Were Battlecruisers a doctrinal mistake? It seems like they

>Were Battlecruisers a doctrinal mistake?
Not in the role they were intended for. They were successful in hunting down German cruisers in the Pacific and Atlantic. Such as at the battle of the Falkland Islands.
But since they had 12" guns the Admiralty would saw them as capital ships and used them in the battle line.

>>33409744
>But since they had 12" guns the Admiralty would saw them as capital ships and used them in the battle line.

When was this? Other than when Scheer sent the battlecruisers into the teeth of the Grand Fleet so he could get could turn his battle line away, which strikes me more as a move of desperation and improvisation than doctrine per se

Final bump

>>33409705
what else would you build if you were cucked by washington treaty but still want big guns on a ship

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>>33409773
When they started using the battlecruiser squadron as the reconnaissance element for the battleships under the reasoning that if the battlecruisers come into contact with the German battleships the British battlecruisers' big guns can deal out some damage to the Germans as they retreat; forgetting that if the battlecruisers can shell the German battleships, the Germans can shell the battlecruisers.

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>>33409705
I'd imagine it was the combination of big guns and speed. I still can't see the niche the Alaska-class was supposed to fill, except for maybe being lots of fire power that was easier to build than a battleship.

>>33411258
To be fair, German battlecruisers typically had enough protection to withstand at least temporarily battleship guns

>>33411397
It was predicated on this idea that Japan was building super cruisers of their own similar to the Alaska. And, since its construction didn't really interfere with anything else, it wasn't scrutinized nearly as closely as it might have been.

>>33409705
>light armor
>big guns
>maximum vroom
sounds like a floating fucking tank destroyer to me

>>33411609
The tank destroyers were also a dumb idea.

>>33411695
What are you talking about? The M18 was a fantastic TD

>>33411707
the M18 was fantastic, but the concept of TDs really wasn't. I think that's what anon means, anyway. and I can't say I disagree with him.

>>33411731
Why have tank destroyers when you can just build a tank with a bigger gun?

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>>33409705
Why do westerners call it a battlecruiser?

>>33411740
Why have tanks with big guns when you can have a tank destroyer with huge guns?

>>33411767
That's just a media thing, submariners call it an easy target.

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>>33411695
>>33411731
>>33411740
In the future, tanks and tank destroyers will be obsolete. Instead everyone will use robotic self-propelled artillery that houses and launches it's own micro-drone swarm fleet for recon and artillery spotting. No tank will be able to get within miles of them without being blasted to hell and back with precision laser guided artillery rounds from behind terrain cover.

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>>33411781
What do submariners call this?
http://eng.ktrv.ru/production_eng/323/507/525/

>>33411812
>can't hit what you don't know is there
Keep shilling for the Kremlin commrade.

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>>33411829
It's a simple question. There is no need to be upset.

On an unrelated note, Letters Time is a top-tier naval alt history about the German Battlecruisers turning back to save Blucher at Dogger Bank, which brings about an earlier than OTL Battle of Jutland. Part of what makes it such a fun read is that the scenario was wargamed out, so things inexplicably go wrong for both sides which makes the whole thing seem more realistic and plausible. Plus not too many alt histories have a realistic, blow-by-blow naval battles. They often barely manage to maintain a semblance of realistic politics.

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>>33409705
> Were Battlecruisers a doctrinal mistake?

They made some sense for the British, as they had a far flung empire but otherwise it was a wasted effort, as battleships became as fast (or almost) as battlecruisers but had bigger guns and plenty of armor.

>>33411812
not an asroc so doesn't matter

>>33411397

The Alaska-class were intended as cruiser-killers. They were also a pet project for FDR.

>>33411695
Lies. They were a good idea and performed admirably when the threat they were designed to encounter appeared. Unfortunately(?), that only happened once. If they had been in France 1940 or on the Eastern Front, they'd have proved their worth many times over.

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>>33411593
>To be fair, German battlecruisers typically had enough protection to withstand at least temporarily battleship guns
Because they compromised with smaller main battery and a slower top speed.

>>33413590
>The Alaska-class were intended as cruiser-killers
Which is what a battlecruiser was intended to be in the first place.

>>33413700

Yes but some people get really upset when you call the Alaska-class BC's for some reason.

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>>33413728
>Yes but some people get really upset when you call the Alaska-class BC's for some reason.
Like Jesus said:
>There's just no pleasing some people.

>>33413700
Who do you think made the better compromise?

