Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 110" video.

  1. wrt the question about the RN pushing for the reduction to 14" guns in Second London. Nothing prevented the Brits using 14" guns in the earlier treaties, if they wanted to do that to provide, what in their assessment, was a better balanced ship. The French had built the Dunkerques well below treaty maximums in both guns and displacement. Seems it's more a matter of the RN trying to use the treaty to force everyone else to build what the RN wants, rather than everyone else working their own design within the original parameters. This was done again wrt carriers. Seems the Brits did a survey of their repair facilities around the empire and found that some facilities could only handle a carrier of 23,000 tons, not the 27,000 tons the earlier treaties had allowed. So, Ark Royal was built to 22,000 and the Illustrious class built to 23,000. And, Second London cut the carrier tonnage limit to what the Brits wanted to build, not what any other party was capable of building. The "escalator clause" of Second London only covered the gun size increase from 14" to 16". It did not include the displacement increase. The displacement increase was negotiated between the US and UK in early 38, and, again, the Brits tried to limit the increase to the 41-42,000 ton range, the largest British facilities could handle. The US held out for 45,000, which they finally got in mid 38, enabling the Iowas. Without so much time wasted due to British obstruction wrt the tonnage increase, the US could have skipped the slow, cramped, South Dakotas and gone straight to the Iowas that they really wanted.
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  2.  @george_364  Consider the spring of 38: Germany just annexed Austria, Italy had invaded Ethiopia, Japan had invaded China, Japan formally dropped out of the naval treaty, Italy was ignoring it, France was mad because the UK had done it's own naval deal with Germany, without consulting France. The world is catching fire, and the UK is still trying to make sure the one country still willing to talk with it, the US, can't build a bigger ship than the Brits can.
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  3. wrt the question about Japan v Russia, the thing would have been for Japan to attack the eastern end of Russia. Besides diverting Russian troops from fighting the Germans, occupying eastern Russia would make it possible to intercept US Lend Lease aircraft that were being flown to Russia via Alaska.
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