Laid down in 1916/17. The Hannibal class followed on the eight gun improvement line that the Greenland battleships had been following. The Dido class had been 8x16", therefore the next logical step was to go to battleships with 8x18". Doesn't sound much, but the jump in size of everything fitted to the ship was huge. Bigger guns, more armour, larger machinery plant to attain the same speed as the Dido's. The ships would be over 100 feet longer and nearly 10 feet more beam. This added up to a 12,000 ton jump in size. These ships also introduced the Greenlandian Navy to the Coventry Works 5.5" secondary armament gun. This would be used on many future ships, including cruisers, which is what the gun was originally designed for, two Greek light cruisers.
"Hood, Schmood". The Hood was completed in 1920 and for twelve months was the largest ship in the world. The completion of the Hannibal in 1921 eclipsed the Hood easily. But the Hannibal nearly went to the breakers yard after only 12 months of service. The designers of the Washington Treaty did not like the Hannibal. The Treaty stopped Hannibal's two sisterships from being completed in 1922 and 1923. The hulls being turned into aircraft carriers. (see Shacar and Molloch when I draw them)
After the Hannibal's three year rebuild the ship emerged as good as any modern battleship, and only bettered by the Japanese Yamato II class ships. Same guns but the Japanese ships were bigger and better armoured. The Japanese knew about the Hannibal and had made sure their ships were better. In European waters, no other ship could match the Hannibal. The reason it survived the Washington Treaty? there was only one. It could easily be overwhelmed by the forces of the bigger navies.
Hannibal and the three Dido class made up one of the most potent battle squadrons available on the outbreak of war. They were put in harms way because of this with battles against the Germanic States Fleet and the Axis South Fleet.
July 1940 and France surrenders. Dunkirk and other minor affairs take time to get the British Army and as many Allied troops across the channel as possible. Ships from all those surrendered nations have been arriving in British waters seeking sanctuary and the chance to hit back at the hated Boche. What France's surrender does trigger is the entry of Italy and Spain into the war on the side of the Axis forces. Spanish and German troops try to take Gibraltar while a German Paratroop attack is made on Malta with Italians attacking from the sea. The Allied forces have one chance to evacuate Malta and Gibraltar of civilians that want to leave and disrupt the Axis forces plans. A huge fleet of eight carriers and twelve battleships is to force the Strait of Gibraltar against the air attack and possible sea attack from Axis fleet South. The Eastern Mediterranean Fleet is to attack the forces attacking Malta and relieve the island to make evacuation possible. The scene is set.
The Greenland Navys' job is to force the strait with its four aircraft carriers and six battleships to clear all Axis shipping along the coast of Southern Spain up to and including the Naval Port of Cartagena. As the orders stated, send Cartagena and its facilities back to the stoneage. And so it did. The speed of advance caught the Axis Fleet South in port where first air attacks and then a cannonade from the Battleships blew away everything in sight. This included four old WW1 modernised battleships, three modern cruisers and half a dozen destroyers. Those ships that tried to raise steam were targeted first. Once resistance had been blown away, the fleet took the time to shell all the shore installations, docks, fuel depots and tanks, shipyards, all were bombarded. and destroyed. Cartagena was no longer fit to be the base for Axis Fleet South (Mediterranean). The fighters off the aircraft carriers were having fun shooting down Axis aircraft trying to interfere with the Fleets work. Nearly a years combat experience gave the Greenlandian fighter pilots a decided edge over the Axis pilots for whom the war had just started. Also the Greenlandian aircraft were the latest available and outclassed their Axis opponents. (I have to design and build the aircraft when I do the aircraft carriers). A resounding victory for the Allied forces. But it was still not much against the loss of Gibraltar and then Malta. Meanwhile the Commonwealth forces were attacking along the Spanish Atlantic coast doing the same thing. Putting ports out of action as fleet bases and repair centres. Cadiz, Lisbon, Ferrol, and others. One of the major aims was to ensure that the Spanish battleship Crisobal Colon was destroyed before it could be commissioned. The last thing the Allies would want is another 15" battleship loose in the Atlantic.
If the ground forces in Egypt could not withstand the Axis assaults to come then the whole Middle East with its oh so valuable oilfields were in danger of being rolled up under the Axis banner. While the Allied forces can be based on Greenland and bottle up the Axis forces in the Mediterranean. Reinforcements for the Middle East have to go round the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa and back up the east coast. A very long journey.
The war now rests with Turkey. If Turkey joins the Axis, then the Axis forces can attack the Middle East from the North and West. The Allied forces could not hope to survive a two front battle arena. Projecting forward a year. the Axis forces can now attack Russia from Turkey up into the Caucasus and take the oil fields. Russia is lost. Hello, New World Order. If Turkey remains neutral then the Allied forces may survive long enough to somehow get America into the war. Would the US of A join earlier if it could see the potential of the Allied losses in the Middle East and its strategic value to the USA as well. Give Roosevelt his due. He and his advisors knew what they wanted to achieve strategically from WW2. They wanted the USA to emerge from WW2 as top dog, controlling as many of the strategic resources as they could lay hands on. To do that they had to keep the Commonwealth forces in the war. The USA could not afford to have the Middle East or Russia fall to the Axis. Something would have to be done. The USA had many opportunities to join the war provided by the Germanic States U-boats sinking their ships which were supposedly neutral. There were reports from December 1940 through to October 1941 of US ships being sunk that could have been used as a pretext for the USA to declare war on the Axis forces rather than waiting for Pearl Harbour.
I do go on a bit about these 'possible' events as it shows just how close to the knife edge the Allied forces were to getting their arses kicked. With 80% of the German Army in France in 1940, the Spanish could have been told, join or we will take you out as well. It would have been easy for the Germans to do that. After 5 years of Civil War there would have been little fight left in the Spanish forces.
I have said nothing about the French. Would the Germans be happy with a Vichy France setup? I think not if they thought they could bottle up the French ships at Mers-El-Kebir in the Mediterranean and hopefully capture them. If I was the French, those ships would sail the gauntlet through the narrows at Malta and head for the rest of the French ships interned at Alexandria. A lot of extra ships to help the Allied armies to keep Egypt.
I have gamed these events many times. We used to have the Game Designers Workshop (GDW) War in the West, War in the East, and Desert War expansion packs. To have all the maps set up we needed a huge 7mx5m room with very little space to move around the maps. Thousands of little 12mm squares of cardboard depicting all the different forces involved. With everything set up on the map in their start positions it was extremely colourful. Very easy to have a gods eye view of what was happening. Now we can play the same level of authenticity down to regimental level forces on the computer. You can of course scroll around the battle fronts, but you lose the gods eye feel. It was a lot of fun. But got boring fast. So we designed a replacement points system for all sides so you could choose what reinforcements you wanted and when. 'Buy' a Panzer division but we would make it that it would require 8-9 months building before it would go in the replacement pool. You had to have a bit of foresight and make sure that you had the right mix of forces in the right place at the right time. Much more fun than blindly following the mistakes of the various countries during WW2. As long as the Allies can hold till the USA forces start rolling then there is only one end. A lot of things like involving Spain and Turkey were forbidden. You could not just abandon Greece or the Germans had to take Yugoslavia and Greece because of Italy. If you did not attack Russia as the German player by July/August 1941 you were penalised.
I have always disliked those sort of rules which is why I get such a kick out of doing these Alternate Universe Navies. The 'Purists' don't like me much. I do 'hack' jobs of their beautiful pixel art.
