Battlecruisers were large capital ships built in the first half of the 20th century. They were developed in the first decade of the century as the successor to the armoured cruiser, but their evolution was more closely linked to that of the dreadnought

Dreadnought

The dreadnought was the predominant type of 20th-century battleship. The first of the kind, the Royal Navy's had such an impact when launched in 1906 that similar battleships built after her were referred to as "dreadnoughts", and earlier battleships became known as pre-dreadnoughts...

 battleship

Battleship

A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...

. They were similar in size and cost to a battleship

Battleship

A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...

, but while they typically used the same large-calibre main armament as a battleship, battlecruisers sacrificed armour protection in exchange for speed.

Throughout the First World War

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, the battlecruiser was principally used to provide a fast and hard-hitting addition to a battleship fleet. Battlecruisers formed part of the navies of Britain

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, Germany and Japan

Imperial Japanese Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renunciation of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes...

 in World War I. While battlecruisers took part in several raids and skirmishes as well as the Battle of Jutland

Battle of Jutland

The Battle of Jutland was a naval battle between the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet during the First World War. The battle was fought on 31 May and 1 June 1916 in the North Sea near Jutland, Denmark. It was the largest naval battle and the only...

, the latter was the only pitched battle of the war between dreadnought battleships. By the end of the war, there were very few differences between the design of a battlecruiser and a fast battleship

Fast battleship

Historically, a fast battleship was a battleship which emphasized speed without - in concept - undo compromise of either armor or armament. The term is especially appropriate when applied to a design which was not only faster than the preceding battleship class, but faster than subsequent classes...

. Britain, Japan and the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 all designed battlecruisers after the end of World War I that were as heavily armed as a battleship, though faster and still not as heavily armoured. The Washington Naval Treaty

Washington Naval Treaty

The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, was an attempt to cap and limit, and "prevent 'further' costly escalation" of the naval arms race that had begun after World War I between various International powers, each of which had significant naval fleets. The treaty was...

, which limited capital ship construction from 1922 onwards, treated battleships and battlecruisers identically, and the new generation of battlecruisers planned was scrapped under the terms of the treaty.

From the 1930s, only the Royal Navy continued to use 'battlecruiser' as a classification for warships, for the WWI-era capital ships that remained in the fleet. Nevertheless, the fast, light capital ships developed by Germany and France of the Scharnhorst

Scharnhorst class battleship

The Scharnhorst class were the first capital ships, alternatively referred to as battlecruisers or battleships, built for the German Navy after World War I. The class comprised two vessels: the lead ship Scharnhorst and Gneisenau...

 and Dunkerque

Dunkerque class battleship

The Dunkerque class was a new type of warship of the French Navy built during the 1930s, labeled as 'fast battleships'. Not as large as other contemporary battleships, they were designed to counter the threat of the German pocket battleships of the Deutschland class. They had a specific main...

 classes are often referred to as battlecruisers, as they were as well armoured but smaller, and carried a lighter calibre of armament compared to follow-up designs, which were considered fast battleships.

The Second World War saw battlecruisers in action again, mostly consisting of modernized WWI ships and the fast battleships built in the 1930s. There was also renewed interest in large "cruiser killer" type warships, but few ever began construction (the exception being the American ), as construction of capital ships was curtailed in favor of more needed convoy escorts, aircraft carriers, and cargo ships. In the post–World War II era, only the Soviet have been described as battlecruisers.

First battlecruisers

The battlecruiser was developed by the British Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 in the first years of the twentieth century as a dramatic evolution of the armoured cruiser. In the late 1890s, technical developments including the introduction of Krupp face-hardened steel armour

Krupp armour

Krupp armour was a type of steel armour used in the construction of capital ships starting shortly before the end of the 19th century. It was developed by Germany's Krupp Arms Works in 1893 and quickly replaced Harvey armour as the primary method of protecting naval ships.The initial manufacturing...

 meant it was finally possible to build an armoured cruiser which could withstand the fire of 6-inch quick-firing guns. In 1896 and 1897, France and then Russia started to build large, fast armoured cruisers which outclassed all other cruisers afloat. Such ships were capable of threatening trade routes worldwide, or of working closely with a battleship fleet, and in some circumstances could even confront a battleship.

The Royal Navy was concerned about these ships. France and Russia had the second and third largest fleets in the world; they were also allies, and since the late 1880 British policy had been to have a large enough navy to be capable of defeating both simultaneously. The new designs of armoured cruiser might inflict immense damage on British trade worldwide in the event of a war. For this reason, the British began to build their own armoured cruisers, prompting the French and Russians to scale up their own construction.

The need to build large numbers of new and improved armoured cruisers alongside battleships placed great strains on the finances of the Royal Navy. In the period 1889-96 the Royal Navy spent £7.3 million on new large cruisers. From 1897 to 1904 it spent £26.9 million. There were also significant costs involved in paying for the men to crew the ships and facilities to support them. By 1903-4, it seemed politically impossible to expand the naval budget to keep buying the new cruisers that were required to maintain a sufficient margin of superiority over the Franco-Russian alliance.

In 1904, Admiral "Jackie" Fisher" was appointed as First Sea Lord

First Sea Lord

The First Sea Lord is the professional head of the Royal Navy and the whole Naval Service; it was formerly known as First Naval Lord. He also holds the title of Chief of Naval Staff, and is known by the abbreviations 1SL/CNS...

, the senior officer of the Royal Navy. Fisher had for some time thought about the development of a new fast armoured ship. He was very fond of the "second-class battleship" HMS Renown

HMS Renown (1895)

HMS Renown was a predreadnought battleship of the Royal Navy. Third and last of the lightly armed, long-range Centurion class, she had an upgraded design compared to her two sister ships HMS Centurion and HMS Barfleur....

, a lighter, faster battleship. As early as 1901, there is confusion in Fisher's writing about whether he saw the battleship or the cruiser as the model for future developments.

In the period 1902–1904 the mainstream of British naval thinking was clearly in favour of heavily armoured battleships, rather than the fast ships that Fisher favoured. A shift away from the mixed-calibre armament of the 1890s pre-dreadnought

Pre-dreadnought

Pre-dreadnought battleship is the general term for all of the types of sea-going battleships built between the mid-1890s and 1905. Pre-dreadnoughts replaced the ironclad warships of the 1870s and 1880s...

 to an "all-big-gun" design was already being considered, and preliminary designs circulated for battleships with all 12-inch or all 10-inch guns and armoured cruisers with all 9.2-inch guns.

In mid-1904 the decision was taken to use 12-inch guns for the next generation of battleships, because of their superior performance at long range. There was also a strong case to use 12-inch guns for new armoured cruisers. The size and cost of the next generation of armoured cruisers meant that it was very desirable that they should be able to play a role in a battleship action. This was the same logic that had led the Japanese to arm their latest cruisers with four 12-inch guns as their main armament.

However, during late 1904 Fisher began to argue that big-gun cruisers could replace battleships altogether. The continuing improvement of the torpedo meant that submarine

Submarine

A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...

s and destroyer

Destroyer

In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast and maneuverable yet long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against smaller, powerful, short-range attackers. Destroyers, originally called torpedo-boat destroyers in 1892, evolved from...

s would be able to destroy battleships, and this in Fisher's view heralded the end of the battleship. Nevertheless, armoured cruisers would remain vital for commerce protection

Of what use is a battle fleet to a country called (A) at war with a country called (B) possessing no battleships, but having fast armoured cruisers and clouds of fast torpedo craft? What damage would (A's) battleships do to (B)? Would (B) wish for a few battleships or for more armoured cruisers? Would not (A) willingly exchange a few battleships for more fast armoured cruisers? In such a case, neither side wanting battleships is presumptive evidence that they are not of much value" - Fisher to Selborne, 20 October 1904

Fisher's views were very controversial within the Royal Navy, and even given his position as First Sea Lord, he was not in a position to insist on his own approach. Thus he assembled a "Committee on Designs", consisting of a mixture of civilian and naval experts, to determine the approach to both battleship and armoured cruiser construction in future. While the stated purpose of the Committee was to investigate and report on future requirements of ships, Fisher and his associates had already made key decisions. The terms of reference for the Committee were for a battleship capable of 21 knots with 12-inch guns and no intermediate calibres, capable of operating from existing docks; and a cruiser capable of 25.5 knots, also with 12-inch guns and no intermediate armament, armoured like HMS Minotaur

HMS Minotaur (1906)

HMS Minotaur was the lead ship of the Minotaur-class of armoured cruiser of the Royal Navy, launched in 1906.-Career:She served in the First World War with her sisters, taking part in convoy duties from Australia to the Mediterranean. She fought at Jutland as part of the Second Cruiser Squadron. ...

, the most recent armoured cruiser, and also capable of working from the existing docks.

Under the Selborne plan of 1902, the Royal Navy intended to start three new battleships and four armoured cruisers each year. However, in late 1904 it became clear that the 1905-6 programme would have to be considerably smaller, because of lower than expected tax revenue and the need to buy out two Chilean battleships under construction in British yards, lest they be purchased by the Russians for use in the Russo-Japanese War. These economies meant that the 1905-6 programme consisted only of one battleship, but three armoured cruisers. The battleship became the revolutionary battleship HMS Dreadnought

HMS Dreadnought

Several ships and one submarine of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Dreadnought in the expectation that they would "dread nought", i.e. "fear nothing, but God"...

, and the cruiser became the three ships of the Invincible

Invincible class battlecruiser

The three Invincible class battlecruisers were built for the Royal Navy and entered service in 1908 as the world's first battlecruisers. They were the brainchild of Admiral Sir John Fisher, the man who had sponsored the construction of the world's first "all big gun" warship,...

 class. However, Fisher later claimed that he had argued during the Committee for the cancellation of the remaining battleship.

The construction of the new class was begun in 1906 and completed in 1908, delayed perhaps to allow their designs to learn from any problems with Dreadnought. The ships fulfilled the design requirement quite closely. The Invincibles had a displacement similar to that of the Dreadnought but twice the power to give a speed of 25 knots (49 km/h). They had eight 12 inches (305 mm) Mk X guns

BL 12 inch Mk X naval gun

The BL 12 inch Gun Mark X was a British 45-calibres naval gun which was mounted as primary armament on battleships and battlecruisers from 1906...

