Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "The Drydock - Episode 029" video.

I don't think anyone but Fisher would have had the combination of vision and just giant steel cajones to retire 150 obsolete ships in just one year (1904). This reduced the fleet numbers by almost 20% and gave the impetus to start constructing modern ships in their place. There was tremendous opposition to this move, and it was only Fisher's influence and pugnaciousness that allowed him to pull it off, thereby positioning the RN for the war with a modern fleet.
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I'm not aware of the UP rockets ever having been used in actual combat. It had its first indication of why itw was a dangerous weapon for the ship launching it when the first demonstration firing in Scapa Flow with practice bombs saw the wind change direction with the aerial bombs drifting back into the HMS Orion, getting caught in the rigging, and some of the small charges actually exploding. The practice mines were too small to do much damage to the ship in this case, but the 8 ounce bursting charge was large enough to at least bring down some of the rigging and radio antennas. Each empty 10 cell mount weighed over four tons compared to 8.5 tones for a quadruple 2 pounder mount, and the 2 pounder was an actually effective antiaircraft weapon. They had to be reloaded by hand, a process that took about 15 minutes, and aiming was point it in the right general direction and fire. They were all landed by the end of 1941, not the least because of questions about the UP being part of the reason for the sinking of the Hood. It wasn't, but it was a reasonable suspect at the time. There was a land version using two and three inch rockets that were assigned to Home Guard units when there wasn't much else available. At least one Home Guard unit claimed a kill of a low flying bomber using the rockets. If nothing else, it tended it keep low flying aircraft up higher, making their bombing less accurate, so it was effective in that role.
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@chocolatecatdad Fisher was quite an amazing man, and his vision of what the next naval war would be like was spot on, except for his ideas about how the battlecruiser would perform. His single minded obsession with speed allowed the concept of the fast battleship to take hold. He was the first Admiral of the Fleet to start making promotions based on merit rather than just seniority. The heavy cruiser concept died out in the 30's, except for the USN. The RN didn't build a heavy cruiser after 1930 while the USN built them from the 20's right through the end of the war. I think the USN envisaged the need for heavy and sustained shore bombardment in the Pacific and felt the heavy cruiser was the ship for the job. In reality, the Cleveland class light cruisers could put more explosives on target in less time and battleships were superior for attacking inland and heavily fortified positions. The main contribution of the Baltimore class was to provide a platform for the first postwar missiles ships.
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I imagine the obvious advantage of superifing guns wouldn't have been possible without an armored gunhouse for at least the lower guns. Armor and weather protection for the gun mechanism and crew also had obvious advantages. Just the size of blast shields needed for superfiring 4" and 5" guns gives an idea what would have been needed for guns of 12" and larger.
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2 am here in CST time. It never fails. I'm just getting ready to shut things down and then there's a notification from this Drachinifel guy. That means a 47 minute delay in sleep this morning.
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