WesWorld

Over the last few days I've been tinkering with a destroyer leader design. My initial thought was, "Oooh, sweet - these'll be nice."

But now I'm not so sure. What's the job of a DL? Provide additional gunfire support to destroyers making a torpedo attack? Providing flag facilities to the fellow in charge of a destroyer group?

In short - are they worthwhile from a late '20s viewpoint?

In '20s parlance, a little of both.

In the RN, the DL was the flag for the Captain (D), the commander of the destroyer flotilla. Early ones, 20's era, were only slightly larger than their cotemporaries in the class.

The Flotilla Leaders were larger than their fellows, usually carrying an extra gun. Codrington, leader of the A class, (LD 1929) was over 1500 tons standard, while her flotilla mates were a little over 1300 tons. If you have a Conway's or Jane's handy, take a look at her.

My thought is yes, they're worthwhile. For the flotilla to attack as a group, there needs to be an officer in charge. The Leader provides that 'flag' facility. Remember, in the 20s, signal flags, semaphores and blinker lights will be the means of flotilla communication. It's better if everyone is focused on one ship. And having a slightly larger ship with a little more firepower wouldn't hurt, either, expecially when first encountering the enemy screen...

The alternative, of course, is to use CL's as destroyer leaders, like the Japanese did. This has the advantage of even more firepower when encountering the enemy screening DD's, but also ties up a larger ship in leading destroyer charges. I guess it comes down to your tactics/preferences/tastes.

My thoughts,

Big Rich

My 1929 "cruiser minelayer" (which has morphed so much that the original wouldn't recognize the "latest final" version), ~2700 tons, will fill the role of Destroyer Leader for the Filipinos' three destroyer flotillas (North, South, Southwest) when not off laying mines.

I'm still, however, considering shrinking them some...the historical French Jaguar-class DLs look really nice. *waffle, waffle*

Well, do DD flotillas need a leader? A leader of different kind?

In WW2 many flotillas didn´t have a leader and the DDs build as leaders were used to create their own flotillas. This way the british TRIBALs for example ended up not leading their smaller cousins but doing the nasty and dangerous things smaller DDs weren´t capable of.

In the RN the DLs offered the advantage of having a doctore with them.

In WesWorld, CL are acting as leaders for TB or DD flotillas in the RSAN to allow better communications and to add firepower. However, this may change over the next years.

As DD's get larger, the advantage of a specialized leader seems to decline. Also, the size of the flottila/squadron/group in question would determine the value of the 'leader' concept.
DD's are vulnerable. Many times machinery breakdown's, availability, or battle damage will incapacitate the leader and the commodore will have to shift his flag to another ship anyway.
For flexibility all DD's should have the capacity to serve as temporary flagships.
There is an advantage to having a limited number of standardized designs all working in a single unit. One leader many be the 'odd' unit and impose unique logistics and maintenance requirements.

Atlantis uses the philosophy of CL's as DL's, hench the smaller 4000 ton CL designs. Smaller ships means the ability to build them in larger numbers than proper CL's.
A small CL has an enormous firepower advantage over enemy DD's, espeacially considering the Atlantean CL's possess 5.5" guns as apposed to 4" guns on the DD's.

Given the high ratio of CL's in the post CT Atlantean navy, I can afford to use them in this role to justify their continued existance. These ships however like their SAE counterparts will eventually be replaced by purpose built designs.

Quoted

Smaller ships means the ability to build them in larger numbers

Which is one of the reasons I'm reconsidering my CM/DL29 design...

CM29 Mk. IX (or something like that) = ~2630t light

Jaguar type DL = ~2160t light

Basically, I can build 4 of the latter, as opposed to only 3 of the former.

Decisions, decisions...

As I recall, the Destroyer Leaders of the Great War era would eventually become the standard Destroyer (in terms of size) for World War Two, and new destroyers would be build to that larger size normally replacing the 600-1200 ton destroyers of old. So it might wise to think that destroyers are getting bigger, not just the leaders. This might lead to the Japanese type use of Light Cruisers as Flotilla Leaders based on the strict termonology of what a destroyer is verses a light cruiser.

