World of Warships Colab 1, Questions & U Class subs: Second 9 of the 36hr Historiophon Part 2/4

Competing interpretations of an unresolved British capital-ship design weigh triple-turret studies against an 18-inch gun programme that produced hardware.

The Queen Elizabeth class supplied a benchmark for later super-dreadnought design, including Nagato.

The carrier duel contrasts Béarn's battleship armour and casemate guns with Independence's cruiser origins and weak secondary armament.

Thirty knots is the speed given here.

It commemorates Afridi's first captain, who helped establish the Tribal class's motto and esprit de corps.

One on each side; Tiger has two in the comparison.

An uneven destroyer screen lets torpedo attacks decide a game framed around Jutland's capital ships.

His signalling was the problem.

The VIP escort's heavy ships leave it without the smoke cover that smaller escorts could provide.

Once the game's protected ship is lost, Scharnhorst's speed offers a better option than continuing against Rodney and Queen Elizabeth.

Added bulges without an engine upgrade are proposed as the explanation, and the later inspection identifies bulges on the game's Oklahoma.

They give escorts useful long-range striking power in the surface fight and add another offensive layer to the carrier group.

Operation Hermes raises questions about German fuel supply, absent opposing fleets, and the stronger escort that advance intelligence should bring.

A one-percent hit chance illustrates the tension between historical gunnery probabilities and the pace of an arcade naval battle.

Cunningham, Vian, and Jellicoe are discussed, with Broke as an earlier gunnery analogue whose mathematical approach differed.

They would welcome them enthusiastically.

Those experiments are not confirmed; an 8-inch Paveway shell is recalled as a fielded example, with an explicit qualification about the participant's knowledge.

Michelangelo's paper provenance does not resolve disagreement over whether its short citadel leaves enough machinery space for 33 knots.

It would lose its historical reason to deploy in support of Italy's North African campaign; the proposed Italian civil war keeps Italy out of that conflict.

German use of Liberty ships is rejected here; reused game models explain the scene more readily.

The class is recalled as rated for 32 knots, with about 33 knots suggested at full power; the lower game speed remains unexplained.

Their submarines did in the Indian Ocean, where Italian submarines also operated.

The brief reply tentatively favours the Royal Navy, without establishing a detailed deployment history.

Probably by the early 1920s, after the preceding capital ships had driven the necessary dockyard expansion and established the design lineage.

Royal Navy warships entered the Second World War with unusually heavy anti-aircraft batteries, before combat experience pushed other navies toward similar additions.

There is apparent deck space, but main-gun blast constrains its use; the exchange leaves simultaneous firing requirements disputed.

Magazine separation and substitute insulation provide a proposed explanation for one part of the Littorio class's dispersion problems.

The series receives an enthusiastic recommendation, followed by another participant's reflections on reading Civil War history.

On the initial battlecruiser interpretation, destroying the carriers while under air attack would be an extraordinary achievement.

A permanently fitted .50-calibre machine gun is the preferred minimum, giving it a weapon larger than a rifle-calibre machine gun.

Very little; a fleet strong enough for both tasks would still resemble the historical German program and would still draw a Royal Navy response.

Opinions differ about its appearance, but its prospects for service are judged poor after the Cold War ended.

Remote human control could plausibly have been pushed into late World War II, while fully centralized automated control required postwar electronics.

A future Type 83 is suggested, but both the name and cruiser classification remain speculative rather than settled program facts.

Start with missions, geography, allies, and the peer threat; globally dispersed navies need proportionally more escorts and cruisers than fleets operating close to home.

Crews changed the fuel-air mixture or added material to the exhaust uptakes to produce visible smoke.

Combined decoys address several sensors, but improving image recognition could require additional ways to obscure or disable a seeker.

It is considered physically possible at roughly 200,000 to 300,000 tons, but low speed, inadequate protection against its own guns, and a rate of fire measured in rounds per hour make it impractical.

A Roanoke-like three-turret monitor would probably overwhelm Virginia through multiple heavy guns and much greater firepower than the original Monitor carried.

Disruptive patterns are suggested as a temporary countermeasure, based on their effects on publicly known recognition systems.

Distinctive dazzle patterns are suggested, while predictable national colours would make recognition easier.

Probably not: pykrete is judged tough but brittle, and protection would depend largely on the vessel's enormous mass.

A command cruiser, potentially a nuclear guided-missile cruiser (CGN); the value of its conventional gun battery remains disputed.

The proposed battery is expected to overwhelm Virginia, but the recalled failure of Roanoke's recoil mountings complicates the wider design argument.

Brazilian participation could raise overall limits and give Britain leverage to seek separate allocations for the Dominions, complicating the American position under the Monroe Doctrine.

The hypothetical calculation discusses fourteen Japanese ships against twenty each for Britain and America, before adding allied fleets.

The Japanese Kai is considered retired in this November 2024 exchange, while other Phantom variants are reported still operating elsewhere.

