Committee design under political and interservice pressure

An achievable carrier suited to Germany’s resources gave way to a compromise hull expected to deliver every specialist’s preferred solution. Because no authority forced trade-offs, each subsystem could be optimized in isolation while the whole ship grew heavier and harder to finish. Repeated changes were compounded by political intervention and the German Army’s competing demands on industry and funding. Even a misread armament proposal could not be easily reversed, suggesting a command system unable to correct its own errors. Technically intelligent decisions can combine into a failed programme when governance cannot set priorities.