The creation of three battle cruisers of the "Invinnsble" class at once obviously put Great Britain in the world leaders in terms of battle cruisers. Following England, only Germany began to build ships of the same class, and even then not immediately, having laid down at first the rather obscure "large" cruiser "Blucher". There was no doubt that the Von der Tann that followed was superior to any of the Invincibles, but the problem was that His Majesty's fleet received three battlecruisers when the Von der Tann was still being completed at the quay wall.
Thus, Great Britain took a brilliant start, but, alas, could not keep up the pace. Lord Caudore, who handed over to the powers of the First Sea Lord D. Fischer in 1905, wrote about the need to lay down four ships a year, then, with a construction period of a heavy warship of two years, eight such ships would be built in England at any given time. Alas, D. Fischer managed to maintain these rates only in the 1905-1906 program, when the Dreadnought and three Invincibles were laid down, and then (although not without heated debate) the government decided that three ships would be enough. As a result, in 1906-1907 and 1907-1908. three battleships of the "Bellerophon" and "Saint Vincent" types, respectively, were laid down, but battle cruisers were not laid down at all.
This, of course, did not mean that all work on battlecruisers was abandoned. The British continued to design ships of this class, trying to find the optimal alloy of tactical and technical characteristics.
Perhaps the most innovative proposal was the X4 project, which, in truth, had nothing to do with battle cruisers, but was proposed for construction in the 1906-1907 program. "On the rights" of a battleship. In it, the British formulated the concept of a high-speed battleship of the future - the X4 was supposed to have the same main caliber as the Dreadnought (10-305-mm / 45 guns), 279-mm armor belts, barbets and turrets and the speed of a battle cruiser, that is, 25 nodes. The idea was brilliant, but it was ruined by the economy - the displacement of such a battleship, even according to preliminary calculations, should have been 22,500 tons, and the government considered that it would be an excessively expensive ship. As a result, the X4 project went to the archive, and the very, I must say, ordinary battleships of the "Bellerophon" type stood on the stocks.
But in the next shipbuilding program in 1907-1908. the fleet nevertheless hoped to "knock out" the bookmark of the battle cruiser, and the design of ships of this class resumed. As always in such cases, a number of different projects were drawn up. Surprisingly, but true - this time the designers took a firm course on the German concept of battle cruisers. If the first projects were almost the same "Invincibles" with slightly improved armor, but reduced speed, then on the subsequent offered armor thickness even 254 mm. The most promising was the "E" variant, presented on December 5, 1906, and if the second series of British battle cruisers were based on this project, the British received very interesting ships. Option "E", like "Invincible", was armed with eight 305-mm guns, but these were more powerful and heavy fifty-caliber guns. If the guns of the Invincible fired 386 kg shells with an initial speed of 831 m / s, then the new guns accelerated the same projectile to 869 m / s. However, it should be noted that the new British twelve-inch guns were not very successful, which is why, in fact, His Majesty's fleet switched to 343-mm guns. A diagonal arrangement of the main caliber was assumed, while all eight guns could participate in an onboard salvo, and in general the "E" variant looked more powerful than the "Invincible" or "Von der Tann".
At the same time, the "E" variant was supposed to be protected by a very powerful and extended 229-mm armor belt, in addition, apparently, it was planned to strengthen the armor of other parts of the ship relative to the battle cruisers of the first series. The total weight of the armor for variant "E" was supposed to be 5,200 tons versus 3,460 tons for the Invincible. At the same time, and unlike other projects of the battle cruiser, the project "E" provided for the achievement of a 25-knot speed.
Project E, if embodied in metal, would be a tough nut to crack for German battlecruisers. Its 229 mm armor very well protected the ship from German 280 mm shells at medium ranges: recall that the Von der Tann's guns pierced 200 mm of armor only on 65 cables, while British 305 mm / 50 guns were more powerful than the German ones. In principle, the project "E" did not look so bad and against the background of the next German battle cruisers, "Moltke" and "Goeben". Unfortunately, the British Navy did not receive this ship. In the shipbuilding program of 1907-1908. battlecruisers did not hit at all, nevertheless, design work on the "E" variant continued, in the hope that someday Great Britain would still return to building battlecruisers.
