How destroyer doctrine answers an enemy battleship

Does the arrival of a battleship such as Warspite overturn a destroyer force's doctrine?

No. Destroyer doctrine must include a response to enemy capital ships, and the Royal Navy's response was to close the range and attack with torpedoes.

Capital-ship contact was a scenario destroyer doctrine had to anticipate, rather than an exception that made doctrine irrelevant. British destroyers were expected to approach as closely as circumstances allowed and press home a torpedo attack. Repeated attacks against Italian heavy ships show that this was an operational method rather than a paper idea. The destroyer's value came from imposing a maneuvering threat that a battleship could not safely ignore. The answer prepares the more detailed closing discussion of torpedoes disrupting capital-ship gunnery.