Comments by "Bk Jeong" (@bkjeong4302) on "HMS Revenge - Guide 120" video.

One of the most underrated BBs, IMO. Yes they were old by WWII but the entire BB concept was obsolete by that point anyways, and when they were first commissioned they were among the most capable ships around.
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Frank DeMaris Yeah I think those three classes of ships were particularly egregious examples of pointless capital ship construction (the Iowas honestly are NOT a good example of practicality, as often made out to be). But while the KGVs, NorCals and SoDaks (and the Axis vessels obviously) weren’t as stupid as trying to build big-gun ships after everyone knew it was pointless, they still ended up being pointless in the end.
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1IbramGaunt They were built in the lead up to WWII less because of actual military value and more because of perceived military value. People were still thinking they’d be useful, even though they weren’t anymore. Glorious was more a result of human stupidity rather than any inherent vulnerability of carriers. A carrier can just keep a distance from enemy surface units and attack them with impunity when used properly.
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1IbramGaunt But why use a battleship to kill targets way below their weight class? If you want to kill convoys, smaller surface ships, aircraft, and submarines can get that job done without the costs of building and maintaining a battleship. And given that Glorious is the only case where a carrier lost a fight with battleships, your argument that such cases justify the construction of battleships make no sense. Battleships became obsolete largely because they were no longer cost-effective at attacking enemy forces, and less because they became more vulnerable (though that played a role). Yes, all the major navies did think battleships were necessary, AND THEY WERE PROVEN WRONG.
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Mason Stewart They only worked as a deterrent because people overestimated them. The Kriegsmarine and Regia Marina surface units were effectively neutralized halfway through the war (for political reasons and loss of fuel respectively), and the British would have done better to treat them as the pointless machinery they really were. A weapon that relies almost entirely on bluff to cause harm to the enemy probably isn’t a great weapon. And given that Royal Navy carriers played major roles in the Mediterranean and that CVEs were a huge factor in winning the Battle of the Atlantic you have to admit carriers were important even in these theatres.
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Glenn Simpson And just how common are naval battles in bad weather? Not nearly common enough to justify new battleship construction. And pre-war naval aircraft could operate in bad weather: look at just how bad the Swordfish bombers that doomed Bismarck had it. They engaged in atrocious weather and still won despite being obsolete aircraft. So no, the decision to build the KGVs and Vanguard instead of developing better carriers and better naval doctrine was an error. The USN kept building battleships, but that proved to be the wrong decision, especially as they were operating in good weather conditions as you mentioned. The ships never ended up justifying their costs, the Iowas (as well-designed as they were) especially so. Just because people thought they were making the right decision at the time does NOT mean that decision holds up as correct when reaccessed in the cold light of history.
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Frank DeMaris In all four of the battles you mentioned, the Axis BBs were supposed to be used for tasks that you do not need a BB for (commerce raiding for North Cape and shore bombardment for the rest). So it comes back to the main argument of whether you really need battleships to get these things done. And with First Guadalcanal, the side that had two battleships LOST, with one of them being mission-killed because she couldn’t maneuver easily in the narrow channel and had her bridge and crew machine-gunned and set on fire. Yes, the Americans also took heavy losses that night, but it takes a lot of destroyer or cruiser losses to equal one battleship loss, so I doubt that the Japanese won out in that equation. I do agree that BBs are the best tools for stopping other BBs in bad weather, but that doesn’t mean they are a useful tool overall, because that type of situation is a) rare and b) historically depended on the enemy holding the idiot ball. And these battles pale in comparison to the massive number of battles where it was the carriers that saved the day.