Alas - in June 1907, the British government proposed to abandon the further construction of cruisers with 305-mm guns (the term "battle cruiser" did not yet exist, and the Invincibles were considered armored) and in the future to lay down two cruisers with 234-mm artillery. Against this background, the "promotion" of the "E" option, whose displacement in the original project was 21,400 tons, but by June 1907 had grown to 22,000 tons, would be extremely difficult - the St. Vincents under construction and the Neptune planned for construction had less than 20,000 tons of normal displacement. To justify the government that the country needs a cruiser that is superior in size to the battleship, in such conditions, it would be an extremely non-trivial task.
Nevertheless, perhaps the sailors would have succeeded if not for the views of the First Sea Lord D. Fisher. He sincerely believed that six inches of armor belt and one inch of armor deck would be more than enough for a battlecruiser, and he saw no reason at all to defend ships of this class better than the Invincible. As a result, the views of the First Sea Lord and the government to a certain extent coincided, which predetermined the compromise - the battle cruiser "Indefatigable". What kind of ship did the British get?
Let's consider the weight summary of the "Indefatigable" (in brackets - the corresponding indicator of the battle cruiser "Invincible"):
Equipment - 750 (680) tons;
Artillery - 2,440 (2,580) tons;
Machines and mechanisms - 3 300 (3 655) tons;
Normal fuel supply - 1,000 (1,000) tons;
Armor - 3 460 (3 735) tons;
Hull - 6,200 (7,000) tons;
Displacement stock - 100 (100) t;
Total, normal displacement - 17,250 (18,750) tons.
In other words, the hull became almost 13% heavier, the machines and mechanisms - by 10.75%, the artillery - by 5.33%, and the completely inadequate Invincible armor - only by 8%, i.e. in the increase in the weight of articles, armor took the "honorable" penultimate place. On the whole, these figures irrefutably testify that the British, in fact, created only slightly edited "Invincibles".
Artillery
The British preferred to classify the information about the new battle cruiser project to the maximum. The magazine "Naval und Military Record" hinted at the 343-mm cannon on the "Indefatigable" and the ones under construction with it under the 1908-1909 program. dreadnought "Neptune". Jane claimed that the new battle cruiser is protected by a 203 mm waterline belt, 76 mm deck, and the armor of its turrets reaches 254 mm, but with all this, the cruiser develops 29-30 knots. Oddly enough, but the fog that enveloped the true performance characteristics of the cruiser has not been dispelled to the end in our time.
A number of authors, including very authoritative ones, such as O. Parks, claims that the second series of British battlecruisers received the latest British 305-mm / 50 gun, which, by the way, was also armed with the Neptune, which is being built simultaneously with the Indefatigable. Other sources (D. Roberts) write that the ships were armed with old 305-mm / 45 guns, exactly the same ones that were installed on the Invincible. But, for example, dear V. B. Muzhenikov reports, referring to "official blueprints and other primary sources," that 305-mm / 45 guns were installed only on the Indefatigable, and the subsequent New Zealand and Australia received 305-mm / 50 artillery. The author of this article does not undertake to put a final dot over the "i" in this issue, but tends to the version of VB Muzhenikova. Mine artillery - 16 102-mm cannons - did not differ from that on the Invincible, but their placement changed somewhat. The guns were no longer placed on the roofs of the towers, but were completely placed in superstructures: six in the bow and ten in the stern.
As for the torpedo tubes, their number was reduced from five to three, or even to two - in this the sources also did not come to a consensus.
Reservation
When reading numerous publications devoted to the battle cruiser "Indefatigable", one gets the impression that the protection of this ship remained at the level of its predecessors, the "Invincibles". Nevertheless, this is completely wrong: oddly enough, but in the new project the British managed to worsen the already weak protection of the Invincible-class battle cruisers. But first things first.
As we said earlier, the Invincible's artillery was positioned diagonally, but the traverse (side) towers were too close to each other, which prevented them from firing simultaneously on one side. Accordingly, in the "Indefatigebla" project, these towers were blown closer to the extremities, so that the second series of British battlecruisers could fight with all eight guns at the same time. However, this arrangement led to the need to move the bow and stern towers closer to the extremities.
If translated into numbers, the body of the "Indefatigable" became 7 meters longer than that of the "Invincible". But at the same time, the bow tower "Indefatigebla" was located not 42 m from the stem, but only 36, at the same time the stern was not 38.4 m from the stern cut, but only 31.3 m. Accordingly, the distance between the axles of the bow and stern towers increased by 20, 1 m (for some reason, VB Muzhenikov indicated 21 m).
