There was, and indeed still is, a lot of condemnation of Fisher for not building the Renown’s as ships with eight guns. However, no one behind that criticism ever asked the question as to, under wartime conditions, whether or not it would have been the proper use of available resources to build an eight gun ship; bearing in mind that if the ship was to be worth building at all, then it needed to be completed in a timeframe short enough to allow it have a meaningful impact in wartime naval operations. A normal eight gun capital ship would take longer to build (an absolute minimum of two years by Fisher’s estimation), and consume even more scarce resources, than a six gun ship. Therefore, it could possibly have been an investment that could have proven to have critically negative impacts on other wartime operations due to the continuous draw on available resources over such a long period; other operations that may result in such a long term construction project being suspended for long periods of time and therefore becoming a pointless endeavour.
Hood and her three sisters are the prime example of doing things the way Fisher’s critics suggested they should have been done. Laid down in 1916, Hood completed over a year and a half after the war had ended, making her construction pointless, particularly as wartime developments ensured her design was hopelessly obsolete by the time of the armistice. Hood and her three sisters consumed a vast amount of very scarce resources during the war and her sisters only ended up being scrapped on the slip. All in all, the Hood program was a truly colossus waste of resources that seriously crippled Britain’s ability to respond to the U-boat threat once it got into its stride. The Hood project also demonstrates the administrative competence of the critics who demanded an 8x15-inch ship: it proved their core criticism of Fisher’s wartime capital ship projects to be completely without any merit whatsoever.
Building four 4x15-inch gun, 19,000 ton battlecruisers would have maximised the return on the allocation of scarce resources as this size of ship could be built far faster (an estimated 11 to 12 months) than anything larger and more powerful; and up to four could be built utilising otherwise unused 15-inch turrets. Going to three turrets cut the possible force that could be built in half, reducing operational capability by an even greater percentage, and it would take longer for the reduced force to get into service (an estimated 15 months). However, unlike Hood, they actually did get into service well before the wars end. The fact that they didn’t undergo any real trial by fire to justify their construction is more a commentary on the failure of Royal Navy wartime leadership than any failings with the ships themselves.
The leading criticism that four, or even six, guns were inadequate for salvo firing simply does not stand up to scrutiny. Many of the professional critics at the time were advocates of the pre-dreadnought type of battleships, vessels which only mounted four guns themselves; which does indicate the hypocritical nature of this particular criticism. Granted, these particular professionals considered the pre-dreadnoughts rapid-firing 6-inch armament to be the decisive weapon of the pre-dreadnought type battleship, but by the time criticism of Renown and Repulse began, it was well established by bitter experience that most capital ship engagements took place well outside the effective range of rapid-firing 6-inch guns; leaving the cherished pre-dreadnought battleships with only four heavy guns to contribute to a capital ship action (they were denied even this contribution as their inadequate speed saw them relegated to secondary duties).
Even Jellicoe, one of the leading opponents to any capital ship having less than eight guns, freely admitted that four guns was the minimum necessary for an effective salvo and Fisher provided ships that met that minimum requirement (and with the Renown’s, exceeded it). Many historians, and non-gunnery professionals, have jumped on Jellicoe’s criticism of Fisher’s wartime capital ship builds, possibly without understanding the nuances of Jellicoe’s criticism and almost certainly without understanding the gunnery potential inherent in the tactic of concentration fire.