A peer war would create a severe escort shortage, making large numbers of uncrewed or minimally crewed protective vessels increasingly necessary.

Roughly 250,000 to 300,000 tons, with stability, magazine volume, wing-turret protection, and ammunition handling dominating the design.

She would likely be simpler and more buildable, but German pressure for heavy surface armament could still reintroduce serious complexity and top-weight problems.

Her attitude is characterized as fascination that alternates between affection and hostility, alongside sharp treatment of army officers.

The response distinguishes hostile control from neutral operation that preserves merchant passage; it supplies no definite timetable or answer about permanent occupation.

No confirmed comparison is established. For a hypothetical dedicated train attack, the tentative preference is the A-10 with targeting pods and guided weapons.

Only modestly, because early automatic systems still needed substantial supervision in case they failed.

The November 2024 assessment is that solar and battery capacity remain inadequate, while a reactor-powered alternative would still face autonomy and weapons-control questions.

Costs changed little in this account because charges shifted to processing fees; another legal challenge would require funding and its outcome was uncertain.

Breaking the line creates two local enfilading positions at the breach and disrupts the enemy formation, provided the attacking columns keep advancing.

The judgment is that Zeros would inflict severe losses, while a heavy-bomber version would sacrifice the design's takeoff qualities.

Larger waterways would not settle treaty restrictions or provide the infrastructure and working practices for large warships; political support could still motivate the investment.

Tomahawk-style land-attack weapons, Harpoons, and 18-inch gunfire would greatly strengthen attacks on airfields, warships, and land positions, while missile defence would still require escorts.

Reliability and integration matter as well as the existence of a concept; supporting machinery must fit and its power demand adds further weight and space.

Optical recognition and multimode seekers are expected to keep evolving, while electronic warfare still depends on detailed knowledge of opposing sensors and countermeasures.

If this refers to the earlier 18-inch design, the Nelson-style arrangement would improve it very little.

A three-boat experiment for training and confined waters expanded into the U and V classes and influenced later British submarine designs.

Small boats let a navy buy more submarine hulls within an aggregate tonnage allowance.

Laurence's carrier and aircraft-production appointments place his submarine work within a broader technical career.

A 1926 Royal Navy committee concluded that named submarines supported morale after letter-and-number boats left crews feeling expendable.

Undine's fourth war patrol ended after a leak and lost hydrophones left her unable to monitor German minesweepers before a damaging explosion.

Unity sank within minutes of a collision while leaving for a Norway patrol, as two men stayed behind so shipmates could escape.

The claimed distinction concerns both boats being underwater; attacks on surfaced submarines are a separate category.

Ursula survived the war after British patrols and a Soviet transfer, including an attack aimed at Leipzig that hit escort F9 instead.

Dissatisfaction with oilskins led Ursula's navigating officer to adapt motorcycling clothing into a practical submarine watchkeeping suit.

Later U-class groups developed the hull shape and carried four internal bow tubes with four reloads, compared with the first boats' six tubes and ten torpedoes.

Umpire sank only nine days after commissioning when wartime blackout conditions produced a convoy collision, yet several sailors escaped from the wreck.

Una's career combined attacks on Axis shipping, a politically sensitive sinking, a commando mission during Operation Pedestal, and later ASW training.

Unbeaten disappeared after a Biscay patrol and a special landing in Spain, probably in an attack by a British Wellington.

Unique vanished during an October 1942 Biscay patrol after leaving her escort off the Scillies and failed to reach Gibraltar.

Upholder completed 24 patrols and sank about 93,000 tons before disappearing on her final patrol, probably in an Italian minefield.

Upright survived repeated depth-charge attacks and sank the Italian light cruiser Armando Diaz before being scrapped in 1946.

Urchin served Poland as Sokół before returning to the Royal Navy and surviving into the late 1940s.

Urge vanished while leaving Malta for Alexandria with crew and passengers; the 2019 wreck discovery explained her sudden loss.

Usk's short Mediterranean career ended in a probable mine loss near Cape Bon in April 1941, with the exact date uncertain.

A small gap between the speeds cited above and below water illustrates the emphasis on submerged performance.

Utmost's disappearance is linked to a possible attack by Groppo while returning to Malta, illustrating the danger once a submarine is detected.

Operational urgency sent several U-class boats to sea under P numbers before formal naming, and some were lost before the ceremony could occur.

U-class numbers helped sustain Mediterranean operations and reduced the need to divert larger S- and T-class boats.

The case for earlier and larger U-class orders rests on predictable wartime losses, coastal requirements, and the difficulty of replacing trained crews.

One explanation links the U class's small, quiet design with the Royal Navy's experience of hunting submarines.

Yes. They understood the danger and continued because they knew the importance of the work.

The U class lacked Far Eastern endurance, and removing treaty tonnage limits is expected to strengthen the Royal Navy's preference for larger Pacific boats.

Only tightly: the large guns and their sophisticated but space-hungry breech mechanism left little room inside the existing installation.

