were installed on the USN destroyers. There only capability was that potentisl third world weapons did not realise they had zero hard capability. A storm of opposition in the press and Parliament to the rising cost and slow completion of the cruisers and led to the premature sale of the operational refitted cruisers HMS Ceylon and Newfoundland to Peru, the stopping and non restarting of Swiftsures reconstruction and an abortive attempt to commission HMS Lion for service a year earlier than scheduled thru shortcuts to the reconstruction and modernisation of its engineering rooms, and a large order for proximity fused 40 mm L70s cancelled. To finance the immensely expensive completion of the two incomplete Tigers and nip in the bud the intense opposition to 'obsolete cruisers' and new gunnery perceived as faulty, work on Swiftsures refit stopped. Her sister ship Superb, had been paid off into reserve in late 1957 after 12 years service, her similar modernisation plans abandoned April 1957 and was sold for scrap in early 1960, one of the first Fiji or Improved Minotaurs to be scrapped. Alternative plans for converting Swiftsure to a helicopter carrier were already being considered seriously by 1958, In November 1960 Swiftsure was still being seriously considered for retention and modernisation with Seaslug missiles as a single-ended conversion or as a helicopter carrier. The Admiralty considered Swiftsure one of its few modern and modernised cruiser hulls and even considered completely flat decking the cruiser to carry 10–12 helicopters, estimated to cost a prohibitive £7 million pounds and other more limited conversions removing the Y 6-inch turret and retaining just the forward Mk 23 turret, but she was eventually sold, arriving at the Inverkeithing yard of Thos. W. Ward on 17 October 1962 to be scrapped. Her three 6-inch triple turrets had been removed to reduce top weight for the largely empty hull for the tow from Chatham to the east coast of Scotland. The helicopter carrier conversion plans however were largely adopted in the late 1960s on the Tiger-class cruisers Blake and . Notes References Publications External links WWII cruisers HMS Swiftsure at Uboat.net Minotaur-class cruisers (1943) Ships built on the River Tyne 1943 ships World War II cruisers of the United Kingdom Cold War cruisers of the United Kingdom Ships built by Vickers Armstrong