Generally, all going well, the reloading cycle of a 15-inch gun is no more than 40 seconds (although reloading rates as low as 32 seconds have been recorded). Therefore, a 15-inch gun can add its shell to a salvo at least every 40 seconds provided that the fall of shot from the previous salvo has fallen within this time frame to allow for spotting and adjustment of aim. At the range of 16,000 yards (which was considered post-war to be the average WW1 battleline range) flight of time for a 15-inch shell is 26.6 seconds. Assuming, perhaps, up to 10 seconds for adjustment of aim from spotting the previous salvo, theoretically, a 4x15-inch gun ship can just about maintain a timely rate of salvo-fire at that battle-range (as the range extends beyond 16,000 yards, maintaining a timely salvo rate becomes easier as flight times become longer). However, in practice, hiccups, such as misfires etc., can result in one or more guns missing a salvo resulting in unacceptably weak salvoes that greatly reduced hitting probability. A 6x15-inch armed ship has a 50% reserve above the minimum salvo and can temporarily lose up to two guns to mishaps without suffering the issue of firing salvos that are too weak to be effective.
Therefore, for ranges from about 16,000 yards and up, criticism of the Renown’s having only six guns have little of substance behind them, and Jellicoe’s comments on the subject are taken out of context as, when Jellicoe made those comments, general fighting ranges were expected to be a much shorter 10,000 yards, where time of flight of a 15-inch shell was only 15.16 seconds and the second salvo could only be fired after a serious delay following the adjustment onto target following the spotting returns. A capital ship unable to shoot within a reasonable amount of time after the spotting results came in was always going to be disadvantaged in a gunnery duel. This is why Jellicoe did not like ships with less than eight guns. By dividing the gun battery in half, a nominal (mishaps also affected eight or ten gun ships resulting in weak salvos) 4+ gun salvo was ready to promptly fire once the spotting returns came in. A 4x15-inch, or 6x15-inch, gun ship would always be at a disadvantage at ranges under 16,000 yards against a ship with 8+ broadside guns.
However, Fisher was well aware of this. In his more normal designs, that did indeed mount 8+ guns, Fisher always advocated a closing battle where a ship should sneak as close a possible to an enemy before fire was opened. Therefore, these designs emphasised low profile attributes that reduced silhouette as much a possible. With Rhadamanthus (and the following Onslaught concept Large Light Cruisers) Fisher requested increased freeboard for improved seakeeping: in effect requesting increased silhouette while also requesting none of his usual low profile demands, such as telescopic pole masts, instead accepting the standard, highly visible, tripod mast with aloft fire-control without comment. Fisher also emphasised the very long-range of the 15-inch gun of 24,500 yards while also demanding that the secondary battery of 4-inch guns range out to an unprecedented (for such a light calibre) 14,000 yards. For the first time ever, Fisher asked for a ship design specifically for fighting at genuinely long ranges where the limited number of main guns was not an issue when firing salvoes. This is the nuance of these emergency wartime designs that has escaped notice by almost all commentators. The unprecedented long-range accuracy of the 15-inch gun is what allowed capital ships to be built with such a limited number of heavy guns and Fisher jumped on the possibilities that this presented.
The high-speed of Fisher’s designs combined with the potential of concentration fire was the gunnery ace Fisher had up his sleeve to adequately arm these designs for closer ranged battles. Fisher never advocated high-speed capital ships fighting in a line. He always tried to endow his ships with a substantial speed superiority to allow them gain the tactical advantage of position. A speed of 32 knots allowed them place themselves in positions of advantage against slower adversaries; such as the German battlecruisers. As the Germans were firm advocates of line of battle, and as the concentrated British battlecruiser force had no speed advantage to fight their German opposites in anything other than a line of battle, the large speed superiority of the Rhadamanthus’ would allow a pair of them to act independently (as the battlecruisers scouts they should be acting independently anyway), and attack, in cooperation, the single enemy vessel at either end of the enemy line; a line likely already engaged with a British battlecruiser line. Two vessels, whether 4x15-inch or 6x15-inch, acting as one gunnery unit by using concentration fire techniques, can deliver rapid salvoes at least every twenty seconds against their target; giving them the same gunnery capability as single ships with eight or twelve guns available on the broadside.