, compared to ten on Dreadnought. There was armour 6 or 7 inches (150 to 180 mm) thick along the side of the hull and over the gunhouses, whereas Dreadnoughts armour was 11 inches (280 to 300 mm) at its thickest. The class had a very marked increase in speed, displacement and firepower compared to the most recent armoured cruisers, but no more armour.

The Invincibles were to have the same role as the armoured cruisers they succeeded, but the new ships were expected to be more effective all-round. Specifically their roles were:

• Heavy Reconnaissance. Because of their power, the Invincibles could sweep away the screen of enemy cruisers to close with and observe an enemy battlefleet, before using their superior speed to retire.
• Close support for the battlefleet. They could be stationed at the ends of the battle line to stop enemy cruisers harassing the battleships, and to harass the enemy's battleships if they were busy fighting battleships. Also, the Invincibles could operate as the fast wing of the battlefleet and try to outmanouevre the enemy.
• Pursuit. If an enemy fleet ran, then the Invincibles would use their speed to pursue, and their guns to damage or slow enemy ships.
• Commerce protection. The new ships would hunt down enemy cruisers and commerce raiders.

Confusion about how to refer to these new battleship-size armoured cruisers set in almost immediately. Even in late 1905, before work was begun on the Invincibles, a Royal Navy memorandum refers to "large armoured ships" meaning both battleships and large cruisers. In October 1906, the Admiralty began to classify all post-Dreadnought battleships and armoured cruisers as "capital ships", while Fisher used the term "dreadnought" to refer either to his new battleships or the battleships and armoured cruisers together. At the same time, the Invincible class themselves were referred to as "cruiser-battleship", "dreadnought cruiser"; the term "battlecruiser" was first used by Fisher in 1908. Finally, on 24 November 1911, Admiralty Weekly Order No. 351 laid down the decision that "All cruisers of the Invincible and later type are, for the future, to be described and classified as battlecruisers to distinguish them from armoured cruisers of the older type."

Battlecruisers in the Dreadnought arms race

In the period from the launching of the Invincibles to just after the outbreak of the First World War, the battlecruiser played a junior role in the developing dreadnought arms race. The battlecruiser was never wholeheartedly adopted as the key weapon in British imperial defence, as Fisher had presumably desired.

Britain's strategic circumstances had changed markedly between the conception of the battlecruiser and the commissioning of the first ships. While the prospective enemy for Britain had previously been a Franco-Russian alliance with many armoured cruisers, it was now clearly Germany. Diplomatically, Britain had entered the Entente cordiale

Entente Cordiale

The Entente Cordiale was a series of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and the French Republic. Beyond the immediate concerns of colonial expansion addressed by the agreement, the signing of the Entente Cordiale marked the end of almost a millennium of intermittent...

 in 1904 and the Anglo-Russian Entente

Anglo-Russian Entente

Signed on August 31, 1907, in St. Petersburg, Russia, the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 brought shaky British-Russian relations to the forefront by solidifying boundaries that identified respective control in Persia, Afghanistan, and Tibet...

. Furthermore neither France nor Russia posed a particular naval threat; the Russian navy had largely been sunk or captured in the Russo-Japanese War

Russo-Japanese War

The Russo-Japanese War was "the first great war of the 20th century." It grew out of rival imperial ambitions of the Russian Empire and Japanese Empire over Manchuria and Korea...

 of 1904-5, while the French were in no hurry to adopt the new dreadnought battleship

Dreadnought

The dreadnought was the predominant type of 20th-century battleship. The first of the kind, the Royal Navy's had such an impact when launched in 1906 that similar battleships built after her were referred to as "dreadnoughts", and earlier battleships became known as pre-dreadnoughts...

 technology. Britain also boasted very cordial relations with two of the significant new naval powers; Japan (bolstered by the Anglo-Japanese Alliance

Anglo-Japanese Alliance

The first was signed in London at what is now the Lansdowne Club, on January 30, 1902, by Lord Lansdowne and Hayashi Tadasu . A diplomatic milestone for its ending of Britain's splendid isolation, the alliance was renewed and extended in scope twice, in 1905 and 1911, before its demise in 1921...

, signed in 1902 and renewed in 1905), and the USA.

These changed strategic circumstances, and the great success of the Dreadnought, ensured that she rather than the Invincible became the new model capital ship. Nevertheless, battlecruiser construction played a major part in the renewed naval arms-race sparked by the Dreadnought.

For the first few years after their completion, the Invincibles entirely fulfilled Fisher's vision of being able to sink any ship fast enough to catch them, and run from any ship capable of sinking them. An Invincible would also in many circumstances, be able to take on an enemy pre-dreadnought battleship. The Invincibles were so far ahead of any enemy armoured cruiser that it was difficult to justify building more or bigger cruisers. This lead was extended by the surprise both Dreadnought and Invincible produced, which prompted most other navies to delay their building programmes while radically revising their designs. This was particularly true for cruisers, because the details of the Invincible class were kept secret for longer; this meant that the next German armoured cruiser, Blücher

SMS Blücher

SMS Blücher was the last armored cruiser to be built by the German Imperial Navy . She was designed to match what German intelligence incorrectly believed to be the specifications of the British s...

 was armed with only 8.2-inch guns, and was obsolete before she was even launched.

The Royal Navy's early superiority in capital ships led to the rejection of a 1905-6 design that would, essentially, have fused the battlecruiser and battleship concepts. The 'X4' design combined the full armour and armament of Dreadnought with the 25 knots (49 km/h) speed of Invincible. The additional cost could not be justified given the existing British lead and the new Liberal government's need for economy; the slower and cheaper Bellerophon

HMS Bellerophon (1907)

HMS Bellerophon was a dreadnought of the Royal Navy. She was the lead ship of the Bellerophon class, and the fourth Royal Navy vessel to bear the name of the mythic Greek hero...

, a relatively close copy of Dreadnought, was adopted instead.

By 1911 Germany had built battlecruisers of her own, and the superiority of the British ships could no longer be assured. Von der Tann

SMS Von der Tann

SMS Von der Tann"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was the first battlecruiser built for the German Kaiserliche Marine, as well as Germany's first major turbine-powered warship. At the time of her construction, Von der Tann was the fastest dreadnought-type...

, begun in 1908 and completed in 1910, carried eight 11.1-inch guns but with 11.1-inch (280 mm) armour was far better protected than the Invincibles. The two Moltkes

Moltke class battlecruiser

The Moltke class was a class of two "all-big-gun" battlecruisersThe German navy classified the ships as Großen Kreuzer . These ships differed from older Großen Kreuzer, such as the Roon class, in that they carried a uniform main battery, instead of four large guns and a mixed array of smaller weapons...

 were quite similar but carried ten 11.1-inch guns of an improved design. The German Navy did not share Fisher's view of what a battlecruiser should be; it was entitled to build armoured cruisers under the terms of the Navy Laws, and used this authority to match or better the British battlecruisers.

The next British battlecruisers were three of the Indefatigable

Indefatigable class battlecruiser

The Indefatigable class were the second class built of British battlecruisersThe Indefatigable-class ships were formally known as armoured cruisers until 1911 when they were redesignated as battlecruisers by an Admiralty order of 24 November 1911. Unofficially a number of designations were used...

 class. These ships were slightly improved Invincibles, which corrected some flaws in the earlier ships but were built to fundamentally the same specification. The British were hampered on this occasion by the secrecy surrounding German battlecruiser construction and particularly about the heavy armour of Von der Tann. Political pressure to reduce costs also played a role in the selection of the Indefatigable design, and this class is widely seen as a mistake.

The next generation of British battlecruisers were markedly more powerful. By 1909-10 the political climate had changed; the desire for cost-cutting was now outweighed by a sense of national crisis about rivalry with Germany. A brief political crisis and a naval panic resulted in the approval of a total of eight capital ships in 1909-10. Fisher pressed for all of them to be battlecruisers, but was unable to force his way, and had to settle for six battleships as well as two battlecruisers of the Lion class

Lion class battlecruiser

The Lion class were a class of battlecruisers built by the British Royal Navy before World War I. Nicknamed the "Splendid Cats", the ships were a significant improvement over their predecessors of the in terms of speed, armament and armour...

. These carried eight 13.5-inch guns; the standard armament of the British "super-dreadnought" battleships of the same period was ten 13.5-inch. Speed increased, to 27 knots. Lion also carried better armour than previous British battlecruisers, with 9 inches on the armour belt and barbettes; nevertheless, protection was not as good as in German designs. The two Lions were followed by the very similar Queen Mary

HMS Queen Mary

HMS Queen Mary was a battlecruiser built by the British Royal Navy before World War I, the sole member of her class. She was similar to the s, though she differed in details from her half-sisters. She was the last battlecruiser completed before the war and participated in the Battle of Heligoland...

 

In contrast to the British focus on increasing speed and firepower, Germany further improved the armour and staying power of their next battlecruiser. Seydlitz

SMS Seydlitz

SMS Seydlitz"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was a 25,000-metric ton battlecruiserAdmiral Alfred von Tirpitz referred to the ship as a large cruiser in his annual budgets in an attempt to reduce opposition from the Reichstag; the ship was not referred...

, designed in 1909 and finished in 1913, was a modified Moltke; speed increased by one knot to 26.5 knots (51.9 km/h), while armour was up to 12 inches (304.8 mm) thick, equivalent for the Helgoland

Helgoland class battleship

The Helgoland class was the second class of German dreadnought battleships. Constructed from 1908 to 1912, the class comprised four ships: , the lead ship; ; ; and . The design was a significant improvement over the previous ships; they had a larger main battery— main guns instead of the weapons...

 class battleships of just one or two years earlier. Seydlitz was Germany's last battlecruiser completed before World War I.

