Fleet standardization versus the prestige of 16-inch guns

The choice pits matching foreign headline calibers against preserving an efficient common supply system. A 15-inch/50 could reuse much of the fleet's shell-handling infrastructure and simplify later upgrades, while the 16-inch gun advertised parity with rival capital ships. Nelson and Rodney demonstrated treaty compliance, but their publicly known low speed also advertised the cost of Britain's restraint. Other navies could see the operational compromise without necessarily knowing the disappointing penetration results that complicated Britain's new 16-inch weapon.