Of course, concentration fire techniques can be used with equal facility at long-range as well. When it is understood that Fisher’s 4x15-inch wartime emergency capital ship designs had the same salvo capability, when paired as one gunnery unit, as the most powerful pre-war designs of the Queen Elizabeth and Royal Sovereign classes, their long derided armament is finally placed in the correct context (the 6x15-inch designs, when acting as a single gunnery unit, could actually outperform a Queen Elizabeth or Royal Sovereign in salvo firing). A single vessel carrying 8x15-inch guns is undoubtedly a more cost effective and efficient gunnery unit overall, but the possibility of completing such a ship in time to impact the course of the war was extremely low. On the other hand, splitting the armament between two much smaller ships would allow the vessel to be completed in a timeframe that allowed them to potentially have an impact on the outcome of the war and, when utilised correctly, still provided the same gunnery capability as a single 8x15-inch vessel. Also, the fact that the two lesser vessels were endowed with a high-speed potential in rough sea enabled them to fill in a capability gap in the Royal Navy’s order of battle; providing a different type of cost effectiveness and efficiency that the single 8x15-inch vessel could not match.
It can be pointed out that many critics opposed to Fisher’s wartime capital ship builds had argued against the Dreadnought concept on the grounds that placing so many heavy guns in one ship was a case of putting too many eggs in one basket and a better policy would be to split those guns between two ships: This at a time when concentration fire had yet to be developed by the Royal Navy. When Fisher actually did this with his wartime builds, these “critics” then argued the opposite. Historians have been too accepting of criticism against Fisher, and too willing to repeat it without checking, not recognising that much of it was solely down to personal hatred of the Man and had no technical basis or validity to it.
An oddity that needs to be noted is that Fisher distinctly specified that 4x15-inch Rhadamanthus was not to be equipped with torpedoes. This is unusual, as Fisher was a firm believer in the potential value of capital ship mounted torpedo armament for armoured ship duels. The lack of torpedo armament in the 4x15-inch design is possibly an indicator that Fisher was expecting these vessels to fight at ranges far beyond what torpedoes could ever reach and that such battles would be entirely “stand-off” affairs and not the closing engagements Fisher had favoured up till then. Fisher did reincorporate a torpedo armament in the 6x15-inch design, but the two broadside tubes specified were a far cry from the eight broadside tubes of his pre-war designs and can only be considered a “token” torpedo armament in comparison.
That became a bit rambling, did it not? Anyway I hope you all had a good Christmas! QuoteLikeDislikeShare Читайте, цікаво що побачите ви?
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Hood and her three sisters are the prime example of doing things the way Fisher’s critics suggested they should have been done. Laid down in 1916, Hood completed over a year and a half after the war had ended, making her construction pointless, particularly as wartime developments ensured her design was hopelessly obsolete by the time of the armistice. Hood and her three sisters consumed a vast amount of very scarce resources during the war and her sisters only ended up being scrapped on the slip. All in all, the Hood program was a truly colossus waste of resources that seriously crippled Britain’s ability to respond to the U-boat threat once it got into its stride. The Hood project also demonstrates the administrative competence of the critics who demanded an 8x15-inch ship: it proved their core criticism of Fisher’s wartime capital ship projects to be completely without any merit whatsoever.
Building four 4x15-inch gun, 19,000 ton battlecruisers would have maximised the return on the allocation of scarce resources as this size of ship could be built far faster (an estimated 11 to 12 months) than anything larger and more powerful; and up to four could be built utilising otherwise unused 15-inch turrets. Going to three turrets cut the possible force that could be built in half, reducing operational capability by an even greater percentage, and it would take longer for the reduced force to get into service (an estimated 15 months). However, unlike Hood, they actually did get into service well before the wars end. The fact that they didn’t undergo any real trial by fire to justify their construction is more a commentary on the failure of Royal Navy wartime leadership than any failings with the ships themselves.
