The Butterfly Effect: A British AAR

[coz1]

That certainly is a bonus to have a King so dedicated. Surely his hope for the future is what helped him get well. And it sounds as is the economy might be starting to get on track again. Also a bonus as long as it lasts.

 

[JASGripen]

Fun reading, really!
I hope to see more of contra historical governments and explanations of how they came to power.



ps
Great pic on Eagle too, btw (that Carrier has sunk heaps of ships in my AAR, I might steal that pic later on).

 

[El Pip]

Just when you though it was dead, it comes back. Why the absence of updates? Well basically it takes me an age to do one, I'm trying to ensure there are no stupid mistakes and that its all plausible and that means a fair bit of research. I like doing it, but I haven't had the time to do it recently. Anyway some replies to the comments, because its only polite.

Vincent Julien - I've interested the man who did Prussain Moderation Woot!

therev - Updatery will follow soon.

lifeless - Flattery will get you everywhere.

coz1 - All I've heard about King George V alway emphasised his sense of duty, I couldn't see a man like that dying during a crisis. Plus there were rumours that his doctor, Lord Dawson, 'eased his passing' with a injection or two during the night. So I delayed the doctor and gave the King a reason to keep on going. As for the economy well, wars are always good for buissness aren't they?

JASGripen - I'm glad someone appreciates the explanations, they took me long enough to research I've got at few more contra-historical governments lined up, if everything goes to plan event wise.

The update is being polished as I type, not literally of course I'm typing this, you know what I mean........

 

[El Pip]

Chapter XII: Policy by Other Means.
​

As the end of January approached it become clear that Mussolini would not back down in the face of British pressure, indeed would not make any concession at all to the British objections. In Westminster Prime Minister Churchill, supported by most, but not all, of his cabinet, also refused to back down, in his view the matter had now become a challenge to British honour. More seriously it was a challenge to Britain's reputation and position as a world power, Mussolini was gambling that the Westminster did not have the willpower or courage to back it's words with actions. Quite aside from the strategic concerns about Italian influence in the Mediterranean and Red Sea, backing down now, in the face of the implied Italian threat, would be a sign of British weakness and lack of resolve, something Churchill refused to contemplate.

The British Governments position was not universally popular, while the vocal 'peace with honour' movements attracted the attention there was a wide unease about the diplomatic cost of intervention. Was protecting the Abyssinian government really worth risking war with Italy and terminally damaging relations with France?​

In the actual theatre itself the increase in tension manifested itself with rising troop levels and increasingly vigorous and wide ranging 'patrols' at land and in the air. The high commands of both sides faced problems with a a lack of resources and how best to deploy them, the crisis had come as surprise to all involved and, while their were contingency plans, these all assumed at least some degree of warning and slowly rising tensions. Faced with a sudden crisis the two sides deployment would be guided by both military necessity and political expediency.

The regular British forces in the region were limited to the two infantry division of Middle East Command and the relatively small garrisons around the canal itself and in the Trans-Jordan. The Royal Navy had managed to ship out the British Expeditionary Force to the region, officially on a desert training exercise, a cover story that was alarmingly close to the truth. The divisions of the BEF were not acclimatised to the region and would need all the time to train and re-equip they could get. Worse, despite being almost all the Imperial General Staff felt they could risk sending from the Home Islands, they were still badly outnumbered by the Italian forces. As a result the decision had been made to use the depth of the desert as part of the defence, abandoning the border and instead deploying around Alexandria to await reinforcements from the larger British Army of India.

