>>63929147
>If there's one thing the USN was better at it was
better machinery
by the late-30s the US was the world leader in ship propulsion. everything is due to them managing to save like 10% of weight and volume off their engines vs. everyone else, and translating that into more of all the other useful shit
they also had 2 years of extra rearmament time while everyone else was fighting a war

>>63930675
>the few battleship vs battleship engagements were night battles
because that's when carriers couldn't operate

>everyone spent so much money on battleships envisioning long range artillery duels
because naval treaties limited the construction of new fleet carriers, and airplanes made massive leaps in performance in the late 30s that made them viable

in the early 30s, this was the US Navy carriers' principal torpedo bomber