At this point I must beg forgivness for ignorance beyond the end of the middle ages and that thus my knowledge defaults generally to whig history as taught by old guard proffesors and the eclectic stuff weaned from QI and Paradox AARs...
This explains a great deal. I am somewhat the opposite being slightly hazy and generalist on the Middle Ages and earlier, but getting firmer as time advances. Very different frames of reference.
But back to Ethelred. He wanted a ship for every 300-310 hides of land in the kingdom (basically, a lot of ships. Talking 100 to 300 here).
There were clerks and admirals before then but not for very long or for specific wars (because afterwards the ships disperse/get trashed). Generally speaking, whenever england was trying to invade Scotland or was scared of france, they had an admiral.
Wouldn't that be more of a feudal levy than a tax per se? Relevance of that would be that only a permanent body, with permanent funding, will produce a Navy. One off levees and paying attention for the course of a war may (or may not) give you a fleet, but to build an effective navy is the work of years.
This regular funding and full time administrators (Lord High Admiral, Clerk of the Kings Ships) started in the mid/late 1300s and the limited reading I've done on it credit Parliament / House of Commons and the various coastal/fishing/merchant groups pushing it all through. Hence the customs duties mentioned previously, they were the first tax Parliament voted on that had to be spent on the navy. So the founding date would be around here, even though it then took a very, very long time for the system to produce consistent results.
But as mentioned above, I'm well outside my comfort zone in this time period so it could easily all have been Edward II and III pushing it through.
Because epic deraliments from the main plot is one of the main pillars of this AAR.
Do you believe you have the power to stop him?
No-one can stop a Butterfly Effect plot derailment once in progress.
I've also never voted Tractor in my life.
I pity the fool who does not appreciate a Tractor diversion. You may well be particularly disappointed when the next Agriculture update emerges in... 2023?
Heathen. In the end all wealth comes from the land.
I have one thing to say to you - Fish.
The maintenance carrier concept honestly strikes me as a fairly sound idea when you're fighting far from home and friendly airbases. I suppose that ideally you would only ever do one of those things (the far-from-home bit), but for the British trying to pull off operations in the Pacific (possibly without American help?) this seems like an elegant on-the-fly solution.
The British really aren't thinking Pacific, why would they? There's no British possessions out there and their plan is to attack Japan via the South China Sea and Taiwan, not Iowa Jima and Saipan. So proper deep Pacific fighting is for the IJN and USN, not something the RN really thinks about. (Same reason neither the IJN or USN ever thought about how to fight in the Mediterranean).
Hence the maintenance carriers have the same relatively short legs as the rest of the British fleet, their endurance is more about supporting extended carriers ops than steaming very long distance. If the British do end up in the Pacific then it will still be a bit tricky, at least until they get RAS sorted. But they do help with fighting far from friendly air bases and keeping a carrier fleet fit and fighting for longer, so they will help at least one part of the puzzle.
If we're being reductionist, all wealth comes from the sun.
Technically then all wealth comes from the Big Bang. Or whatever started the Big Bang. But that is getting a bit too metaphysical-philosophical even for a Butterfly diversion.
Since they have bases all over the world and are commiting to expanding them iver the next decade, they don't really need maintenance carriers anywhere but the deep pacific, and honestly I'm not sure what the British would be doing there. Even if they were fighting a big naval war with japan, it'll be focused on their colonies in China and off the coast first. Not to say that it'll be an easy war, it would certainly be very expensive for one, but it is something the british should win, especially with a rearmed and fairly unified empire (at the moment) and with europe simmering rather than boiling over.
Absolutely right on the Deep Pacific point.
As for the role of maintenance carriers, it is as per the OTL plan; storing spare aircraft and supporting the operational airwings on the fleet carriers. There are indeed naval bases across the Empire set up to refuel and resupply the fleet, but they are not set up with air repair facilities and stocks of spare carrier aircraft. Bringing your own spare aircraft with you, along with workshops that can fix (relatively) specialist aero-engines, will allow your fleet to fight for longer before having to pull back to a main base. For instance, the carriers could refuel at Hong Kong but the air wing would need the facilities of Singapore for a decent overhaul - 1500 nautical miles and a week to steam there and back.
So six CVL's, nice. And the design seems good. Since I can't find their update, how many Swiftsure's are planned?
Swiftsure numbers are deliberately a big vague, two on the slips with an unspecified number to come.
