Tides of War

As we all know the choises for german destroyers are quite limited.

The few DDs germany build before and in WW2 were mostly bad designs with teething troubles.

However the alternative history of Enigma gives us a good solution for this problem.

In Enigma France and England are Allied with Germany (well, kinda) so it is only natural to use use foreign Designs which are superiour to the germans in the german fleet.

One example would be the french "Le Fantasque" Destroyers.

These large destroyers (2569 BRT) were build from the early till the mid 1930s and were mainly designed as a counterpart to the latest Italian light Cruisers.

Here are the technical datas:

Displacement: 2569 tons standard (3200 to 3400 tons full load)

Speed: 37 Knots (however the maximum speed achieved in trials was over 45knots!)

Compliment: 210.

Armament:

Five 5.5 inch guns (http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNFR_55-45_m1929.htm),

Four 37mm AA guns (http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNFR_37-50_cail_m1933.htm),

Four 13.2mm AA

(http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNFR_13mm_aamg.htm),

Nine 21.7 inch Torpedo Tubes,

50 mines

Source:

http://www.battleships-cruisers.co.uk/le_fantasque.htm

(and many more, just google for "fantasque destroyer")

Later in WW2 some of the ships were refitted in the US (and reclassified as light cruisers), one torpedo mount was removed (means 3 torpedos less) and the AA armament was beefed up to

8 Bofors 40mm (http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNUS_4cm-56_mk12.htm)

10 2cm Oerlikons (http://www.warships1.com/Weapons/WNUS_2cm-70_mk234.htm)

Source: http://mapage.noos.fr/4edmm/croiseur.htm

I would suggest to add this class as german destroyer with rank requirements just below the light cruisers.

This would give the germans finally a modern destroyer, which is not a WW1 design (the DD is even based on a 1906 light cruiser), which will be able to fight the american and alliance DDs or has the ability to run when fighting superiour forces.

Of course the Z-35c Babarossa should not be completly replaced, the Le Fantasque DDs should be placed like a less numerous state of the art destroyer leading the german destroyer squadrons while the Z-35c remains the backbone of the german navy.





Aren't they just beautiful?

I think the French joined there Enemy?s of 100 years the RN :laugh:

If that actually happened it happened before the year 1930.

In the Newspaper I noticed 2 articles about the french:

- French Minister worried about security of french coast

and more interesting:

- french foreign fleet hired to protect turkish convoys

If the french have a foreign fleet they need to have thier own navy

probally just lend lease ships of the klm

Wouldn't the French be conquered by Germany because they lost WWI?

Well, the german DDE is an American design but ingame it is descriped as a german product

You could simply say that [insert name of french ship designer] started working for germany and build this ship for them.

Or, if france is under some kind of "you are not allowed to have any arms" occupation (that would opposse them having a foreign navy), which would oppose that newspaper articlethat because of the growing tensions between germany and the US france was allowed to start its own naval programm, in order to support the germans.

You see, story wise the existane of those ships is not a problem at all, it even makes more sence then using destroyers based a pre WW1 design in 1937

-edit-

@Mark: I am not that familiar with the alternative history scenario of Enigma, but germany never planned to annex France.

Kaiser Willhelm II had no interests in turning germany into a multi national state like Austria, more likely a Europe after a german victory would look similar to the EU today, a large free trade zone (or at least free for german traders ) just under german dominance.

Correct Tarpoon. France is not allied with RNE however, it's allied with Germany.