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>>33411805
This would require perfect intelligence and perfect, open terrain. There will always be a way to practice counterintelligence and I should doubt terrain will ever be so forgiving. Moreover, what are you going to do when faced with enemy infantry? How are you going to occupy and hold territory without friendly infantry? Logistically, how is this supposed to work? What happens if I don't want to play ball and decide to grab you by the belt buckle? The list of flaws with that line of thought goes on.

What you've done is describe a futuristic SPG and fancy yourself a New Napoleon without actually critically analyzing what you've just said.

It was a doctrinal mistake to use them as ships of the line. In their intended role of chasing down everything else they were great.

The only doctrinal question was whether they were worth the expense.

>>33413509
>not an asroc
Nigga you dumb?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPK-6_Vodopad/RPK-7_Veter

>>33413868
>This would require perfect intelligence
That's what the drone swarm is for
>and perfect, open terrain.
Nope, indirect fire.

>Moreover, what are you going to do when faced with enemy infantry?
Shell the everloving fuck out of them.
>How are you going to occupy and hold territory without friendly infantry?
Friendly infantry will operate under the cover of omniscient robot artillery.

>Logistically, how is this supposed to work?
Shell delivery convoys will be escorted by robotic artillery.

>What happens if I don't want to play ball and decide to grab you by the belt buckle?
Drone swarm with broad spectrum sensors will see you coming miles away. You'll get shelled before you get anywhere close to my belt.

>>33414066
What happens when they develop a tank with its "frontal" armor on its roof
Then your fancy self-guiding anti-tank rounds are useless

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>>33413831
IDK, maybe the Germans. Their shit at least didn't explode catastrophically, and speed certainly didn't work as "armor" for the British.

>>33411240
No battlecruisers were built during the treaty period.

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>>33414376

>>33411812
The least efficient missile launch method ever?

>>33413771
>that main battery elevation

You know, it was rumored that the main battery on the Des Moines was dual purpose. Coukd the Alaska's guns have been DP as well?

>>33415346
Think it can loiter sitting in the water

>>33415346
IIRC it was designed as an ASROC for use by submarines

>>33409705

They came too early and everyone abandoned them before the technology where they would have truly shined matured. Battlecruisers would have been able to bring a decisive end to the battleship era as the herald of the cruise missile.

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>>33415627
LOL oversize missile cruisers are as useless as battleships.

>>33415647

Bigger size means more capacity to hold active countermeasures and additional missiles, ergo larger ships are more formidable than smaller ships: that destroyers ultimately fell into the role of missile platform is largely an improvisation as in the process the majority of them had to be upscaled to light cruiser size just to hold sufficient munitions.

It certainly would have been a better idea than holding onto the Iowas until the 21st century.

>>33414376
Part of that was unsafe powder handling and staging in efforts to increase rate of fire. The RN did a study and implemented some policy changes after to remedy that. They'd leave doors open (increasing danger of flash from an explosion setting off a chain reaction) which was worsened by the fact that they'd stage powder forward of the magazine to get it to the guns sooner.

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>>33415689

>>33415740

The Kirov is capable of one-shotting a Burke with its SNN-19s while a Harpoon will at most damage its auxiliary guns. That makes it by definition the stronger surface combatant.

>>33414182
It wouldn't survived bombardment with modern shaped charge shells. Also the crew would leave the hatches open anyway, like they always do.

>>33414182
The tanks can still be disabled. Many tanks in war are salvaged even if the crew died.

>>33414182

Then you hit it with anti-tank mines. ATGM are going to become soon anyways once CIWS gets adopted for land vehicles. Tanks work as heavily armored bricks because it cost less to armor them in comparison to the amount of dollars in weapons they can withstand before being destroyed.

>>33416080

The Kirov is going to die with its sisters soon due to the RuN's inability to maintain anything, and the day of the ship of the line has ended: it's inefficient to be firing missiles at other ships versus having submarines and carrier craft conduct the anti-surface warfare role. Lasers are going to make this even more inevitable.

>>33416290
Mad amerishit with tiny petards: the post.

>>33416379
Not an argument.

>>33416440
Neither is your butthurt.

Why were the Derfflingers so sexy?

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>>33416568
Not an argument.

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>>33415367

>it was rumored that the main battery on the Des Moines was dual purpose

That's not so much a rumor as it is a fact.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICifnf63lCs

>>33416998
Sheeit

>>33416998
>9x 8"x55 radar-directed @ 8rds/min
God I just want to see it smashing up a German or Japanese CA.

