Summary and key points: The US Navy’s failure to build battlecruisers before World War II, such as the Lexington class, limited its capabilities in the first war. Had the Navy built these faster, better-armed vessels, it could have better supported its fast carrier groups.
-Instead, the United States focused on slow, well-armored battleships, influenced by World War I strategies. During World War II, battlecruisers could have provided vital escort and carrier engagement roles, much like their British and Japanese counterparts.
-The US Navy’s prioritization of heavy battleships over battlecruisers before World War II may have been a strategic oversight.
How the US Navy’s missed opportunity for a battlecruiser influenced World War II
The United States Navy (USN) entered World War II when Japanese aircraft attacked its fleet of old, slow battleships at Pearl Harbor. Fortunately, newer, faster ships would soon enter service, but the USN fought the early battles of the Pacific War without the support of fast battleships.
If the US Navy had made different and better decisions at the end of World War I, it might have started World War II with battlecruisers that could have supported its fast carrier groups. The names of these ships might have been USS Lexington and USS Saratoga.
The turn of the battlecruiser
The US Navy began thinking about building battlecruisers even before HMS Battleship and the HMS Invincible Entered service. Prior to the construction of the Dreadnought, the US Navy had built two different types of warships. Large, slow, well-armored battleships engaged enemy battleships in decisive battles, while large, fast, poorly armored cruisers raided and disrupted enemy commerce. Although battleships were beginning to get larger, by the turn of the century cruisers and battleships were roughly equal in size.
The battleship revolution changed the equation. Britain, Germany, and Japan all began building battleships equipped exclusively with large-caliber guns, but supplemented them with battlecruisers. Faster but less heavily armed and armored than their cousins, battlecruisers would serve as the scouting wing of the battlefleet, but could also operate in traditional “cruising” roles, such as commerce raiding or protection.
He Lexington
The United States, on the other hand, focused exclusively on battleships. It was not until the 1910s, when it became apparent that Japan was on the verge of acquiring four large, fast battlecruisers, that the USN began to take battlecruisers seriously. Early designs resembled modified battleships. Wyomingby lowering one or two turrets and using the weight saved to increase speed. This superficially resembled the British practice of the time, where battleships and battlecruisers shared basic design elements to save time and expense.
He Lexington They were supposed to be a class of six battlecruisers that would close the gap on the British, the Germans, and especially the Japanese. The US Navy scrapped the idea of simply modifying an existing battleship design (these designs were constantly in flux, anyway) and started from scratch. Early efforts were… schematic, and resulted in huge, fast, poorly protected ships with odd configurations (one design had seven smokestacks). The 1916 design specified a displacement of thirty-five thousand tons, a speed of thirty-five knots, and a main armament of ten fourteen-inch guns in four turrets.
Of course, reality intervened and the Lexington Wartime requirements delayed their launch. Fortunately, the British Royal Navy offered its assistance, having gained hard experience with battlecruisers at the Battle of Jutland. The British intervention led to major design changes that increased the size of the ships, but left them more balanced. The United States Navy also opted to switch to sixteen-inch guns, which alleviated some design problems.
As the demand for wartime escort ships declined, the U.S. Navy resumed construction of its battle fleet. The U.S. Navy decided to commit to the construction of the Big Five, advanced standard-type battleships that included two Tennessee-class ships and three Colorado-class ships. One of the Big Five was laid down in 1916, two in 1917, and two in 1919.
Interwar period
The US Navy finally began construction of the Lexington in the early 1920s. But by then the strategic landscape had changed once again, with the United States signing the Washington Naval Treaty with Japan, the United Kingdom, France and Italy. That story is well known: the United States was granted the right to convert two capital ships into aircraft carriers, and it chose the Lexington and the Saratoga. Both ships served with distinction in the war; the Lexington was sunk at the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Saratoga in the postwar atomic bomb tests.
However, it is easy to imagine a world in which the USN had entered the Treaty system with two fewer battleships and two more battlecruisers. The Navy would likely have selected two other ships (for convenience, Constellation and Constitution) to refit as carriers, so it is unlikely that this would have changed the composition of the carrier fleet. The overall impact depends largely on where in the design process the USN had changed its mind. Early designs for the Lexington They were a disaster and would have caused the ships to need immense modification during the interwar period. Still, even the problematic early designs would have left the USN in possession of two large, fast, well-armed battlecruisers. The Navy devoted immense resources to rebuilding its battleships in the interwar period anyway, and may have been able to remedy many of the core problems with the Lexington.
Second World War
Of course, speed wouldn’t have helped. Lexington Had they been trapped in Pearl Harbor during the Japanese attack, the battlecruisers might not have been in Pearl Harbor on 7 December. The battlefleet remained at home while the carriers conducted missions around the Pacific because the battleships could not keep up with the carriers. Had the battlecruisers been available, they could have escorted the Enterprise and Lexington on their ferrying and patrol missions, and thus missed the attack. Alternatively, the USN could have sent the ships out into the Atlantic, as it did with the North Carolina-class fast battleships when they entered service.
If the Lexington and Saratoga survived Pearl Harbor, they would have immediately offered the U.S. Navy a capability it did not have until mid-1942, and in a sense, until late 1943: a fast battleship that could provide high-speed carrier escort in engagements in the Pacific. Lexington They could have seen service in the Coral Sea, Midway, and the Doolittle Raid, providing anti-aircraft and anti-surface protection for U.S. Navy carriers. In late 1942, they could have operated as the core of the cruiser divisions in the Guadalcanal campaign.
In short, like their Japanese counterparts, the Kongos would have been among the most active ships in the fleet. Of course, the story of the Kongos ended badly, as two of the four were sunk during the Guadalcanal campaign. Lexington They would also have been in danger and would not have enjoyed the protection of fast battleships such as the USS Washington or the USS South Dakota. Of the seven battlecruisers that participated in World War II, only one (HMS Renown) survived the conflict.
The Battlecruiser Mistake for the US Navy?
The U.S. Navy prioritized slow, well-armored battleships that could operate together in a battle line. Had the Navy paid more attention to European trends in shipbuilding, it might have moved ahead with the Lexington-class battlecruisers, which would have offered American commanders in the Pacific better tools with which to fight the war. The U.S. Navy might well have lost the ships in the bitter, hard-fought battles of World War II, but that is always the potential fate of useful, in-demand warships. In light of wartime experience, where the utility of the Royal Navy’s and Imperial Japanese Navy’s fast battlecruisers became apparent (despite the ships’ vulnerability), the U.S. Navy should have prioritized battlecruisers over the advanced “Big Five” battleships it began building in 1917.
About the Author: Dr. Robert Farley
Roberto FarleyA frequent contributor to TNI, he teaches at the University of Kentucky. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.
All images are Creative Commons.