Newer Russian destroyer classes armed with 130mm guns are judged not to need a leader, which is usually a small cruiser. Older Russian destroyer classes (with 100mm guns and below) need the extra firepower. As the Bucharskiy and Sibersky Strelok class destroyers are removed from service, their DLs will be also. The Novik, Chastlyvy, and Orphey class destroyers are capable enough to warrant a rebuild at the 15-year mark, so in the early-mid 1930s I plan a class of 4 small light cruisers to be the DLs for flotillas with these ships.

New French destroyers with 120mm guns also won't have DLs.

The CT savages DD numbers. As Greece looks at defending and fighting around islands we seek as many torpedo armed ships as we can. This has pushed tonnage from the traditional cruiser role - policing and scouting, to overgrown destroyers. However, WW1 showed that a DD is more likely to use it's guns in combat than torpedos. My DD are also as big as I can build by the treaty to carry 4-5" guns. I'm looking at 3-4 DD teamed with 1 Flotilla leader. The Flotilla leaders are about 3000 tons - just big enough (in the Med anyway) to carry out a scout role if needed.

Cheers,

So it seems that a larger leader would offer opportunities and drawbacks:

Opportunities:

-Additional firepower
-Opportunity to group into a super-DD squadron for hazardous work
-Centralized command facilities

Drawbacks:

-Non-standardized design
-Other DD may lack necessary command facilities
-Larger hulls equal fewer hulls

India's long term outlook is to operate destroyers in six major formations:

-A battleship squadron, with six to eight destroyers
-A carrier squadron, with six to eight destroyers
-Four cruiser squadrons, with three to four destroyers

The cruiser squadrons shouldn't need a leader, because one of the cruisers would do the job. The two big squadrons might need a leader, primarily to command the screen, but in the case of the BB squadron, also to lead torpedo charges. That might suggest that I could use three leaders - leaving one to act as a spare, or be assigned as required.

The question will then be - slightly enlarged version of fleet destroyer, or super-destroyer?

Thanks for the feedback, guys.

J

Quoted

Originally posted by The Rock Doctor
The question will then be - slightly enlarged version of fleet destroyer, or super-destroyer?

What do you mean with "super-destroyer"?

I´ve puplished several designs in the past showing what I think a DL/mini-CL should look like. Most of those designs will be revised until laid down but nevertheless the range used was from 2kts to 4kts with designs of 2000, 2500, 3200 and 4000ts (artillery ranging from 115mm via 127mm or 133mm to 150mm).

Everything larger seems like a waste of material for such kind of job (4kts already being critical) while everything smaller doesn´t offer what you need for a DL (partly because of SS being of limited use for such designs) in my opinion.

Given the limited funds (material) India has at hand the questions you need to answer are: Do I really need a purpose build DL? Can´t any kind of CL serve in thaat function as well? Should a DL be able to keep pace with accompaning DDs? Should I build 2kts-DDs for a special purpose DD Squadron and what are projected tasks for such unit which cannot be fulfilled by any other DD or cruiser squadron?

Keep in mind the number of CLs is not limited and enough tonnage should be at hand. So probably a 2500-3000ts design could be interesting as long as you have enough material to build it.

Cheers,

HoOmAn

By "super-destroyer", I mean the maximum sized 2,000 t destroyer allowed by the Treaty. My existing design mounts 8 x 12.5 cm guns, 8 x 55 cm torpedoes, and has a speed of 33.7 kts.

The only task I could see needing a squadron of such vessels for is to chase down fast cruisers such as recent Dutch designs. However, I'm not certain I want to spend valuable destroyer tonnage on reaction to a specific vessel. Otherwise, the cruiser/destroyer squadrons can do the other jobs I expect need to be done.

It's crossed my mind that I've only identified two formations in which I think a leader may be necessary. As my newer cruisers come into service, I may look at using the two Trincomalee class cruisers - which by the mid-30s will be my smallest cruisers - as command units for screening forces.