France, Germany, and Italy often used each other's construction choices as benchmarks despite their different strategic circumstances. The Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet supplies an earlier example: it resembled a smaller Grand Fleet even though Germany's geography called for a different mix of capabilities. Modern British procurement repeated the specialization problem when a shrinking fleet bought ships for narrowly defined roles. The Type 45 was built for but not with the Mark 41 VLS. Those cells would have preserved its air-defence strength and added general-purpose strike options. Their presence would have weakened a later argument that the design was too specialized for future needs.
Chapter · 48:32-52:36
Fleet design should follow strategy
Naval construction should match a country's own strategic problem rather than copy an opponent or divide a small fleet among narrow specialties.