The next step in the battlecruiser design came from Japan. The Imperial Japanese Navy

Imperial Japanese Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renunciation of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes...

 had been planning the Kongō class

Kongo class battlecruiser

The were a class of ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy constructed immediately before World War I. Designed by British naval architect George Thurston, the lead ship of the class was the last Japanese capital ship constructed outside of Japan. Displacing upon completion, the vessels of this...

 ships from 1909. The Japanese navy was determined that, since the Japanese economy could support relatively few ships, each ship would be more powerful than its likely competitors. Initially the class was planned with the Invincibles as the benchmark. On learning of the British plans for Lion, and the likelihood that new U.S. Navy battleships would be armed with 14-inch guns, the Japanese decided to radically revise their plans and go one better. A new plan was drawn up, carrying eight 14-inch guns, and capable of 27.5 knots, thus marginally having the edge over the British Lions in speed and firepower. The heavy guns were also better-positioned, being superfiring

Superfire

The idea of superfire is to locate two turrets in a row, one behind the other, but with the second turret located above the one in front so that the second turret could fire over the first...

 both fore and aft with no turret amidships. The armour scheme was also marginally improved over the Lions with 9 inches of armour on the turrets and 8 inches on the barbettes. The first ship in the class was built in Britain, and a further three constructed in Japan. The Japanese also re-classified their strong armoured cruisers of Tsukuba

Tsukuba class cruiser

-External links:*...

 and Ibuki

Ibuki class battlecruiser

The , also called the , was a ship class of two large armoured cruisers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy in the early 20th century. Both vessels were reclassified as battlecruisers in 1912, and both were scrapped in September 1923 under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty.- External links...

 classes, carrying four 12-inch guns, as battlecruisers, nonetheless they had weaker armament and were slower.

The next British battlecruiser, Tiger

HMS Tiger (1913)

The 11th HMS Tiger was a battlecruiser of the Royal Navy, built by John Brown and Company, Clydebank, Scotland, and launched in 1913. Tiger was the most heavily armoured battlecruiser of the Royal Navy at the start of the First World War although she was still being finished when the war began...

, was broadly on the model of Lion but also influenced by the design of the Japanese ships. She retained the eight 13.5-inch guns of her predecessors, though these were positioned for better fields of fire. She was faster (making 29 knots (56.8 km/h) on trials), and carried a heavier secondary armament. Tiger was also more heavily armoured on the whole; while the maximum thickness of armour was the same at 9 inches, the height of the main armour belt was increased.

1912 saw work begin on three more German battlecruisers of the Derfflinger class

Derfflinger class battlecruiser

The Derfflinger class was a class of three battlecruisers of the German Imperial Navy. The ships were ordered for the 1912 to 1913 Naval Building Program of the German Imperial Navy as a reply to the Royal Navy's three new s that had been launched a few years earlier...

, the first German battlecruisers to mount 12-inch guns. These excellent ships, like the Tiger and the Kongō, had their guns arranged in superfiring turrets for greater efficiency. Their armour and speed was similar to the previous Seydlitz class.

In 1913, the Russian Empire also began the construction of the four-ship Borodino class

Borodino class battlecruiser

The Borodino class battlecruisers were a group of four battlecruisers ordered by the Imperial Russian Navy before World War I. Also referred to as the Izmail class, they were laid down in December 1912All dates used in this article are New Style . at Saint Petersburg for service with the Baltic...

, which were designed for service in the Baltic Sea

Baltic Sea

The Baltic Sea is a brackish mediterranean sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and...

. These ships were designed to carry twelve 14 inches (355.6 mm) guns, with armour up to 12 inches (304.8 mm) thick, and a speed of 26.6 knots (52.1 km/h). The heavy armour and relatively slow speed of these ships makes them more similar to German designs than to British ships; construction of the Borodinos was halted by the First World War and all were scrapped during the Russian Revolution.

By 1914, only Britain, Germany and Japan had battlecruisers, with Russia building some. On several occasions, it had already been possible to point to moments where the concepts of battlecruiser and battleship might be seen in the same vessel. This was true of the 1906 'X4' design, and the Russian Borodinos and arguably the entire German Battlecruiser program. It was even more true of the most recent British battleship design. The Queen Elizabeth

Queen Elizabeth class battleship

The Queen Elizabeth-class battleships were a class of five super-dreadnoughts of the Royal Navy. The lead ship was named after Elizabeth I of England...

 class was designed to make 25 knots (49 km/h), as much as the first battlecruisers had achieved, while carrying eight 15-inch guns and armour up to 15 inches (381 mm) thick. The Queen Elizabeths were the first true fast battleship

Fast battleship

Historically, a fast battleship was a battleship which emphasized speed without - in concept - undo compromise of either armor or armament. The term is especially appropriate when applied to a design which was not only faster than the preceding battleship class, but faster than subsequent classes...

s, and could have brought the end of the development of the battlecruiser as an independent line. It was principally due to the influence of Jacky Fisher that the battlecruiser continued.

World War I

In the First World War, the British and Germans used battlecruisers in several theatres. Battlecruisers formed part of the dreadnought fleets that faced each other in the North Sea, taking part in several raids and skirmishes as well as the Battle of Jutland. Battlecruisers also played an important role at the start of the War as the British fleet hunted down German commerce raiders, for instance at the Battle of the Falkland Islands

Battle of the Falkland Islands

The Battle of the Falkland Islands was a British naval victory over the Imperial German Navy on 8 December 1914 during the First World War in the South Atlantic...

, and also took part in the Mediterranean campaign.

Construction

For most of the combatants, capital ship construction was very limited during the War. Germany finished the Derfflinger class and began work on the Mackensen class

Mackensen class battlecruiser

The Mackensen class was the last class of battlecruisers to be built by Germany in World War I. The class was to have comprised four ships: Mackensen, the name ship, Graf Spee, Prinz Eitel Friedrich, and Fürst Bismarck. None of the vessels were completed, as shipbuilding priorities were redirected...

. The Mackensens were a development of the Derfflinger class, with 13.8-inch guns and a broadly similar armour scheme, designed for 28 knots.

In Britain, Jackie Fisher returned to the office of First Sea Lord in October 1914. His enthusiasm for big, fast ships was unabated, and he set design staff to producing a design for a battlecruiser with 15-inch guns. Because Fisher expected the next German battlecruiser to steam at 28 knots, he required the new British design to be capable of 32 knots. He planned to convert two Royal Sovereign class battleships

Revenge class battleship

The Revenge class battleships were five battleships of the Royal Navy, ordered as World War I loomed on the horizon, and launched in 1914–1916...

, which had been approved but not yet laid down. Fisher finally received approval for this project on 28 December 1914 and they became the Renown class

Renown class battlecruiser

The Renown class consisted of a pair of battlecruisers built during the First World War for the Royal Navy. They were originally laid down as improved versions of the s. Their construction was suspended on the outbreak of war on the grounds they would not be ready in a timely manner...

. With six 15-inch guns but only 6-inch armour they were a further step forward from Tiger in firepower and speed but returned to the level of protection of the first British battlecruisers.

At the same time, Fisher resorted to subterfuge to obtain another three fast, lightly armoured ships that could use several spare 15-inch gun turrets left over from battleship construction. These ships were essentially light battlecruisers, and Fisher occasionally referred to them as such, but officially they were classified as large light cruisers. This unusual designation was required because construction of new capital ships had been placed on hold, while there were no limits on light cruiser

Light cruiser

A light cruiser is a type of small- or medium-sized warship. The term is a shortening of the phrase "light armored cruiser", describing a small ship that carried armor in the same way as an armored cruiser: a protective belt and deck...

 construction. They became Courageous

Courageous class battlecruiser

The Courageous class comprised three battlecruisers known as "large light cruisers" built for the Royal Navy during World War I. Nominally designed to support Admiral of the Fleet Lord John Fisher's Baltic Project, which was intended to land troops on the German Baltic Coast, ships of this class...

 and her sisters Glorious and Furious

HMS Furious (47)

HMS Furious was a modified cruiser built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. Designed to support the Baltic Project championed by the First Sea Lord of the Admiralty, Lord John Fisher, they were very lightly armoured and armed with only a few heavy guns. Furious was modified while...

, and there was a bizarre imbalance between their main guns of 15 inches (or 18 inches in 'Furious') and their armour, which at 3 inches thickness was on the scale of a light cruiser. The design was generally regarded as a bizarre failure (nicknamed in the Fleet Outrageous, Uproarious and Spurious), though the later conversion of the ships to aircraft carriers was very successful. Fisher also speculated about a new mammoth but lightly built battlecruiser that would carry 20-inch guns, which he termed HMS Incomparable

HMS Incomparable

HMS Incomparable was the name given by Admiral "Jackie" Fisher to a proposal for a very large battlecruiser which was suggested in 1915. It never entered the design stage nor came close to being built....

; this never got beyond the concept stage.

It is often held that the Renown and Courageous classes were designed for Fisher's plan to land troops (possibly Russian) on the German Baltic coast. Specifically, they were designed with a shallow draught, which might be important in the shallow Baltic. This is not clear-cut evidence that the ships were designed for the Baltic: it was considered that earlier ships had too much draught and not enough freeboard

Freeboard (nautical)

In sailing and boating, freeboardmeans the distance from the waterline to the upper deck level, measured at the lowest point of sheer where water can enter the boat or ship...

 under operational conditions. Roberts argues that the focus on the Baltic was probably unimportant at the time the ships were designed, but was inflated later, after the disastrous Dardanelles Campaign.

The final British battlecruiser design of the war was the Admiral class

Admiral class battlecruiser

The Admiral-class battlecruisers were a class of four British Royal Navy battlecruisers designed near the end of World War I. Their design began as a improved version of the s, but it was recast as a battlecruiser after Admiral John Jellicoe, commander of the Grand Fleet, pointed out that there was...

, which was born from a requirement for an improved version of the Queen Elizabeth battleship. The project began at the end of 1915, after Fisher's final departure from the Admiralty. While initially envisaged as a battleship, senior sea officers felt that Britain had enough battleships, but that new battlecruisers might be required to combat German ships being built (the British overestimated German progress on the Mackensen class as well as their likely capabilities). A battlecruiser design with eight 15-inch guns, 8 inches of armour and capable of 32 knots (62.7 km/h) was decided on. The experience of battlecruisers at the Battle of Jutland meant that the design was radically revised and transformed again into a fast battleship concept with armour up to 12 inches (304.8 mm) thick but still capable of 31.5 knots (61.7 km/h). The first ship in the class, Hood

HMS Hood (51)

HMS Hood was the last battlecruiser built for the Royal Navy. One of four s ordered in mid-1916, her design—although drastically revised after the Battle of Jutland and improved while she was under construction—still had serious limitations. For this reason she was the only ship of her class to be...

, went ahead according to this design. The plans for her three sisters, on which little work had been done, were revised once more later in 1916 and in 1917 to improve protection.

