Hi everyone!!!
> John wrote:
They're called "Panzerschiffe" (Armoured Ships) in german and were classed as
Heavy Cruisers towards the end of WW2. Panzerschiffe were no battleships, but
a new class of ships between Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers. They were
optimized for commerce raiding and not to fight other warships above cruiser
size. I don't know of any official (english) designation for them.
TschüÃ!!! Hauke
The pocket battleships actually more resembled WW1 armored cruisers than
anything else. An "AC" designation might be appropriate.
Tim
> KueckH@aol.com wrote:
> Hi everyone !!!
> On Mon, 27 Jul 1998 KueckH@aol.com wrote:
> They're called "Panzerschiffe" (Armoured Ships) in german and were
The problem with designations designed by A is that sometimes B builds
something that doesn't quite fit the parameters... The "pocket battleships" is
one such case.
The correct answer ofcourse is that there is no official English designation
for a German ship, it's their ship and they can call it whatever they like to.
The designation system arose from the naval treaties of the era: 10000 tons
and max 8" guns was classed as heavy cruisers, anything heavier being
classed as capital ships -- this lead to a very distinct gap in the
designs as if you were going to use up your treaty allotment of capital ships,
it made no sense to pull your punches with a 15000 ton vessel or somesuch.
The treaties also caused very interesting attempts to "bend the rules",
including a French sub with 8" guns.
Germany, OTOH, wanted their stuff to be classed as CA because they were under
very strict limitations. So they lied about the tonnage etc.