In April 1933, Arthur, who was gradually settling into his work rhythm, sat at his desk and looked thoughtfully at a few blueprints laid out before him.
These blueprints were all designs from the Royal Shipyard, and they were precisely the designs for the new battleships and aircraft carriers that Minister Thomas had mentioned previously.
Because the Naval Limitation Treaty was no longer in effect, theoretically, there were no tonnage restrictions whatsoever on the new battleships and aircraft carriers built by various nations.
This also meant that on the battleship design blueprint in front of Arthur, the expected displacement of the battleship would reach 45,700 tons, and the anticipated full-load displacement would exceed 52,000 tons, making it a super battleship in the truest sense.
However, Arthur had no interest in building too many such super battleships. Even within the Navy construction plan proposed by the Ministry of Defense, only two such super battleships would be built, and the design of battleships would be directly abandoned thereafter.
Then came the question: since they were going to abandon battleship designs altogether, why did they still come up with such a formidable-looking battleship?
Aside from increasing the navy's overt strength, tricking their Pacific competitor, the Japanese, was also a quite significant reason.
According to intelligence from various quarters, the Japanese were already planning to build more warships, among which the main force to be constructed would be battleships.
As the Japanese's biggest competitor, Australasia's achievements regarding battleships would naturally be transmitted as intelligence to the Japanese.
Naturally, the Japanese would not accept Australasia having a naval advantage, especially since the Japanese needed maritime security even more than Australasia did.
This also meant that they would definitely follow suit in researching super battleships and would build at least two, or perhaps even more, super