MOST DEADLY AFLOAT

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 64, 17 March 1933, Page 7

MOST DEADLY AFLOAT

NEW FRENCH -CRUISER

LESSON FROM BRITAIN

France has paid a handsome compliment, to the ■. British Navy by reproducing the salient features of H.M.S. Nelson in her new battle-cruiser, the D,unqucrque, of, which I have been able to secure exclusive details, writes Hector By water in the London "Daily Telegraph."

Ihis vessel, winch is now on the .stocks at Brest, is the first capital unit to be ordered for the French iiiuj.ior nineteen years, and the first Dreadnought to be laid down anywhere m the world since 1922. .I a geilera i| design blic is a battle-cruiser version of the Nelson and the Rodney. When these ships were planned, over ten years ago, tho- Admiralty constructors decided that in order fully to/embody I war experience it was necessary to .break clean away from conventional ideas. So they mounted all the big guns m the bows of the ships, thus I enabling armour protection to be concentrated round the turrets, barbettes and magazines; they placed the secondary armament well aft, and withdrew tho boilers and machinery towards the stern covering them with a massive steel deck, arched like the carapace of a turtle. QUEEN,ANNE'S MANSIONS. In place of the usual foremast they built a lofty control tower—which the 1 instantly dubbed "Queen Anne's Mansions"—from which tho ships are navigated and fought. As .i result of these innovations, the two Nelsons present most grotesque profiles, and although their fighting power is undoubted they are tho "ugly sisters" of the Fleet. This has not deterred the French navy from designing its now ship on very similar .lines. Like the British prototype, the Dunquerque will carry her entire main armament on the forecastle and the secondary guns towards the stem. She will also have a big control tower a la Nelson and a. single funnel placed well aft. Evidently, therefore, French naval experts arc satisfied that the orignal British design is the best model to follow. This does not mean that tlyj Dunquerque is devoid of- novel features. On. the contrary, her designers have introduced many ideas of their own. Instead of triple turrets, . as*in the Nelson, they have chosen quadruple turrets' for the 13in guns, eight of which are to be mounted. Each turret is a self-contained fortress of steel, 33ft wide, and weighing over 1500 tons. It may be said to consist of two turrets welded into one, since each pair of guns is in its own compartment and can be worked independently of the other pair except in regard to traverse. There are two main-magazines each containing eight hundred rounds of 13in (1200' pr.) shell. SECONDARY ARMAMENT. The multiple system of mounting has been extended to the secondary armament, which will comprise twelve 6in guns in triple or quadruple turrets. These weapons are to be given an almost vortical elevation, enabling them to be used against aircraft when necessary. It is not generally known that tho 6in guns of the Nelson and Rodney can also engage- sky targets. The Dunquerque is a ship of 26,500 tons, with a contract speed of thirty knots. It is reported, but not yet confirmed, that she will have turboelectric drive, similar to that installed ia the super-liner Normandie. From tho naval point of view this system has the great advantage of permitting closer subdivision and isolation of the propelling units than is possible with ordinary, turbine drive.

Like the Nelson, the Dunquerque will have a very short quarterdeck. This will be occupied by two catapults for projecting the four seaplanes which tho ship is to cam-. Mindful of the lessons of Jutland, tho designers have reserved a high percentage of tho displacement for protection. The ship will have a heavy armour belt on the waterline, double "steel decks to keep out plunging shells or aircraft bombs, and a maze of watertight compartments to minimise tho effect of torpedo hits. As a, "reply" to the German pocket battleships the Dunquerquo is overwhelming. She ,is two and a half times larger, four knots faster, fires a broadside twice as heavy, and has far superior powers of resistance. As a battle-cruiser her solo rival is H.M.S. Hood, and she could,, in fact, engage any warship now afloat without undue ■risk.

' Mainly for strategical reasons —i.e., to neutralise the new German navy and ensure predominance in the Channel — the Dunquerque is to be based on Brest when she is completed, and will there eventually be joined by the two or three sister ships which it is proposed to build. This decision, however, may also have been influenced by a desire to allay the fears of Italy, who has given notice of her intention to build dreadnoughts of her own if tho existing balance of power in tho Mediterranean is menaced by the new French battle -cruisers.