no washington naval treaty

Discussions on alternate history, including events up to 20 years before today. Hosted by Terry Duncan.
User avatar
T. A. Gardner
Member
Posts: 3546
Joined: 02 Feb 2006, 01:23
Location: Arizona

Re: no washington naval treaty

#16

Post by T. A. Gardner » 26 Sep 2016, 22:54

On the carrier issue, this effects the US and Japan more than it does Britain. The RN would likely still build smaller carriers and mostly rely on conversions because of cost. The RN also has the singular problem of no really independent naval air arm. Without the RAF giving funds to the RN, the later is going to have to rely primarily on AA gun systems for fleet defense. It also makes no sense to build a large carrier if you can't come close to supplying the aircraft to operate from it.

The US and Japan might not have started off with very large carriers like they did. In the US case, converting Lexington and Saratoga was a doctrinal blessing. It gave the USN two very large carriers to operate large air wings off of at a time when they were still operating the Langley as their experiment in carriers. Likewise, the Japanese had Hosho which was roughly the same size as Langley. Without the conversions these two might have built smaller carriers like the British rather than the larger ones they did.

Another interesting shift might well be the USN sells Greece two old dreadnought-type battleships instead of the two pre-dreadnoughts they actually did. Here, the USN would have replaced more of the older BB in service with new ships rather than waste funds on rebuilding them as they had to under the WNT.

Another major change would have been the US would be free to build Pacific island bases and upgrade defenses as they wanted. I could see the Philippines getting more infrastructure earlier and things like better coast defenses. Many of the historical Japanese landing sites would have had some coverage by coast defenses in this case. Guam, Wake, and Midway, would have all gotten defenses earlier that were far more serious than they actually had, although Guam might have still been left off the list.
In the PI there would have been nothing to stop the US from training and standing up a large Philippine Army in anticipation of handing over the islands to self rule in the late 40's as planned. The WNT stopped that from happening earlier than it did.

The Japanese on the other hand, couldn't have done much more than they historically did. This gives the US a huge advantage in basing as theirs would have become almost impossible to invade and take. The IJN and IJA wouldn't have any more troops or any real shift in amphibious doctrine here.

The French and Italians likely would have done pretty much as they did although both might have started new capital ship construction a bit earlier.

Post Reply

Return to “What if”