Comments by "" (@RedXlV) on "The Drydock - Episode 015" video.

  1. IIRC, Strasbourg's upgrades in armor over her sister Dunkerque (substantially thicker belt and slightly thicker deck and turrets) were a response to Scharnhorst.
    3
  2. Kongo and Tiger were very similar ships as built. The main advantage of Kongo was that she had Vickers 14"/45 Pattern A guns, which had better range and penetration than the BL 13.5"/45 Mk V. Though Kongo had an 8" belt compared to Tiger's 9", so only range would be a relevant advantage if the two ships went up against each other. They'd be about equally capable of defeating each other's armor when the shells hit. I still find it a bit surprising that, given how much the threat of the Deutschland-class cruisers was being overestimated at the time, that Tiger wasn't retained on account of being one of only 4 ships in the fleet capable of outrunning and outgunning Deutschland. To stay in compliance with the London Naval Treaty while keeping Tiger, they could've simply scrapped Iron Duke and demilitarized Revenge as a training ship. From what I understand, Revenge was already in worse material condition than Tiger in 1930 anyway. The only downside would've been that Tiger would be the only ship in the fleet still carrying 13.5" guns.
    2
  3.  @richardcutts196  I was thinking more in terms of the logistics of keeping 13.5" shells in stock at every naval base that Tiger might be sent to. As such, a retained Tiger probably would've been permanently assigned to the Home Fleet, so that bases in the Indian and Pacific Oceans wouldn't need to stock any of those shells that only a single ship could use.
    1
  4. The most plausible scenario for the entire French fleet going to Britain would be if Churchill and Reynaud's Franco-British Union proposal had actually happened. (Which would only have been possible if Petain and other pro-armistice politicians in France had been disposed of. Either by arresting them for treason (which in retrospect they were actually guilty of) or just assassinating them.) Regarding the question on Nelson and Myoko turrets, if the third rather than second turret is superfiring then at long range that actually would allow for all three turrets to fire forward. Since the second turret's guns would be elevated to fire over the roof of the first turret. This actually was the layout used on the Mogami-class cruisers, and later on the Juneau- and Worcester-class CLAAs. And at least two British battlecruiser concepts (F2 and F3, a pair of Treaty battlecruiser designs that were among the Nelson-class proposals before the O3 battleship design was chosen) also used that layout. Personally, even aside from turret layout, I think the Royal Navy would've gotten more utility out of the Nelsons had they been built to the F3 design. The armor would've been weaker, but still rather good (12-13" belt instead of 13-14", basically the same deck armor). The armament would've in theory been weaker, but given that the Nelsons' 16"/45 guns proved to be a bit of a disappointment, 3x3 15"/50 guns firing the same shells as the 15"/42 would've actually been an improvement. And a ~29 knot top speed would've allowed them to keep pace with aircraft carriers rather than being limited to operating with slower fleets or as convoy escort.
    1