Super Destroyers: From the Torpedo Boat Era to the Dominant Surface Warship of Today

256 pages

Chris O’Flaherty

This book is a well-illustrated and informative passage through much of the design, construction and operational history of the genre of ships known as ‘Destroyers’. In their late 19th century guise, torpedo boat destroyers were relatively small (often a few hundred tons), reasonably quick, and very agile. Engaged in raiding, scouting and the screening of larger warships, these were roles for which the heavy warhead torpedo was an ideal and effective weapon, albeit one with a rather short range. “Advances in technology, both that of torpedoes … and ship’s engines” then saw an international race of increasing speed, displacement and armament (of torpedoes and guns) which spiralled the development of a plethora of destroyer classes.

In following the thread of the book, one recurring highlight is the struggle of navies and nations to achieve an accepted definition of ‘Destroyer’. By 1914 it was considered that a “standard destroyer” was a ship “of the kind that composed the working flotillas that escorted a nation’s main battlefleet or blockaded an enemy’s coastline, in excess of 1,000 tons”.  A further attempted codification at the Geneva [arms limitation] Conference in 1927 noted the “destroyer type was defined as surface ships that displaced between 3,000 and 600 tons with a top speed of greater than seventeen knots”, whilst conspicuously failing to mention either gun calibre or torpedo armament.

The author duly qualifies the book’s title by opining that ‘Super Destroyers’ occasionally steamed into the maritime picture due to “a quantum leap in size and capability over the previous generation”. This allows the author considerable latitude in respect of choosing his focal ships, with developmental examples cited from many world navies. By 1945, the thread of attempted definition accordingly focusses on the need of navies for a ship that “fulfilled all the requirements of a true utility craft, namely that it would be available, adaptable, and expendable”, with the later requirement assuming “that these craft would be procurable in large enough numbers and at a low enough cost that losses could be tolerated without undue concern” … there may be a contemporary lesson in this sentence alone.

Noting this criterion for large numbers, the single most produced class of destroyer was the US Navy’s Fletcher-class. Initiated in 1939, a total of 175 ships were produced (of 181 ordered), with subsequent in-class modifications incorporating early British war experience such as the importance of armour protection for engineering spaces, and ‘stronger’ anti-aircraft armament … up to six x 40mm and ten x 20mm AA cannon per ship of just 2,325 tons, in addition to five x 5-inch main guns. For destroyers, this epitomises the enduring conflict of maximising firepower whilst constrained by the stability considerations of topweight.

The vivid descriptions of notable WWI and WWII destroyer actions bring alive some of the key design evolutions. However, the very abbreviated section on destroyer development after the Second World War, jumping from 1946 to 2022 in just seven pages, leaves the narrative slightly devoid of the morphing of the vital role of such escorts into the air-defence (or attack) missile platforms we now see with ‘D’ pennant numbers. Accordingly, the caption under an image of a 10,000 ton US Navy Ticonderoga-class (CG52), stating that “by all the criteria in this book, [USS] Bunker Hill qualifies as a destroyer” could be seen as a tad of a stretch.  Unmentioned by the text, an examination of the crucial role of destroyers in, for example, the 1982 Falklands conflict, could have provided the required warfighting epoch.

For aficionados of world war and inter-war naval history, this book descriptively sets out the key destroyer developments and technological leaps in the first half of the 20th century. Indeed, many current commanding officers will jealously read about the level of armament that their ‘super destroyer’ forebears fielded in order to deliver success across a host of operations.