British and Italian force deployments in North Africa at the end of January. The RAF was belatedly realising that the lack of forward air bases would limit their operations to the defence of Alexandria and the Canal Zone, at least until either the Italians crossed the border or British force constructed or captured a forward air strip.​

The Italian military faced a far different problem, while dealing with the potential British threat they also had an ongoing war to fight. It is one of the great ironies of the Abyssinian crisis that the actual war between Abyssinia and Italy was never the main issue, just the manner in which it was conducted. This explains the priority placed on the Abyssinian front by the Italian high command, the Comando Supremo realised that if the war in Abyssinia was fought and won quickly the crisis could yet be defused. The other concern weighing on the Italian High Command was France, while London and Paris had written off the Entente Cordiale as dead, Rome had not and could not. A substantial force, including the Alpini divisions and much of the Italian armoured corps, would be maintained on the French border throughout the war as a deterrent and a precaution, smaller forces would also cover the Austrian and Yugoslav borders as well. The Italian deployments reflected this hierarchy of threats, with the cream of the units at home and much of the best expeditionary forces in Abyssinia the forces in North Africa were very much the reserve and colonial units. While numerous they were not well led or well equipped, but quantity often has a quality all of it's own and, in any event, for a policy of threat and intimidation raw numbers were all Mussolini needed.

In Abyssinia itself the Italian superiority in weapons and air power was finally telling on the Abyssinian army, but not quickly enough to beat the British deadline for sealing the canal. Without resupply the Italian commanders on the ground predicted they could last no more than two months, longer if they halted their offensive. Certainly not enough time to complete the conquest and annexation of Abyssinia. It was this news that prompted Mussolini to further escalate the crisis, having started the war to gather glory and to expunge the shame of the defeat in the First Italo-Ethiopian War with a crushing victory, he was now faced with the humiliation of withdrawing and negotiating in Abyssinia. This fear, along with an inability to rationally assess his country's chances and a lingering belief that the British were bluffing and would negotiate if presented with a fait accompli all drove him to escalation.

On the 30th of January 1936 the Suez Canal was closed to all Italian flagged shipping, on the same day Il Duce ordered the Italian freighter Dino to attempt to force her way through.​

The run of the SS Dino had two aims; first to see if the British were bluffing, the outcome that most of the Italian military desperately hoped for. Secondly, if the British were serious, she was to attempt to capture the canal installations, gaining control of the waterway as a bargaining chip for a negotiated agreement. In support of her second aim the cargo of the Dino wasn't supplies or fuel, but a full battalion of Bersaglieri, the elite Italian light infantry. As the Dino sailed past repeated British warnings they lay in wait for the first warning shot, at which point they burst onto the deck and furiously returned fire overwhelming the small British garrison which was forced to withdraw.

The Italian plan was brave and daring, but ultimately doomed by two factors, firstly the lack of naval support from the Regina Marina, which Mussolini had though unnecessary (and which the naval staff had been unwilling to risk so close to Alexandria), and secondly it made absolutely no provision for the possibility that the British would fight back. While the larger Suez garrison could undoubtedly have rallied and retaken the canal installation, though not without risk of damaging it, it instead fell to the Royal Navy to deal with the matter, the light cruiser HMS Diomede was passing through the canal at the time of the raid and was rapidly summoned.

HMS Diomede, a 6 inch 'D' class light cruiser from the Great War. Having spent the previous decade as part of the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy she had been ordered home at the end of 1935. By the end of January she had reached the Red Sea and was transiting the Canal on her way to Malta. Her actions on the 30th would gain her the nickname 'The Saviour of Suez'.​

With the supporting fire from Diomede the garrison troops were able to rally and retake the main buildings around Port Said. The surviving Bersaglieri, although still outnumbering the garrison were pinned by the offshore gunnery and has seen the Dino, with most of their supplies still on board, sunk by the Diomede. Surrounded, lacking their own heavy support and with no means of escape they were forced to surrender. By all accounts the failure of the Dino plan sent Mussolini into a towering rage and, despite the desperate warnings of the Fascist Grand Council, this rage expressed itself as a formal declaration of war.

On the 30th of January 1936 the Kingdom of Italy declared war on the British Empire and her allies.

