Bruships 260: Naval History Questions Answered Live

Their coastal hull forms would usually make open-ocean escort work difficult.

They would probably receive new engines. Diesel propulsion and a rearranged main battery, potentially three triple turrets, are possible options.

Under the interpretation offered here, ships could remain in service beyond twenty years without counting against permitted strength.

It would be a useful and dangerous opponent because sixteen guns provide substantial broadside weight and volume of fire.

The guns were wanted for other uses, and the cruiser needed 6-inch armament with a clearly distinct secondary battery.

The Philippine Sea is proposed for ships and area, and Jutland for a concentrated fleet battle; the choice depends on the measure.

Probably a Second World War frigate such as a River-class ship, although the precise ship and expansion-engine terminology remain qualified.

The Falklands War might change little, while Second World War crews could have stronger incentives to capture cruisers, submarines and merchant ships.

The main expected differences are stronger demands for aggressive operations and resources, and a less accommodating relationship with MacArthur.

Yes, in this counterfactual, the crew would have taken Altmark back to Britain.

The 10th Submarine Flotilla at Malta, particularly its U-class boats, and Venturer are recommended starting points.

Their role differs from the Type 055's despite similar size. The first pair accommodates radar ordered for land use, while a possible later pair could be designed around shipboard requirements.

Four triple turrets are preferred, with maintenance complexity the reservation about quadruple mountings.

A substantial amount of radar could have entered service by 1941 if funding stayed consistent and researchers achieved roughly comparable breakthroughs.

The tentative explanation is that other uses were less viable, leaving study and tourism as practical options.

Theoretically, but suspicion, reconnaissance and sailors' local contacts would make the trap difficult.

British canal mining is proposed, although aircraft often failed to place mines in the canals.

Two crew divisions suited the organisation and work rhythm, with several daily watch periods and the dog watches rotating their hours.

No. Fisher's Baltic plan predated Gallipoli.

More often than is usually acknowledged, in this broad assessment, which comes without examples or a count.

Moving and docking a tourist ship adds expense that its owners must justify against the value of the repair.

It would gain strategic depth, but Hainan would be exposed and require continuing defence.

Assuming the battleship, withdrawing toward Ascension to join the task group is the proposed response; isolated action would be more dangerous.

Technically yes, despite Germany coming close to operating a carrier on a couple of occasions.

The trainer's expected financial return is judged insufficient for its requirements. Boeing is separately predicted to win F/A-XX.

Crewed corvettes are considered useful, and Black Sea uncrewed operations are treated cautiously as a guide to North Atlantic requirements.

A powerful addition for fighting other destroyers and carrying out anti-submarine work.

An armoured ship can lose its ability to fight without a missile penetrating its main armour.

An isolated ship's radar horizon favours a fast missile approach in this assessment, while airborne early warning prompts a preference for numerous sea skimmers.

Additional Audacious carriers were possible, but the Lions had not advanced far enough to provide a useful conversion basis.

The Su-27's landing gear.

Completion is estimated around 1923, with British concern around 1920 as Russian construction also accelerated.

Fast sealift can remain idle for years before becoming urgently necessary. No replacement fleet size or procurement timetable is specified.

Patrolling frigates and air-defence aircraft illustrate why deterrence is difficult to measure through incidents handled.

A rough CVA-01 cost comparison supports the argument that weakened deterrence can produce much larger wartime costs.

The calibre would probably need to fall to about 13.5 inches, and the arrangement would still be cramped.

Only a modest rise in gunport height and perhaps around a knot of speed are suggested.

Defence procurement is examined for its contribution to domestic industry, skilled employment and exports.

A severe international crisis and major Royal Navy difficulties are the circumstances envisaged.

No timetable is offered. Logistics and intelligence support are considered more likely than direct military intervention.

Birmingham, especially Jonathan Boff, is the principal recommendation. Supervisors' availability and temperament also matter.

To an extent, yes, although the detailed reconstruction is left unexplored.

They could cover important passages and force the small operational U-boat force to spend more transit time submerged.

Available tugs and other small vessels were used, often alongside existing towing duties.

Power electronics and frequency regulation mattered alongside motors, circuit protection, metallurgy and compatible electrical systems.

A converted vessel's armament depended partly on which guns were available.

They could strengthen its operations but probably encourage an earlier international ironclad arms race.

Speed is attractive, but high running costs and machinery optimised for fast passages make extended patrol work an awkward fit.