>>33411609
Goddamn you are a fucking moron.

>>33414066
Lasers fry drone swarm wat do

>>33417464
drone swarm hugs the ground, lasers can't find all of them.

>>33413728
The Alaskas were large cruisers.
Just scaled up cruisers. No underwater protection.
Battlecruisers were battleships with guns or armor traded for speed.

>>33411812

useless russian trash

>>33411397

>They preserved the Iowas and scrapped the Alaska when she could have done their job more cost effectively

She could have been the first missle cruiser, lads. They killed my state's ship.

>>33413656
Yes, but that's kinda the point--TD Doctrine was developed as a response to France, but it completely ignored the strategic situation: namely, that the US would not have the luxury of being on the defensive, but would have to invade and conquer Europe if/when it got involved in the war.

When you start off with that basic assumption, a purely-reactive element like TDs becomes a waste of resources compared to more tanks.

>>33411812
Why not just use VLS like everyone else?

>>33411695
>>33411731

Tank destroyers were a way of dealing with an emerging problem with the technology at hand. They died off shortly after WW2 because we developed the piezoelectric fuse and shaped charge projectiles came to the forefront. Early in the war, however, it wasn't entirely clear how armies should be expected to react to large concentrations of armor.

There was really nothing wrong with the concept given what people knew and what was practical. The seemingly unstoppable blitzkrieg needed a timely solution, and tank destroyers allowed the firepower of towed guns to be used more effectively.

Likewise, battlecruisers gave the European empires a doctrinal answer to cruisers harassing shipping to and from overseas colonies. It wasn't an ideal solution, but in the right circumstances they did their job well (Battle of the Falklands). Fast battleships, escort carriers, and the shifting role from anti-cruiser to anti-submarine duties would make them obsolete, just like man-portable AT weapons made TDs obsolete. That doesn't mean they were horrible ideas from the beginning.

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>>33419445
Because of unification. Same as its predecessor RPK-2 Vyuga and its predecessor's American analogue UUM-44, these are launched from torpedo tubes. Essentially RPK-6/7 is what UUM-125 was supposed to be.
>use VLS like everyone else
No one had VLS back when RPK-2 was developed. And Russians were the first ones to put VLS on a ship. But yeah, the reason is the aforementioned unification with submarines. For instance VLS launched RUM-139 can not be used by submarines.

>>33413916
>thinks your webm or link were ASROCS

Fucking Kys you retarded vatnik

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>>33420137
You are correct, ASROC was too shitty and obsolete to be anywhere near an RPK-6/7 equivalent. We are rather taking RPK-1 here, amerishit.

>>33419157
>Battlecruisers were battleships with guns or armor traded for speed.
Battlecruisers were very large cruisers with battleship-sized main armament, high top speed and extreme range, meant to hunt down the previous generation of armored cruisers. It has nothing to do with underwater protection.

>>33419402
>but it completely ignored the strategic situation: namely, that the US would not have the luxury of being on the defensive, but would have to invade and conquer Europe if/when it got involved in the war.
I'm going to disagree with that. The Americans expected German counterattacks in force. However, because of the peculiarities of the specific conflict (most German armor was tied up in the East), the Americans only faced the significant counterattack they feared only once. And the TDs did prove themselves in that one counterattack extremely well, generating impressive kill:loss ratios. Had the Germans allocated their forces differently, or the Americans hadn't sent the Germans absolutely reeling as they blitzed through France, there might have been more examples of TD battalions proving their worth.

So no, they didn't "ignore the strategic situation of being the attacker". Nothing of the sort. Rather, they recognized the single greatest dangerous thing the enemy could do and they produced forces to counter it. A waste of resources? Hardly. If you're going to say sweeping statements like what you just did, you'd better be right, otherwise you look like an idiot.

>>33420519
wrong

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>>33421299
Inadequate rebuttal.

Quit or retry?

>>33411397
Dude, the Alaskas were just about as expensive to operate while being less capable

>>33421368
WTF is that thing moored on the right?

>>33411695
kys my man if you're talking about WW2

>>33411767
Well its a big fucking cruiser
Plus it sounds cool

>>33421368
God the dreadnought era produced some sexy ships

>>33411740
this

>>33417524
Phalanxes. Phalanxes everywhere.
BRRRRRRRRRT

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>>33421936
Monitor HMS Erebus.

>>33421985
Did.