"It is humiliating to remain with our hands folded while others write history. It matters little who wins. To make a people great it is necessary to send them to battle even if you have to kick them in the pants. That is what I shall do." Benito Mussolini, Enciclopedia Italiana.​

---
Butterfly Redux Notes:
Doubled the length of this one, setting up quite how terrible the Italian forces in North Africa were. In this instance I would argue the AI behaviour was fairly sensible, Italy couldn't be sure France wouldn't intervene so had to garrison that border and a quick victory in Abyssinia would have defused the crisis.

Facts on the HMS Diomede are correct, she was indeed transiting the Suez Canal at about that point and probably still had a good few Kiwi accented sailors on board.

Up Next: Opening shots on land and at sea.

 

[Vann the Red]

Excellent update, El Pip. Particularly loved the Clauswitzian title. I have never played a British or Italian GC, but I assume these events are hand-crafted?

Vann

 

[unmerged(51002)]

This is a really nice AAR, I love the style and the amount of work you put into the mod must be huge!

However, in RL Churchil commended the Italians for invading Ethiopia

Or so I'm told...

 

[El Pip]

Vann the Red - Yes these events are fresh from my own keyboard, with a few more in this chain still to fire off...

Alexus - It was a fair bit of work, it's currently sitting at 15 event files about 120kb in size, in context all the non-AI events are only a meg. Worst of all it's still not finished!

As for Churchill, I did have a bit of thought that. However I decided that
A. Churchill was a politican, he was not going to wilfully go against a public demanding action without a very good reason.
B. He was a staunch Imperialist and Italy was directly challenging British influence not only in Africa but in the more important Mediterranean. That would have been unacceptable to his way of thinking.

Thanks to both of you for the comments.

 

[GeneralHannibal]

well obviously the British will win but what will happen to Italy after they lose. Also on the bright side Italy won't be able to supply the Nationalists in Spain so maybe an alternate Spanish civil war.

 

[unmerged(47162)]

wow very nice! war in 1936 with italy. maybe you'll be able to get a front with germany when the time comes

 

[Sir Humphrey]

Lets hope things turn out well for Blighty.

 

[unmerged(41995)]

The Med fleet can bump off the eyeties - but troops are a bit snort on the ground! I hope the Indian Divisions get there soon!

 

[Vann the Red]

They're doing cocaine? ;-)

Vann

PS: Sorry, therev; I simply couldn't resist.

 

[Sir Humphrey]

Well in fact cocain wasn't banned until the 1950s in Britain.

 

[Vann the Red]

No wonder the American troops enjoyed their time awaiting Overlord!

Vann

 

[unmerged(51900)]

Am I the only one pumped up by this AAR? Im even contemplaiting mashing F5 every 5 minutes for another update. The literary style, the story, everything is simply great.

 

[El Pip]

Right an update is brewing and should appear tonight, until then I will reply to the comments. Crazy I know.

GeneralHannible - I have plans for Spain. Big plans, none of them historical...

lifeless - That assumes there will be a war with Germany.

Sir Humphrey - With the Royal Navy around, how can things not go well for Blighty?

therev - Tis true, I didn't realise but Italy starts with fifty division, including 5 mountaineer and 30 infantry. Britain has barely got 35 total including 10 millita.

Vann the Red - Tempting is the dark side hmmm. Cheap laughs has it.

Pureone - I'm glad your enjoying it and I hope the next update keeps the same standards.


EDIT:

Scratch all that, the entire update just got eaten and I can't face re-writing it tonigh.
However I will try and get an update before the weekend.

 

[VILenin]

Should be a really interesting conflict between Britain and Italy. Britain will, of course, win in the long run but I suppose victory might be possible for the Italians if they win some quick victories and damage British morale. The British people might not be entirely behind the war. But wait, this is the Italians so quick victory is out fo the question. Disregard that whole premise. Good work El Pip.