But the increase in the distance between the bow and stern towers required an increase in the length of the citadel. In other words, in order to provide the same protection that the Invincible had, in the Indefatigebla project, the 152-mm armor belt had to be 20, 1 meter longer! However, such an increase required an increase in the mass of armor, and there was no displacement reserve for this.
And here is the result - if the Invincibles had their 152 mm belt protected not only the boiler rooms and engine rooms, but also the feed pipes and ammunition magazines of the main caliber of the bow and stern towers (although the Invincibles did not have enough for the stern tower, but it was protected by a traverse, located at an angle to the side), then on the "Indefatigable" "six-inch" protection was provided only by the boiler rooms and engine rooms. The sides in the area of the bow turret of the main caliber were defended with only 127 mm armor, and the stern - and did 102-127 mm! The length of 152 mm armor belts of the first and second generations of British battlecruisers is perfectly illustrated by the diagrams below.
Here is the Indefatigebla booking scheme
And here, for comparison, "Invincible", top view
In other words, it turned out like this. Without a doubt, 152 mm armor belt was insufficient even against 280 mm German shells with armor penetration 200 mm Krupp armor on 65 cables. But still, under certain conditions (if the ship does not go perpendicular to the trajectory of the projectile flying at it) and luck, and also taking into account the 50 mm bevel behind the armor belt, it could sometimes prevent the penetration of enemy shells into the artillery cellars, engine rooms and boiler rooms. But the 102-127 mm "armor protection" of the bow and stern turrets of the "Indefatigebla" would have penetrated a 280-mm projectile in almost all reasonable positions.
The British, apparently, still understood what they were doing, so they tried to somehow compensate for the weakening of the onboard booking by strengthening the protection of the barbet. The stern turret "Invincible" for 152 mm armor belt had 50.8 mm of armor, for "Indefatigable" for 127 mm armor - 76.2 mm, and for 102 mm armor - 102 mm. Formally, it seemed that the protection did not suffer - the same 203 mm of total armor. But the problem was that the Invincible's traverse covered the barbet at such an angle that an enemy projectile hitting it perpendicular to the slab would pass through the barbet, having good chances of ricochet, and vice versa - in order to strike at an angle. close to 90, in the barbet, it was necessary to pierce 152 mm armor plate at a large angle. Thus, despite the formal equality of thicknesses, the barbet of the aft tower of the Indefatigebla was still less protected than the Invincible. Well, below the barbet (which lasted only up to the armored deck), the Indefatigebla's ammunition storage was protected by 50 mm bevel and 101-127 mm side armor, against 50 mm and 152 mm, respectively, of the Invincible.
The Indefatigable was doing even worse with the bow tower. The barbet 178 mm thick lasted only up to the 25 mm thick armored deck, which rested on the upper edge of the 127 mm belt, and below, judging by the scheme, had no protection at all. So the enemy projectile passed inside the barbet when the one-inch deck was broken through, or when it passed 127 mm of the side armor - nothing else protected the barbet. The cellars had all the same 127 mm sides + 50 mm bevel against 152 mm and 50 mm for Invincible.
"Invincible" at least could accept the battle at sharp bow angles - for example, keeping the same "Von der Tann" at a course angle of 45 1915 g). In this case, the British cruiser would expose 152 mm side and 178 mm forward traverse to enemy shells at practically the same angle. And already under 45 degrees. 152 mm, and even more so 178 mm armor plates had a good chance of holding the German 280 mm shells. "Inflexible" could not do anything like that - it had only 102 mm traverse in its bow, so turning towards the German ships with its bow (even at an angle) was categorically contraindicated for it.
The six-inch Invincible armored belt had a length of 95 m at a height of 3.43 m, at Indefatigebla, due to the need for a longer citadel, the length of the 152 mm section was 91 m at a height of 3.36 m.
But as for the horizontal defense of the "Indefatigable", then, alas, there are some ambiguities with it. Some sources claim that its total thickness within the citadel corresponded to that of the Invincible, i.e. 25.4 mm of the main deck plus 38 mm of the armored deck in its horizontal part and 50 mm - on the bevels. But others say that the horizontal part of the armored deck was reduced to 25.4 mm, i.e. the lateral defenses of the Indefatigable were weaker.
