In this account, the Jeune École left France with a long industrial deficit as well as a disputed doctrine. French yards could not immediately produce enough armor and structural steel for dreadnought construction. The navy therefore continued building transitional battleships resembling older Royal Sovereign-era forms while capacity caught up. The example shows why apparently conservative procurement can reflect industrial sequencing rather than an inability to understand a new design.
Notable Point · 23:11-24:29
Why France could not jump straight to dreadnoughts
French battleship policy is used to show that design ambition cannot outrun the yards, armor production, and steelmaking capacity needed to build the ships.