 

[El Pip]

Chapter XIII: The Ghosts of the Past. ​

The Abyssinian War was decided at sea in the clashes between the Regia Marina and the Royal Navy. As much as the generals and soldiers would prefer it otherwise, the outcome of the land campaigns were in large part decided in advance by who had control of the seas and so could ship in reinforcements and supplies. With this in mind a comparison of the two navies, their equipment, mentality and their tasks during the conflict will be of considerable assistance in understanding the war.

The Regia Marina of the 1920s and 30s suffered from many problems, but lack of a clear strategic direction was not one of them. It is therefore unfortunate that this direction would turn out to be so badly wrong; the Regia Marina's central assumption was that Italy's next war would be against France and her Balkan allies, the conflict breaking out sometime in the 1940s. In terms of opponent this was not an unreasonable conclusion, from long before the Great War the Italians had seen France as one of it's main rivals and, with the dissolution of Austria-Hungary removing the other local contender, it had been natural for Rome to focus primarily on France. The naval treaties has reinforced this belief, Italy and France receiving identical tonnage allowances for capital ships and the restrictions on transferring capital ships ensured there would be no large 'Yugoslavian' fleet of ex-French ships in the Adriatic. This outcome was celebrated in Rome as a diplomatic and strategic master-stroke; with France forced to split her fleet between three coasts, not to mention her colonies, the Italians could expect naval superiority in the Mediterranean, all else being equal. Sadly for Italy when war did come, all else was very much not equal.

The main problem facing the Italian navy was resources, not just lack of money to finance new construction (though that was always a serious issue) but a lack of all the worthy, unexciting but expensive things you needed to support a fleet; modern shipyards with long slipways, gun pits to construct large calibre naval rifles, steelworks that could produce thick, high quality, armour plate and so on. This lack of investment extended all the way to the top; the wartime naval high command (the Supermarina) did not even have a permanent head quarters building, at the time of the outbreak of the Abyssinian War their new command complex was still under construction. The result was that, in contrast to the major naval powers, the Italian fleet was more constrained by domestic politics and finance than the treaties, even by the outbreak of war she was well within her treaty tonnage allowances. Nowhere was this more apparent than in naval aviation, where Italy would enter the war with no proper aircraft carriers in service despite being allocated some 60,000 tons of carrier displacement (For reference the American Yorktown class were a shade under 20,000 tons standard load, for a relaxed definition of 'standard'). While arguments about the merits of naval aviation raged within the Regia Marina for much of the late 1920s and early 1930s, with at least three aircraft carrier designs being worked up at various points, ultimately economics and the battleship lobby won out. With limited funds Italy was never going to be able to construct a 'balanced' fleet, therefore the admirals came around to favouring a strong battleline while relying on the unsinkable carrier of Italy for aviation support; better to do one thing properly than many things badly was part of the reasoning. The embodiment of this was Admiral Domenico Cavagnari, Chief of Staff of the Regia Marina at the outbreak of the war, a man who combined the relatively common faith in big guns with his own unique peccadilloes, not least a distrust, bordering on hatred, of radar and other electronic devices. Appointed in 1934 most of the fateful decisions had already been taken and Cavagnari would find himself taking responsibility for the consequences of those choices, but as he would have likely made the exact same choices he could not complain too much about this.

The RN Zara, the latest in Italian heavy cruiser design she had been launched in early 1930 and was rightly considered one of the best 'Washington Cruisers' in the world, an accolade that in part rested on the world not knowing she displaced 11,500t standard and so was a good 15% over the maximum tonnage allowed by treaty. As many have found before and since; it is easy to be the best if you cheat. A major departure from the previous Trento-class, the Zara's traded speed for protection, being four knots slower than her excessively quick 36knot predecessors she only needed 2/3rds of the horsepower and two shafts and propellers not four. These savings, and being over tonnage, allowed significantly more armour, almost three times thicker over her critical areas. Her great weakness remained the same however, while the eight 203mm (8") guns were acceptable enough their ammunition supply was not, lax quality control and large tolerances meant the shells were not consistent and accuracy suffered. That said ship for ship, and crucially assuming similarly trained and experienced officers and crews, they were more than a match for a Royal Navy County-class.​