The leading criticism that four, or even six, guns were inadequate for salvo firing simply does not stand up to scrutiny. Many of the professional critics at the time were advocates of the pre-dreadnought type of battleships, vessels which only mounted four guns themselves; which does indicate the hypocritical nature of this particular criticism. Granted, these particular professionals considered the pre-dreadnoughts rapid-firing 6-inch armament to be the decisive weapon of the pre-dreadnought type battleship, but by the time criticism of Renown and Repulse began, it was well established by bitter experience that most capital ship engagements took place well outside the effective range of rapid-firing 6-inch guns; leaving the cherished pre-dreadnought battleships with only four heavy guns to contribute to a capital ship action (they were denied even this contribution as their inadequate speed saw them relegated to secondary duties).
Even Jellicoe, one of the leading opponents to any capital ship having less than eight guns, freely admitted that four guns was the minimum necessary for an effective salvo and Fisher provided ships that met that minimum requirement (and with the Renown’s, exceeded it). Many historians, and non-gunnery professionals, have jumped on Jellicoe’s criticism of Fisher’s wartime capital ship builds, possibly without understanding the nuances of Jellicoe’s criticism and almost certainly without understanding the gunnery potential inherent in the tactic of concentration fire.
Generally, all going well, the reloading cycle of a 15-inch gun is no more than 40 seconds (although reloading rates as low as 32 seconds have been recorded). Therefore, a 15-inch gun can add its shell to a salvo at least every 40 seconds provided that the fall of shot from the previous salvo has fallen within this time frame to allow for spotting and adjustment of aim. At the range of 16,000 yards (which was considered post-war to be the average WW1 battleline range) flight of time for a 15-inch shell is 26.6 seconds. Assuming, perhaps, up to 10 seconds for adjustment of aim from spotting the previous salvo, theoretically, a 4x15-inch gun ship can just about maintain a timely rate of salvo-fire at that battle-range (as the range extends beyond 16,000 yards, maintaining a timely salvo rate becomes easier as flight times become longer). However, in practice, hiccups, such as misfires etc., can result in one or more guns missing a salvo resulting in unacceptably weak salvoes that greatly reduced hitting probability. A 6x15-inch armed ship has a 50% reserve above the minimum salvo and can temporarily lose up to two guns to mishaps without suffering the issue of firing salvos that are too weak to be effective.
Therefore, for ranges from about 16,000 yards and up, criticism of the Renown’s having only six guns have little of substance behind them, and Jellicoe’s comments on the subject are taken out of context as, when Jellicoe made those comments, general fighting ranges were expected to be a much shorter 10,000 yards, where time of flight of a 15-inch shell was only 15.16 seconds and the second salvo could only be fired after a serious delay following the adjustment onto target following the spotting returns. A capital ship unable to shoot within a reasonable amount of time after the spotting results came in was always going to be disadvantaged in a gunnery duel. This is why Jellicoe did not like ships with less than eight guns. By dividing the gun battery in half, a nominal (mishaps also affected eight or ten gun ships resulting in weak salvos) 4+ gun salvo was ready to promptly fire once the spotting returns came in. A 4x15-inch, or 6x15-inch, gun ship would always be at a disadvantage at ranges under 16,000 yards against a ship with 8+ broadside guns.
However, Fisher was well aware of this. In his more normal designs, that did indeed mount 8+ guns, Fisher always advocated a closing battle where a ship should sneak as close a possible to an enemy before fire was opened. Therefore, these designs emphasised low profile attributes that reduced silhouette as much a possible. With Rhadamanthus (and the following Onslaught concept Large Light Cruisers) Fisher requested increased freeboard for improved seakeeping: in effect requesting increased silhouette while also requesting none of his usual low profile demands, such as telescopic pole masts, instead accepting the standard, highly visible, tripod mast with aloft fire-control without comment. Fisher also emphasised the very long-range of the 15-inch gun of 24,500 yards while also demanding that the secondary battery of 4-inch guns range out to an unprecedented (for such a light calibre) 14,000 yards. For the first time ever, Fisher asked for a ship design specifically for fighting at genuinely long ranges where the limited number of main guns was not an issue when firing salvoes. This is the nuance of these emergency wartime designs that has escaped notice by almost all commentators. The unprecedented long-range accuracy of the 15-inch gun is what allowed capital ships to be built with such a limited number of heavy guns and Fisher jumped on the possibilities that this presented.
