List of battlecruisers

During the first half of the 20th century, many navies constructed or planned to build battlecruisers: large capital ships with greater speed but less armor than dreadnought battleships. The first battlecruisers, the , were championed by the British First Sea Lord John Fisher and appeared in 1908, two years after the revolutionary battleship . In the same year, Germany responded with its own battlecruiser, . Over the next decade, Britain and Germany built an additional twelve and six battlecruisers, respectively. Other nations joined them: entered service for the Royal Australian Navy in 1913, Japan constructed four ships of the from 1911 through 1915, and in late 1912 Russia laid down the four s, though they were never completed. Two countries considered acquiring battlecruisers in this time, but chose not to: France looked at several battlecruiser design studies in 1913 and 1914,Gardiner & Gray, p. 200 and the United States ordered six s in 1916 that were never built.

The British and German battlecruisers were used extensively during World War I between 1914 and 1918, including in the Battles of Heligoland Bight and Dogger Bank, and most famously in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May and 1 June 1916, where one German and three British battlecruisers were sunk. The Japanese battlecruisers did not see action during the war, as the German naval presence in the Pacific was destroyed by the British in the early months of the war. Britain and Germany attempted to build additional battlecruisers during the war—the for the former, and the and es for the latter—but changing priorities in favor of smaller warships prevented their completion. At the end of the war, the German High Seas Fleet was interned and subsequently scuttled in Scapa Flow.

In the immediate aftermath of World War I, Britain, Japan, and the United States all considered new battlecruiser construction, including the British G3 class, the Japanese , and a revised version of the American ''Lexington''s. In the interest of avoiding another crippling naval arms race, the three countries, along with France and Italy, signed the Washington Naval Treaty in 1922, which included a moratorium on new capital ship construction. A clause in the treaty, however, gave the British, Japanese, and Americans a chance to convert several of their battlecruisers into aircraft carriers. Only a handful of battlecruisers survived the arms limitation regime. In the 1930s, several navies considered new " cruiser killer" battlecruisers, including Germany's , the Dutch Design 1047, and the Soviet . The outbreak of World War II in September 1939 put a halt to all these plans.

During the war, the surviving battlecruisers saw extensive action, and many were sunk. The four Japanese ''Kongō''-class ships had been rebuilt as fast battleships in the 1930s, but all were sunk during the conflict. Of the three British battlecruisers still in service, and were sunk, but survived the war.Burt (1986), pp. 301–302 The only other battlecruiser in existence at the end of the Second World War was the ex-German , which had been transferred to Turkey during the First World War and served as ''Yavuz Sultan Selim''.Gardiner & Gray, p. 391

Several new wartime classes were proposed, including the American and the Japanese Design B-65 class. The ''Alaska''s were officially classified as "large cruisers", but many naval historians refer to them as battlecruisers. Only two of the American ships were built before the end of the war. In the postwar drawdown of forces, ''Renown'' and the two ''Alaska''s were withdrawn from service and eventually scrapped; ''Yavuz Sultan Selim'', the last surviving battlecruiser in the world, lingered on until the early 1970s, when she too was sent to the shipbreakers. Only one country, the Soviet Union, considered building battlecruisers after the war. The three ships, championed by Joseph Stalin, were laid down in the early 1950s, but were cancelled after his death in 1953. However, in the 1970s, the Soviet Union began the construction of a class of very large guided missile cruisers, much larger than any other surface combatant''Surface combatants'' are naval warships which are designed for warfare on the surface of the water, with their own weapons. They include battleships, battlecruisers, cruisers, destroyers, frigates, and corvettes. Aircraft carriers, amphibious assault ships, and mine hunters are not considered surface combatants. Thus, it would be incorrect to say that ''Kirov'' battlecruisers are the largest class of naval warship built since the Second World War, since many aircraft carriers built after the war have been larger. built since the Second World War. This new type, the , although designated as a "heavy nuclear-powered missile cruiser" by the Soviet Navy, was generally referred to in the West as a "battlecruiser".

Key

The list of battlecruiser classes includes all battlecruisers listed in chronological order by commission. Classes which did not enter service are listed by the date of cancellation or last work on the project.

