The next question asks whether battlecruisers were ever cruisers or were always second-rate battleships, while dating that interpretation to after the 1920s rather than immediately after Jutland. SMS Blücher then shows what an armoured cruiser developed on dreadnought lines could look like. German planners acted on minimal intelligence and assumed Britain was continuing its armoured-cruiser sequence. The British design instead carried dreadnought-level guns, so the German answer was built for the wrong target. The example ties ship classification and design lineage to an intelligence failure that shaped construction.
Notable Point · 19:27-20:49
Battlecruiser labels and the SMS Blücher intelligence failure
The post-1920s claim that battlecruisers were only second-rate battleships is paired with SMS Blücher as a warning about labels, design evolution, and incomplete intelligence.