Written by D-Mitch
This article is devoted to the battleships, the most powerful ships to sail the waves and the pride of every navy from 1880 to the early '40s. These large warships with the impressive gun armament, the so-called "Castles of Steel" or "The Floating Fortresses", were a symbol of naval dominance and national might, and for decades the battleship was a major factor in both diplomacy and military strategy. The following image (compiled by iksanov) depicts individual battleships and battlecruisers of major battleship classes as they were in a specific year (camouflage, prior or after a modernization, etc.). The majority of them served during WWII with very few exceptions such as the España class battleship Jaime I (n.28) or the HMS Vanguard (n.2) that was commissioned in 1946 (I modified the original image because instead of Vanguard, it had the Sovetsky Soyuz-class battleship, a ship that was never completed and commissioned). Somebody can notice also that not all the battleship classes are included, such examples are the Conte di Cavour class of Italy, the New Mexico and Pennsylvania classes of the United States of America, the Ise class of Japan and many more classes of the United Kingdom. For a brief overview of all the battleship classes (ironclads, pre-dreadnoughts, dreadnoughts, battleships and fast battleships), including those that were never commissioned, you can read here (I noticed quickly that some classes are missing though such as the Espana class). About the individual battleships within the classes you can find them here where they are listed alphabetically. Please notice that the silhouettes have not been created by me but by anonymous users in the web (if somebody found an author or the authors please send me a message!)
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| IJN Yamato in 1941. The ship, together with its sister-ship, IJN Musashi, were the only super-battleships that saw action. |