The Admiral class would have been the only British ships capable of taking on the German Mackensen type; German shipbuilding was drastically slowed by the war, and while two Mackensens were launched, none were ever completed. Work on the three additional Admirals was suspended in March 1917 to enable more escorts and merchant ships to be built to deal with the new threat from U-boats to trade. They were finally cancelled in February 1919.

Operations

The German battlecruiser Goeben

SMS Goeben

SMS Goeben was the second of two Moltke-class battlecruisers of the Imperial German Navy, launched in 1911 and named after the German Franco-Prussian War veteran General August Karl von Goeben...

 perhaps made the most impact early in the War. Stationed in the Mediterranean, she and her escorting cruiser evaded British and French ships on the outbreak of war

Pursuit of Goeben and Breslau

The pursuit of Goeben and Breslau was a naval action that occurred in the Mediterranean Sea at the outbreak of the First World War when elements of the British Mediterranean Fleet attempted to intercept the German Mittelmeerdivision comprising the battlecruiser and the light cruiser...

, and steamed to Constantinople

Constantinople

Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...

 with two British battlecruisers in hot pursuit. Goeben was handed over to the Turkish Navy, and this was instrumental in bringing Turkey into the war on the German side. Goeben herself, renamed Yavuz Sultan Selim, saw engagements against the Russian Navy in the Black Sea and against the British in the Aegean.

Battle of Heligoland Bight

A force of British light cruisers and destroyers entered the Heligoland Bight to attack German shipping in August 1914, the first month of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. When they met opposition from German cruisers, Admiral Beatty

David Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty

Admiral of the Fleet David Richard Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty, GCB, OM, GCVO, DSO was an admiral in the Royal Navy...

 took his squadron of four battlecruisers into the Bight and turned the battle, ultimately sinking three German light cruisers and killing a German commander, Rear Admiral Leberecht Maass

Leberecht Maass

Leberecht Maass was the rear admiral who commanded the German naval forces at the first Battle of Heligoland Bight...

.

Battle of the Falklands

The original battlecruiser concept proved successful in December 1914 at the Battle of the Falkland Islands

Battle of the Falkland Islands

The Battle of the Falkland Islands was a British naval victory over the Imperial German Navy on 8 December 1914 during the First World War in the South Atlantic...

. The British battlecruisers Inflexible

HMS Inflexible (1907)

HMS Inflexible was an of the British Royal Navy. She was built before World War I and had an active career during the war. She tried to hunt down the German battlecruiser and the light cruiser in the Mediterranean Sea when war broke out and she and her sister ship sank the German armoured...

 and Invincible

HMS Invincible (1907)

HMS Invincible was a battlecruiser of the British Royal Navy, the lead ship of her class of three, and the first battlecruiser to be built by any country in the world. She participated in the Battle of Heligoland Bight in a minor role as she was the oldest and slowest of the British battlecruisers...

 did precisely the job they were intended for when they chased down and annihilated a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 cruiser squadron, centered on the armoured cruisers Scharnhorst

SMS Scharnhorst

SMS Scharnhorst was an armored cruiser of the Imperial German Navy, built at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg, Germany. She was the lead ship of her class, which also included her sister . Scharnhorst and her sister were enlarged versions of the preceding ; they were equipped with a greater...

and Gneisenau

SMS Gneisenau

SMS Gneisenau was an armored cruiser of the German navy, part of the two-ship . She was named after August von Gneisenau, a Prussian general of the Napoleonic Wars. The ship was laid down in 1904 at the AG Weser dockyard in Bremen, launched in June 1906, and completed in March 1908, at a cost of...

, along with three light cruisers, commanded by Admiral Maximilian Graf Von Spee

Maximilian von Spee

Vice Admiral Maximilian Reichsgraf von Spee was a German admiral. Although he was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, the counts von Spee belonged to the prominent families of the Rhenish nobility. He joined the Kaiserliche Marine in 1878. In 1887–88 he commanded the Kamerun ports, in German West...

 in the South Atlantic Ocean. Prior to the battle the Australian battlecruiser HMAS Australia

HMAS Australia (1911)

HMAS Australia was one of three s built for the defence of the British Empire. Ordered by the Australian government in 1909, she was launched in 1911, and commissioned as flagship of the fledgling Royal Australian Navy in 1913...

had unsuccessfully searched for the German ships in the Pacific.

Battle of Dogger Bank

During the Battle of Dogger Bank, the after turret of the German flagship Seydlitz was pierced by a British 13.5 inch shell from HMS Lion, which detonated in the working chamber. The charges being hoisted upwards were detonated, and the explosion flashed up into the turret and down into the magazine, setting fire to charges in the process of being handled. The gun crew tried to escape into the next turret, allowing the flash to spread, destroying both turrets internally. Seydlitz was saved from near-certain destruction only by emergency flooding of her after magazines. This near-disaster was due to the way that ammunition handling was arranged and was common to both German and British battleships and battlecruisers, but the lighter protection on the latter made them more vulnerable to the turret or barbette being pierced. The "working chamber" had been introduced in HMS Formidable

HMS Formidable (1898)

HMS Formidable —the third of four ships of that name to serve in the Royal Navy—was the lead ship of her class of pre-dreadnought battleships. She was the second British battleship to be sunk by enemy action during the First World War...

 (1898) and was intended to prevent such a dangerous flash, but instead made such an event more likely. The Germans learned from investigating the damaged Seydlitz and instituted improved measures to ensure ammunition handling was flash tight. The British remained unaware of the weakness, to their great misfortune at the Battle of Jutland.

Apart from the cordite

Cordite

Cordite is a family of smokeless propellants developed and produced in the United Kingdom from 1889 to replace gunpowder as a military propellant. Like gunpowder, cordite is classified as a low explosive because of its slow burning rates and consequently low brisance...

 handling, the battle was mostly inconclusive, though both Lion and Seydlitz were severely damaged. The British flagship Lion lost speed, causing her to fall behind the rest of the battleline, and Admiral Beatty was unable to effectively command for the remainder of the engagement. A British signalling error allowed the German battlecruisers to withdraw, as most of Beatty's squadron mistakenly concentrated on the crippled armoured cruiser Blücher, sinking her with great loss of life. Blücher herself was obsolete, out of all the ships in the battle, and so she had proved to be a liability to the rest of the German squadron, which was otherwise an all battlecruiser squadron.

Battle of Jutland

At the Battle of Jutland 18 months later, both British and German battlecruisers were employed as fleet units. The British battlecruisers became engaged with both their German counterparts, the battlecruisers, and then German battleships before the arrival of the battleships of the British Grand Fleet

British Grand Fleet

The Grand Fleet was the main fleet of the British Royal Navy during the First World War.-History:It was formed in 1914 by the British Atlantic Fleet combined with the Home Fleet and it included 35-40 state-of-the-art capital ships. It was initially commanded by Admiral Sir John Jellicoe...

. The result was a disaster for the Royal Navy's battlecruiser squadrons: Invincible

HMS Invincible (1907)

HMS Invincible was a battlecruiser of the British Royal Navy, the lead ship of her class of three, and the first battlecruiser to be built by any country in the world. She participated in the Battle of Heligoland Bight in a minor role as she was the oldest and slowest of the British battlecruisers...

, Queen Mary

HMS Queen Mary

HMS Queen Mary was a battlecruiser built by the British Royal Navy before World War I, the sole member of her class. She was similar to the s, though she differed in details from her half-sisters. She was the last battlecruiser completed before the war and participated in the Battle of Heligoland...

 and Indefatigable

HMS Indefatigable (1909)

HMS Indefatigable was a battlecruiser of the Royal Navy and the lead ship of her class. Her keel was laid down in 1909 and she was commissioned in 1911...

 exploded with the loss of all but a handful of their crews. This was due to the vulnerability of the working chamber, which the Germans had discovered after the near-loss of Seydlitz at Dogger Bank and had taken preventative measures against. The British ships not only had lighter armour but also lacked flash tight ammunition handling arrangements, due in part to lack of awareness and experience, and also as it would improve their rate of fire to compensate for poor accuracy. Each was lost to a single salvo penetrating the turret and detonating in the working chamber. Beatty's flagship Lion herself was almost lost in a similar manner, save for the heroic actions of Major Harvey.

The better armoured and flash-tight German battlecruisers fared better, in part due to poor performance of British fuzes (their shells exploded on impact with the ships armour instead of penetrating the armour before exploding thus causing more damage). Lützow

SMS Lützow

SMS Lützow"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was the second built by the German Kaiserliche Marine before World War I. Ordered as a replacement for the old protected cruiser , Lützow was launched on 29 November 1913, but not completed until 1916...

 for instance only had 117 killed despite receiving more than thirty hits, though she had sufficient flooding that she was scuttled. The other German battlecruisers, Moltke, Von der Tann

SMS Von der Tann

SMS Von der Tann"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was the first battlecruiser built for the German Kaiserliche Marine, as well as Germany's first major turbine-powered warship. At the time of her construction, Von der Tann was the fastest dreadnought-type...

, Seydlitz, Derfflinger

SMS Derfflinger

SMS Derfflinger"SMS" stands for "Seiner Majestät Schiff", or "His Majesty's Ship" in German. was a battlecruiser of the German Kaiserliche Marine built just before the outbreak of World War I. She was the lead vessel of her class of three ships; her sister ships were and...

 were all heavily damaged and required extensive repairs after the battle, Seydlitz barely making it home, for they had been in the very centre of enemy fire for much of the battle. No British or German battleship was sunk during the battle with the exception of the old German pre-dreadnought

Pre-dreadnought

Pre-dreadnought battleship is the general term for all of the types of sea-going battleships built between the mid-1890s and 1905. Pre-dreadnoughts replaced the ironclad warships of the 1870s and 1880s...

 Pommern

SMS Pommern

SMS Pommern was one of five Deutschland class of pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Kaiserliche Marine between 1904 and 1906. Named after the Prussian province of Pomerania, she was built at the AG Vulcan yard at Stettin, where she was laid down on 22 March 1904 and launched on 2 December...

, the victim of torpedoes from British destroyers.

