The counterfactual keeps all five triple 16.5-inch turrets instead of following the Italian practice of removing a central turret during reconstruction. The standardized superstructure has hangar doors even though the ship lacks an aircraft-launch system. In principle the adjacent turret could be trained away to clear space, but every launch or recovery would then depend on moving the main battery. A retained turret can conflict with aviation facilities, funnels, secondary armament, and other refit requirements. Preserving the maximum gun count may therefore make a modernization less operationally coherent.
Notable Point · 38:44-40:14
Keeping the fifth turret complicates aircraft handling
Retaining all five triple turrets preserves the fifteen-gun battery, but it crowds the refit and leaves the modeled hangar doors without a practical aircraft-launch arrangement.