Italian designs are often underestimated, and the Royal Navy took their quality seriously. A ship can suit Italian requirements without being the right design for another navy to copy wholesale. Other fleets can still borrow individual features after judging whether they work as expected. A contemporary Chinese submarine with a conning tower resembling a Swedish design illustrates how visible ideas can travel without the entire ship being duplicated. External arrangements can be observed and tested, whereas internal layouts are much harder to assess from the outside.
Notable Point · 9:07-10:55
Italian design quality and selective copying
Italian warship ideas deserve close study, although a ship optimized for Italian needs cannot simply be copied into another navy.