Interwar period

In the years immediately after World War I, Britain, Japan and the USA all began design work on a new generation of ever more powerful battleships and battlecruisers. The new burst of shipbuilding that each nation's navy desired was politically controversial and potentially economically crippling. This nascent arms race was prevented by the Washington Naval Treaty

Washington Naval Treaty

The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, was an attempt to cap and limit, and "prevent 'further' costly escalation" of the naval arms race that had begun after World War I between various International powers, each of which had significant naval fleets. The treaty was...

 of 1922, where the major naval powers agreed to limits on capital ship numbers. The German navy was not represented at the talks; under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles

Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...

, Germany was not allowed any modern capital ships at all.

Through the 1920s and early 1930s only Britain and Japan retained battlecruisers, often modified and rebuilt from their original World War I designs. The line between the battlecruiser and the modern fast battleship became blurred; indeed, the Japanese Kongō class

Kongo class battlecruiser

The were a class of ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy constructed immediately before World War I. Designed by British naval architect George Thurston, the lead ship of the class was the last Japanese capital ship constructed outside of Japan. Displacing upon completion, the vessels of this...

 were formally redesignated as battleships.

Plans in the aftermath of World War I

HMS Hood

HMS Hood (51)

HMS Hood was the last battlecruiser built for the Royal Navy. One of four s ordered in mid-1916, her design—although drastically revised after the Battle of Jutland and improved while she was under construction—still had serious limitations. For this reason she was the only ship of her class to be...

, launched in 1918, was the last First World War battlecruiser to be completed. Owing to lessons from Jutland, Hood was modified during construction to feature belt armour that was thought to be capable of resisting her own weapons - the classic measure of a "balanced" battleship. Hood was the largest ship in the Royal Navy when completed; thanks to her great displacement, she in theory combined the firepower and armour of a battleship with the speed of a battlecruiser, causing some to refer to her as a fast battleship. However her protection was markedly less than that of the British battleships built immediately after World War I, the Nelson class

Nelson class battleship

The Nelson class was a class of two battleships of the British Royal Navy, built shortly after, and under the terms of, the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922...

.

The navies of Japan and the United States, seeing a threat from Hood, laid down battlecruisers to rival her. The Imperial Japanese Navy began four Amagi class battlecruisers. These vessels would have been of unprecedented size and power, being as fast and well armoured as HMS Hood whilst carrying a main battery of ten 16" guns - the most powerful armament ever proposed for a battlecruiser. The United States Navy responded with the Lexington class battlecruisers, which if completed as planned would have been exceptionally fast and well armed with eight 16" guns, but would have carried armour little better than that of the very first battlecruisers. The final stage in the post-war battlecruiser race came with the British response to the Amagi and Lexington types: four 48,000 ton G3 battlecruiser

G3 battlecruiser

The G3 battlecruisers were a class of battlecruisers planned by the Royal Navy after the end of World War I in response to naval expansion programs by the United States and Japan. The four ships of this class would have been larger, faster and more heavily-armed than any existing battleship...

s. Royal Navy documents of the period often described any battleship

Battleship

A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...

 with a speed of over about 24 knots (44 km/h) as a battlecruiser, regardless of the amount of protective armour, although the G3 was considered by most to be a well-balanced fast battleship.

The Washington Naval Treaty meant that none of these designs came to fruition. Ships that had been started were either broken up on the slipway or converted to aircraft carriers.

In Japan, Amagi and Akagi

Japanese aircraft carrier Akagi

Akagi was an aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy , originally begun as an . She was converted while still under construction to an aircraft carrier under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty...

 were taken in hand for conversion into aircraft carriers. In 1923 the Amagi was damaged beyond repair by an earthquake and was broken up on the slips, the hull of one of the proposed Tosa class battleships, Kaga,

Japanese aircraft carrier Kaga

Kaga was an aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy , named after the former Kaga Province in present-day Ishikawa Prefecture...

 being converted in her stead.

In Britain, Fisher's "large light cruisers" were converted to carriers. Furious had already been converted to an aircraft carrier during the war and Glorious

HMS Glorious (77)

HMS Glorious was the second of the cruisers built for the British Royal Navy during the First World War. Designed to support the Baltic Project championed by the First Sea Lord, Lord Fisher, they were very lightly armoured and armed with only a few heavy guns. Glorious was completed in late 1916...

 and Courageous

HMS Courageous (50)

HMS Courageous was the lead ship of the cruisers built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. Designed to support the Baltic Project championed by the First Sea Lord, John Fisher, the ship was very lightly armoured and armed with only a few heavy guns. Courageous was completed in late...

, which had no place in the post-Treaty navy, were similarly converted.

The United States Navy

United States Navy

The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

 also re-tasked two battlecruiser hulls as aircraft carriers in the wake of the Washington Treaty: USS Lexington

USS Lexington (CV-2)

USS Lexington , nicknamed the "Gray Lady" or "Lady Lex," was an early aircraft carrier of the United States Navy. She was the lead ship of the , though her sister ship was commissioned a month earlier...

 and Saratoga

USS Saratoga (CV-3)

USS Saratoga was the second aircraft carrier of the United States Navy and the fifth ship to bear her name. She was commissioned one month earlier than her sister and class leader, , which is the third actually commissioned after and Saratoga...

 were both designed as battlecruisers (the hull designations were originally CC-1 and CC-3) but converted part-way through construction, although this was only considered marginally preferable to scrapping the hulls outright (the remaining four: Constellation, Ranger, Constitution and United States were indeed scrapped).

Rebuilding programmes

In total, nine battlecruisers survived the Washington Naval Treaty. Their high speed made them valuable surface units in spite of their weaknesses so most of these ships were significantly updated before World War II, although the Royal Navy sold HMS Tiger for scrap in 1932 on the grounds that she was worn out, and in addition, the Turks did not have the means to upgrade the Sultan Yavuz Selim (ex Goeben of the Imperial German Navy).

HMS Renown

HMS Renown (1916)

HMS Renown was the lead ship of her class of battlecruisers of the Royal Navy built during the First World War. She was originally laid down as an improved version of the s. Her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war on the grounds she would not be ready in a timely manner...

 and Repulse

HMS Repulse (1916)

HMS Repulse was a Renown-class battlecruiser of the Royal Navy built during the First World War. She was originally laid down as an improved version of the s. Her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war on the grounds she would not be ready in a timely manner...

 were modernized significantly in a series of refits between 1920 and 1939. Like several elderly British capital ships, the Renown underwent a total reconstruction between 1937 and 1939 to make her suitable for acting as a fast heavy escort warship for aircraft carriers. Similar rebuildings planned for the Repulse and the Hood were cancelled by the events of World War II.

Unable to pursue new construction, the Imperial Japanese Navy also chose to improve its existing battlecruisers of the Kongō class

Japanese battleship Kongo

Kongō was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. She was the first battlecruiser of the Kongō class, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built. Her designer was the British naval engineer George Thurston, and she was laid down in 1911 at...

 (the Hiei

Japanese battleship Hiei

was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. Designed by British naval architect George Thurston, she was the second launched of four s, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built. Laid down in 1911 at the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal, Hiei was formally...

, the Haruna

Japanese battleship Haruna

, named after Mount Haruna, was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during :World War I and :World War II. Designed by the British naval engineer George Thurston, she was the fourth and last battlecruiser of the , among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built...

, the Kirishima

Japanese battleship Kirishima

was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. Designed by British naval engineer George Thurston, she was the third launched of the four Kongō-class battlecruisers, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built...

, and the Kongō

Japanese battleship Kongo

Kongō was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. She was the first battlecruiser of the Kongō class, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built. Her designer was the British naval engineer George Thurston, and she was laid down in 1911 at...

) by increasing the elevation of their guns to 40 degrees, adding anti-torpedo bulges and additional armour, and building on a "pagoda" mast. The 3,800 tons of additional armour slowed their speeds, but between 1933 and 1940, replacement of heavy equipment and an increase in the length of the hull by 26 ft (8.0 m) allowed them to reach up to 30 knots (58.8 km/h) once again. They were reclassified as "fast battleships" and their high speed made them suitable as aircraft carrier escorts, although their armour and guns still fell short compared to surviving World War I–era battleships in the American or the British navies, which proved dire consequences during the Pacific War

Pacific War

The Pacific War, also sometimes called the Asia-Pacific War refers broadly to the parts of World War II that took place in the Pacific Ocean, its islands, and in East Asia, then called the Far East...

, when Hiei and Kirishima were easily crippled by US gunfire during actions off Guadalcanal, forcing their scuttling shortly afterwards.

Naval rearmament

In the late 1930s navies began to build capital ships again, and during this period number of large commerce raiders and small, fast battleships were built. While the design philosophy behind these ships was very different from that of the original battlecruisers, the term was adopted from time to time for these new ships.

Germany, Italy, France and Russia all designed new vessels in this category, though only Germany and France completed them.Ultimately the Italians chose to upgrade their old battleships rather than build new battlecruisers, whereas the Russians laid down the 35,000 ton Kronshtadt

Kronshtadt class battlecruiser

The Kronshtadt-class battlecruisers, with the Soviet designation as Project 69 heavy cruisers, , were ordered for the Soviet Navy in the late 1930s. Two ships were started but none were completed due to World War II. These ships had a complex and prolonged design process which was hampered by...

 Class, but were unable to launch them before the Germans invaded in 1941 and captured one of the hulls. The other Soviet ship was launched and scrapped after the war.

The German Deutschland

Deutschland class cruiser

The Deutschland class was a series of three panzerschiffe , a form of heavily armed cruiser, built by the Reichsmarine officially in accordance with restrictions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles...

-class cruiser (German:Panzerschiffe - armoured ship) were built to meet the limitations of the Treaty of Versailles

Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...

, which forbad Germany from exceeding 10,000 tons or six 28.0 cm (11-inch) guns. Their 12,000-ton displacement somewhat exceeded that of a heavy cruiser

Heavy cruiser

The heavy cruiser was a type of cruiser, a naval warship designed for long range, high speed and an armament of naval guns roughly 203mm calibre . The heavy cruiser can be seen as a lineage of ship design from 1915 until 1945, although the term 'heavy cruiser' only came into formal use in 1930...

, and their 11-inch main armament made them more powerful than heavy cruisers, which were restricted to 8-inch guns by the Treaty of London

Treaty of London

The Treaty of London may refer to:* Treaty of London , which ceded western France to England, repudiated by the Estates-General in Paris on 19 May 1359* Treaty of London , a non-aggression pact between the major European nations...

