Britain gets new Battleships after Washington Naval Treaty

pedmore1202

Under the Washington Naval Treaty, the Signing Nations agreed to undergo a Battleship Construction Holiday for 10 years. However, Britain had been under a Battleship Construction Holiday (of sorts) since the beginning of the war, with no new Battleships being laid down after January 1914.

As such, what if Britain had argued for a limited building program for the Royal Navy in order to ensure that the necessary skills and knowledge didn't vanish.

Eventually the other nations agree that Britain would be able to build up to 2 battleships a year for the next 5 years (but be limited to only 8 new battleships in total), (but still be limited to OTL limits for tonnage, weapons and total tonnage).

Could the Royal Navy do this? Replacing the 8 oldest Dreadnoughts that they had kept under the OTL Washington Naval Treaty on a one-to-one basis with brand new ships?

If so, what would be the design likely be? Nelson's, or a different design altogether? Could the Navy afford it in the first place? What would the effect be on the rest of the Navy? Would various ship classes be cancelled/limited compared to OTL in order to pay for these new battleships?

What do you think?
 

sharlin

Banned
There's a lot of factors to take into effect with the biggest being money. All of the RN's 12 inch gunned ships and most of its 13.5 inch ones were obsolete and tired, having seen a lot of use in the war if not much in the way of action. The Queens and R Class are also not as modern as the new American ships with their all or nothing armour scheme and new contemporaries like the Nagato or West Virgina's threaten to outclass them plain and simple.

Whilst I would love to have the G3 class they are probably a bit too expensive for the british econimy to make so something like the Nelrods would probably be made. Personally I would cancel the Hood or turn her into a carrier, her armour scheme was obsolete.

But going of this idea of a max of 2 cap ships I would start on replacements for the R's although they are brand new, they simply lack the upgradeability of the Queens.

One design I found, can't remember the author or person who thought them out but lord it was good was this:

Eg5fcFC.png


44,400 tonnes fully loaded and 720 feet long with 9 x 16 inch guns, same weapon as the Nelsons just firing a heavier shell. Same secondary armament too.

15 inch belt with 25 knots of speed. More than a match for most contemporary ships and not slower than the Queens which instead of being replaced would recive the overhaul of their lives, new machinery, re-done secondaries etc, basically an improved version of what the Elisabeth and Valiant got. I'd take Renown and Repulse in and modernise them as well as thickening armour, a Kongo esque rebuild basically. With no Hood i'd keep the Tiger as she was the best of the WW1 RN BCs and could benifit from a full modernisation. If the Hood is kept then again full modernisation and re-working a-la Kongo. Certain things would need to be recongised early on, a universal armament for destroyers, tearing the FAA away from the RAF and making useful carriers and equip them with aircraft you'd be proud to fly.
Personally I'd not bother with fully armoured carriers and repeat build the Ark Royal.

Concetrating on destroyers would be needed and again a universal armament for them ,not varying types and a DP mount would be vital as would continued research on ahead throwing AS weapons which was cancelled in the early 1930s for some reason.

We could produce some very good stuff, but the main factors are political will to do so, and money. Keeping the ship building industry ticking over would be a good way to keep folks employed and could help soften the impact of the great depression.
 

PMN1

sharlin said:
.

One design I found, can't remember the author or person who thought them out but lord it was good was this:

Eg5fcFC.png


44,400 tonnes fully loaded and 720 feet long with 9 x 16 inch guns, same weapon as the Nelsons just firing a heavier shell. Same secondary armament too.

.
Click to expand...

IIRC, Nick Sumner used it in his timeline 'The Dark Colossus', not sure if he actually drew it up though.
 
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pedmore1202

Yeah, I am thinking of doing a Post-WW1 RN timeline, seeing if I can improve on how it OTL, but keeping it realistic - IE: same resources and technology for the period. I'm thinking of taking it up to the beginning of WW2, potentially through it.

But that's a month or so off. I need to do more research etc and plan it out properly before I do that.

One other thing, thanks for bringing it up by the way Sharlin (well, sort of anyway). In the build up to WW2, did the RN ever design any escorts that were cheap, quick to build, effective and mass producible in case of another war, based on experiences in the last war with Uboats and the need for escorts for convoys?
 

PMN1

pedmore1202 said:
In the build up to WW2, did the RN ever design any escorts that were cheap, quick to build, effective and mass producible in case of another war, based on experiences in the last war with Uboats and the need for escorts for convoys?
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Well, there was the rush that led to the Flower class....one thing i've wondered is given the modifications needed to virtually all the designs looked at why the original WW1 Flower class sloops wasn't looked at.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower-class_sloop

At around 250-260ft long they should be more confortable than the OTL WW2 Flowers.
 

sharlin

Banned
There wasn't really felt to be a 'need' for an escort as the RN placed waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much confidence in ASDIC (Sonar) rendering subs easily detected and sunk. The exercises against subs with ASDIC escorts were so stupidly weighted against subs that the outcome was never in doubt and the RN built up a false premise that subs vs asdic and convoys would be easy targets.

Don't forget that common thinking when thoughts turned to Germany was that it was going to be a re-run of WW1, lots of fighting in France. The RN never entertained the idea that France could fall until it did.

