HMS Fiji's treaty-era design and real displacement

The opening compares Fiji's profile with the larger Town-class cruisers and asks how different the two designs really were. Fiji was the only Royal Navy ship named for the Crown Colony, and John Brown laid her down at Clydebank in 1938. Her recorded displacement after completion was 8,770 tons standard and 11,194 tons at deep load. Since she was launched in 1939 and commissioned after war began in 1940, those figures complicate any simple comparison with the original treaty limit. The figures cast doubt on the usual claim that relaxed treaty restrictions simply allowed the ship to grow. Her quoted endurance and 32.25-knot top speed show the machinery, fuel, and armament tradeoffs inside a compact cruiser hull.