of capital ship tonnage. Both countries were put under significant pressure from the other signatories to use their allotted tonnage to build smaller battleships with reduced caliber main batteries. The first Italian design, prepared in 1928, called for a ship armed with a main battery of six guns in twin turrets. They opted for this design because this allowed three ships under the 70,000-ton limit. This would have allowed the Italian fleet to keep at least two units operational at any given time. Protection and radius of action were sacrificed for speed and heavy armament, though the Italians did not value range, as they operated primarily in the confined waters of the Mediterranean. Later in 1928, the design staff prepared another ship, with a displacement of , armed with six guns and protected against guns of the same caliber. At least one of these ships would have followed the three 23,000-ton ships once the building holiday expired in 1931. Funding was not allocated to begin construction, however, as the Italian Navy did not want to instigate an arms race with the French Navy. The London Naval Treaty of 1930 extended the building holiday to 1936, though Italy and France retained the right to build 70,000 tons of new capital ships. Both countries rejected British proposals to limit new battleship designs to and guns. After 1930, the Italian Navy abandoned the smaller designs altogether. By 1930, Germany had begun to build the three ships, armed with six guns, and France had in turn laid down two s to counter them. The French vessels were armed with eight guns. In late 1932, Italian constructors responded with a design similar to the Deutschland class, but armed with six guns in triple turrets on a displacement. The Italian Navy decided that the smaller design was impractical, and that a larger design should be pursued. A design was then prepared, which mounted eight 343 mm guns in twin turrets. This was ultimately abandoned in favor of a 35,000 ton design to be armed with 406 mm guns. The 406 mm gun in turn was abandoned in favor of the 381 mm gun because there were no designs for the larger gun, which would delay construction; a 381 mm gun had already been designed for the canceled . Ultimately, nine 381 mm guns in three triple turrets were adopted as the primary battery for the ships,