Comments by "Steve Valley" (@stevevalley7835) on "The Drydock - Episode 081" video.

  1. wrt reforming the USN in the 1910s. Building the standards with an eye to reengining them in the 30s for more speed would be futile, because the USN didn't update the Tennessees or Colorados during that period, when the update of the New Mexicos in 31 showed the way. A more plausible choice would be to forego the turbo-electric drive in the first place and use the space freed up by elimination of the motors and generators for larger turbines and boilers. Also, forget triple expansion engines and go straight to turbines, even if that means buying them from Parsons. Another thing would be to forget the casement mounted secondary armament. Put all the secondary armament on deck, so they can be easily replaced with modern AA during WWII. With a large increase in the budget prior to WWI, at least some of the Battle Cruisers would have been laid down, in their original 1916 design. If the USN were lucky, the hulls would have been launched in 17 to clear the building ways and further work delayed until after the war. Then, instead of converting a collier that would have had resale value, convert the incomplete BC hulls to carriers. With construction under way, in 21, they would have been exempt from the treaty as "experimental", so could be replaced whenever the USN saw fit.
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  2.  @Drachinifel  true enough. When the Italians rebuilt their 4 pre-WWI BBs in the 30s, they lengthened the hulls by about 35 feet, as well as increasing power from 30,000 to 75,000shp. to push them from 21kts to 26. While building a USN equivalent to a Queen Elizabeth would be a good start, there would not be any follow-through in the 30s. In effect, we would be creating the 1920 South Dakotas. 43' longer than a QE, 15' wider, with 60K shp vs 56K, and 23kts. But, unlike the RN, there would be no major updates in the 30s. If you or I were the typical age of the head of the General Board in 1915, we would be retired, if not dead, long before 1935, so would not be around to make the reengining happen, meaning the ships are stuck at 23kts. There would be no rebuild of the superstructures either, which is why I specified abandoning casement mounted 5/51s in favor of putting them all on the weather deck. In the USN of the 30s, the only updates we could expect would be replacing the 5/51s on the weather deck with 5/25s and 1.1s.
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  3. The other wrinkle is our advance knowledge of the Washington Treaty. Without our intervention, Maryland was the only Colorado in commission at the time of the treaty. The US negotiated a clause allowing completion of West Virginia and Colorado, in exchange for the disposal of the two Delawares, which the original treaty retention list had included. The Colorados were under the treaty's 35,000 ton limit. As we are talking longer ships with more powerful engines and higher speed capability, essentially 1920s South Dakotas, which displaced 43,000, the US would probably not be able to work that exchange to complete two after the signing of the treaty. So, all the future vision BBs would need to be in commission before the end of 1921, meaning they need to be laid down before 1919. New Mexico was launched 4/13/17 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and Tennessee was laid down a month later, launching 4/30/19, so we can't get more out of Brooklyn. Mississippi was launched 1/25/17 at Newport News. NN laid down Maryland 4/24/17, launching on 3/20/20, so we can't get more out of NN. Mare Island didn't launch California until 11/20/19, so can't get another BB out of that yard. Only opportunity to advance construction schedule in a yard known to have capacity to build BBs is at NY Shipbuilding. That yard launched Idaho on 6/30/17, so Colorado could be advanced from it's actual lay down date of 5/29/19 to somewhere in August of 17.
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