HMS Incomparable

HMS "Incomparable" was the name given by Admiral "Jackie" Fisher to a design for a very large battlecruiser which was drawn up in 1915, but never ordered. [Breyer, p.172]

Fisher had long been an advocate of improving technology to maintain Britain's naval superiority. At the beginning of the 20th century he had masterminded the introduction of the dreadnought type of battleship and its faster cousin, the battlecruiser. At the start of World War I, Fisher returned to the office of First Sea Lord. Here he oversaw the development of vessels which took the battlecruiser concept to extremes. The last such ship, HMS "Furious", was intended to carry two 18-inch guns, far larger and more powerful than the 15-inch weapons standard on British battleships and battlecruisers; at the same time her armour was only 3-inch thickness, not really capable of standing up to the guns of even a light cruiser.

"Incomparable" was drawn up as the logical conclusion of this trend in battlecruiser design. By the standards of her time, she would have been a mammoth vessel. Her design displacement of 48,000 tons dwarfed not only "Furious" (a shade under 20,000 tons) but the "Revenge" class of battleship (28,000 tons); in fact "Incomparable"'s design was bigger than any subsequent British battleship or battlecruiser until HMS "Vanguard", which was completed after World War II. [ Breyer, p.172, 110-2] [Note: Garzke and Dulin give the full load displacement of the Japanese battleship "Yamato", launched 08 Aug 1940 and commissioned for service in the Imperial Japanese Navy 16 Dec 1941, as 69,988 tons [71,110 mt] ; other references, including the article on "Yamoto", give the full load displacement as 72,800 tons [See: Garzke, William H., Jr., and Robert O. Dulin, Jr., "Battleships: Axis and Neutral Battleships in World War II", Naval Institute Press, Annapolis MD, 1985] ]

This large hull was intended to accommodate monstrous engines and armament. The 20-inch guns which were planned for "Incomparable" [Breyer, p.172] are bigger than the largest guns ever installed on a warship (the 18.1-inch guns of "Yamato"): 20-inch guns were only ever used on paper. Just as remarkable as the firepower intended was the speed of the ship: if "Incomparable" had been capable of the 35 knots intended, she would have been faster than almost any battleship or battlecruiser built historically, and indeed faster than many cruisers or destroyers.

The tactical value of "Incomparable" is dubious. Her construction would have been a very large expense, and her armour relatively weak. The Royal Navy's experience at the Battle of Jutland in 1916, where many of Fisher's battlecruisers were destroyed, resulted in a decisive turn away from the 'large light cruiser' concept and towards the 'fast battleship'. The subsequent design of battlecruiser, the "Admiral" class, ended up incorporating much heavier armour but guns of only 15-inch calibre. The following class intended (but also never built), based on the 'G3' design, was similarly a balanced 'fast battleship' type. It is therefore untrue to say that "Incomparable", or a ship like her, would have been built had Britain not signed the Washington Naval Treaty.

If "Incomparable" had been built, it is unlikely that she would have lasted very long. With a thin armour on her deck, and probably little anti-torpedo protection below the waterline, "Incomparable" would have been a relatively easy target for the air attack which became the main threat to battleships in the 1930s and 1940s.

References

ources

*Breyer, Siegfried: "Battleships and Battlecruisers of the World, 1905-1970". Macdonald, London, 1973. ISBN 0-356-04191-3.