, but they were slower than cruisers (and a few battlecruisers) although faster than battleships. Armor protection was only at the standards of contemporary heavy cruisers. The Deutschland's intermediate status and their superficial appearance (particularly the second and third members of the class with their tall conning towers) to battleships resulted in the term "pocket battleship", and their importance (not attributes) to the German navy led to some classifying them as capital ships. Their mission was long-range commerce raiding like contemporary heavy cruisers, being able to outrun battleships while being able to outfight the heavy cruisers that could catch them, which caused some alarm among the Allies. However, this was only a temporary advantage as the Deutschlands could be outgunned and outrun by the few battlecruisers that remained (the Royal Navy's WWI-era battlecruisers, as well as the new small battleships of the French).

The first true German capital ships of the 1930s were Scharnhorst

German battleship Scharnhorst

Scharnhorst was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the lead ship of her class, which included one other ship, Gneisenau. The ship was built at the Kriegsmarinewerft dockyard in Wilhelmshaven; she was laid down on 15...

 and the Gneisenau

German battleship Gneisenau

Gneisenau was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the second vessel of her class, which included one other ship, Scharnhorst. The ship was built at the Deutsche Werke dockyard in Kiel; she was laid down on 6 May 1935...

. The Royal Navy categorized them as battlecruisers, while the German Navy referred to them as schlachtschiffe or battleship. At 31,500 tons standard displacement, they were intermediate in size between Repulse or Renown and the 35,000-ton limit for battleships. Their top speed of 33 knots (64.7 km/h) exceeded that of existing battlecruisers and battleships and their armoured protection was modelled on that of a battleship. Their armament was light, for a capital ship; Scharnhorst and Gneisenau carried nine 280 mm (11-inch) gun turrets (though with provision to change to replace these with six 380 mm (15 inch)). Their design thus compromised on armament for high speed and strong protection.

The French response to the "pocket battleships" was the Dunkerque class

French battleship Dunkerque

The Dunkerque was the first unit of a new class of warships of the French Navy built in the 1930s, officially rated as battleships, or even «navires de ligne» , as Dunkerque and Strasbourg constituted, from the commissionig of Strasbourg to some days after Mers-el Kebir, the «1ère Division de Ligne»...

 in the 1930s. Displacing 26,500 tons and armed with eight 330 mm (13 inch) guns arranged in two quadruple turrets located forward, they were significantly larger and more powerful than the pocket battleships. Their speed (30 knots) was in line with other fast battleships, and they were armoured as heavily as possible as their light displacement allowed.

Commerce raiding

In the early years of the war the German ships each had a measure of success hunting merchant ships in the Atlantic. The pocket battleships were deployed alone and sank a number of vessels, causing disruption to the trade routes that supplied the UK

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

. They were pursued by the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 and on one occasion, at the Battle of the River Plate

Battle of the River Plate

The Battle of the River Plate was the first naval battle in the Second World War. The German pocket battleship had been commerce raiding since the start of the war in September 1939...

 in 1939, the hunter became the hunted.

Admiral Graf Spee had been at sea at the start of World War II and engaged in a successful commerce raiding spree. Off the coast of South America, Admiral Graf Spee encountered the British heavy cruiser Exeter

HMS Exeter (68)

HMS Exeter was a York class heavy cruiser of the Royal Navy that served in World War II. She was laid down on 1 August 1928 at the Devonport Dockyard, Plymouth, Devon. She was launched on 18 July 1929 and completed on 27 July 1931...

 and light cruisers Achilles

HMNZS Achilles (70)

HMNZS Achilles was a Leander class light cruiser which served with the Royal New Zealand Navy in World War II. She became famous for her part in the Battle of the River Plate, alongside HMS Ajax and HMS Exeter....

 and Ajax

HMS Ajax (22)

HMS Ajax was a Leander class light cruiser which served with the British Royal Navy during World War II. She became famous for her part in the Battle of the River Plate, the Battle of Crete, the Battle of Malta and as a supply escort in the Siege of Tobruk. This ship was the eighth in the Royal...

. Admiral Graf Spee inflicted heavy damage on Exeter but in turn suffered considerable topside damage from the light cruisers. The pocket battleship's armour mostly held, but she sustained several critical hits that made the ship unseaworthy to return to Germany, and she was forced to retire to neutral Uruguay

Uruguay

Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...

. Unable to stay in port any longer without internment, and led to believe by the nature of British radio transmissions that aircraft carriers and 15 inches (381 mm) gunned battlecruisers were too close to evade, her captain elected to scuttle his ship, and then accepted responsibility for its destruction by committing suicide.

Allied battlecruisers such as , , Dunkerque and Strasbourg

French battleship Strasbourg

The Strasbourg was a more heavily armoured Dunkerque-class battleship of the French Navy, labeled as a "fast battleship". Faster than full battleships, but not as heavily armed or armoured as them, they were designed to counter the threat of the German "pocket battleships" - the Deutschland-class...

 were employed on operations to hunt down the commerce raiding German battlecruisers, but they rarely got close to their targets, Renown enjoying a brief clash against the German 11-inch battlecruisers, scoring three non-critical hits on Gneisenau but being unable to keep up in bad weather. The one stand-up fight

Battle of the Denmark Strait

The Battle of the Denmark Strait was a Second World War naval battle between ships of the Royal Navy and the German Kriegsmarine, fought on 24 May 1941...

 occurred when the battleship Bismarck

German battleship Bismarck

Bismarck was the first of two s built for the German Kriegsmarine during World War II. Named after Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, the primary force behind the German unification in 1871, the ship was laid down at the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg in July 1936 and launched nearly three years later...

 was sent out as a raider and was intercepted by and the battleship in May 1941. The elderly British battlecruiser was no match for the modern German battleship: within minutes, the Bismarcks 15 inch shells caused a magazine explosion in Hood reminiscent of the Battle of Jutland. Only three men survived.

Gneisenau

German battleship Gneisenau

Gneisenau was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the second vessel of her class, which included one other ship, Scharnhorst. The ship was built at the Deutsche Werke dockyard in Kiel; she was laid down on 6 May 1935...

 and Scharnhorst

German battleship Scharnhorst

Scharnhorst was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the lead ship of her class, which included one other ship, Gneisenau. The ship was built at the Kriegsmarinewerft dockyard in Wilhelmshaven; she was laid down on 15...

 hunted together and were initially successful at commerce raiding, sinking the British armed merchant cruiser  in 1939. Following repairs from damage during the Norwegian campaign

Norwegian Campaign

The Norwegian Campaign was a military campaign that was fought in Norway during the Second World War between the Allies and Germany, after the latter's invasion of the country. In April 1940, the United Kingdom and France came to Norway's aid with an expeditionary force...

, the two battlecruisers set out commerce raiding once again in 1941 and sank 22 merchant ships. They returned to Brest

Brest, France

Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...

 in northern France but found this port was vulnerable to Royal Air Force

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 attacks and were obliged to return to Germany. They did so in the Channel Dash, a daring and successful run up the English Channel

English Channel

The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...

. They were both damaged by mines and although Scharnhorst was repaired, Gneisenau was damaged again in RAF

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 bombing raids and was eventually disarmed and sunk as a blockship. Scharnhorst was employed once more to attack commerce and attempted to raid the Arctic convoys

Arctic convoys of World War II

The Arctic convoys of World War II travelled from the United Kingdom and North America to the northern ports of the Soviet Union—Arkhangelsk and Murmansk. There were 78 convoys between August 1941 and May 1945...

 in December 1943. She was surprised by the battleship with the cruisers , and at the Battle of North Cape

Battle of North Cape

The Battle of the North Cape was a Second World War naval battle which occurred on 26 December 1943, as part of the Arctic Campaign. The German battlecruiser , on an operation to attack Arctic Convoys of war materiel from the Western Allies to the USSR, was brought to battle and sunk by superior...

 and sunk on 26 December 1943. The 14 inches (356 mm) gunfire from Duke of York crippled her turrets and engine room, then the attendant British cruisers and destroyers closed in and finished her off with torpedoes.

The use of battlecruisers as commerce raiders was curtailed following an attack by the Admiral Scheer

German pocket battleship Admiral Scheer

Admiral Scheer was a Deutschland-class heavy cruiser which served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. The vessel was named after Admiral Reinhard Scheer, German commander in the Battle of Jutland. She was laid down at the Reichsmarinewerft shipyard in Wilhelmshaven in June...

 on a convoy guarded by the HMS Jervis Bay

HMS Jervis Bay (F40)

HMS Jervis Bay was a British liner later converted into an Armed Merchant Cruiser, pennant F40. She was launched in 1922 and sunk on 5 November 1940 by the German pocket battleship ....

, an armed merchant cruiser. It persuaded the British Admiralty

Admiralty

The Admiralty was formerly the authority in the Kingdom of England, and later in the United Kingdom, responsible for the command of the Royal Navy...

 that convoys had to be guarded by battleships or battlecruisers. The older R-class battleships and the un-upgraded Queen Elizabeths (Malaya and Barham) were used for this task, for which they were quite adequate despite their age, and subsequently the smaller German ships were forced away from their quarry. Additionally, the air gap over the North Atlantic closed, Huff-Duff

Huff-Duff

High-frequency direction finding, usually known by its abbreviation HF/DF is the common name for a type of radio direction finding employed especially during the two World Wars....

 (radio triangulation equipment) improved, airborne centimetric radar was introduced and convoys received escort carrier

Escort aircraft carrier

The escort aircraft carrier or escort carrier, also called a "jeep carrier" or "baby flattop" in the USN or "Woolworth Carrier" by the Royal Navy, was a small and slow type of aircraft carrier used by the British Royal Navy , the Imperial Japanese Navy and Imperial Japanese Army Air Force, and the...

 protection. The results of some of these developments were illustrated by the successful defence of convoys at the Battle of the Barents Sea

Battle of the Barents Sea

The Battle of the Barents Sea took place on 31 December 1942 between German surface raiders and British ships escorting convoy JW 51B to Kola Inlet in the USSR. The action took place in the Barents Sea north of North Cape, Norway...

 and the Battle of the North Cape.

By comparison with the critical role of submarines during the Battle of the North Atlantic the commerce-raiding role of battlecruisers was marginal in its impact on the outcome of the war. Big ships with big guns were increasingly obsolete.