Again money issues were the main problem but as PMN said the WW1 Flower class would have probably been better than the WW2 ones if they were repeat built but with more modern equipment. Their extra size would have made them more seaworthy and allowed them to carry more weapons. The Flowers of WW2 were built for costal work but when France fell and the lack of suitable long ranged escorts became obvious the Flowers were drafted into long range convoy duty. Most RN destroyers lacked the legs to escort a convoy all the way across the atlantic and the fleet was always unwilling to release them from battle fleet itself.
 
Derek Pullem

Derek Pullem

Donor
pedmore1202 said:
But not available due to the limits of the Washington Naval Treaty. The NelRod's were only just within Treaty Limits, so that would be the limit for the new design
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Beg your pardon I'd missed that the individual capital ship limits were still in place:eek:

I doubt that they would be all battleships - I would guess that they would be 4 battleships and 4 battlecruisers. The Nelsons would do for the battleships - could you squeeze a G2.5 in 35000 tonnes with 6 x 16"
 

pedmore1202

Well, possibly Derek. They would actually likely be classed as battlecruisers, same as G3's were, due to their higher speed and smaller armament, but be battleships in all but name.

Perhaps 4 Nelson's, as OTL, and 4 smaller G3's (or G3 Lite) armed with 15 inch guns perhaps
 
Cook

Cook

Banned
pedmore1202 said:
What do you think?
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The primary motivation for British involvement in the negotiations to draw a halt to the international competition in ship building was because the country was massively in debt; the last thing the country needed to spend money on was new ships.
 

pedmore1202

Cook said:
The primary motivation for British involvement in the negotiations to draw a halt to the international competition in ship building was because the country was massively in debt; the last thing the country needed to spend money on was new ships.
Click to expand...

Yes, Britain couldn't afford another Arm's race, building more and more ships. But, a limited construction run, replacing old, worn out ships that are obsolete with brand new ships including all the lessons learnt during WW1, could potentially just about be done.
 

Richter von Manthofen

And IIRC the Brits did not "need" more battleships - While the US and Japan were seen as rivals they were not (immediately) seen as enemies.

The biggest enemy (GErmany) was just gone. Others like France and Italy were (close) allies.

Limiting the number of (new)(capital) ships was in the very interest (economy treasons) of Britain.

OTOH Britan needed Cruisers/destroyers for colonial duty - so the limit on BBs actually helped the Brits.

The Nelson Class included much of the lessons of WWI. G3/N3 while powerful would soon be made obsolete by new US/Japanese classes.

Just prior to WWII UK had ordered the Lion class which got cancelled during hostilities when it became clear the tiome of the BB was over. Just HMS Vanguard was built as a stopgap measure - but used material (guns) from Glorious and Courageous.

That said I assume building more (modern) ships actually would have been bad for Britain as the money would have been missed elsewhere (Tanks, Aircraft, small ships Carriers?)
 

pedmore1202

Richter von Manthofen said:
That said I assume building more (modern) ships actually would have been bad for Britain as the money would have been missed elsewhere (Tanks, Aircraft, small ships Carriers?)
Click to expand...

Which is why I asked if the RN could afford them, and if so, what would suffer. My thoughts are that the money for the new battleships would come out of the navy's budget, so it won't affect anything outside of it, but what would it affect within the Navy?

And, I've specified that they aren't increasing the number, they're replacing older ships on a 1-to-1 basis. So the question is, which is cheaper? Keeping older ships in commission for at least 10 more years, with maintenance costs increasing each year due to complexity/lack of upgrades compared to more modern ships; or building 8 new ships to replace the oldest ships, decreasing maintenance costs but with an initial large payment to construct them?
 
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Simon

Simon

PMN1 said:
IIRC, Nick Sumner used it in his timeline 'The Dark Colossus', not sure if he actually drew it up though.
Click to expand...
The Nach Dem Tag thread. Long story short the British accept the 5:5:3 proposal but point out they've already had a 5 year building holiday so another 10 could see vital skills and industries disappear, plus at the end of the 10 years you're just likely to see a mad rush to new builds resulting in a famine-feast cycle. They also argue that a year's war service should really count for two years peace service to reflect how hard worked and basically shagged out a number of Royal Navy ships are. Rather than a blanket ban what eventually emerges is a limited managed building programme within the tonnage limits somewhat like the dispensations that were allowed to France and Japan in our timeline.


Derek Pullem said:
True but Vanguard - bleugh!
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What have you got against Guards Van? :)
 

pedmore1202

Okay, been looking over the capital ships that Britain retained after Washington Naval Treaty, and I didn't realise just how few there were. I thought that there were over 20 retained, instead there was only 15 in total. In that case, which do you think would be more probable, 8 new ships replacing 8 older ships, or 6 new ships replacing 6 older ships (but still with the same limits as in the OP)?

Also, which ships do you think would be replaced with this building program? the list of them are below (I think that's all of them, if there were any more retained let me know and I'll add them in so they're in one place)

Queen Elizabeth Class
HMS Queen Elizabeth
HMS Warspite
HMS Barham
HMS Valiant
HMS Malaya

Revenge Class
HMS Revenge
HMS Royal Sovereign
HMS Royal Oak
HMS Resolution
HMS Ramillies

Nelson Class (Not built yet, but included as part of RN interwar. These ships would replace/augment them)
HMS Nelson
HMS Rodney

Renown Class
HMS Renown
HMS Repulse

Admiral Class
HMS Hood
 
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