Re: Pocket Battleships

On Mon, 27 Jul 1998 KueckH@aol.com wrote:

> They're called "Panzerschiffe" (Armoured Ships) in german and were 
> classed as Heavy Cruisers towards the end of WW2.
> Panzerschiffe were no battleships, but a new class of ships between 
> Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers. They were optimized for commerce
> raiding and not to fight other warships above cruiser size. I don't
know 
> of any official (english) designation for them.

The problem with designations designed by A is that sometimes B builds
something that doesn't quite fit the parameters... The "pocket
battleships" is one such case.

The correct answer ofcourse is that there is no official English
designation for a German ship, it's their ship and they can call it
whatever they like to.

The designation system arose from the naval treaties of the era: 10000
tons and max 8" guns was classed as heavy cruisers, anything heavier
being
classed as capital ships -- this lead to a very distinct gap in the
designs as if you were going to use up your treaty allotment of capital
ships, it made no sense to pull your punches with a 15000 ton vessel or
somesuch.

The treaties also caused very interesting attempts to "bend the rules",
including a French sub with 8" guns.

Germany, OTOH, wanted their stuff to be classed as CA because they were
under very strict limitations. So they lied about the tonnage etc.

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