For about 100 years — since the beginning of the widespread introduction of steam machines before the end of the era of artillery and armour — the characteristics of any of a warship anyway was a compromise between speed, armament and protection.
The term “shipbuilding holiday” traditionally referred to as the decade that followed the Washington conference of 1922. However, that’s hardly fair: it is precisely in those years, there was rapid development of all classes of combat ships, except battleships. It is much more appropriate to apply this concept to the 50-th years of XX century. Too large a fleet at the victorious Second world war allies and the uncertainty of the task facing him has allowed naval authorities of many States of the West and the “third world” to pause and not spend extra money on upgrading its Navy. As a result, in the next two decades, almost half of the navies of the world consisted solely of English or American second hand. Well, the countries continue to build major warships in this period, can literally be counted on the fingers.
Paradoxically, but in the early 60-ies of the last century escort fleet the largest sea powers of the world — the United States of America — was in very poor condition. It is based on the old destroyers, massively built during the Second world war. New military units were few and they were all to varying degrees flawed. Fiasco project cheap escort destroyer type “Claude Jones” devoid of almost all need modern combat ship of the qualities that made the heads of the Navy to re-deploy the shipbuilding policy by 180 degrees. Instead of diesel engines — turbines, instead of a primitive “hedgehogs” and release gear — anti-submarine missiles. As a consequence, the displacement and the price escortyou new generation began to grow rapidly.
Fighter VOUGHT F6U PIRAT. The appearance at the end of the war, military jet aircraft in Germany and Japan forced the command of the naval forces of the United States to start a program to re-deck aircraft with new equipment. In 1944, the three leading aviation companies: McDonnel, Vought and North American was requested to develop preliminary designs of jet fighters to provide air defense of an aircraft carrier in a radius of five kilometers.
In early 70-ies of XX century views on the use of surface naval forces has changed significantly. In the West, only one country — the United States continued to rely on shock aircraft carrier connections. The European partners of the Americans within NATO to follow the example of Washington did not make sense: first, it was unaffordable, and secondly, their doctrine assumed that the main theatre of war the third world war will be the Mediterranean sea and the Atlantic. under the guise of coastal aviation.
The collapse of the colonial system after world war II and the emergence on the map of many independent States initially did not affect the balance of power in the oceans. “Microscopic” fleets of new countries of Asia and Africa were equipped with mostly antiquated vessel, shipped from the US, Britain and Soviet Union under military assistance programmes. No need to develop special export projects warships during the first two postwar decades was not felt.
If to speak about laws of development of the escort forces of the main sea powers in 1940-ies, the first thing that catches the eye of ever-increasing size of ships. This trend continued during the cold war. In the vast oceans required the hull, allows you to accommodate not only solid fuel but also of appropriate weapons, numerous electronics and gidroakustiki, which led to an increase in displacement and cost of construction. The once-popular corvettes, leading descended from small fishing boats, seemingly forever disappeared from the scene.
In the 60-ies of XX century the concept of the IUD in the hypothetical third world war Soviet and Western experts met in completely different ways. For example, admirals from the Pentagon, the main force of the fleet was considered a carrier group, and numerous surface ships of other classes one way or another was considered only as a means of carriers, protection. In the USSR before the surface fleet posed a few other problems — primarily to fight aircraft carrier connections, as well as enemy nuclear submarines near its shores.
In the English language has long existed a popular expression “Chinese copy” (“Chinese copy”), meaning illegal the repetition of any industrial product without purchasing a license for its production. But for the 50-year history of military shipbuilding of China, this expression is very true in its literal translation. To this day, almost all combat units of the Chinese Navy are a patchwork of units and systems, carefully copied from Soviet or Western models.
By the mid 80-ies of XX century, the naval experts of the countries of the West had no doubt that the most advanced class of surface ships in the foreseeable future will remain the frigates. These versatile ships-rocket carriers have been very numerous in the seas and oceans under the flags of different countries at the time, swam at least 350 frigates, and their “population” continued to rise steadily. They actually replaced the cruisers and destroyers in most countries of the world, becoming the largest combat units in their fleets. Of course, the attitude towards them has changed: the design and construction of the frigate now began to approach more carefully, trying to avoid the rush and the use of untested solutions.