Passenger capacity and sustained ocean-passage speed suit large liners to troop transport.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission maintains overseas graves; the participants understand the Unknown Warrior's anonymity to be deliberate.

The tentative estimate is a couple of months. Insufficient dry-dock capacity is identified as the immediate obstacle.

Facilities exist around the Black Sea, in the Kola region and in the Far East. Their condition is questioned, and British use is ruled out.

Suggested Canadian docking support raises the cost of certifying facilities for nuclear vessels.

Four years, with no dry-dock funding identified in this account.

A proposed planning reform would limit repeated consultation after a major project receives permission.

A dock restored for decommissioning is expected eventually to support active submarines, raising a question about maintenance priorities.

Substantial work is expected, alongside close international scrutiny that would complicate the treaty system.

A domestic-energy proposal connects distributed generation, storage and manufacturing with reduced exposure to imported energy.

Yes, with domestic generation intended to keep goods moving during a petroleum shortage.

A claim of French sonar superiority prompts a comparison of British and French use of a Thales system.

FREMM is preferred on paper for anti-submarine capability. Including the lead yard favours the Álvaro de Bazán submission and its General Dynamics and Bath Iron Works partnership.

The origin of the conflicting account is unknown; mistaken identification or a copied number is suggested.

Any saving must be assessed alongside ammunition paths, loading machinery and permitted loading angles.

Gas turbines are tentatively suggested as a way to retain speed and improve fuel management.

It was sufficient against merchant vessels, but another armed merchant cruiser would be dangerous to both lightly protected ships.

A hypothetical torpedo armament exploits the close approach of Rawalpindi's German opponents.

Japanese practice and British lists of conversion candidates are offered as examples.

Hollowed-log boats are suggested tentatively after the date is corrected from an initial reading of 5,000 years.

About a dozen is suggested, preferably with uncrewed support; two crewed escorts are favoured.

At least by the seventeenth century, with modern overage terminology associated with the nineteenth.

American nuclear carriers are suggested as very fast ships, without a confirmed maximum speed.

Both are considered possible, depending on classification and existing naming traditions.

A larger ship carrying more of the systems selected for Canada's Type 26-derived vessels.

Japan could not attack the American battle fleet at Pearl Harbor, and a carrier strike against San Diego is rejected as impractical. Its alternative plan remains uncertain.

Aircraft comparisons depend on dates, replacement programmes and night-operating ability.

The roles added weight and complexity, while repeated engine changes forced redesign.

The unlicensed-copy allegation is rejected on intellectual-property and engineering grounds, without a documented design history.

Copying is rejected, with performance differences cited against it. Similar breech dimensions can follow from shared calibre and ammunition requirements.

Alaska is tentatively favoured for a possible range advantage and more effective radar-directed fire. Both ships had radar.

That explanation remains unsettled. Director damage is considered, while a claim about disabling its own radar with gunfire is corrected as confusion with Bismarck.

Radar comparisons include funding, testing and crew familiarity as well as the equipment.

Propellant, turret layout and Arctic visibility help explain how a cruiser could be mistaken for a battleship.

An unreasonable standard treats awareness of foreign designs as copying. Studying their mistakes differs from basing an entire weapon on another design.

Russia lacked the budget to procure the replacement at the same time as India.

Sometimes, but a documented lineage is also mistaken for proof that all comparable weapons are copies.

Yes, though no detailed sequence of designs is established.

Yes. A Vickers joint venture became Vickers-Terni, and the 1929 Odero-Terni-Orlando name supplied the abbreviation OTO.

Possible Rheinmetall, Remington and Springfield connections show the breadth attributed to Vickers' industrial network.

Accounts of Škoda weapon plans and Rothschild industrial interests describe attempts to keep assets beyond Nazi control.

Direct subcontracting is uncertain. Participants recall possible connections through Tube Alloys, enrichment research and ignition-system work.

Improved designs would not solve the officer problem in this assessment, and the Royal Navy might gain better prizes.

French engineering and later Vickers advice connect Kure's growth with overseas shipbuilding and industrial expertise.

No. Vickers had a strategic partnership with Mitsubishi predecessor organisations, dated here to 1905.

States could buy industrial infrastructure and military equipment through Vickers, Armstrong and their subsidiaries.

Recalled Vickers offers range across Iranian battleships, Russian industrial reconstruction and Tibetan artillery.

Recalled sales to opposing customers connect arms commerce with Greek independence, Italian unification and later conflicts.

