1 But despite their similar sizes, the Alaskas had a very different design history than the previous ships. Only the American Alaska class was actually built, a ship that displaced 34,253 tons full, quite close to the 35,500 tons of Dunkerque and the 38,900 tons of Scharnhorst. But ships of this size soon reappeared, driven by the need for something that would overmatch the treaty cruisers that were likely to form the backbone of commerce raiding and protection while being smaller than a battleship. Every subsequent battleship would be at least 35,000 tons, with designs not limited by treaty getting much, much bigger. In practice, this didn't work as well as the Germans had hoped, with Graf Spee doing significant damage to Exeter at River Plate before being scuttled thanks to damage, while Lutzow was driven off by British cruisers during an attack on a convoy in the Barents Sea in the only other major action fought by the type.īut the Scharnhorsts were the last gasp of the smaller battleship, and afterwards, the trend was only bigger. Ultimately, instead of being built to defend Germany's coasts, they were commerce raiders, intended to be capable of defeating anything that could match their speed with the exception of a trio of British battlecruisers. The most unusual feature was their propulsion, provided by diesel engines, which gave the ships very long range. The Germans decided to do something quite different, building what was known at the time as a "Pocket Battleship", with two triple 11" turrets, a speed of about 28 kts and an armored belt of 6-8 cm. These limited Germany to ships of 10,000 tons and armed with 11" guns, with the obvious intention of Germany being able to build a few coastal defense ships to replace the pre-dreadnoughts they had retained after the war. In a lot of ways, the progenitor of the type were the Deutschland class Panzerschiffe, built under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |