Bruships: A Special - Questions/What If's till the Bru runs out?

Pulo Aura reversed the premise: armed merchantmen looked enough like warships to bluff a stronger French squadron into retreat.

Those missions make sea control useful by protecting commerce, opening routes, and enabling supplies and forces to move.

British yards normally used oak; emergency construction might use fir, and Indian yards could use excellent but expensive teak.

Escort carriers had the greatest individual effect, with long-range aircraft and HF/DF close behind and mass production enabling the wider system.

Probably, if Japan also stays out; Canadian production and a narrower war make victory plausible, but likely later.

They might have, because disrupting a coordinated air attack could make its individual elements much easier for the ships to evade or repel.

The Fuso class could draw on knowledge gained from the British-built Kongo while still expressing Japan's own developing naval intelligence and design practice.

A useful British conversion might take about a month, but the time depends on whether it must merely land helicopters or sustain a full squadron.

Keep selected ships in a sheltered warm-water reserve, protect their exposed systems, and avoid removing equipment that would slow reactivation.

The force itself was defensible, but its forward placement was not; an Indian Ocean base would have made it a stronger mobile deterrent.

Probably not soon; Soviet offensives would slow, but German logistics and manpower would still bind major forces to the Eastern Front.

Probably not; Japan's material shortages and imperial ambitions still pointed toward taking control of the Dutch East Indies.

Mostly because the name works; in operational terms it was a campaign and, more broadly, an entire theater.

Operations would become faster and safer, but the change assumes accompanying advances in landing aids, engines, and aircraft.

Yes; British Q-ships pretended to be damaged merchantmen so submarines would approach their concealed guns.

The later fleet might move to 16-inch guns sooner, giving the Queen Elizabeths, Revenges, and Nelsons a more standardized armament family.

Britain mostly believed it had won strategically, despite disappointment over the incomplete tactical result; other navies drew different lessons.

It could weaken it dramatically by turning the North Sea into an Allied air barrier between German yards and French Atlantic bases.

Reconnaissance, long-range attack, and fleet coordination would collapse toward visual, local control despite otherwise modern ships and aircraft.

Yes; several navies were reviving visual camouflage for regional deployments because it could still complicate an opponent's visual acquisition.

A generational turnover combined with seniority rules that kept talented junior officers from replacing weaker seniors during peace.

The more decisive preparation was to man the pillboxes protecting Singapore's water supply so the garrison was not forced to surrender for lack of water.

Probably not; both sides could contest and use the Baltic, but control would remain local rather than theater-wide.

It would accelerate the international caliber race, likely producing British 16-inch ships sooner and making 18-inch treaty designs far more plausible.

Because an entrenched German force in Norway's difficult terrain would make a renewed invasion disproportionately costly and complex.

They studied them seriously, and lessons such as the Royal Navy's focus on night fighting still paid off despite technological change.

Unicorn was an experimental first step, and her support role was subsequently carried into light fleet carriers such as Pioneer and Perseus.

Its sensors and precision weapons could disrupt British command and tip the fight, but it probably could not sink the armored battle line by itself.

Britain and Japan could form an exceptionally strong global naval partnership, but the United States would work hard to divide it.

The ships could be smaller or, more likely for the US Navy, substantially faster because less weight and space would be devoted to guns and ammunition.

Glorious left the main force and was caught after her captain failed to maintain the standard air patrol that could have warned of the German battlecruisers.

Probably not without a major engine overhaul and extensive work to reverse decades of deterioration.

It would likely add carriers and escorts while bringing the King George V and Lion programs substantially closer to operational strength.

Keep limited home and Mediterranean covering forces, then mass the remaining carriers, battleships, and submarines at Ceylon for operations against Japan.

Allied anti-submarine work would become much harder and more resource-intensive, but the Type XXI would not automatically restore decisive German success.

The fleet could retain command, but whether Beatty or Jellicoe survived might determine how aggressively it continued the battle.

Battleships, because cruisers can cover many battlecruiser missions while no smaller type fully replaces a fast, heavily protected capital ship.

Probably more than 50,000 tons for an 18-inch ship; 20-inch guns magnify barrel, handling, and structural problems sharply.

Yes; a 9.2-inch cruiser could provide the heavy hitting power, carrier escort, and presence absent from Britain's mainly six-inch cruiser fleet.

They could be lethal from a prepared ambush, but speed endurance, weapon limits, target suitability, and coordination make the result highly dependent on where they begin.

It would cause a massive technical leap, but reproduction limits and Imperial Germany's political choices would determine whether that knowledge stabilized or destabilized Europe.

A mobilized Nordic armed-neutrality bloc could make German invasion much harder and would probably receive British and French support.

The cruisers would be attacked too, but their radar watch and warnings might give ships in the harbor a better chance to prepare and fire back.

It would build many more 15-inch battleships and probably move to heavier guns, while naval aviation matured much more slowly without wartime pressure.

They calculate the future point where the target should be when the shells arrive, using mechanical fire-control computers to update the solution.

They probably would not survive the hit; the serious uncertainty is whether the railway gun could strike a moving ship at all.

Cheap mass escorts can create useful numbers, but a handful of capital ships must each deliver the full capability their battle-line role requires.

It was best understood as the last armored cruiser, enlarged from cruiser lineage rather than cut down from a battleship.

The basic aircraft remains recognizable, but the F-35's engine, cockpit, sensors, and helmet conceal changes that its silhouette does not show.

There was no knowable fixed threshold; a naval incident could activate national and allied responses that politics then made difficult to de-escalate.

Risk a landing near Genoa to cut across northern Italy, isolate German forces farther south, and avoid fighting through every prepared line on the peninsula.

Lion-class battleships backed by Tribal and Fletcher destroyers, Atlanta anti-aircraft cruisers, Town-class cruisers, and Alaska-class heavy support.

Close is dangerous for a destroyer, disturbing for a cruiser, and usually survivable for a battleship.

Chile and Brazil would probably defeat Argentina, especially if Chile received its super-dreadnought and Brazil retained the Minas Geraes class.

It was one possible mechanism discussed at the time, but the cause remained unknown pending evidence from the wreck and investigation.

Shokaku was strongest by day, Ark Royal at night, and Yorktown the best all-round compromise.

A conclusion can be logical within a narrow set of facts yet remain unproved when missing documents or unrecorded conversations hide part of the decision chain.

A proposed study asks what carrier fleet Britain might obtain by completing Hood's sisters Anson, Howe, and Rodney as conversions instead of rebuilding Courageous and Glorious.

Most U-boats could get below its useful range in deep water, but shallow choke points such as Gibraltar made the early system practical.

About 25,000 tons, heavily armed with missiles and guns, and possibly nuclear-powered to supply lasers and railguns.

Primarily by poor employment, command decisions, and damage control rather than a general failure of British carrier design.

The Royal Navy used them increasingly around 1936-37, and the US Navy followed not long afterward.

The battle becomes larger and costlier, but logistics and the range of the night engagement mean an American victory remains possible.

They would bring heavier guns but spend longer exposed to attack and consume more fuel, making greater losses on both sides likely.

No; realistic, unscripted exercises followed by honest analysis can expose and correct institutional failures without a war.

No; Hitler expected further concessions and misjudged the British and French commitment to Poland.

France assisted Britain by holding back important Exocet supplies from Argentina until after the war.

Yes; warships can be justified for compact, extremely valuable cargo that must get through quickly and securely.

It would probably win, most decisively in a radar-directed night action, but Japanese torpedoes could make the victory costly.

Primarily by operational doctrine, including how the carrier forces were grouped and the combat situations in which they were committed.

Armor does not make high-explosive fire harmless: blast strips exposed systems, injures crews, and repeated impacts can crack protection or overwhelm lighter ships.

Because the gas acts on the shell for longer, transferring more total energy even while its pressure gradually falls.

Victorious has a chance if her Sea Vixens intercept before launch; a large missile salvo getting through would create severe problems for the group.