Control was limited in the recalled account. British operations faced restrictions over Rhodesia, while participants believe overseas branches continued supplying it.

The scenario envisages a large industrial group retaining shipbuilding and English Electric interests, with further acquisitions extending its reach into computing and telecommunications.

Recalled resistance to further Vickers purchases centres on government concern about concentrated industrial power.

Proposed East India Company connections link early arms manufacture with capital, cannon demand and imperial commerce.

Probably a Flight III equivalent, with improved equipment and increasingly crowded ships comparable to later Arleigh Burke development.

Yes, but none of the major refits were seriously carried out.

Yes. Recurring investigations had to weigh the smaller shell's destructive effect and whether fire control could use its extra range.

A recalled 1918 eight-inch experiment pursued extreme range using a Vickers gun originally intended for Russia.

Shorter flight time could improve hit probability, but no firm crossover point is established.

Existing language skills and translators helped, while supply adaptation, gun replacement and practical machinery repair addressed equipment differences.

Churchill and Cunningham's influence was accompanied by pressure to provide enough carriers for Pacific operations and a possible invasion of Japan.

Yes. The recalled proposal placed British carriers where kamikazes would encounter them first, with an estimated 12-to-18-hour benefit for the American carriers.

Limited treaty tonnage forced navies to balance carrier numbers, armour and aircraft capacity according to their expected operating areas.

Malta and Midway illustrate the ability to combine large air groups and substantial flight-deck armour beyond earlier treaty limits.

Loaded aircraft weights pressured flight-deck design before jets became the dominant concern.

Pressure to abandon wood came earlier, through aircraft weight and fire concerns in British wartime practice.

Accelerated Admiral-class construction is suggested, with several completions putting pressure on the postwar treaty settlement.

Yes, particularly given the time available to provide the submarine facilities.

A design allegedly revised until too heavy to float is offered tentatively, but its name remains unclear.

Lighter structures could reduce topweight and improve traverse, while larger gains require machinery changes and the fiction need not obey ordinary engineering.

It would be an unnecessarily complicated light cruiser, with crowded loading arrangements and hull dimensions working against the dense armament.

Merchant-derived types could return to commercial work, while warship types could perform continuing peacetime naval duties.

Japan would lose another cruiser, while the Marine unit would probably become famous and inspire a film.

A remembered meeting distinguishes the appearance of protection from the ability to provide it.

Firing reveals the battery, and ships are judged generally favoured in the exchange.

Satellite and online-investigation anecdotes illustrate what civilians can infer from visible clues and affordable equipment.

The existing labels already convey roles within each navy's system. Capability letters would become unwieldy, and aircraft designations also vary between countries.

Yes, a Gulf War helicopter kill with a laser-guided bomb is recalled.

Boise and New Orleans are the examples eventually offered, following uncertainty about the date restriction and what counts as surviving without sinking.

Sea Lion's proposed barge landings face tidal delays, exposed unloading and fortified ports before the invaders can establish an army ashore.

In this account, legal powers and debt made breakup possible after wartime losses had weakened the company.

The Petroleum Warfare Department's fuel-on-water experiments are recalled, with the test setting uncertain between bogs and very muddy lakes.

Fire each six-gun turret in groups of three or divide it into two triple arrangements. The proposed loading improvements become easier only if the requirement to retain every gun is relaxed.

The recommended starting point is A Short History of Naval and Marine Engineering by Edgar C. Smith.

Probably: a fleet on that scale is expected to require a correspondingly larger basing system.

Personal favourites include ambitious early American battleships, French designs, Graf Zeppelin, Yubari and American cruisers, with affection for their appearance or ingenuity surviving criticism of their performance.

A disagreement over small Sea Control Ships leads into criticism of labels that describe an intended mission more clearly than a ship's type.

A substantial amount of cork could be fitted and would affect torpedo damage, but no estimate of the protection is given.

The first and second rates would fare well and the frigates would become very powerful, though Africa-type third rates would be comparatively light in firepower and the expense would be substantial.

Ships would sail around Africa, and ship designs would probably adapt to that route. Whether the canal could be cleaned up remains open.

Britain and Japan would draw much closer in opposition, and American interests in China could bring the United States into that grouping.

Compressed timelines and a national focus can obscure long campaigns and multinational operations in historical films.

Russia's resources are doubtful, and military strength would require fiscal and political reforms that outside funding alone could not supply.

Most major fleets are judged fairly balanced. Germany's weak cruiser force and American gaps in destroyer and later cruiser procurement are the main exceptions.