A separate ironclad game would work better, using the existing mechanics at historically more suitable ranges and drawing on the era's diverse fleets.

It could, if their arrival remained secret; publicity would change the situation, and long-range missiles would create a threat far beyond gun range.

Yes, as a rapid conversion, but container dimensions, targeting, stability, and launch-exhaust arrangements would constrain the design.

The proposed ships prompt Japanese and American counterparts and a new large-cruiser treaty category. In the interpretation offered here, Britain still seeks to leave the Anglo-Japanese alliance.

Increasing the hypothetical American cruiser gun beyond 9.2 inches risks crossing into shells that take too long to handle at cruiser rates.

Yes, in this scenario, because German gun-making infrastructure constrains the armament available for their replacements.

Rapid 9.2-inch gunfire would force difficult choices between replacing older battlecruisers and rebuilding their protection or gun mountings.

A high-velocity 9.2-inch cruiser gun could reach extreme range, but finding and maintaining a firing solution against a moving ship remains the limiting problem.

That outcome is considered plausible, with the treaty tonnage setting the room available; Japan might try to fit fifteen 9.2-inch guns into 20,000 tons.

Modern wartime station cruisers could survive after 1945 as cheaper command ships and flagships.

Yes, their existing industrial and design lineage is expected to preserve the calibre, and smaller 6-inch cruisers still have a role.

It would probably require a more sensitive rangefinder mounted higher in the ship.

The hypothetical 9.2-inch requirement is expected to exceed the scope of a Mogami-style turret exchange.

The worked example uses a 20,000-ton ceiling for station cruisers and separate aggregate allowances for cruisers, capital ships and carriers; ships below 10,000 tons would be considered for later London limits.

No clear worst type is identified; the greater problem was using submarines outside the environments for which they were designed.

The response is to use a T-class boat, which was already designed for Far Eastern and Pacific service.

No, they received the same pay as other submarine crews.

They generally used Paxman Ricardo diesel generators, with improved later versions and occasional alternatives according to supply.

No single theater matches it: the Baltic parallels the concentrated ASW threat, while Taiwan and the South China Sea offer different combinations of restricted water, shelves, and deep-ocean maneuver space.

A strong inward current let submarines enter the Mediterranean submerged but made escape nearly impossible for German boats whose underwater speed could not overcome it.

Aircraft density and the need to disappear below visual detection favoured a small, quick-diving submarine.

Large uncrewed underwater vehicles are approaching U-class dimensions because similar range and payload demands lead back to a proven small-submarine scale.

Britain would probably build more destroyers and T-class submarines, while the United States could build longer destroyer series with less pressure to overload each individual ship.

An escort sighting alone would be too late; a second carrier with aircraft airborne could give warning and combine air attacks with a stronger destroyer screen.

A combined air and destroyer attack narrows escape routes and can turn one damaging hit into an opening for follow-up attacks.

Geared turbines were lighter, while turbo-electric drive traded machinery weight and conversion losses for rapid shaft control, flexible power distribution, and survivability.

Shared generating capacity and quieter machinery explain several operational attractions of modern electric propulsion.

The November 2024 comparison weighs acoustic performance, crewing, existing Norwegian industry links, and proximity to British yards.

The account describes requirements growing beyond what the selected hull could carry, with detail limited by possible consultancy work.

Probably very little by caliber alone; the breech and mounting arrangement would control much of the actual diameter.

Better integration of long-range air power would matter more, because reconnaissance and air cover constrained how effectively the Italian fleet could operate.

No. Nine rapid-fire guns already provide formidable output, and the extra turrets would consume weight better used for armor and fleet systems.

As a successful carrier that did its job, though her existence would imply far-reaching changes to Britain's carrier fleet.

No source is identified. A participant recalls it as a range extender that could not replace replenishment.

Downward movement brings gravity and elevation problems; sideways movement consumes turret width, so changing direction does not remove the installation tradeoff.

Local people are expected to protect her at Prussia Cove in this counterfactual, without a specific stabilization method being proposed.

Theatre scale, intelligence access, and delegation explain the case for Nimitz commanding from Hawaii.

Recalled engagement orders prompt a brief consideration of the danger to carriers operating separately.

His published naval ideas would remain, but the participants leave the effect on the Great White Fleet and naval expansion uncertain.

Start with specialist ship-modeling references, then use collections at Greenwich or Kew for authoritative plans, while expecting access and reproduction costs.

A researcher-funded scan prompts a proposal for subsequent free public access.

Department-specific forms and invoice requirements add time to purchases in the participants' own workplace accounts.

They used ships and facilities around the country, with reservists training in vessels such as sloops and minelayers within the RNR and RNVR.

It was folded into the RNR, and some former RNVR culture survived; the reply does not fully explain their earlier recruitment differences.

Their sensors, radar fire control, and trained crews make the battle extremely one-sided, provided commanders avoid serious tactical mistakes.

Information synthesis and officers' willingness to use it are central to the improvement in night-action command.

No. The scenario changes only the cruisers.