Great Britain

Germany

Japan

Russia/Soviet Union

})
, align="center" rowspan="4" , 8 × 14 inMcLaughlin 2003, pp. 243–244
, align="center" rowspan="4" , McLaughlin 2003, p. 252
, align="center" rowspan="4" ,
, align="left" rowspan="4" , 4 screws, steam turbines,
, rowspan="4" align="center" , 19 December 1912McLaughlin 2003, pp. 248–249
, align="center" , 22 June 1915
, align="left" , Scrapped, 1931Breyer 1992, p. 114
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , (russian: Бородино, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , 31 July 1915
, rowspan="3" align="left" , Sold for scrap, 21 August 1923McLaughlin 2003, pp. 332–335
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , ''Kinburn'' (russian: Кинбурн, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , 30 October 1915
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , ''Navarin'' (russian: аварин, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , 9 November 1916
, - valign="center"
, align="left" , (russian: Кронштадт, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" rowspan="2" , 6 × 38 cmMcLaughlin 2004, p. 111
, align="center" rowspan="2" ,
, align="center" rowspan="2" , McLaughlin 2004, pp. 107, 112
, align="left" rowspan="2" , 3 screws, steam turbines, McLaughlin 2004, p. 109
, align="center" , 30 November 1939
, align="center" , —
, rowspan="2" align="left" , Ordered scrapped, 24 March 1947McLaughlin 2004, pp. 112, 114
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , ''Sevastopol'' (russian: Севастополь, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , 5 November 1939
, align="center" , —
, - valign="center"
, align="left" , (russian: Сталинград, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" rowspan="3" , 9 × 30.5 cmMcLaughlin 2006, pp. 110–111
, align="center" rowspan="3" ,
, align="center" rowspan="3" ,
, align="left" rowspan="3" , 4 screws, steam turbines, McLaughlin 2006, p. 115
, align="center" , November 1951McLaughlin 2006, p. 116
, align="center" , 16 March 1954McLaughlin 2006, p. 118
, align="left" , Hulk used as target and later scrapped
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , ''Moscow'' (russian: Москва, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , September, 1952
, align="center" , —
, rowspan="2" align="left" , Scrapped, 1953
, - valign="top"
, align="left" , ''Kronshtadt''? (russian: Кронштадт, italic=yes, links=no)
, align="center" , October 1952
, align="center" , —
, - valign="top", - valign="top"
! width=15%; align= center rowspan=2 , Ship
! width=10%; align= center colspan=2 , Main armament
! width=10%; align= center rowspan=2 , Displacement
! width=15%; align= center rowspan=2 , Propulsion
! width=35%; align= center colspan=4 , Service
, -valign="top"
! width=8%; align=center , Anti-ship missiles
! width=8%; align=center , Guns
! width=8%; align= center , Laid down
! width=8%; align= center , Commissioned
! width=12%; align= center , Fate
, - valign="center"
, -
, (russian: Адмирал Ушаков, italic=yes, links=no)
, rowspan=5, 20 x P-700 GranitJackson, p. 409-411
, 2 x AK-100
, rowspan=5,
, rowspan=5, 2 shaft CONAS; 2 x KN-3 nuclear reactor and 2 x GT3A-688 steam turbine,
, 27 March 1974
, 30 December 1980
, rowspan="2" , Laid up
, -
, (russian: Адмирал Лазарев, italic=yes, links=no)
, rowspan=4, 1 x twin AK-130
, 27 July 1978
, 31 October 1984
, -
, (russian: Адмирал Нахимов, italic=yes, links=no)
, 17 May 1983
, 30 December 1988
, In refit
, -
, (russian: Пётр Великий, italic=yes, links=no)
, 11 March 1986
, 9 April 1998
, Active in service
, -
, ''Admiral Kuznetsov'' (russian: Адмирал Кузнецо́в, italic=yes, links=no)
, colspan=3 align=center, Cancelled 3 October 1990

United States

Australia

France

Netherlands

Austro-Hungarian Empire Sieche

See also

* List of battleships
* List of cruisers
* List of ships of the Second World War
* List of cruisers of the Second World War
* List of battlecruisers of the Second World War

Footnotes

Notes

Citations

References

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* Jackson, Robert (2000). ''The World's Great Battleships''. Brown Books.
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* McCurtie, Francis (1989) 945 ''Jane's Fighting Ships of World War II''. London: Bracken Books.
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* Schom, Alan (2004). ''The Eagle and the Rising Sun; The Japanese-American War, 1941–1943''. Norton & Company.
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* Stille, Mark (2008). ''Imperial Japanese Navy Battleship 1941–1945''. Oxford: Osprey Publishing.
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