Anthropoid
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From: Secret Underground Lair
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quote:
ORIGINAL: jwilkerson
You know I've never understood what this thread was about anyway. If you carefully consider the words "Best Designed Ship of WWII" - gee that's quite a complex set of topic specifications.
Best - by what criteria? Needs a lot of definition. Unfortunately this usually just boils down to "what do you like" which is probably too broad a question to be of interest.
Designed - so this seems to be driving to separate the implementation from the design - so we need to consider this intent when answering
Ship - as opposed to vessels not normally considered to be ships - so PT boats and probably even submarines would not be included.
WWII - so this probably means any ship which operated between 1 Sep 39 and 15 Sep 45.
When we take all these words together - we seem to be interested in good designs - versus good ships. If we decide we are talking about warships, and we are not talking about submarines - which are usually called boats - then maybe we are talking about carriers or surface warships - though this implies we assume we are ruling out all manner of auxiliaries and non-combatants.
Of course carriers and surface combatants are very different creatures - and it does not necessarily seem to make sense to include both together in the discussion - so if I was asking the question - I would specific one or the other.
So, if we are talking about surface combatants then I think there is room for a discussion - if we are talking about carriers the number of possible answers is tiny.
But I'm mostly just trying to squeak from the sidelines about the nature of the question and how difficult it would be for me to even begin to participate.
Ahem, quoting the Evil Doctor, it looks like 'great,' (or at least rational?) minds think alike 
quote:
Wow, never knew about this thread . . . What amazes me, as a social scientist without a lot of expertise in naval design or the actual history is what appears to be a more or less _total_ lack of consensus among you guys! A bunch of very smart, very knowledgeable fanboys of the period!? That in itself is interesting.
Let me make a suggestion, define "best design" in some measurable, testable way?
For example: (1) enemy losses inflicted per dollar cost or /operating costs (including crew) etc.
(2) survivability divided by mission effectiveness (ala Terminus' point about RN CVs not carrying enough planes)?
(3) strategic impact?
Thinking in terms of (1), I would guess that the earlier German U-boats sank pound-for-pound more than any other class? Sure there may have been more cool or advanced designs later in the war, but if there is not real proof of being 'best' how can you objectively say as much . . . not to say having a 'favorite' design is invalid, but not exactly the same thing as 'best design.'
In terms of (2) weren't American CVs pretty legendary? In fact, weren't most US ships pretty well off in terms of survivability as a result of damage control?
For (3) what about the "Liberty" ships? They were cheap, and did the job well!
One of the points that occurred to me is that: a piece of technology like a ship could be a "great" design, but if it is poorly used, "implemented" as you say, because of either wrong-time/wrong-place, or just bad doctrine, or political impediments, then a great design might have been a worthless asset in realworld terms.
A related point is that of policy, procedure and doctrine. Good example being U.S. damage control procedures (along with ship design and technology). A good "design" necessarily has to go hand-in-hand with good policy and procedure or more specifically strategic and tactical doctrine. A related example (might) be that of Japanese sub-war doctrine, i.e., ignoring "low-value" ships in favor of always attacking high-value warships.
At the end of the day, in a war in which one side achieves a massive unconditional surrender from the other, is it really rational or logical to conclude that ANY of the losers "designs" or "strategies" or any other aspect of their warfighting was anything better than mediocre?
Example: U.S. torpedoes pre-1942, classic example of "bad design." They were fraught with duds for Pete's-Sake! No doubt, in the short-term that lead to more U.S. losses, and less damage to Japanese warfighting capability than if there had not been those problems with those torp contractors in that period. BUT! (and here I admit to be speculating wildly, for the sake of trying to show in this example the incredibly contingent nature of history) perhaps the myriad lessons of the Dud Torpedo period had long-term benefits to a wide array of other dimensions of US warfighting? Maybe it made mid-level officials realize that certain procedures or policies about reviewing weapons contractors or quality-control needed to be revised, therefore preventing OTHER latter war Dud issues that would otherwise have occurred with other weapons systems.
< Message edited by Anthropoid -- 4/30/2009 2:22:34 PM >
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