page_title: List of battleships of the United States
section_title: South Dakota class (1920)
hierarchical_section_title: List of battleships of the United States / Dreadnought battleships / South Dakota class (1920)
caption_attribution_description: English: Photo # 19-N-63999 &#160;&#160;&#160; USS Washington off the Puget Sound Navy Yard, April 1944, following repair of collision damage to her bow.
context_page_description: The United States Navy began the construction of battleships with USS Texas in 1892, but the first battleship under that designation would be USS Indiana. Texas and USS Maine, commissioned three years later, were part of the New Navy program of the late 19th century, a proposal by then Secretary of the Navy William H. Hunt to match Europe's navies that ignited a years-long debate that was suddenly settled in Hunt's favor when the Brazilian Empire commissioned the battleship Riachuelo. In 1890, Alfred Thayer Mahan's book The Influence of Sea Power upon History was published and significantly influenced future naval policy—as an indirect of its influence on Secretary Benjamin F. Tracy, the Navy Act of June 30, 1890 authorized the construction of "three sea-going, coast-line battle ships" which became the Indiana class. The Navy Act of July 19, 1892 authorized construction of a fourth "sea-going, coast-line battle ship", which became USS Iowa. Despite much later claims that these were to be purely defensive and were authorized as "coastal defense ships", they were almost immediately used for offensive operations in the Spanish–American War.
context_section_description: Displacement: 43,200 tons
  Armament: 12 × 16 in (406 mm) (4x3), 16 × 6 in (152 mm) (16x1), 8 × 3 in (76 mm) (8x1), 2 × 21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes
  Armor: 13.5in Belt / 4.75in Deck
  Speed: 23 knots
  Ships in class: 6: USS South Dakota, USS Indiana, USS Montana, USS North Carolina, USS Iowa, and USS Massachusetts
  Fate: Because of the Washington Naval Treaty, all were cancelled and scrapped on their slips prior to launch in 1923.
caption: USS Washington
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