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Frank DeMaris The problem is that tor premise counts on two assumptions: - the Axis capital ships have to be countered through your own capital ships, or even at all - it is better to spend resources building your own battleships just in case your carriers aren’t available, rather than use those resources for situations that are far more likely to happen. Regarding the need to counter Japanese capital ships because they could outrun the Standards (especially the Kongos and the new Yamatos); I doubt that need was anywhere near as great as you seem to think it is. Japan planned to hold its heavy surface units back until either they had a sure chance of victory or when things got desperate for them (it ended up being the latter in the end). The problem is that the final iteration of War Plan Orange gave up on the idea of an immediate assault on Japan, instead opting to withdraw from the western Pacific until naval build-up had tipped the odds. So they didn’t really have an immediate need for a fast capital ship to counter the Japanese vessels. Of course, by the time this revised version of WPO came out the North Carolinas were already under construction, but they could have skipped the Iowas without any issues seeing as the Iowas, for all their good design, never engaged another capital ship in the end. Honestly, the same is arguably true of German capital ships; while all four Kriegsmarine battleships were too fast to be brought to bear easily via surface units, they could have been (and in several cases were) countered by naval aviation, and that’s taking into account that Britain had fallen behind in naval aviation. Furthermore, after the loss of Bismarck the German surface fleet was heavily restricted in terms of what it could do due to political reasons (Hitler figured out that battleships were a waste of resources and forced a bunch of restrictions on Raeder). After that Britain didn’t really need to keep the Kriegsmarine BBs in check because they were already neutralized by the German high command. Britain would have done better to see through the bluff and ignore the surface units: trying to keep the already-neutralized surface units in check by building their own battleships led to less ships being built to do other things, unnecessarily fuel usage, and a convoy disaster (PQ-17). By overestimating the Kriegsmarine, the British only ended up creating a self-fulfilling prophesy; the Kriegsmarine vessels caused damage to Britain precisely because Britain tried to stop them from doing anything. Good point about the human lives perspective, but even there I’d like to note that the low fatality rate for the Americans on Second Guadalcanal had a lot to do with the fact none of the Japanese ships were engaging Washington until it was too late (because they were busy shooting up and launching fish at South Dakota), and also because the Japanese vessels were equipped with HE and sanshiki shells for shore bombardment. Had the Japanese noticed her presence a lot earlier, or had they been armed with anti-ship munitions, the death toll could have been higher for the Americans (though they’d still probably have won). And you also have to take into account that every bit of resource that’s spent on building and maintaining a battleship is every bit of resource that’s not going into other uses, so any reduction in dead sailors achieved through the construction and use of battleships may well be balanced out by a greater death toll elsewhere. I wasn’t saying that cruisers are particularly effective for countering capital ships (as you mentioned the Allies were still feeling the effects of treaty restrictions early in the war). But why counter enemy battleships at all? Why not just not engage them and force the enemy to waste resources running their ships in vain hope of a battle that wasn’t going to happen? Re: Japan needing capital units for shore bombardment, the Japanese only had problems neutralizing Henderson Field with destroyers and cruisers because their destroyers (and, to a much smaller extent, their cruisers) were oriented towards torpedo warfare. It’s telling that American destroyers and cruisers, with their much greater firepower, had no issues neutralizing Japanese, Italian and German shore fortifications and airfields. The fact the IJN found battleships necessary to counter Henderson Field is more reflective of the flaws in their destroyer design rather than the cost-effectiveness of battleships for that role. They would have done far better to skip the Yamatos and build more versatile destroyers. The bottom line is that the need for a big-gun capital ship in WWII is so niche that it’s not worth the costs. Yes battleships in WWII were good at countering enemy capital ships at night or bad weather (though even back then carriers weren’t always harmless under those conditions), but those cases are too rare to justify new construction in light of the drawbacks of a battleship.
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@kemarisite There were a small number of WWII engagements where carriers bested battleships at night or in bad weather, though I do agree carrier attack under such conditions wasn't practical in WWII in most cases. Countering enemy battleships at night/bad weather was the one thing battleships could do better than other ships. But again-that's a niche role. It would be like saying cavalry was useful on the Western Front in WWI because they could counter enemy cavalry in the open, even though they were no longer the best solution for anything other than countering enemy cavalry in the open. In WWII, a battleship was useful for countering enemy BBs at night but not a good weapon for anything else, whereas a cruiser isn't nearly as good at countering enemy BBs at night but is overall more useful to the war effort. Unless there is a situation in which you must take out every single enemy battleship operating at night to win the war, it's probably a better choice to go for the more versatile weapon even if it's not as capable in that specific circumstance. Japan did fight many night engagements, buy how many of those actions involved Japanese capital ships? Only three.....and one of them, Surigao Strait, involved old, obsolete ships that were easily countered by the old standard BBs (and by destroyers sinking one of them earlier in that engagement) without the need for any new capital ships. Japan was perfectly willing to engage at night, but not willing to do so with capital ships-those would be held back either as a last resort or as the final blow. It took Yamamoto basically forcing his subordinate officers to use the Kongos (and these were seen as more expendable due to their age) during the Solomons campaign. Not sure why you're discussing the Yamatos in some detail (I don't consider them the best-designed BBs either, though I don't consider then particularly bad in terms of design). My point was that the USN didn't need to build any new battleships to counter them (and indeed ended up just running them over with tons of aircraft), so the Americans building new battleships to counter the new Japanese ships was a mistake (and I believe that you agreed with me on the Iowas being a waste of steel). As for your argument on all four SoDaks being able to sink those two albeit at a cost, I agree-numbers count for a lot on naval engagements, and if it's in low visibility, targeting radar gives the Americans an edge. Fair point about Second Guadalcanal. As for shore bombardment, given the good track record of American cruisers at bombarding enemy-occupied islands, I'm not so certain whether the lack of effectiveness of Japanese cruisers in the same role was really due to cruisers in general being bad at shore bombardment.
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@kemarisite Interesting point about the differences in targets (land defences vs. airfield) and the role of air superiority making things easier for American cruisers and destroyers. The 8" cruiser guns of Allied vessels (and even smaller-calibre weapons from destroyers) were successfully used for bombardment in WWII, but as you said they were shooting under conditions of air superiority. Aside from that, is there any factor that would make bombarding Henderson Field with cruisers more challenging than bombarding land defences with cruisers? You mentioned that naval treaties limited cruiser constructions anyways so it was "build battleships or not build at all, at least without breaking the treaty". During the early parts of the late 1930s treaty regulations would be in effect, but this situation changed with the outbreak of war. The US had already passed the Two Ocean Navy Act by 1940.