>>33420519
Alaskas lacked battleship-sized main armament. Also, the secondary layout is textbook US heavy cruiser. And their primary role was to hunt the Japanese super-cruisers that the US believed they were building. It's a big CA for killing big CAs, not a CC for killing normal CAs.

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>>33422235
>Alaskas lacked battleship-sized main armament
Sure it did.

>>33422330
Those were deliberately fitted with undersized armament so they wouldn't freak out the brits. And considering that Gneisenau was going to be refit with 15-inchers, it's obvious that they didn't intend to keep the guns tiny.

>>33416998
>it was torture-tested with 200 rounds over 25 minutes.

>When you realize they basically made an 8" autocannon that could lay down machine gun-like suppressive fire with shells as large as the Graf Spee's.

God, late WWII hardware makes me erect.

>>33422330
In an era where BBs were shooting 14-16" shells and with BBs being designed to protect against said 14-16" shells, the Alaskas 100% lacked BB-sized armament

>>33414906
For a second there I though that was an open turret.

>>33409705
No.

With Battlecruisers you have to understand the engineering reasons for using them.

They're basically the size of ordinary battleship, but without armour, saved space and displacement was used for machinery. So you've had 28 knot battlecruisiers in the era when battleships did 22 and that's significant difference that opens quite large amount of options for using them.

Now the problem is that if you'd try to draw a function of propellant power/surface speed for a ship of given geometry and size, it won't be linear, but logarithmic. Going above 30 knots is very hard on ships as big as those - Iowa can do 33 at its best(nowadays I doubt you'd get 31 out of it if you'd even care to try) with greatly increased fuel consumption, and all modern aircraft carriers do 30. The fact that ordinary battleship could achieve ~26-30 knots, meant that battlecruisiers had no reason to exist anymore and that's how they died out.

As for the usefulness of those ships - the biggest reason why everybody says they were shit is Jutland. Which isn't very honest thing to do.

From British perspective ship like this makes a lot of sense for two reasons - one is that any enemy they could face would try to disrupt their supply lines and for hunting raiders battlecruisers were great. Stronger than any cruiser while still able to catch up with them up to some point. Secondly - for Brits to have a possibility to delegate "battlecruiser fleet" in case of emergency in let's say - China - was a godsend, so strategic mobility is a factor.

From German perspective they were perfect raiders, since they were superior to everything short of other battlecruisers and battleships(which they could outrun very easily). So for Germany to want many of those - sure man, it's great idea.

Then the machinery advancement cached-up and you could've had proper no-bullshit BB's achieving speeds just a knot or two slower than BC's with just as advanced machinery. It wasn't worth it.

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>>33411842
I want to fire my torpedo into Baku'a stern!

>>33416290
>it's inefficient to be firing missiles at other ships versus having submarines and carrier craft conduct the anti-surface warfare role. Lasers are going to make this even more inevitable.


>a small boat that fires missiles is less efficient than a large boat that launches aircraft that fire missiles

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>>33422485
Graf Spee had 11" guns.

>>33422522
Alaska's 12"/50 Mk.8 guns had shells with superior armor penetration to the 14" guns in US Navy service at the time.

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>>33422522
>>33422235
.... I can't believe that people still argue that the Alaskas were anything but Battlecruisers. Hell, originally the USN was going to designate them with CC.

12 inch guns that with superheavy shells were equivalent to 14 inchers, expressly designed to overmatch any cruiser opponent but not face off against capital ships.

They were battlecruisers. Get over it.

Alaskaboos are literally worse and more deluded than weeaboos or wehraboos.

I believe the Alaska's were developed for the sole purpose of taking on the Scharnhorst class. But since the Scharnhorsts were no longer a threat when the Alaska's were finished they got sent to the pacific as escorts and bombardment vessels.

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>>33423526
The Alaskas were built in anticipation of a big jump in cruiser displacement, armor, and armament that never materialized. The idea was that the Alaskas would already outmatch these new cruisers by the time they were completed.

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>>33411767

Battle cruiser is supposed to make allusion to a ship with the fighting capacity of a BB but the speed of a heavy cruiser. Like HMS Hood for example. It was armed like a BB but was faster then BB's of her time.

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>>33409705

Battlecruisers were great so long as you didn't get any bright ideas about putting them up against actual battleships. Also, battlecruisers were mostly obsolete by the time WW2 rolled around for the exact same reasons as battleships: air power and submarines had supplanted big guns.