The Admiralty are struggling a bit with this. Traditional surface doctrine says they want one more, that way they can have a three ship battlecruiser squadron with one battlecruiser in refit (fleet would be 3 x
Swiftsure, 1x modernised
Hood). But, will they actually deploy the
Swiftsures in standard line of battle squadron style. Probably not? So thinking has become - enough to match up against the German
Scharnhorsts. But how many is that? Not easy questions.
This of course is the divide between reality and popular thinking we like so well in this AAR.
Maybe when the gold standard people figure out it's a bad idea they'll start land investing instead. Would be very easy for the US who owned even more of the west then than they do now...
"The meek shall inherit the Earth, but not its mineral rights." - JP Getty. Wise man.
Having recently completed a reread of el pips masterpiece (the redux stuff is even better than I remembered!) I have been inspired to reinstall HoI2 and get it working on my Linux box...
I blame you all!!!
This is still as amazing as it ever was, long may it continue.
Good to see you back and that you survived the Redux Experience.
I am delighted you think the quality remains high and have returned to HOI2, which holds up surprisingly well I think.
I am of the opinion that British maritime supremacy essentially dates from the founding of the Bank of England and the establishment of reliable state financing not attached to the whims of the King / Queen...
Broad point yes, specifics not so much. The navy debt (and indeed the victualling board debt) seemed to live it's own semi-detached existence even after the Bank of England was founded. When a chunk of it got handed over to the South Seas Company Parliament was surprised at how much debt the Admiralty had been sneaking out when they weren't looking.
That said, the Navy's credit was heavily correlated with that of the nation and there was always a belief that the government would (probably) bail out the Admiralty when it spent too much. Or more technically when parliament demanded too much ship building but didn't vote a large enough naval estimate.
Having the City be a powerful voice in government certainly helped put resources to the navy which in turn protected and expanded the source of national wealth.
This absolutely. There is a saw about the trade producing the tax and sailors that form the fleet that protect the trade. Having recognition of that virtuous circle in government was vital, but long predates the Bank of England. We're back at Edward III and the Woolsack, if not earlier.
Of course but Parliament did taxes, not the king (usually. They used various means to get around this when they wanted to...or tried at least) and for various reasons they generally favoured navies rather than armies, which carried over to after they started running the country themsevles. It's a bit tricky to say whether or not the bank specifically indicated the navy getting more focus because by that time there were many good reasons to invest in a navy, such as already established trading colonies and such. By the 1690s, the english were already pretty much the best at sailing and the navy was expanding fast to the point, I believe, that it has been described as the largest organisaion in the 18th c.
That last sentence is the killer, it was the shore side organisation and planning that was starting to give the edge. A British captain had more chance of heading out in a ship made of properly seasoned timber (as opposed to freshly cut green wood) with provisions that had been prepared in advance (not hastily packed and inadequately preserved). The details of the ships (ropes, capstans, etc) probably worked as they were made by dedicated naval suppliers not generalists, the cannons were forged specially for sea service and not adapted land pieces.
Even on the sailing side, the whole system of keeping track of Midshipmen and ensuring they had sea time and could pass the exams required a degree of land side administration entirely absent from continental navies.
Before the Bank...the Dutch and then the French could put powerful fleets to sea which could and did defeat the British navy...
After the Bank, the British could maintain a dominant Navy for longer periods than their last remaining rivals...and this ensured British trade dominance.
In my view, that is when Britain truly ruled the waves...before then Britain / England was merely powerful on the waves.
So far as I know, the ability for the UK to absorb huge financial costs far superior to their rivals was indeed a useful trick. It helped in the Napoleonic wars and helped avoid the issues which made the Revolution happen in the first place.
I suppose then yes, when the navy was firmly established as permanent, well funded and expanding rapidly, then you would say the navy came into it's dominance.
One counter-argument against the Bank being decisive case is that Napoleon out-spent the British considerably at sea during the Napoleonic wars (I think it was something like 2:1, though with exchange rates, devaluations and looting it's hard to be sure) yet lost decisively. So I do think the contribution of money versus institutions should not be over-stated, while you need some money to build and sustain the institutions they are fairly cheap, at least compared to ship building or manning a fleet for war.
I come back to the point that a strong navy requires sustained political support across a long period, broad based enough that even a change of government does not challenge the fundamentals, even if the new administration changes the details. Money is obviously a large part of that, and having cheap funds is clearly an advantage, but it's not enough on it's own. Far from it.
