How slowly would weapons develop without wartime urgency?

How much slower would weapons development be without a major war before the 1950s?

Navies could still complete about three three-to-four-year weapon cycles by 1952, but the resulting systems would differ from historical wartime designs.

Peace does not end weapons development. Research continues and successive systems still enter service in cycles of roughly three to four years. From 1939 to a hypothetical 1952 war, navies could therefore pass through about three generations of equipment. Some results may be technically better than their historical counterparts and others less mature because combat never selected or accelerated them. The important difference is the direction of development, not a simple uniform delay.