>>33424262
>Battlecruisers were great so long as you didn't get any bright ideas about putting them up against actual battleships

Or battlecruisers, which had BB-tier armament

>>33422716
>From British perspective ship like this makes a lot of sense for two reasons - one is that any enemy they could face would try to disrupt their supply lines and for hunting raiders battlecruisers were great

But its easier to build commerce raiders than battlecruisers, which can be in fewer places than CL or AC commerce raiders

>>33424262
I don't think saying BB's and CA's were truly obsolete. It's like saying that tanks are obsolete because enemy has air superiority.

What was retarded was to rely solely on BB's and CA's to carry the battle as opposed to combined arms.

US BB's performed important roles in the pacific.

After all we still have surface fleets despite modern subs and air power.

>>33424262
>>33424113

These are correct. Hood would have been perfect for hunting down the Scharnhorst/Gneisneau or the Spee, and the only failing that it has was in trying to pick a fight with a real battleship.

>>33423459

Our state is the most recognizable part of the most powerful country in the world, and USS Alaska was a ship to match. Now all we have is a dinky sub and some transports.

>>33424477

I never tried to suggest that BB's or CA's weren't useful ships during WW2, just that they were obsolete. Obsolete does not mean "useless." It just means that there is no point in building more. Think about the Alaska-class cruisers for a moment. They were introduced as "cruiser-killers" (or simply battlecruisers) but I don't think any of the Alaska-class ships ever actually fought a cruiser. Why? Because the planes and submarines had already killed all the cruisers that needed killing. The niche that they were intended to fill had already been filled, just in a different way.

>>33425559
At least you've got one. The last USS Oregon got pulled out of museum ship status to be a fucking ammo barge. I will never stop being mad.

At least we've got the Blueback.

>>33425896

Sorry breh. But obsolete does mean useless to a large extent.Terminology is important.

Regardless weather or not i agree.

>>33426005
Ours is still sitting at the bottom of Pearl harbor

>>33424477
Do we still have battleships?

>>33416998
How the fuck do other countries even compete?

>>33426479

>But obsolete does mean useless to a large extent.

False. The B-52 is obsolete but still gets used all the time. The government will never build new B-52's but it will keeping using them for a long time.

So, we are all in agreement that the Iowa's were Battlecruisers and not Battleships, right?

Iowas were fast battleships.

not even protected from their own guns
12" belt armor
didn't exceed 30knots once except in one test case post war that broke the engines

Not a battleship, not a fast battleship, just a shitty battlcruiser.

>>33428388
This is truth.

>>33422330
so did the scharnhorst class, one of the main reasons they were classed as battlecruisers by most navies and not great ones at that, the same reason they generally avoided action with heavy ships if at all possible

>>33420519
>Battlecruisers were very large cruisers with battleship-sized main armament, high top speed and extreme range, meant to hunt down the previous generation of armored cruisers. It has nothing to do with underwater protection.

they were far more similar to battleships in layout and design than contemporary cruisers, the machinery and turret layouts as well as the armor scheme, the armor was thinner but the layout mirrored the battleships of the period

>>33426005

>They scrapped the US's last predreadnought after she was turned into a museum ship

What the hell!?

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>>33411812
We call it a very dangerous ASW weapon, and treat it with much respect. Russian is very experienced at sinking submarines.

>>33422388

Doesn't change the fact that they were battleships/battlecruisers.

>>33412054

Really good read, thanks for the link!

>>33424113
Thanks for an actual answer.

>>33430723
I didn't ask about 65-73 torpedo, though.

>>33425175

>Hood would have been perfect for hunting down the Scharnhorst/Gneisneau

I'm not convinced that the Hood could have taken on either of those ships.

>>33431282
its armor wasnt up to stopping a 15 inch shell, a 11 inch shell wasnt such a problem, catching them might have been but once engaged the Hoods 15 inch guns were far superior in throw weight and penetration to the german 11 inch guns.

HMS Renown was struck twice by german 11 inch shells from Gneisenau suffering only minor damage and she was less well armored than HMS Hood, her return fire with the same type of 15 inch guns as Hood carried hit with a single shell and did significant damage, so it can be inferred that Hood in a straight gun duel would probably fair pretty well in action with a scharnhorst class ship

>>33409705
everything but submarines and aircraft carriers was a doctrinal mistake, but how could they have possibly known that at the time?

