In the aftermath of the First World War, the Washington Naval Treaty was drawn up in 1922 in an effort to stop an arms race developing between Britain, Japan, France, Italy and the United States.
The wreck of Prince of Wales lies upside down in 223 feet (68 m) of water, near Kuantan, in the South China Sea. She was sunk alongside her consort, the battlecruiser HMS Repulse, by Japanese bombers when they became the first capital ships to be sunk solely by air power on the open sea, a harbinger of the diminishing role this class of ships was subsequently to play in naval warfare. Prince of Wales later escorted one of the Malta convoys in the Mediterranean, and then attempted to intercept Japanese troop convoys off the coast of Malaya as part of Force Z when she was sunk on 10 December 1941, two days after the attack on Pearl Harbor. In her brief career, she was involved in several key actions of the Second World War, including the May 1941 Battle of the Denmark Strait where she scored three hits on the German battleship Bismarck, forcing Bismarck to abandon her raiding mission and head to port for repairs. She had an extensive battle history, first seeing action in August 1940 while still being outfitted in her drydock when she was attacked and damaged by German aircraft. HMS Prince of Wales was a King George V-class battleship of the Royal Navy that was built at the Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead, England.
Ĥ Supermarine Walrus seaplanes, 1 double-ended catapult
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