Germany would have needed to divert resources from the army or find sustained new funding without further conquest. It also needed years of peace to construct yards, weapons plants, and the supporting industrial base. Hitler and similar demagogic rulers tended to believe their own rhetoric and gamble before such long programmes could mature. Plan Z therefore depended as much on strategic restraint and national priority as on any particular battleship drawing.
Chapter · 41:46-43:21
Plan Z needed time, money, and naval priority
Plan Z required years of peace, major resources, and a far higher national priority for the navy.