Comments by "doveton sturdee" (@dovetonsturdee7033) on "The Scrap Iron Flotilla - Australian Destroyers in the Mediterranean" video.

  1. Why? The German war began in September 1939, and Italy declared war in June 1940. Eighteen months before Pearl Harbor.
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  2.  @sundiver137  Destroyers usually had names beginning with the letter of their class. For example the F class had names like Fame, Fearless, or Fury. The first battleship built during the reign of a new monarch tended to be named after the monarch. King George V should have been King George VI, but in the case the King insisted that the ship be named after his father. The last two of the class, incidentally, Anson & Howe, were to have been named Jellicoe & Beatty, but the names were deemed too controversial within the Navy, and changed. The Flower class corvettes were given such names to identify what sort of ship they were.
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  3. 'The battle of Calabria was the first time the royal navy run away from a battle.' When Cunningham abandoned his pursuit of the (faster) Italian fleet, WARSPITE was within 25 miles of the Calabrian coast. It seems that the Royal Navy was 'running away' towards the enemy, whilst the Italian Navy was advancing away from it. Zars was not a battleship, by the way.
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  4. Waterhen was the name given to her by the Royal Navy when she commissioned in July, 1918. She did not become a Royal Australian Navy ship until October, 1933, when she replaced an older S class.
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  5. Depends what you mean by 'sub-standard.' V & W Class destroyers were 20 years old in 1940. They lifted an army from Dunkirk, they held the Channel secure throughout the summer and autumn of 1940, they fought the Atlantic convoys through until new construction arrived, and they protected the East Coast collier convoys throughout the war.
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