Regardless of which of them is right, we have to state that the only advantage of the Indefatigable project is the diagonal arrangement of the towers in such a way that all 305-mm guns could shoot on one side, was bought at an extremely high price, namely, by a critical weakening armor protection of the feed pipes and cellars of the bow and stern towers of the main caliber.
But there are also interesting nuances here. V. B. Muzhenikov claims that only the Indefatigable had the above protection, but the following New Zealand and Australia received a 152 mm long belt as much as 144.2 m, and in this case, of course, it should be admitted that these two the cruisers received better vertical protection than the Invincible or Indefatigable. But it should be borne in mind that in this case a number of questions arise that the respected historian does not explain at all. The fact is that if New Zealand and Australia received both the latest 305-mm / 50 guns and a longer armored belt, how then did the British manage to "fit" all these innovations into the displacement, which according to the project is only 50 tons exceeded that of the "Indefatigable"?
Even the lightest modification of the 305 mm / 50 Mark XI gun weighed 9 144 kg more than the 305 mm / 45 Mark X gun. the new gun was stronger, the charges for the guns also weighed more, etc. Accordingly, to accommodate heavier guns and armor protection on the "New Zealand" it was necessary to remove something, to save money. What exactly? Perhaps this explains the difference in the armor of the horizontal part of the armored deck (38 mm or 25, 4 mm) in different sources, and the "Australia" and "New Zealand" had vertical armor reinforced due to the horizontal?
Power plant
The rated power of the power plant at the Indefatigable was 43,000 hp. at the "Indefatigable" and 44,000 hp on New Zealand and Australia. That's just 2,000 - 3,000 hp. exceeded the power plant "Invincible", but it was believed that with such power, battle cruisers of the "Indefatigable" class would develop 25 knots.
On trials, all cruisers of this type exceeded their expected speed. During the eight-hour runs, the Indefatigable with an average power of 47 135 hp. developed an average speed of 27, 4 knots, "New Zealand" at 45 894 hp. - 26, 3 knots, and "Australia" - 26, 9 knots., Unfortunately, O. Parks in this case does not indicate the power of the machines. The maximum speed of all three cruisers exceeded 27 knots. The normal design fuel reserve was 1000 tons of coal, the maximum for Indefatigable was 3340 tons of coal and 870 tons of oil, for Australia and New Zealand 3170 tons of coal and 840 tons of oil. Daily fuel consumption at a speed of 14 knots was 192 tons, respectively, on one angle alone battle cruisers could go 5 550 - 5 850 miles.
Construction
According to the program 1908-1909. Great Britain laid down only two large ships - the battleship Neptune and the battle cruiser Indefatigable.
Both ships were supposed to become non-serial, because next year it was supposed to lay ships according to other projects. However, such significant reductions in shipbuilding programs - three ships each in 1906-1907 and 1907-1908. and only two ships in 1908-1909. instead of the four built earlier, confused the leadership of the British dominions. As a result, Australia and New Zealand funded the construction of two more battle cruisers. This, no doubt, a good undertaking, nevertheless led to a completely inadequate solution, because "Australia" and "New Zealand" were laid down at a time when new battle cruisers with 343-mm artillery were already being built on the stocks.
The construction of the New Zealand cost £ 1,684,990, its guns cost £ 94,200, and the total cost of building the ship was £ 1,779,190. At the same time, the Princess Royal cost the Crown £ 1,955,922. Art., tools for it - 120,300 p. Art. and the total cost was £ 2,076,222. Art.
The difference in cost between the two ships was only £ 297,032, but adding that amount to the Dominion's donations would give His Majesty's fleet a much more powerful next-generation ship. However, to all appearances, such a possibility never occurred to anyone.
Comparison with Von der Tann
The normal displacement of the Von der Tann was 19,370 tons, the British battle cruiser - 18,470 tons. The rated power of the vehicles was 42,000 hp. from the German and 43,000 to 44,000 hp. the British cruisers have predetermined their comparable driving performance. If the "Indefatigable" was designed for a 25-knot speed, then the "Von der Tann" had to develop 24, 8 knots. During tests, both ships developed much more power and demonstrated, in general, similar speed parameters: "Indefatigable" showed 27.4 knots on an eight-hour run, and "Von der Tann" - 26.8 knots. at six o'clock. True, the German boilers turned out to be somewhat more "voracious" than their British "counterparts", and the Von der Tann had a slightly shorter cruising range, 4,400 miles at 14 knots against more than 5,500 miles for British cruisers. But the cruising range for operations in the North Sea is, in general, a secondary quality, superiority in this area did not give the British cruisers great advantages. Of course, a longer range means more time during which the ship can maintain high speed and a greater distance that the ship will travel with broken pipes and dropped thrust, but, strictly speaking, the superiority of the British cruisers in cruising range rather equated their capabilities with the German ones. Still, the British cruisers acted as "beaters" who were supposed to "intercept and punish" the high-speed ships of the Germans, and if so, then they, in theory, needed to "run" (and even before the battle) more than the Germans. Thus, we see that D. Fischer's thesis that "speed is the best defense" did not work against the first German battle cruiser, because that speed was "protected" no worse than its British counterparts.
