Quote:
Originally Posted by edslunch
The battlecruiser was a misguided attempt to mount large guns on more lightly armoured but faster ships, the thinking being they could use speed to their advantage.
|
There was nothing inherently misguided about the battlecruiser concept, it's just that the ships were foolishly used in roles for which they were never intended. The idea was that they would be the ultimate hunter-killer on the open seas: they had enough speed to catch any ship and enough firepower to destroy any ship. The trade-off was that they were more lightly armoured; they had enough protection to absorb fire from shells of 8 inches or less from cruisers and destroyers, but not the 14+ inch shells from battleships. So their mission profile was to chase and sink anything up to and including cruiser class but use their speed advantage to run away and avoid combat with enemy battleships.
The problem is the admirals who foolishly used battlecruisers as part of their fleets' main line of battle. That should have been exclusively the role of battleships and their escorts, never battlecruisers.