Historynerd

Nope, nope, nope. Sorry, you can't use the F-card, simply because it's not what we were talking about. We were talking about Italy's military fame. And that's something completely different. Italy's military effectiveness has been belittled for decades. The military virtues of its people has been derided, its military equipment has been used as a laughing stock, and whenever it was adequate it was never used, because those that were supposed to use it had run away or surrendered. These were not images or stereotypes invented by the Fascist regime. Its corruption, its lack of ability to shake the conservatism of the military elite, its inefficiency in assessing Italy's potential and true power on the international scale contributed a lot to the reverses suffered, absolutely. But weren't the Allies the ones who took advantage of these? Wasn't the United Kingdom in desperate need of good news after the Battle of France and Dunkerque, and found them in the debacle of the Tenth Army? Weren't the United States, always never too generous with its Italian immigrants, okay with its most important naval historian to derogatorily call the Regia Marina the "Dago Navy"? They needed the image, and crafted it. But it doesn't mean it was the true image of the Italian armed forces, as weak and as lackluster as they were. Also, some have put forward the hypothesis that the Germans, being of proud Nordic race, and with their deadly efficiency, could not be taken very lightly. The Japanese were easier target, but after their string of victories, the racism towards them was always tinged with respect. The Italians did provide the perfect target for weaker enemies, those who never did anything right, whose performance could be laughed at and whose purtported "inferiority" was not an invention, in many mentalities. All this has nothing to do with the fact that Italy was a fascist power, whose regime was totalitarian and killed the freedom of the Italians, whose foreign policy led to brutal campaigns and wars in Africa and later in the Balkans, principally. Which are historical facts as well.

Unfortunately, yes.

I have a dream... ...that one day, we'll manage to have a general discussion open to everyone about Italian ships without someone cracking this kind of jokes. Good choice. It does give a pretty good picture on the Regia Marina on that period.

To be brutally honest, I expect that only from people who tend to be ignorant about Italians. I'm sorry if my sense of humour does not coincide with yours; but I confess that I am a bit tired of this kind of jokes, and I kind of hoped that people would refrain from using them. At least, people who has been in the forums for a while, and therefore might have learned a thing or two about the Regia Marina

Italian DDs as well. Some of them followed the same concept, and they as well are hard-pressed to find a place. As Deamon93 said, "why would people take an Italian DD, when a Russian DD can do the same things, better?"

Allow me to say that next time you should choose a better smiley; that one made me think you wanted to tell something that you thought would not sit well with some of us.

I may be wrong, but I thought there was also infighting between the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe, as Goering didn't want resources to be diverted towards the carriers. In contrast, in Italy the biggest share of fault for not building carriers lies with the Regia Marina, although the Regia Aeronautica didn't help; the admirals were never sure enough that carriers would be needed, so they put off until it was too late. Although in their case carriers were less needed; what they really need was a working interservice protocol between navy and air force, but in 1940 the situation was nothing short of appalling.

I know we'd all prefer to consider only daytime engagements, but for honesty's sake we have to look at the bigger picture.

For what it would've been worth, it would've been a more sensible decision to strip the Cavour of all that could be useful, then forget all about it. The decision to raise and proceed with a full refit was mainly because of fearing to lose prestige if even one battleship were to be truly lost. But the old Voronoff didn't deserve all the resources that were thrown at her. Add also taking advantage of their night combat superiority. That made a lot of difference. However, it's indubitable that in daytime the British achieved somewhat less. Maybe because during the day the Italian ship were still dangerous enough.

Then allow me to say that your knowledge is limited. For example, if we look at all the times when Allied aircrafts tried to torpedo Italian ships underway, the number of times on which the fishes hit is fairly limited. Also, allow me to say that the Italians' contribution to the war was more than just inspiration, or perhaps an impediment to the Axis.

Tough question. I am afraid there is no English book that I know of that is precisely about Italian heavy cruisers, or even their cruisers in general. Whitley's "Cruisers of World War Two" only gives them a general outlook and doesn't say that much. An interesting one might be John Jordan's "Warships after Washington", in which he talks about the evolution of the Treaty cruiser, and gives a nice outlook on both the Trento- and the Zara-class cruisers, although it doesn't give that much details. Maurizio Brescia's "Mussolini's Navy" might tell something about their careers. At the moment, this are the only ones that come to mind. I'll see if I can come up with other possibilities, Or maybe Deamon93 knows something that I don't, given that he has pretty much read everything available on Italian ships...

If I am not mistaken, the issue was that it was impossible to isolate the delicate electrical mechanism satisfactorily enough. They kept suffering whenever water managed to get through. On the older Duilio-class battleships, where this mounts were lower on the water, they broke down so often that in the end the stabilized mechanisms were removed, and they were used manually. On the Littorio-class battleships, where they were higher, the situation was better, so the stabilization remained.

Well, yes and no. Yes, because some designs did show concepts that were at the forefront, or even ahead of its day; for example, the gyro-stabilized mounts for the 90 mm AA gun. That thing was too advanced for its own good. No, because in some things the conservatism and the bureucratic red tape did cause an awful lot of monkey wrenches. The idea of a dual-purpose gun around the 120 mm caliber was thrown around for some time, but it was blocked for ages (also because the guys that designed the weapons were separated from the guys who sailed with and used them, and the distance didn't help); when they woke up, it was late.

If ammo quality were a thing, I'd expect British shells on early BBs and BCs to perform mediocrely. It won't be a factor. Also, what do you mean about theory and practice of protection schemes? The armor schemes of the major warships were never seriously tested. If you mean the Pugliese cylinder TDS, I invite you to read this topic I've created about it: http://forum.worldofwarships.eu/index.php?/topic/38017-the-pugliese-underwater-protection-system/ Not so much as insufficient, but inadequate training, I'd say. In daytime, things were pretty okay. It was at night that the worst tended to happen.

Given the examples we have, I'd say that we cannot now what "flavour" the Italian ships will have.

I looked in Campbell's book, which is the best source I can find. Not a mention. Therefore I assume the RoF to have remained the same. Perhaps the author of the mention on the wikipedia page got confused by the addition of pneumatic run-out of the turrets, that he believed was about the recoil, while it was just about their turning.

Well, as mtm78 pointed out, despite it being relatively little known, the Polish Navy got a DD, due to the sheer size of its playerbase. After that, and going down by size, the French Navy is both important, people want to play its ships, and its native playerbase is bigger than the Italian one; all this leds to the strong possibility that a French premium will come before any Italian one.

Let's be practical here. Given the sizes of the French and the Italian playerbases, from what do you think WG will profit more? A French or an Italian premium?

Well, the Regia Marina did take a few shots at the "big submarine" thing. The Ettore Fieramosca was not that big, but it was meant to have a medium caliber gun and a seaplane; however, it was already axed during the fitting out, so in the end it merely became one of the most useless and disproportioned submarines around. All that jazz... We Italians prefer it sneaky.

Well, the Regia Marina planned to attack New York, although it didn't come so far as to design ships just for that, just modifying the existing ones.

Wikipedia mentions it, but NavWeaps does not. I'll look into it.

...I was merely pointing out evidence that contrasts with his claim that the Hood had a higher rate of fire, and I was trying to be precise. Nothing more.