In theory Italian doctrine was fairly pure Mahanian thinking; the fleet should be concentrated and prepared for a large decisive battle with the enemy, probably somewhere in the Central Mediterranean as the French Fleet attempted to reinforce France's Balkan Allies. In terms of ship design this had pushed the fleet towards high speed, short legged ships with long range guns, ideal to minimise contact with the enemy, except on favourable terms before the 'decisive battle'. The approach of seeking out a large battle also met with political approval, during the Great War the Italian navy had done very little and participated in no major sea battles with the Austro-Hungarian fleet, limiting herself to sabotage and human torpedo attacks. This approach, while strategically justifiable, had not been well received in Italy, some even accusing the navy of cowardice and hiding from the fight while the Army had bled itself white. The Supermarina had no intention of receiving the same accusations during the next war so officially planning on fighting a "Mediterranean Jutland" against France had appeal politically. The problem with such a plan was that while the tactical outcome of Jutland could be debated, strategically it has been a clear victory for the Royal Navy, i.e. the larger fleet, a position Italy was unlikely to be in. If the treaties held then Italy and France would remain notionally equal, while if they failed and a naval arms race resulted then it was believed France could out-build Italy, a belief reinforced by the ongoing Italian struggle with resources. Therefore successive heads of the Regia Marina had hedged their bets, constructing and training a large and well drilled submarine fleet that was either the largest or second largest in the world, depending on your view of some of the less sea-worthy Soviet submarines. In practice therefore, the Italian doctrine was to use her large submarine fleet to attrite the enemy and disrupt his trade, deploy her force of cruisers to protect her own supply convoys, and to hold the battlefleet as a 'Fleet in Being' to distract and neutralise the French battle fleet, venturing out to either attack isolated portions of the enemy or escort the most critical and vital troop convoys.

The key mistake in the Regia Marina's strategic assumption was not the choice of enemy, they probably would have reached a broadly similar strategic conclusions even if they had planned on fighting the British, but timing. By general consensus, especially among her own officers, the Regia Marina entered the war at least four years too early, if not five or six. The grand battlefleet was still building or undergoing reconstruction when war broke out, in particular the Vittorio Veneto class battleships, on which so many hopes were pinned, were still on the slipway and the first ship was at least a year away from launching, further still from commissioning into service. In the absence of these new ships the Italian navy had to rely on her old Conte di Cavour and Andrea Doria class battleships, mildly upgraded pre-Great War era ships, moreover the two Conte di Cavours had to be rushed, incomplete, out of long term refits to be ready for the conflict. Those refits were themselves part of Italy's naval problems; in a tragically misguided attempt to save money the Regia Marina had decided to re-build and upgrade the Conte di Cavours rather than build new tonnage. In theory this would have provided a modernised battle line to face off against the new French Dunkerques and fill the gap until the Vittorio Venetos commissioned. In practice the 're-builds' would cost almost as much as the new battleships and hit the same construction bottlenecks as a new build, causing the work to take four years. As an example the Conte di Cavours were armed with 305mm (12") main guns which lacked the range and hitting power to reliably threaten a modern battleship, so were originally planned to be replaced during the rebuild. However Italy had few large calibre gun pits and they were all busy manufacturing new 381mm (15") guns and turrets for the Vittorio Venetos, so the rebuilds were forced to used 're-bored' guns; the existing gun tubes milled out and relined to 320mm (12.6") so the original turrets could be re-used. As the original guns had been efficiently engineered there was no real 'spare' capacity in the guns for this sort of re-design, consequently the 'new' guns would suffer with thermal problems during sustained fire, resulting in larger dispersion and poor accuracy. Similar issues were experienced in all areas of the work, not least in the re-armouring where the ships were forced to compete with their more modern sister ships and the fledgling Italian armoured corps for the limited supply of armoured plate. Rushed out of the shipyards after a truly Herculean effort, the rebuilds did at least have their new engines and 'new' main guns in place, but the armour scheme was incomplete and much of the internal work, such as providing electrical power to the new powered secondary turrets, had barely been started. It is hard to escape the conclusion that the efforts spent on the reconstruction would have been better employed accelerating the construction of the Vittorio Veneto class.

