The Bellerophon class was cut from four ships to three

Bellerophon differed from Dreadnought, although Fisher's resistance to superfiring constrained the design. Beresford's criticism was strategic: introducing Dreadnought erased Britain's inherited numerical lead, yet the Navy did not build enough new ships to replace it quickly. Another Dreadnought and a fourth Bellerophon would have required political effort but lay within Britain's demonstrated capacity. The later eight-ship political settlement shows that willingness to spend political capital limited the program more than any absolute inability to order another hull.