In general, it can be stated that the Germans managed to create a much more balanced and harmonious ship than the British in the "Indefatigable" project. In this regard, it would be very interesting to analyze the armor penetration of the Indefatigable's armor by the Von der Tann cannons and vice versa, but, unfortunately, on the basis of the data available to the author, an accurate analysis is impossible.
Without bothering the dear reader with the nuances of calculating armor penetration according to de Marr's formulas (considered canonical for such calculations), we note that the data in the general press are somewhat contradictory. For example, O. Parks indicates that the British 305-mm / 45 Mark X cannon penetrated 305 mm of Krupp's armor at a distance of 7,600 m. mm at the same distance. At the same time, German sources indicate that the 280-mm / 45 Von der Tann cannons were capable of penetrating 200 mm of Krupp armor on 65 cables, but alas, they do not contain the initial data in order to check the validity of these figures. de Marr's formulas. In addition, it should be borne in mind that the Krupp armor produced by different countries is not identical, but at the same time, of course, each country uses in the calculations the data of exactly the armor that it produces itself. It is believed that the English armor of the First World War was stronger than the German one, but the author of this article did not find a reliable justification for this thesis.
If we take the practical results of combat clashes, then in the battle of Jutland, the German guns, in general, confirmed the declared results - for example, a 280-mm Moltke projectile from a distance of 66 kbt, roughly, hit the 229 mm barbet of the tower of the battle cruiser Tiger, knocked out a piece of armor measuring 400 * 700 mm and went inside (but did not explode). This is more than the 200 mm indicated for the Von der Tann at a distance of 65 kb, but it should be noted that the Moltke cannons were somewhat more powerful and accelerated a 302 kg projectile to 880 m / s, i.e. 25 m / s faster than the guns of the first German battle cruiser. With this correction, 200 mm for 280 mm / 45 looks quite realistic.
At the same time, at the time of the duel of the 3rd squadron of battle cruisers of Admiral Hood with the Lyuttsov and Derflinger, British 305-mm shells hitting 300 mm and 260 mm of Derflinger's armor plates were recorded (the distance fluctuated between 30-50 kbt), however, no armor penetration was recorded in any case. Strictly speaking, this does not prove anything, because we do not know at what angle these outfits fell and whether they were armor-piercing, but in any case, we have no reason to believe that the British 305mm / 45 guns had better armor penetration than the one indicated by O. Parks and which follows from de Marr's calculations.
Let us now recall the booking of the German and British cruisers.
It should be noted that in most cases the 152 mm armor of the Invincibles and Indefatigebles is opposed to the 250 mm armor belt of the Von der Tann, but this is still not entirely correct, because the 250 mm armor belt of the German battle cruiser was very narrow - the height The 250 mm armor belt did not exceed 1.22 m (according to Muzhenikov) or, perhaps, 1.57 m, while the height of the Indefatigebla's armor belt was 3.36 m. Still, the main armor of the side (and barbets of the main caliber turrets) consisted of 203 mm armor plates against 152-178 mm from the British.
But even in this case, "Indefatigable" loses to "Von der Tann" with a truly devastating score. The sides and barbets of the British battle cruiser are quite comfortably penetrated by the Von der Tann guns at a distance of 65-70 kbt., While the British battle cruiser has approximately the same level of “comfortable armor penetration” by no more than 50 kbt. We are talking here about "comfort" in the argument that armor penetration is usually indicated by the armor plate installed perpendicular to the earth's surface and if it were not for the angle of incidence of the projectile, it would hit it at an angle of 90 degrees. At the same time, there is pitching in battle, ships are usually deployed at an angle to each other, etc., that is, the shell usually hits the armor at a greater angle than is provided by the armor penetration tables.