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A massive mistake only when murrishittlers decided to fuck it up by making the trashcan battlecruiser iowa's

>>33415689
>Assuming that missile battleships wouldn't simply be the first targets and would be sunk before they can expend 5% of their munitions

We've been over this time and time again. Battleships have been obsolete since WW2 because of airplanes and are still obsolete in the present day because of missiles, both of which are sufficient and cost effective counters to them.

Battleships are not "formidable", they are only slightly harder than normal targets for any modern military.

>>33431762

I retract my earlier statement. The Hood had much more armor than I thought it did.

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>>33423439

I think the biggest reason why the U.S. Navy refused to call the Alaska-class battlecruisers is simply because the term had acquired a negative connotation of being fragile vessels with powerful guns but weak armor. The Alaska-class were intended to be a more "balanced" design meaning that their armor was thick enough to offer good protection against their own guns.

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Post cute battlecruisers.

>>33432093
also german 11 inch guns are a bit shit as battleship/battlecruiser guns go

>>33432877

Purely because of size or was there something else wrong with them?

>>33431762
Didn't the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau also have really good armour for a battlecruiser? Something like 14 inches of belt armour?

>>33432931

That's why they're normally referred to as battleships despite the sub-par main battery.

>>33432958
Yeah, I just checked and they have about equal or better armour than many designated battleships. No wonder people aren't sure what to classify them as, they've got a weak armament but amazing armour and top speed.

>>33432958
Really? I've only ever heard of them referred to as battlecruisers. They still followed the previous German naval mindset of keeping as much protection as possible at the expense of a "battleship sized" main battery and still keeping a high top speed.

>>33432931
Trying to fit things into the various naval classification terminologies is self-masturbatory nonsense. Don't waste time thinking about it.

>>33432892
size mostly, they did ok at penetrating but they were not nerely as effective once they penetrated, the bursting charge of the AP shell was only a third of the size of the lightest contemporary british heavy AP shell the 14 inch.

they could put a hole in a enemy ship but not damage it as much internally whereas the heavier projectiles of the bigger guns penetrated as well and did far more damage once the got through the armor.

>>33432931
not enough though, they got damaged by HMS Renown using guns built in ww1, admittedly the 15" BL mkI was one of the best naval guns ever and certainly for its time.

the also got shot to shit when engaged by a single KGV the armor proving inadequate to the task of keeping 14inch shells out, and those 14 inch guns were not great, probably the biggest failing of the KGV, the attempt to limit battleship armament by treaty and the decision to commit to the lower size guns even after failling to get anyone else to do so, the alternative scheme of 9x16" guns would have been excellent considering the KGV were already among the best protected warships afloat.

>>33433282
*nearly.

fuck knows how i managed to mis-spell that.

This has been a surprisingly informative thread

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>>33433092

The biggest reason for the 11-inch guns was politics. In 1935, the Anglo-German Naval Agreement was signed. Hitler had argued that Germany needed a larger navy to counter Soviet aggression, and Britain reluctantly agreed. This treaty eliminated many of the restrictions that had previously been placed on the German Navy by the Treaty of Versailles. Under the new agreement, Germany would be allowed to build a modern navy up to 1/3 tonnage of the British Royal Navy. This might not seem very generous, but compared to what had been previously allowed under Treaty of Versailles, this was a great deal for the Germans.

The Scharnhorst and Gneisenau were both laid down later that same year. But of course, many in Britain were skeptical of the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, and France was absolutely infuriated that Britain had lifted the Versailles restrictions without even bothering to consult with them. Hitler ordered the ships be armed with 11-inch guns to ease tensions with Britain and France as any larger guns would have been seen as much more provocative.

It is also important to understand that the Scharnhorst-class was seen as a starting point. Germany hadn't been allowed to build any new modern battleships for a long time because of Versailles and so starting off with an unambitious design as a way of relearning the art made sense. The Germans had 11-inch guns readily available for the ships, whereas the 15-inch guns that would eventually find their way onto Bismark and Tirpitz were still in the development stage. And of course, the 41000-ton Bismark-class ships themselves were also intended as an interim design to pave the way for the six 56000-ton H-series battleships that never manifested themselves.

>>33434923
Why did the Germans and Italians not develop dual purpose guns for their capital ships?

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>>33434938
I think it's because they were much slower developing naval air power, and so slower to recognize the wide variety of threats posed by aircraft.