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Frank DeMaris At least some of the battleships that were authorized in the treaty years were still unfinished when the Two Ocean Navy Act came out. There was some time available to cancel some of them and focus on other types of vessels. Also, I thought we were discussing all big-gun capital ships from 1935 onwards, not just treaty battleships.
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@kemarisite I do think that the later vessels like the Iowas are less justified (or, in my opinion, even less justified) than the earlier North Carolinas and SoDaks. I'm not really sure that the construction of even the North Carolinas is really justified, however; if one is going to argue that they were justified as a counter to Japanese capital ships when they were first laid down, you may well argue that the Yamatos were justified as a counter to American capital ships when first authorized (Yamato being laid down in 1937), but nobody is going to take that argument seriously, because the Yamatos proved to be pointless, unnecessary and a waste of resources. I can understand why people would think new battleships were necessary for the upcoming war in the late 30s, but that doesn't mean they made the right decision when they decided to build these ships. There seems to be a disconnect between the two of us when we judge how useful a certain ship was: my arguments are more based on when the ships were in service, while you seem to focus more on when the ships were first authorized, which creates problems as the strategic value of a battleship can change in the years it takes to build it. Another disconnect would be that I evaluate usefulness by the combat record of a vessel and its relative impact (direct and indirect) in the war, and whether the ship was the best tool for achieving what it did in the war, while you seem to focus on whether it made sense from the perspective of naval officers to authorize the construction of a ship when the construction orders were given. My view on battleships post-1935 is that they seemed to be a good idea at the time but turned out to be bad ideas, as with things like the torpedo ram.
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@kemarisite I did agree that the Iowas/Montanas/Alaskas were even less cost-effective than the treaty vessels. My whole reasoning behind cancelling even the treaty battleships (those that haven't been launched yet by the time of the Two Ocean Navies act) would be that: - if there is no longer a limit on cruiser tonnage, suddenly it becomes possible to build more and better cruisers, and while a cruiser is less suited to the specific role of countering enemy battleships at night, it's a far more useful ship overall than any battleship. So why not use the resources towards cruisers instead? - since naval aviation is advancing rapidly, and arguably has already gotten to the point it's a threat to surface units by 1940 (see Taranto), it would be a good idea to future-proof the fleet by focusing more heavily on warships that are more likely to become dominant in the future compared to battleships. Especially since by 1940, War Plan Orange is no longer calling for an immediate naval attack on Japanese units, but to retreat out of the Western Pacific and build up before undertaking an island-hopping campaign, meaning that there isn't an urgent need to kill Japanese battleships yet.
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@Frank DeMaris IMO we should not argue that a weapon wasn't a bad idea because the context behind the decision to build that weapon explains why it was created. It makes the decision to create that weapon excusable, but doesn't change the fact that in the end, that decision led to resources being wasted and other, more useful weapons not getting the focus they should have gotten. And honestly, if one is to argue that battleship constructions in the 1930s was a good idea, we have to argue the same about a huge number of weapons that are widely considered impractical or obsolete. There were many, many weapons in history that were built for reasons that were understandable at the time, but turned out to be bad investments in the end. Let's take one of the wunderwaffen generally accepted to be a bad idea; Schwerer Gustav was built to destroy French fortifications, but that role turned out to be unnecessary, and while it did shell Sevastopol the huge costs of operating this gun, and the far more mobile nature of WWII, made it impractical. We can see there was a reason to decide to build this gun, but we can also see that doing so weakened Nazi Germany in the end. Furthermore I'm not really certain whether we can honestly say that authorizing battleship construction in the late 30s really made sense even back then. Given the fast pace of aviation technological development compared to the fact it takes years to build a battleship, someone really should have taken note of the fact that by the time they were done building the battleships, the ships may end up being rendered obsolete by naval aviation. It should also be taken into account that naval aviation development, especially in Britain, was significantly delayed by battleship advocates, and that focusing on naval aviation rather than battleships would go a long way to ensuring the earlier debut of naval aircraft that could pose real danger to surface units. Finally, there had already been some military exercises in the 30s that indicated the feasibility of a carrier raid. In the end this is a situation where the navies of the world made the wrong choice for the right reasons; they had their reasons for thinking battleships would remain important in the upcoming war, gambled their resources on it, and lost. We can forgive them for their error, but at the same time should take this as a cautionary tale in military procurement rather than trying to justify it. Funnily enough I though of mentioning the M4, and the German big cats it faced, but for a different reason: I intended to use the M4 as an example of a weapons system that was a more useful weapon overall even if it wasn't quite as good as the opposition in one specific role (in this case, killing other tanks), and the German big cats as weapons systems that were better than the opposition in that niche role but worse overall. In this analogy the German tanks would be equivalent to battleships (good at one niche role but not the best solution for anything else or more useful overall) and the M4 would be analogous to cruisers.
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