So - "Von der Tann" is quite capable of piercing the sides and barbets of an English battle cruiser at 65-70 kbt, while the artillery of "Indefatigebla" gets similar capabilities in relation to the German ship somewhere in the 50-55 kbt. But at 50-55 kbt, the Von der Tann cannons will confidently penetrate not only the 152 mm side, but also the 50 mm bevel behind it and 64 mm protection of the cellars of British ships, while the British cannons will only have 200 mm side. despite the fact that to get into cars or cellars (250 mm side plus 50 mm bevel), the British shells have no chances. And again - we are talking about 152 mm armor of British ships, but the cellars of the bow and stern towers of the Inflexible were covered only with 102-127 mm armor belt …
But why did the Germans, with a generally insignificant difference in displacement, have a much stronger ship? The answer, most likely, is to be found in the weight report of Von der Tann and Indefatigable. It should be noted here that it is impossible to compare figures from reference books directly, because the same articles of weights for the British and Germans had different contents. So, for example, under the article "artillery" the Germans indicated the weight of the towers without armor, the British - with armor, but the weight of the armored deck, which the British counted in the armor, the Germans considered part of the hull and indicated it in the mass of hull structures.
Taking into account the appropriate adjustments, the mass of the Von der Tann's armor was 5,693 tons, while the mass of the Indefatigebla's armor was only 3,735 tons, in other words, the Germans managed to find an opportunity to install 1,958 tons of more armor on their ship. than the British. How? Here one could recall the lighter weapons of the Von der Tann, but alas, it is quite comparable with the British and amounts to 2,604 tons versus 2,580 tons. That is, the German battle cruiser carried 24 tons more weapons than the Indefatigable ! The thing is that, of course, the British guns were heavier, but the Germans better armored the turrets of the main caliber, and therefore a certain parity arose. But the British power plant had a mass of 3 655 tons, while the German one had only 3 034 tons, that is, with almost equal nominal power, the British machines and boilers turned out to be 620 tons heavier. And the hull of the British ship turned out to be almost a thousand tons heavier - that is, with its large dimensions, the hull of the German battle cruiser weighed significantly less than the English one!
In principle, such an economy of hull structures could be explained either by the insufficient strength of the hull, or by its too low height, which predetermines poor seaworthiness. But in the case of the Von der Tann, these explanations do not work very well, because claims to the strength of its hull have never been heard, as for the side height, here you can start from such an important indicator as the height of the axles of the main battery guns above sea level. For the "Indefatigable" the indicated figure for the bow tower was 9.7 m, for the "traverse" towers - 8.5 m, and the aft one - 6.4 m. The height of the axes of the guns at the "Von der Tann" the bow tower and 7, 7 m for the rest, that is, it was quite comparable to the English one.
Probably, in terms of seaworthiness, cruisers of the Invincible and Indefatigable class were still somewhat superior to the Von der Tann, but this superiority was clearly not so great that at least a thousand tons of armor had to be sacrificed for it.
The author of this article considers the Invincible-class battlecruisers to be a mistake in British shipbuilding. But this mistake is to some extent excused by the fact that the British were still innovators and created ships of a new class. The construction of Indefatigable, New Zealand and Australia does not even have such an excuse. Without a doubt, much of the blame for them lies with the British government, which decided to save where it was completely inappropriate, but the fault of the First Sea Lord in this case is no less.
At the same time, having stumbled on the first step (the big cruiser Blucher), the Germans created, let's not be afraid of this word, the magnificent Von der Tann. Without a doubt, both the English and German dreadnoughts and the battle cruisers of the first series had various, sometimes quite serious shortcomings. "Von der Tann" was also not deprived of them, but in terms of the totality of its characteristics it was much more in line with its purpose than "Dreadnought" or "Nassau", "Invincible" or "Blucher". From this point of view, among the "big ships" of the first "dreadnought" series, "Von der Tann", according to the author of this cycle, came closest to the ideal of a heavy battleship. Without a doubt, a few years after its laying, both in England and in Germany, they began to build much more powerful and sophisticated ships, but there is no reproach to the creators of the first German battle cruiser. Progress in those years was moving by leaps and bounds. And for its time, "Von der Tann" became the standard of a battle cruiser - the ship turned out to be so good that the German shipbuilders did not manage to repeat its success right away …
But that's a completely different story.