The Conte di Cavour and her sister-ship the Giulio Cesare in harbour together shortly after war had broken out. The two ships would operate with their un-modernised semi-sisters, the two Andrea Dorias, and together form the centrepiece of the Regia Marina's main fighting unit, the Prima Squadra, throughout the war. Out-gunned by every Royal Navy battleship afloat they also lacked the armour to resist the ubiquitous BL 15" gun. Things were not all bad however and the ships would have the traditional Italian advantage of speed, newly modernised machinery and a shipyard fresh hull would give the Conte di Cavours a ~3knot speed advantage over a modernised Queen Elizabeth-class. How best to utilise that speed while being hamstrung by the far slower Andrea Dorias would be just one of the challenges the Supermarina would face.​

To turn to their opposition, the Royal Navy found the conflict equally as unexpected. While the Mediterranean Fleet had plenty of war plans for a conflict with Italy, the vast majority of them involved either France as a British ally or Britain being distracted by a conflict elsewhere (or both). A straight up conflict between the Royal Navy and the Regia Marina had been planned for, but most of the staff officers assigned had seen it more as make-work than preparation for a realistic proposition. The fact that the Mediterranean Fleet headquarters were still based in Valetta and had not been moved to the more secure, if less convenient, base at Alexandria shows the generally relaxed attitude to the Italian threat. The main concern of the Admiralty, at least prior to the collapsed Anglo-German Naval Agreement talks, had been Japan; the then under-construction aircraft carrier HMS Ark Royal had been slated for deployment to Singapore to join China Station. The build up to the crisis had allowed the Royal Navy to surge ships to the area, call up reserves and generally get onto more of a wartime footing, so while it may not have been the war the Admiralty were expecting, they were at least prepared when it broke out.

Operationally the Royal Navy faced a harder task than their Italian counter-parts, not least because it was actually several tasks; In addition to re-supplying British troops in North and East Africa, reinforcements from the UK and India had to be brought in, fire support to the outnumbered British troops in the North Africa had to be provided, Italian supply convoys were to be disrupted and the rest of the Navy's global commitment, including maintaining a strong deterrent Home Fleet, had to be kept up. What should be noticed is that 'Sinking the Italian Fleet' does not appear on that list, certainly it would make many of those tasks easier but doctrinally the Royal Navy was essentially Corbettian, or perhaps more precisely anti-Manhanian. Essentially the Admiralty didn't anticipate it would be fighting complete fools, so the expectation was that any opponent would avoid a Mahanian decisive battle unless the odds were in the enemies favour. As the joint largest fleet in the world the odds would always be in the Royal Navy's favour, once it had concentrated, so the Admiralty's expectation was on facing an enemy mounting an 'active-defence' and using a fleet-in-being to frustrate superior British numbers. Hence the Royal Navy holding to an approach which looked for a decisive battle if possible but did not depend on the enemy co-operating. Certainly provoking, tempting or tricking the enemy into committing the fleet-in-being would be a major activity, but not an over-riding one and certainly not to the detriment of the crucial tasks. The Admiralty emphasised the importance of being able to maintain 'Sea Control', the ability to move and use the seas as you wished while denying that capability from your opponents. Sinking the enemy certainly would achieve such control, indeed for many senior officers it was the preferred way of doing so, but it was not the only way. The Royal Navy would focus on well escorted convoys, active patrolling by air and sea to find enemy convoys (and convoy raiders) and maintaining a strong force capable of countering the enemies fleet-in-being. Crucially this force was intended to be active, supporting the fighting in North Africa, conducting shore bombardment raids and attacking the most well protected convoys, both for the value of those activities and to try to lure out the Italian Fleet-in-Being.

