Project 21 as a more attainable Soviet battlefleet

Project 21 combined nine 16-inch guns, twelve 6-inch guns, twelve 4-inch guns, and thirty-six 37 mm guns with a 30-knot target on roughly 35,000 tons. A speed nearer 28 knots may have been more realistic, but the design was still much smaller than Project 23. If laid down in 1935, two ships and perhaps a third might have entered service before Germany invaded in June 1941. Its smaller hull would have made suitable slips and maintenance facilities easier to provide. Project 21 therefore tests what Soviet yards and support systems could plausibly sustain.