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>>33409705
>>33434938

At that point in time, small warships armed with torpedoes (DD and TB) were seen as the primary threat that secondary guns were expected to engage. And if you consider fast, unarmored boats to be your greatest concern, then 6-inch low-angle guns (or 15 cm for the Germans) are probably what you'd gravitate towards for your secondary armament on a battleship or cruiser. A battery composed of 6-inch (15 cm) guns is going to be able to engage small, unarmored surface targets more quickly (because of greater firing distance) and more effectively than a battery composed of dual-purpose guns would be able to.

The 5"/38 caliber secondary guns you'd find on a North Carolina-class BB could fire a 25 kg shell up to 16,000 meters. In comparison, the 6"/55 caliber secondaries for Italian Littorio-class could fire a 50 kg shell over 25,000 meters. So as far as range and stopping power are concerned, the Littorio is the clear winner. Now further consider: the Japanese Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedo had an effective firing range of 22,000 meters. So the secondary battery of the Italian Littorio-class would be able to engage a Japanese destroyer from outside of torpedo range. The North Carolina-class cannot do this, leaving it vulnerable to torpedo attack.

>>33436505
On the other hand, the Littorio only had 60% of the guns of a NorCar, with massively lower ROF (15-22 rpm for 5"/38 vs 5-6 rpm for Italian 152mm/55, according to navweaps). 20 guns at 15 rpm is signifigantly better than 12 at 6 rpm, even if the latter are firing shells twice as big.

And "ability to shoot a target before they fire Long Lances" is fucking useless because long-range torpedo attacks in Japanese doctrine were made at night, and there's no way a Littorio's hitting shit with secondaries at night at 22 km. Hell, I doubt a NorCar could do it.

>>33420519
US TD forces were used both offensively and defensively very effectively in Europe. Several battles had the TD speed advantage utilize by US forces to confuse and gain major superiority over German forces.

I can't remember the battle but Hellcats did a series of engagements where over the course of a day they engaged, gained local superiority, withdrew, moved to a new point of contact over roads at max speed reengaged, withdrew and did it one more time to make the German command think they had engaged many more US forces than they had thought would be in theater.

Nothing succeeds like overkill

>>33437338
Dang Sorry was replying to the TD guy and mistyped the number

>>33436773

The Long Lance was mentioned because it was the most famous torpedo, and I can't refute anything you just said. I even tried converting all the numbers to joules just to see if the 6"/55 guns had enough muzzle energy in them to out-perform the 5"/38 guns that way, but even with that, the superior numbers and the higher ROF of the 5-inch guns puts the North Carolina ahead in terms of overall energy output per minute despite the 6-inch (15 cm) guns obviously having greater energy per shot. The only advantages that leaves for the 6-inch (15 cm) guns are range and armor penetration, the latter being worthless because DD's lack armor to begin. The 6"/55 still has a 9000+ meter advantage over the 5"/38. Whether that is enough to make up for the lesser energy per minute output is beyond my ability to calculate.

>>33436505
>effective firing range of 22,000 meters

I'm pretty sure this depends greatly on geometry and that in other than a torpedo attack from ahead, the delta-v would require the destroyer to close below 22,000 yards for the torpedo path to intercept

>>33437524
Presumably the flatter trajectory would give it an advantage in an optical fire control era.

So, what was better in WW2, 8" cruisers or 6" cruisers?

Was the US wrong to not put torpedoes on their CLs and CAs?

>>33437806
Is there even any tangible benefit to putting torpedoes on a CA? I mean, I can understand why'd they be useful for CLs.

>>33437830
I feel like by WW2, the designations were almost interchangeable, other than gun caliber.

>Is there even any tangible benefit to putting torpedoes on a CA?

I feel like they'd be useful for night attacks. From the record, it seems like even the best drilled torpedomen of the IJN still underperformed in long range, daylight attacks.

>>33437863
Well, if you're the US and have some of the best radar FC systems in the world and you're facing an opponent who primarily uses optical FC, I feel like you'd still get more out of using guns during a night attack.

>>33437901
But that's a little unfair for ships designed in the 1930s, where naval architects probably could not have predicted the speed at which radar fire control would improve as it did in the 1940s

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>>33437714

The Type 93 torpedo had an official range of 11 km, but the actual range was far beyond that, with 22 km being the maximum effective range and 40 km being the absolute maximum that it could travel before losing power. But no matter what the actual numbers are, it's advantageous for the defending warship to be able to engage with secondaries from a greater distance. That's why German and Italian battleships kept using 6-inch (15 cm) guns instead of switching to dual-purpose secondaries, because they saw DD's armed with torpedoes as a bigger threat than aircraft. It was a bad trade-off because of how dangerous aircraft quickly became, but that was the thinking.

