Battlecruiser

The type was championed by the British admiral John Fisher: the ship was to run down and destroy enemy cruisers, scout for the fleet and act as its fast wing. The first were the Invincible class, completed in 1908. Germany built battlecruisers with lighter guns but better armour, and Japan had four of its own. In December 1914 Invincible and Inflexible destroyed Admiral Maximilian von Spee's squadron off the Falklands, while the German Goeben, transferred to the Ottoman flag, helped bring Turkey into the war.

Battlecruisers fought at the Dogger Bank, shelled the English coast and opened the fighting at Jutland. There three British ships of the class, Indefatigable, Queen Mary and Invincible, were lost when their magazines exploded; the Germans lost Lützow. The battle exposed their weak protection, and after the war the type merged into the fast battleship.