The oil tanker British Pride stopping off at Cape Town, the Devil's Peak Mountain clearly visible in the background. One of the newest additions to the fleet of the British Tanker Company, the shipping arm of the vast Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, the British Pride continued the BTC's habit of somewhat unsubtle names. The former First Sea Lord Admiral Fisher had claimed "Five keys lock up the world! Singapore. The Cape. Alexandria. Gibraltar. Dover." While the Royal Navy would probably conceded that the construction of the Panama Canal meant it was arguably six keys, the logic still held. Ensuring vessels such as the British Pride could continue to safely travel between those 'keys' would remain a major distraction to the Royal Navy throughout the conflict and prevent them concentrating the entire fleet in the Mediterranean.​

Having looked at what the fleet had to do and how they intended to do it, we now come to the ships available to execute the plan. The Royal Navy had what appeared to be overwhelming numerical supremacy, almost four to one in capital ships as well as the advantage of several aircraft carriers. This headline figure was somewhat misleading, as outlined above a large section of the fleet had to be retained in Home Waters and there were ongoing commitments from the South Atlantic to Hong Kong, after such detachments Admiral Cunningham's advantage in battleships was down to 3 to 2, useful but far from overwhelming. That said the Admiralty had taken care to deploy it's stronger units to the Mediterranean, the core fleet based out of Valetta could call upon all five of the Queen Elizabeth class fast battleships. Although Great War era ships like the Conte di Cavour class that was where the similarities ended, the Queen Elizabeths mounted the fearsome 15"/42 guns, were some 8,000 tonnes heavier and far more heavily armoured. While some of the Queen Elizabeths had been reconstructed during the 1920s and early 30s, the Royal Navy had not attempted the same speed increases the Regia Marina had applied to the Conte di Cavours. The result being they were some 3 knots slower than the Conte di Cavours but retained a similar advantage over the un-modernised Andrea Doiras. This speed deficit was not the concern it could have been, for the Admiralty had also deployed the Battlecruiser Squadron to Gibraltar; Hood, Renown and Repulse. Operating as Force H they would finally get the chance to carry out their intended mission - hunting enemy heavy cruisers and commerce raiders, however with their speed they were also available to act as 'fast wing' should the Regia Marina attempted a high speed breakout to out-run the slower British battleships.

There is also the issue of the role of carriers to consider, while the coming dominance of air power is obvious with hindsight, at the time it was not. Carrier borne aircraft were still a largely unproven weapon and had only proliferated due to the restrictions of the Washington and London Treaties which had forced the major navies to convert excess battleship tonnage into aircraft carriers. The three powers that seriously operated carriers; The United States, Japan and Britain had all reached different conclusions on carriers, conclusions shaped more by circumstance than objective assessment. Of the three the US fleet was in the worst condition, having spent most of the late 1920s and early 1930s in port due to lack of funds. This enforced inactivity had reduced innovation to theoretical paper studies and had not given the US Admirals a chance to develop many practical doctrines beyond Great War ideas of reconnaissance and gunnery spotting. The IJN on the other hand had had plenty of sea time, perhaps too much, as they had been unable to decide on a single doctrine. The main split was between those who embraced the carrier for quick aggressive strikes and those who wanted a strong battle fleet on traditional lines. Both approaches had been tested and been successful during fleet exercise and so Japan decided to pursue both lines to cover their bets. The large expansion programme of the Japanese navy had left Japanese naval aviation as the most advanced in the world, while lacking the large ships of the US Navy their doctrine and intensive training gave them a distinct edge.