>>33409744
the cost of battlecruiser does not warrant its benefit. For the cost of a battlecruiser you might as well build a proper battleship.

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>>33437806

5" cruiser master race reporting in.

>>33437830

>Is there even any tangible benefit to putting torpedoes on a CA?

Well, if you're in a CA, and you happen to run into a BB at night, then it's nice to have torpedoes to fall back on.

>>33424113
Essentially, they are down-armored battleships, trading armor for speed.

>>33411695
>be anon with his army (circa 1942)
>have big tank with okay gun
>enemy comes out with heavily armored tank that your puny gun can't penetrate
>only gun that can deal with new tank is too big to fit in tank
>designer comes up to you with way to mount big gun in current tank, saving costs and time
>"no lol that's a tank destroyer so it's retarded kys"

alternatively
>have big tank with thick armor and big gun
>expensive as shit
>build 1,000
>enemy has tank destroyer with gun that skullfucks your tank
>cheap
>builds 10,000
>both tanks get destroyed by each other

>>33437806
>So, what was better in WW2, 8" cruisers or 6" cruisers?
Depends on whose CA/CL you're talking about. The US CLs had fucking insane ROF on their 6-inchers (nominally 8-10 rounds per minute, but in combat some hit 12+(!) rpm) compared to the 5-8 you see on pretty much everyone else's ships. This does theoretically allow them to fulfill the role prewar theorists saw CLs in in combat (getting close and murdering the enemy with dozens of 6-inch shells).

In practice there's not a lot of difference between CLs and CAs except in the rare event they encounter a CC or lightly-armored BB, where that extra oomph might be enough to cause hits through the armor. (Was San Francisco's hit to the steering gear through the armor? I can't seem to find anything on this.)

>torpedoes on CLs and CAs
Useful, but wouldn't really have helped the US considering the state of the Mk 14 family in the early war where it would have played a role. And by the late war they'd have been a liability, risking extra damage from air attack.

>>33437442
Howdy, newfriend! You now you can just click on the post number and it'll automatically do that for you, right?

Battlecruisers will make a comeback with directed energy and railguns. All that excess power when not in combat will be used for propulsion.

>>33438595
Are you retarded, or just a bit slow?

>>33438696
You shouldn't be mean to him like that. He can be both if he wants to.

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>>33432049

If that's the case, why is the move towards smaller numbers of larger, heavier armed and protected ships?

>>33439770
It's not? Ships have been growing bigger throughout pretty much all of history due to increasing needs for power and range of weapons requiring more space. The Zumwalts were supposed to be the next-gen DDG that would replace the Burkes, and thus required hull space for all the planned new features (railguns, lasers, bigger generators for both). And the Zumwalts are more protected through the use of soft-kill measures such as stealth and ECM systems, not through added armor.

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>>33439911

Exactly. They're larger than the Burke because it has become apparent that the Burke is of insufficient size to mount the most modern weapon and defensive systems. Whether protection is a soft-kill measure. hard-kill measure, or an intert steel plate is largely irrelevant as the end result is additional protection in return for higher mass, which ultimately translates to harder to sink vessels being heavier and larger than easier to sink vessels who lack these systems. Battlecruiser-sized missile cruisers would be the logical conclusion of this size creep, and in the modern era, there will be no battleship analogues from which to counter them.

The Russians saw this in the Kirov, and the biggest rationale to keep the Iowas comissioned was to use them to counter the Kirovs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_UryFjKUsM

Nice Jutland documentary

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>>33440137
>Battlecruiser-sized missile cruisers would be the logical conclusion of this size creep, and in the modern era, there will be no battleship analogues from which to counter them.

Though those won't exactly be battlecruiser analogues either, as they have grown to become harder to kill, instead of the battlecruiser which put its weight budget into guns and speed.

I wonder what things would have looked like if there had been, for whatever reason, an Washington Naval Treaty equivalent a few years before WW1.

Perhaps limiting battleships and battlecruisers to guns of 13.5" caliber and displacements of 25k standard tons.

>>33440137
Just because they're bigger won't change their role. They're still gonna be DDGs, just like how late/post-WW2 CAs were bigger than some pre-dreadnought battleships (the Des Moines-class were 70% larger than the Indianas)

>>33409705

bump

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>>33440137
Kirov-class was built so large because it was the main surface CBG hunter that was required to be able to autonomously and efficiently enough preform quite literally every task imaginable save only carrying fixed interceptors.