rank than he deserves, scuttles the talks in indignation, or even does something extremely dramatic.

"The machinations of the British and American negotiators have dishonored me; I offer my life in attonement," he says, just before comitting Sepuku in front of the White House. Not at all likely, but an extremist might do something like that to disgrace the United States, and shock them.

,Edit: Checking Wiki, admittedly not the most reliable of sources, it wouldn't be sepuku, but funshi "which is any suicide made to state dissatisfaction or protest."
 
Last edited:
The RN spent most of the period between the wars on the wrong track when it came to carriers, with the result that British carriers in 1939 were badly outclassed by the American carriers, and an emphasis on new battleships strikes me as having an alarmingly good chance of worsening this trend.:eek:

Not entirely sure about that observation. There were a host of problems the RN faced in the development of naval aviation. They were the leading authority for a few years, when everyone really didn't know which way naval aviation was going. They were saddled with a large force of old carriers that they couldn't replace and the RAF had control of all the pilots and fighters for a few years.
 
Regarding the parts about the USN's Lexington class BC/CC, they could turn out to be an advantage rather than a disadvantage. The USN wasn't happy with any version of the Lexington CC. What happens if the USN builds all 6, but decides to make most or all aircraft carriers?

I remember reading at the warshipprojects forum that the USN was looking at carrier conversions of the Lexingtons even before the Washington Treaty went into effect. (PMN1, I'm dracos at both the warshipsprojects and Bob Henneman's forums.)

dilvish

Interesting lins from the UK rep on the Washington Treaty Reevaluated study on the Bob Hennemon's Battlecruiser board a while back

i.If the US were to be hostile, or ambivalently neutral, towards the UK and the Empire, it would be in our best interests to have as many SoDaks and Lexingtons started or built as possible (“Bind my enemy with chains of gold”). These twelve ships would be:
a. Expensive to build;
a.Technologically obsolescent;
b.Making an already unbalanced fleet even more top-heavy with battleships and battlecruisers;
c.Out-designed by the RN’s new ships;
d.Too slow (SoDaks) to be able to pick a range at which to fight against the next generation capital ships, or too fragile to remain in range of a fight (Lexingtons) with one;
e.Too complicated to easily rebuild to modern (1920’s) standards;
f.Expensive to rebuild;
g.This would also ensure that the USN had twelve ships that were drains on the US Treasury, and were also:
h.Unpopular politically with the Republican party,
i.A drain on operating expenses,
j.But too new to replace by scrapping.
 
Regarding the parts about the USN's Lexington class BC/CC, they could turn out to be an advantage rather than a disadvantage. The USN wasn't happy with any version of the Lexington CC. What happens if the USN builds all 6, but decides to make most or all aircraft carriers?

I remember reading at the warshipprojects forum that the USN was looking at carrier conversions of the Lexingtons even before the Washington Treaty went into effect. (PMN1, I'm dracos at both the warshipsprojects and Bob Henneman's forums.)

dilvish

Dilvish

They might. That would be a big boost to the USN if it did do that. However it would leave them without any fast capital ships as I doubt if Congress would agree to them designing and constructing big new ships if the already partially built Lexington's were to be converted to carriers. As such I could see 2-3 possibly being converted, which would be very good for the US but not all 6. I think a lot would depend on the internal politics of the US government and navy plus also how the talks break down and the Japanese response to this. If one side, [probably Japan as the main US problem was getting the funding from Congress] pushed to complete their large fast ships the other would be under strong pressure to follow suit.

Stevep
 
Top