Norwegian campaign

The Royal Navy and the Kriegsmarine

Kriegsmarine

The Kriegsmarine was the name of the German Navy during the Nazi regime . It superseded the Kaiserliche Marine of World War I and the post-war Reichsmarine. The Kriegsmarine was one of three official branches of the Wehrmacht, the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany.The Kriegsmarine grew rapidly...

 both deployed battlecruisers during the Norwegian campaign in April 1940. The Gneisenau

German battleship Gneisenau

Gneisenau was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the second vessel of her class, which included one other ship, Scharnhorst. The ship was built at the Deutsche Werke dockyard in Kiel; she was laid down on 6 May 1935...

 and the Scharnhorst

German battleship Scharnhorst

Scharnhorst was a German capital ship, alternatively described as a battleship and battlecruiser, of the German Kriegsmarine. She was the lead ship of her class, which included one other ship, Gneisenau. The ship was built at the Kriegsmarinewerft dockyard in Wilhelmshaven; she was laid down on 15...

 were engaged during the Action off Lofoten

Action off Lofoten

The Action off Lofoten was a naval battle fought between the German Kriegsmarine and the British Royal Navy off the southern coast of the Lofoten Islands, Norway during World War II...

 by HMS Renown

HMS Renown (1916)

HMS Renown was the lead ship of her class of battlecruisers of the Royal Navy built during the First World War. She was originally laid down as an improved version of the s. Her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war on the grounds she would not be ready in a timely manner...

 in very bad weather and although they had stronger armour than their counterpart, the British ship could hit them harder and at a longer range because the German ships were having difficulty with their radars. They disengaged after Gneisenau sustained damage. One of Renowns 15-inch shells passed through Gneisenau's director tower without exploding, severing electrical and communication cables as it went. The debris caused by the passing shell killed one officer and five enlisted men, and destroyed the optical rangefinder for the forward 150 mm turrets. Main battery fire control had to be shifted aft due to the loss of electrical power to the director tower. Another shell from Renown struck the aft turret of Gneisenau, knocking it out of action.

Later in the campaign they returned and sank the light aircraft carrier HMS Glorious (a converted battlecruiser herself) and her destroyer escort. One of the destroyers (HMS Acasta

HMS Acasta (H09)

HMS Acasta , the third ship to bear that name, launched in 1929, was an A-class destroyer built for the Royal Navy. She served in the Second World War and was sunk on 8 June 1940 in action against the German warships and , while escorting the aircraft carrier...

) succeeded in damaging the Scharnhorst with a torpedo, and later a submarine did the same to Gneisenau, forcing both ships to spend several months in repair. The pocket battleship Lützow

German pocket battleship Deutschland

Deutschland was the lead ship of her class of heavy cruisers which served with the Kriegsmarine of Nazi Germany during World War II. Ordered by the Weimar government for the Reichsmarine, she was laid down at the Deutsche Werke shipyard in Kiel in February 1929 and completed by April 1933...

 was similarly damaged by HMS Spearfish

HMS Spearfish (69S)

HMS Spearfish was a Royal Navy S-class submarine which was launched April 21, 1936 and fought in World War II. Spearfish is one of 12 boats named in the song Twelve Little S-Boats...

 during the campaign.

Mediterranean

The French battlecruisers had fled to North Africa following the fall of France

Battle of France

In the Second World War, the Battle of France was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries, beginning on 10 May 1940, which ended the Phoney War. The battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb , German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes, to cut off and...

. In July 1940 Force H

Force H

Force H was a British naval formation during the Second World War. It was formed in 1940 to replace French naval power in the western Mediterranean that had been removed by the French armistice with Nazi Germany....

 under Admiral James Somerville was ordered to force their surrender or destroy them. The Dunkerque was damaged by shells from HMS Hood at Mers-el-Kebir

Mers-el-Kébir

Mers-el-Kébir is a port town in northwestern Algeria, located by the Mediterranean Sea near Oran, in the Oran Province.-History:Originally a Roman port, Mers-el-Kébir became an Almohad naval arsenal in the 12th century, fell under the rulers of Tlemcen in the 15th century, and eventually became a...

 but escaped to join the Strasbourg at Toulon

Toulon

Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....

. Both ships were scuttled on 27 November 1942, although Strasbourg was raised and used by the Italian navy before being sunk again in an air attack on 18 August 1944.

Pacific War

The first battlecruiser to see action in the Pacific War was Repulse

HMS Repulse (1916)

HMS Repulse was a Renown-class battlecruiser of the Royal Navy built during the First World War. She was originally laid down as an improved version of the s. Her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war on the grounds she would not be ready in a timely manner...

 when she was sunk near Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

 on December 10, 1941 whilst in company with HMS Prince of Wales

HMS Prince of Wales (1939)

HMS Prince of Wales was a King George V-class battleship of the Royal Navy, built at the Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead, England...

. She had received a refit to give extra anti-aircraft protection and extra armour between the wars. Unlike her sister Renown, Repulse did not receive a full rebuild as planned, which would have added anti-torpedo blisters

Anti-torpedo bulge

The anti-torpedo bulge is a form of passive defence against naval torpedoes that featured in warship construction in the period between the First and Second World Wars.-Theory and form:...

. During the Sea Battle off Malaya

Sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse

The sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse was a Second World War naval engagement that took place north of Singapore, off the east coast of Malaya, near Kuantan, Pahang where the British Royal Navy battleship HMS Prince of Wales and battlecruiser HMS Repulse were sunk by land-based bombers and...

, her speed and agility enabled her to hold her own and dodge 19 torpedoes. Without aerial cover she eventually succumbed to the continuous waves of Japanese bombers, and without enhanced underwater protection she went down quickly after a few torpedo hits.

The Japanese Kongō class battlecruisers were significantly upgraded and re-rated as "fast battleships", and they were used extensively as carrier escorts for most of their wartime career due to their high speed. Their World War I-era armament was weaker and their upgraded armour was still thin compared to contemporary battleships. During the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal

Naval Battle of Guadalcanal

The Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, sometimes referred to as the Third and Fourth Battles of Savo Island, the Battle of the Solomons, The Battle of Friday the 13th, or, in Japanese sources, as the , took place from 12–15 November 1942, and was the decisive engagement in a series of naval battles...

 on 12 November the Hiei

Japanese battleship Hiei

was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. Designed by British naval architect George Thurston, she was the second launched of four s, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built. Laid down in 1911 at the Yokosuka Naval Arsenal, Hiei was formally...

 was sent out to bombard US positions. She suffered extensive topside damage from gunfire of US cruisers and destroyers, but, more critically, her steering gear was incapacitated by an 8-inch shell. The next day, Hiei was attacked by waves of aircraft from Guadalcanal’s American held airfield (Henderson Field

Henderson Field (Guadalcanal)

Henderson Field is a former military airfield on Guadacanal, Solomon Islands during World War II. Today it is Honiara International Airport.-Japanese construction:...

), which eventually made salvage impossible, and so she was left to sink north of Savo Island

Savo Island

Savo Island is a volcanic island in the Solomon Islands group in the South Pacific ocean. It is located to the northeast of the northern tip of Guadalcanal Island at . Politically, Savo Island is a part of the Solomons' Central Province. The indigenous language of Savo is the Savosavo language.The...

. A few days later on 15 November 1942, Kirishima

Japanese battleship Kirishima

was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. Designed by British naval engineer George Thurston, she was the third launched of the four Kongō-class battlecruisers, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built...

 engaged the U.S. battleships South Dakota

USS South Dakota (BB-57)

USS South Dakota was a battleship in the United States Navy from 1942 until 1947. The lead ship of her class, South Dakota was the third ship of the US Navy to be named in honor of the 40th state. During World War II, she first served in a fifteen-month tour in the Pacific theater, where she saw...

 and Washington

USS Washington (BB-56)

USS Washington , the second of two battleships in the North Carolina class, was the third ship of the United States Navy named in honor of the 42nd state. Her keel was laid down on 14 June 1938 at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. Launched on 1 June 1940, Washington went through fitting-out before...

, and was sunk following mortal damage from at least nine 16-inch hits inflicted by the Washington, which disabled her forward main turrets, jammed her steering, and holed her below the waterline. In contrast South Dakota survived 42 hits (including only one 14-inch hit, but many 8-in. heavy cruiser shells), all to her superstructure, and was back in operation four months later. The Kongō

Japanese battleship Kongo

Kongō was a warship of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War I and World War II. She was the first battlecruiser of the Kongō class, among the most heavily armed ships in any navy when built. Her designer was the British naval engineer George Thurston, and she was laid down in 1911 at...

 survived the Battle of Leyte Gulf

Battle of Leyte Gulf

The Battle of Leyte Gulf, also called the "Battles for Leyte Gulf", and formerly known as the "Second Battle of the Philippine Sea", is generally considered to be the largest naval battle of World War II and, by some criteria, possibly the largest naval battle in history.It was fought in waters...

, but she was sunk on 21 November 1944 in the Formosa Strait by three torpedo

Torpedo

The modern torpedo is a self-propelled missile weapon with an explosive warhead, launched above or below the water surface, propelled underwater towards a target, and designed to detonate either on contact with it or in proximity to it.The term torpedo was originally employed for...

es from the U.S. Navy submarine

Submarine

A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...

 USS Sealion (SS-315)

USS Sealion (SS-315)

USS Sealion , a Balao-class submarine, was the second ship of the United States Navy to be named for the sea lion, any of several large, eared seals native to the Pacific....

and poor damage control.

Large cruisers or "cruiser killers"

On the eve of World War II, there was a late renaissance in popularity of ships between battleships and cruisers. While some considered them battlecruisers, they were never classified as capital ships, and they were variously described as "super-cruisers", "large cruisers" or even "unrestricted cruisers". They were optimised as cruiser-killers, fleet scouts and commerce raiders. The Dutch, Japanese, Soviets and Americans all planned new classes specifically to counter the large heavy cruisers being built by their naval rivals - especially the Japanese Mogami

Mogami class cruiser

The were a class of four heavy cruisers built for the Imperial Japanese Navy in the mid-1930s. All four fought in World War II, and were sunk.-Design:...

class cruisers. The Germans also designed a class of lightly protected battlecruisers.

