Italy's postwar economy was weak, and the navy chose to dispose of Dante Alighieri and the salvaged Leonardo da Vinci to reduce costs and clear room for future work. Treaty-era limits and the desire to develop a later generation made an aging experimental ship harder to justify. In this assessment, Dante remained formidable through much of the First World War and could still hold her own against many ships in 1918. By 1928, however, ships such as Nelson and Rodney demonstrated how far capital-ship design had moved beyond the first dreadnought generation.
Chapter · 28:44-29:48
Why Italy discarded Dante Alighieri in 1928
Budget pressure, treaty-era priorities, and a new generation of capital ships made the pioneering battleship expendable.