Britain's interwar planning problem included major wars in several parts of the empire at once. Japan and Italy formed the threatening combination in the 1920s, with Germany added during the 1930s. Exercises against an American-sized fleet provided a demanding test, but the wider strategic difficulty was dividing ships between distant opponents. Even the world's largest navy could not provide full battleship, carrier, cruiser, and destroyer squadrons everywhere they were needed. Task-force doctrine therefore had to establish what smaller combinations could accomplish in each theatre.
Notable Point · 1:16:00-1:17:57
Britain planned for simultaneous wars in several theatres
Concurrent threats from Japan and Italy, later joined by Germany, made distributing limited naval strength central to British task-force doctrine.