The first such battlecruisers were the Dutch Design 1047

Design 1047 battlecruiser

Design 1047, also known as Project 1047, was a series of plans for a class of Dutch battlecruisers prior to the Second World War. The ships were intended to counter a perceived threat posed by Imperial Japanese aggression to the Dutch colonies in the East Indies...

. Never officially assigned names, the Dutch wanted them to protect their colonies in the East Indies

Dutch East Indies

The Dutch East Indies was a Dutch colony that became modern Indonesia following World War II. It was formed from the nationalised colonies of the Dutch East India Company, which came under the administration of the Netherlands government in 1800....

 in the face of Japanese aggression. Designed with the assistance of the Germans and Italians, they broadly resembled the German Scharnhorst class and had the same main battery, but would have been considerably lighter and only protected against 8 inches (203 mm) gunfire. Although the design was mostly completed, work on the vessels never commenced as the Germans overran the Netherlands in May 1940, while the first ship would have been laid down in June of that year.

The Germans planned to build three battlecruisers of the O Class as part of the expansion of the Kriegsmarine

Kriegsmarine

The Kriegsmarine was the name of the German Navy during the Nazi regime . It superseded the Kaiserliche Marine of World War I and the post-war Reichsmarine. The Kriegsmarine was one of three official branches of the Wehrmacht, the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany.The Kriegsmarine grew rapidly...

 (Plan Z

Plan Z

Plan Z was the name given to the planned re-equipment and expansion of the Nazi German Navy ordered by Adolf Hitler on January 27, 1939...

). With six 15 inch (38 cm) guns, high speed, excellent range but very thin armour, they were intended as commerce raiders. Only one of these was ordered shortly before World War II broke out and no work was ever done on it. No names were assigned, and they were known as O, P, and Q. The new class was not universally welcomed in the Kriegsmarine, their abnormally light protection gaining the class the derogatory nickname Ohne Panzer Quatsch (without armour nonsense) within certain circles of the Navy.

The only class of these late battlecruisers to be laid down were the United States Navy's three Alaska class

Alaska class cruiser

The Alaska-class cruisers were a class of six very large cruisers ordered prior to World War II for the United States Navy. Although often called battlecruisers, officially the Navy classed them as Large Cruisers . Their intermediate status is reflected in their names relative to typical U.S....

 "large cruisers", Alaska

USS Alaska (CB-1)

USS Alaska —the third ship to be named after the then-territory and present state—was the lead ship of a planned six "large cruiser"sMany contemporary historians believe that the Alaskas should be classified as battlecruisers instead. See Alaska class battlecruiser#"Large cruisers" or...

, Guam

USS Guam (CB-2)

USS Guam was an Alaska class large cruiser which served with the United States Navy during the end of World War II. She was the second and last ship of her class to be completed....

 and Hawaii

USS Hawaii (CB-3)

USSTechnically, "USS" should not be in this article's title since this ship was never commissioned; however, it has been included here to adhere to the naming conventions of Wikipedia. Hawaii , the first United States Navy ship to be named after the Territory of Hawaii,Hawaii was not yet a state at...

—of which only Alaska and Guam were completed. The Alaskas were classified as "large cruisers" instead of battlecruisers, and their status as non-capital ships is evidenced by the fact that they were named for territories or protectorates (as opposed to battleships, which were named after states, or cruisers, which were commonly named after cities). But with a main armament of nine 12-inch (305 mm) guns in three triple turrets and a displacement of 27,000 tons, the Alaskas were twice the size of the preceding Baltimore class

Baltimore class cruiser

The Baltimore class cruiser was a type of heavy cruiser in the United States Navy from the last years of the Second World War. Fast and heavily armed, ships like the Baltimore cruisers were mainly used by the Navy in World War II to protect the fast aircraft carriers in carrier battle groups...

 cruisers and had guns some 50% larger in diameter. They lacked the thick armoured belt and torpedo defense system of true capital ships and, unlike most battlecruisers, they were considered a balanced design (according to cruiser standards) as their protection could withstand fire from their own caliber of gun, albeit only in a very narrow range band. They were designed to hunt down Japanese heavy cruisers, though by the time they entered service most Japanese cruisers had been sunk by American aircraft or submarines. Like the contemporary Iowa-class

Iowa class battleship

The Iowa-class battleships were a class of fast battleships ordered by the United States Navy in 1939 and 1940 to escort the Fast Carrier Task Forces which would operate in the Pacific Theater of World War II. Six were ordered during the course of World War II, but only four were completed in...

 fast battleships, their speed ultimately made them more useful as carrier escorts and bombardment ships than as the sea combatants they were developed to be. Hawaii was 84% complete when hostilities ceased, and was laid up for years while various plans were debated to convert her large hull into a missile ship or a command vessel; she would eventually be scrapped incomplete. Three additional hulls, to be named Philippines, Puerto Rico and Samoa, were cancelled outright.

The Japanese started designing the B64 class, which were similar to the Alaska but with 12.2 inches (310 mm) guns. News of the Alaskas led them to upgrade the design, creating the B65. Armed with 14 inches (356 mm) guns, the B65's would have been the best armed of the new breed of battlecruisers, but they still would have had only sufficient protection to keep out 8-inch shells. Much like the Dutch battlecruisers, the Japanese got as far as completing the design for the B65s, but never laid them down. By the time the designs were ready the Japanese Navy recognised that they had little use for the vessels and that their priority for construction should lie with aircraft carriers. Like the Alaskas, the Japanese did not call these ships battlecruisers, referring to them instead as supersized heavy cruisers.

Cold War designs

In spite of the fact that World War II had demonstrated battleships and battlecruisers to be generally obsolete, Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

's fondness for big gun armed warships caused the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 to plan several large cruiser classes in the late 1940s and early 1950s that would be a response for the Alaska class vessels. In the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

, as in many other languages, they were called "heavy cruisers" (thyazholyi kreyser).

The fruits of this program were the project 82 (Stalingrad)

Stalingrad Class Battlecruiser

The Stalingrad-class battlecruiser, also known in the Soviet Union as Project 82 , was intended to be built for the Soviet Navy after World War II. Three ships were ordered, but none were ever completed....

 cruisers, with 36,500 tons standard load (42,300 tons full load), 9 guns 305 mm and a speed of 35 knots (69 km/h). Three ships were laid in 1951–52, but after Stalin's death they were canceled in April 1953. Apart from high costs, the main reason was that gun-armed ships became obsolete with an advent of guided missiles. Only a central armoured hull section of the first cruiser Stalingrad was launched in 1954 and then used as a target for rockets.
The Soviet Kirov class

Kirov class battlecruiser

The Kirov-class battlecruiser is a class of nuclear-powered military ships of the Russian Navy, the largest and heaviest surface combatant warships currently in active operation in the world. The Russian designation is heavy nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser...

 of Tyazholyy Atomnyy Raketny Kreyser (Heavy Nuclear-powered Missile Cruiser), displacing approximately 26,000 tons, is classified as a battlecruiser in the 1996–7 edition of Jane's Fighting Ships

Jane's Fighting Ships

Jane's Fighting Ships is an annual reference book of information on all the world's warships arranged by nation, including information on ship's names, dimensions, armaments, silhouettes and photographs, etc...

, even though in actuality they are very large missile cruisers. Their classification as battlecruisers arises from their displacement, which is roughly equal to that of a World War I battleship

Battleship

A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...

, and the fact that they possess more firepower than nearly every other surface ship. The Kirov-class lacks the heavy armour that distinguishes battlecruisers from regular cruisers and they are classified as "heavy missile cruisers" in Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

. There were four members of the class completed, Kirov

Soviet battlecruiser Kirov

Kirov, the lead ship of her class of nuclear-powered missile cruisers, is one of the major and biggest surface warships of the Russian Navy, though it was originally built for the Soviet Navy. It is similar in size to a World War II battleship...

, Frunze

Soviet battlecruiser Frunze

Admiral Lazarev is the second Kirov class battlecruiser. In fact, she is not a battlecruiser, but a heavy missile cruiser. However, her size has given her the unofficial designation of a battlecruiser in the mass media of many countries...

, Kalinin

Soviet battlecruiser Kalinin

Admiral Nakhimov is the third battlecruiser of the Kirov class. In fact, she is not a battlecruiser, but a heavy missile cruiser. However, her size has given her the unofficial designation of a battlecruiser in the mass media of many countries...

, and Yuri Andropov

RFS Pyotr Velikiy

Pyotr Velikiy is a heavy nuclear-powered cruiser , the fourth Kirov class battlecruiser of the Russian Navy, originally named Yuriy Andropov...

. As the ships were named after Communist personalities, after the fall of the USSR they were given traditional names of the Imperial Russian Navy, respectively Admiral Ushakov, Admiral Lazarev, Admiral Nakhimov, and Pyotr Velikiy. Due to budget constraints two members of this class have been decommissioned, although Pyotr Velikiy and Admiral Nakhimov are in active service and funds are being gathered for possible repair of Admiral Lazarev. Nakhimov was returned to service early, at the beginning of 2006, possibly due to increasing tensions in the Middle East

Middle East

The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...

 and potential Russian naval involvement therein.

See also

• List of sunken battlecruisers
• Protected cruiser
  Protected cruiser
  The protected cruiser is a type of naval cruiser of the late 19th century, so known because its armoured deck offered protection for vital machine spaces from shrapnel caused by exploding shells above...
  
  
• Armoured cruiser
• Alaska class cruiser
  Alaska class cruiser
  The Alaska-class cruisers were a class of six very large cruisers ordered prior to World War II for the United States Navy. Although often called battlecruisers, officially the Navy classed them as Large Cruisers . Their intermediate status is reflected in their names relative to typical U.S....
  
   (Large cruiser)
• Cruiser
  Cruiser
  A cruiser is a type of warship. The term has been in use for several hundreds of years, and has had different meanings throughout this period...
  
  
• List of cruisers
• Crossing the T
  Crossing the T
  Crossing the T or Capping the T is a classic naval warfare tactic attempted from the late 19th to mid 20th century, in which a line of warships crossed in front of a line of enemy ships, allowing the crossing line to bring all their guns to bear while receiving fire from only the forward guns of...
  
  

External links

• Maritimequest Battleships & Battlecruisers of the 20th century
• British and German Battlecruisers of the First World War
• Navsource Online