A Hawker Nimrod from No.801 Squadron being lifted up from the hangar of HMS Furious onto the flight deck. Like so much of the FAA's inventory the Nimrod was based on an existing RAF land plane, in this case the Hawker Fury, that had been navalised. The single seater Nimrod had been slated for replacement by the marginally slower, but multi-roled, two-man Hawker Osprey by the end of the year; the FAA looking to make the most o the limited space on carriers (and even more limited funds). The outbreak of war changed this and a crash programme had been initiated to produce and ship out a Sea Gladiator, once again a naval version of an RAF land plane but at least a more modern one. Until these could arrive the Nimrod would find itself shouldering the burden of fleet defence for the Navy's carriers.​

The Royal Navy fell somewhere between these two extremes. While the Royal Navy had pioneered carrier tactics in the Great War, indeed had conducted the first carrier strike on a land target in the 1918 Tondern Zeppelin base raid, she had lost her lead during the mid 1920s due to lack of investment. There are many reasons for this, but undoubtedly the merging of the Royal Naval Air Service into the Royal Air Force was the biggest factor. The RAF's main priority was land based aircraft and the Naval Air Branch had been left to survive on what was left over after other priorities had been met, generally 'navalised' versions of RAF types instead of purpose designed carrier aircraft. While Churchill had separated the two branches on almost his first day the Fleet Air Arm was still struggling from decades of under investment and a lack of modern aircraft. The main striking arm was still the Fairey Seal as the newer Swordfish had only been approved for service at the start of the year while fighter cover was still provided by the Hawker Nimrod biplane. While many in the Admiralty, particularly the First Sea Lord Roger Keyes, had great hopes for the future of the Fleet Air Arm there was also pessimism. Few believed that the current generation of aircraft would survive long against a full fleets anti-aircraft screen, and so the carriers were assigned to reconnaissance and support work, hunting Italian light units and convoy raiders while providing spotting and scouting aircraft to support the main fleet. The Admiralty may have wanted the FAA to focus on the first two roles of it's motto, "Find" and "Fix", the various air operations officers, carrier commanders and flight crews had decided that if the opportunity presented itself they would prove themselves more than capable of the third part - "Strike".

Up next: The First Battle of Taranto.

--
Butterfly Redux Notes:
If I had not got this one half written I probably won't have started the effort, but as I had I felt compelled to finish it. If nothing else it provides some context for the later performance of the Regia Marina. Like the previous chapter this one has swollen in the re-mastering, about triple the length and with a somewhat different focus.

As I believed noted earlier French naval aviation had stopped with the Béarn, a conversion carrier that was obsolete almost before her completion. In particular development of carrier aircraft was non-existent and the carriers doctrinal role was little more than a base for reconnaissance aircraft. So for these purpose they are not counted as being that serious about carriers, which is a bit harsh but also mostly true.

The shortage of Italian armour plate, gun pits and everything else you need to make a proper battleship is indeed correct. As is the fact that the Cavours should be in long term refit in 1936, they only emerged in summer/autumn 1937 in OTL. Obviously in Butterfly they got rushed back into service, that is my story and I am sticking to it. Also of note is the ongoing class name issue (Littorio vs Vittorio Veneto), depends on if you count first laid down, first launched, first commissioned or whatever the navy in question wrote down. When I started this the convention was the Vittorio Veneto class, however looking at sources today and it's swung round to Littorio.

For those looking for a bit more on Mahan vs Corbett doctrine I can recommend Chapter LXIV: Learning From The Past. Or the wider internet.

 

[Vann the Red]

Another excellent update, El Pip! I heartily approve of your current posting schedule. ;-)

Vann

 

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After lurking this AAR since Page 1 i finally find the space to comment. This is the best British AAR i've read, Pippy! Never have i seen such political scenes being played out, and never, EVER, have i seen the Italians going to war so early. KUTGW!