In fact, before the First World War, Germany's navy was very large, although far less than Britain, but it could also rank in the top five in the world; during the First World War, the German high seas fleet and the British Royal Fleet fought very well; but after the end of the First World War, most of the warships of the German high seas fleet chose to sink themselves, and the remaining warships were divided by the Allies.
That is to say, after the end of the First World War, Germany had no navy; although Germany built a number of warships, it was no different; this situation was not changed until after Adolf came to power, Adolf agreed with the "Z plan" proposed by the commander-in-chief of the navy, Raedel, and decided to build warships on a large scale. As we all know, during the First World War, battleships were the most important measure of a country's naval strength, so battleships became the mainstream of naval warfare.
However, during the Second World War, the battleships that ruled the sea for nearly half a century gradually fell behind, replaced by new aircraft carriers; with the development of science and technology, the performance of aircraft has been greatly improved, and all countries have developed very good aircraft, especially after the Taranto attack, countries are very keenly aware of the potential of aircraft carriers, so they began to vigorously develop aircraft carriers; among them, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Japan had the fastest research and development progress.
Many people are curious as to why Germany did not keep up with the development of the times, if Germany had also vigorously developed aircraft carriers at that time, it might have taken Britain; in fact, this is really wronged Germany, Germany has developed a lot of "black technology"; although Germany lost in the First World War, Germany's industrial and technological development is not backward at all, Adolf although very crazy, but he is extremely appreciative and supportive of new technology and new technologies.
In the "Z plan", there will naturally be no shortage of aircraft carrier construction plans, and even supporting aircraft development plans, such as the collapsible Stuka C bomber and BF-109t fighter. In 1935, Germany decided to build an aircraft carrier, which was built by the German shipbuilding company Volchant Shipyard, which has a long history, especially with China, and built 9 warships for the Qing Dynasty, namely Dingyuan, Zhenyuan, Jiyuan, Laiyuan and so on.
After receiving the military's demand, the Voltaire Shipyard began to develop an aircraft carrier codenamed "Zeppelin", but the German military also knew that the requirements for the first construction of an aircraft carrier could not be too high, so the Aircraft Carrier Zeeberin was not the same as the large aircraft carriers of the United States, Britain and Japan, which was used to compete with the enemy for air supremacy at sea, but to serve as a flagship and provide air cover for the German commercial attack fleet active in the Atlantic Ocean at that time.
The design and construction of the Aircraft Carrier Zeppelin was still very smooth, it was launched in 1938, it looked very advanced in appearance, but because this was the first time that the Volchant shipyard designed the aircraft carrier and there were many defects; but this was not the key, the key was that the German military had been arguing about what weapons should be equipped for the Aircraft Carrier Zebrain, and the problem was not resolved until 1942, and the construction began to continue, but at this time Germany's manpower and material resources could not support the completion of the Aircraft Carrier Zebrain.
Didn't it say at first that the construction of the Aircraft Carrier Zipperling was stalled because the German military was arguing about what weapons to equip, but in fact, the culprit that caused the Aircraft Carrier Ziberling to be unable to be completed was Goering, yes, Adolf's most trusted and important Grand Marshal Goering, and one of Goering's many positions was Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force; this Goering once said that "everything that flies belongs to me" and "let my air force cover the blue sky" and other rhetoric.
And he did just that, taking advantage of Adolf's trust and weight to divide up a large amount of military expenses to build an air force, so that Germany had an extremely large air force, which made an indelible contribution to the construction and development of the Luftwaffe. But on the question of the aircraft carrier HMS Zeppelin, Goering was confused, believing that all that Could Fly and all flight operations in Germany must be commanded by the Air Force, and firmly disagreed that the Navy should own or command a small flying unit alone.
Therefore, although there have long been plans for the development of carrier-based fighters and carrier-based bombers, and even carrier-based bombers have been developed, they have not been equipped on the Aircraft Carrier Zeppelin for a long time. Although Marshal Raeder was also trusted and valued by Adolf, he was far from Goering, resulting in the delay in the completion of the aircraft carrier Zeppelin. By the time the dispute was resolved, the war against Britain was over, Marshal Raeder stepped down, and Marshal Dönitz took the throne.
Marshal Dönitz did not seem to have any interest in surface warships, and he devoted a great deal of naval manpower and material resources to the development and construction of submarines, so in the time that followed, Germany built a large number of U-boats, while the Aircraft Carrier Zepperin continued to be idle; at the end of the Second World, germany sank it in order to avoid the unfinished Aircraft Carrier Zeppelin becoming a Soviet trophy, but later the Soviets salvaged it, and after thorough research, sank it again.
It can be said that the aircraft carrier Zipperin is the most tragic and bumpy warship in the world, from its construction to its complete sinking, a total of 12 years, although it took only three years to launch, but it has always been in the idle stage; later it was difficult to have a chance to complete, but it continued to be idle due to personnel changes and changes in the situation; it was chiseled at the end of World War II, then fished up, and finally sunk; this fate is even more tragic than the Japanese aircraft carrier Shinano...