Pax's Alternate History Snippet repository.

[Faralis]

To be fair China does not need battleships, what it needs is a good number of patrol boats and a decent number of destroyers and submarines. Even cruisers are not a real need because unless they know they are going to war with a big mayor (UK/US/ or even Japan ) on their side, the number they need is insanely expensive.

 

[Imperator Pax]

To be fair China does not need battleships, what it needs is a good number of patrol boats and a decent number of destroyers and submarines. Even cruisers are not a real need because unless they know they are going to war with a big mayor (UK/US/ or even Japan ) on their side, the number they need is insanely expensive.

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I mean this from a strategic perspective... to be sure I am certain even though I don't have sources handy to look for evidence that there were people in both the northern and southern power structures who were like 'we have to have battleships as symbols of national prestige' regardless of the cost, but the Chinese Navy was always the step child service and during this period the navy was as politically unreliable as army commands. Fukien Clique defected / switched sides several times and the Zhejiang clique squadron defected here leaving Anhui wide open at Shanghai

as the quip goes a ship at sea is its own world

 

[ATP]

To be fair China does not need battleships, what it needs is a good number of patrol boats and a decent number of destroyers and submarines. Even cruisers are not a real need because unless they know they are going to war with a big mayor (UK/US/ or even Japan ) on their side, the number they need is insanely expensive.

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You have a point.They are unable to fight USA or Japan fleet even if they built one or two battleship,so why bother building sometching which could not be used?
WW1 could be used as example.Germans built good fleet,but so what? it made one battle,and except that hide in harbours.
Either built sometching which could fight enemy,or not built anytching except submarines and patrol boats.

Not mention China past - they built modern fleet,and french sunk it.They built another,and Japan sunk it.Why bother?

 

[ATP]

You have a point.They are unable to fight USA or Japan fleet even if they built one or two battleship,so why bother building sometching which could not be used?
WW1 could be used as example.Germans built good fleet,but so what? it made one battle,and except that hide in harbours.
Either built sometching which could fight enemy,or not built anytching except submarines and patrol boats.

Not mention China past - they built modern fleet,and french sunk it.They built another,and Japan sunk it.Why bother?

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I checked China- french war,and i was wrong - in 1884 Fuzhou battle old french ships sunked obsolate chineese ships.Only new thing was using two torpedo boast,which could not be targeted by chineese guns,becouse they were too fast for them.

That is why every navy later use 37,47,57 and 65mm fast firing guns - to target torpedo boats.
And 65mm guns,thanks to long barrels,could be used for tanks before WW2.Like this:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=CAESdQHrOzAVNQB9A_T_wLqbPEUl9fJbElwt_oiwKrYVTURR6I0IunEUDfwuCetuJiTzeOlSu5bGsI6WsRoBbpPCvWf70FgBHL6mKbSuq16IriTzD3HM4FWMy8xByvMQUMpqlzRHToYI3DHCPHojmgslhqZ5GttUSQ&ved=2ahUKEwivqoOglf2WAxVaAxAIHYHYOb0QFnoECBoQAQ&uoh=2&usg=AOvVaw0X43GN1sB7GlCiCoqQd1Ne

strange,why nobody did it in OTL.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I checked China- french war,and i was wrong - in 1884 Fuzhou battle old french ships sunked obsolate chineese ships.Only new thing was using two torpedo boast,which could not be targeted by chineese guns,becouse they were too fast for them.

That is why every navy later use 37,47,57 and 65mm fast firing guns - to target torpedo boats.
And 65mm guns,thanks to long barrels,could be used for tanks before WW2.Like this:

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=CAESdQHrOzAVNQB9A_T_wLqbPEUl9fJbElwt_oiwKrYVTURR6I0IunEUDfwuCetuJiTzeOlSu5bGsI6WsRoBbpPCvWf70FgBHL6mKbSuq16IriTzD3HM4FWMy8xByvMQUMpqlzRHToYI3DHCPHojmgslhqZ5GttUSQ&ved=2ahUKEwivqoOglf2WAxVaAxAIHYHYOb0QFnoECBoQAQ&uoh=2&usg=AOvVaw0X43GN1sB7GlCiCoqQd1Ne

strange,why nobody did it in OTL.

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Xian's venerable 1 PDR is a 37mm fast firing gun, as for the 65mm its a weird caliber the French and Italians did stuff with it but its in the middle between smaller calibers and then stuff like France's preference for the 75 and well the 65 didn't have the much time to come into its own before the war. If world war 1 had not happened we'd have probably seen more done with 65mm because honestly we were already seeing a wide range from 1890-1913 of gun calibers being introduced (new powders, new recoil systems, etc) where there was a drive to develop new things, and then it was disrupted by the war and the demands it placed on production which biased towards how many ~3 inch sized calibers were in service. [I haven't delved into that specifically but I assume that the 70+ probably offered some kind of manufacturing niche or size handling or other factors thats why you had such a wider range number of calibers that proliferated and some of thats probably a dimensional sweet spot in powder and shell size. A 5inch shell is 55lbs roughly (have to go look that up later) a gun crew can do that but much above you're running into problems especially on unpowered systems but 120 does start to win out after that.

65mm works for torpedo boats , the answer is as alays... more research is required

 

[ATP]

Xian's venerable 1 PDR is a 37mm fast firing gun, as for the 65mm its a weird caliber the French and Italians did stuff with it but its in the middle between smaller calibers and then stuff like France's preference for the 75 and well the 65 didn't have the much time to come into its own before the war. If world war 1 had not happened we'd have probably seen more done with 65mm because honestly we were already seeing a wide range from 1890-1913 of gun calibers being introduced (new powders, new recoil systems, etc) where there was a drive to develop new things, and then it was disrupted by the war and the demands it placed on production which biased towards how many ~3 inch sized calibers were in service. [I haven't delved into that specifically but I assume that the 70+ probably offered some kind of manufacturing niche or size handling or other factors thats why you had such a wider range number of calibers that proliferated and some of thats probably a dimensional sweet spot in powder and shell size. A 5inch shell is 55lbs roughly (have to go look that up later) a gun crew can do that but much above you're running into problems especially on unpowered systems but 120 does start to win out after that.

65mm works for torpedo boats , the answer is as alays... more research is required

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i read that nobody made bigger AA guns then 132mm/England Navy/ becouse anytching bigger had schells too heavy for crew to load fast.
Germans had plans and prototypes of 150 and 210mm AA guns,but they had some automated system for loading schells.

I read,that they even build real railgun in the end of WW2 - but it need small electric plant to operate,so......
But when it had enough energy,it worked very well as AA gun.
I hope,that your China manage to made some after WW2 !

P.S Pity,that WW1 do not happened 10 years later - we would have more intsersting guns,and all navies would have superdrednaughts,even A-H.