Spot on. They're not going to take premium ships away when the game goes to release. People like to read controversy into WG's actions where at all possible and assume the worst, but removing ships you've paid for directly would amount to charging for the right to test their product. They've never done that before and they're not going to now because it's nonsense from a business perspective. WG are trying to build a commercial success out of a product that's yet to come to market and no business makes a success out of infuriating it's only clients.
I'd say your two conclusions are sound, with the latter being most likely. WG have no reason to have committed to an end OBT wipe or not at this stage. A wipe at the end of OBT might well depend on their timeframe for introducing new nations and tech trees. I've seen no stats to back this up but I should imagine that WG consistently make their biggest profits from WoT when they introduce new nations and trees...why?...because the grass is always greener on the other side, and so it's at those times that we all buy gold, convert xp, and advance toward that new t10 that we just got murdered by.
If they're going to be ready for release of the Russian tree shortly after the game goes live then maybe it becomes more likely that there won't be a wipe, instead you can keep your progress and convert all that xp, to the benefit of WG's bottom line. If on the other hand we're going to be kept waiting for Russian steel for some time then I imagine a wipe becomes more likely.
Just my two pence