The high-speed of Fisher’s designs combined with the potential of concentration fire was the gunnery ace Fisher had up his sleeve to adequately arm these designs for closer ranged battles. Fisher never advocated high-speed capital ships fighting in a line. He always tried to endow his ships with a substantial speed superiority to allow them gain the tactical advantage of position. A speed of 32 knots allowed them place themselves in positions of advantage against slower adversaries; such as the German battlecruisers. As the Germans were firm advocates of line of battle, and as the concentrated British battlecruiser force had no speed advantage to fight their German opposites in anything other than a line of battle, the large speed superiority of the Rhadamanthus’ would allow a pair of them to act independently (as the battlecruisers scouts they should be acting independently anyway), and attack, in cooperation, the single enemy vessel at either end of the enemy line; a line likely already engaged with a British battlecruiser line. Two vessels, whether 4x15-inch or 6x15-inch, acting as one gunnery unit by using concentration fire techniques, can deliver rapid salvoes at least every twenty seconds against their target; giving them the same gunnery capability as single ships with eight or twelve guns available on the broadside.
Of course, concentration fire techniques can be used with equal facility at long-range as well. When it is understood that Fisher’s 4x15-inch wartime emergency capital ship designs had the same salvo capability, when paired as one gunnery unit, as the most powerful pre-war designs of the Queen Elizabeth and Royal Sovereign classes, their long derided armament is finally placed in the correct context (the 6x15-inch designs, when acting as a single gunnery unit, could actually outperform a Queen Elizabeth or Royal Sovereign in salvo firing). A single vessel carrying 8x15-inch guns is undoubtedly a more cost effective and efficient gunnery unit overall, but the possibility of completing such a ship in time to impact the course of the war was extremely low. On the other hand, splitting the armament between two much smaller ships would allow the vessel to be completed in a timeframe that allowed them to potentially have an impact on the outcome of the war and, when utilised correctly, still provided the same gunnery capability as a single 8x15-inch vessel. Also, the fact that the two lesser vessels were endowed with a high-speed potential in rough sea enabled them to fill in a capability gap in the Royal Navy’s order of battle; providing a different type of cost effectiveness and efficiency that the single 8x15-inch vessel could not match.
It can be pointed out that many critics opposed to Fisher’s wartime capital ship builds had argued against the Dreadnought concept on the grounds that placing so many heavy guns in one ship was a case of putting too many eggs in one basket and a better policy would be to split those guns between two ships: This at a time when concentration fire had yet to be developed by the Royal Navy. When Fisher actually did this with his wartime builds, these “critics” then argued the opposite. Historians have been too accepting of criticism against Fisher, and too willing to repeat it without checking, not recognising that much of it was solely down to personal hatred of the Man and had no technical basis or validity to it.
An oddity that needs to be noted is that Fisher distinctly specified that 4x15-inch Rhadamanthus was not to be equipped with torpedoes. This is unusual, as Fisher was a firm believer in the potential value of capital ship mounted torpedo armament for armoured ship duels. The lack of torpedo armament in the 4x15-inch design is possibly an indicator that Fisher was expecting these vessels to fight at ranges far beyond what torpedoes could ever reach and that such battles would be entirely “stand-off” affairs and not the closing engagements Fisher had favoured up till then. Fisher did reincorporate a torpedo armament in the 6x15-inch design, but the two broadside tubes specified were a far cry from the eight broadside tubes of his pre-war designs and can only be considered a “token” torpedo armament in comparison.
That became a bit rambling, did it not? Anyway I hope you all had a good Christmas!
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