of battleship tonnage available for new vessels before they would reach their treaty limits, but they avoided new construction in the 1920s due to severe budgetary problems and to avoid a naval arms race with France. These financial limitations also forced the Italians to scrap Dante Alighieri in 1928. Nevertheless, the Regia Marina decided to make use of its excess tonnage by the early 1930s, which resulted in the four s. Two were finished early in World War II and were used extensively to escort convoys during the North African Campaign. The third ship, Roma, was finished in 1942, but was sunk in September 1943 by a German radio-controlled bomb when Italy surrendered to the Allies. The fourth ship, Impero, was never finished and was instead sunk by American bombers and scrapped after the end of the war. The two surviving ships, Littorio and Vittorio Veneto, were surrendered to the Allies and were later broken up for scrap. Of the surviving members of the Conte di Cavour class, Conte di Cavour was scrapped after the end of the war and Giulio Cesare was surrendered to the Soviet Union as war reparations. Only the two Andrea Doria-class battleships survived in Italian service for any significant length of time after the conclusion of hostilities; both served as training ships until the mid-1950s, when they too were broken up for scrap. Pre-dreadnought battleships Ammiraglio di Saint Bon class The first of the Italian Navy's modern battleships, the Ammiraglio di Saint Bon class were smaller than their contemporaries due to limitations imposed by the Italian government and indecision in the naval design staff over what kind of battleship should be built. They were designed under the supervision of Admiral Simone di Pacoret Saint Bon, the namesake of the lead ship, and Benedetto Brin. Ultimately, the ships' small size, weak main battery, and slow speed made them ineffective capital ships, since they were not strong enough to engage foreign battleships, and too slow to catch cruisers. Both ships served in the active duty squadron early in their careers, and participated in the Italo-Turkish War of 1911–1912. They took part in the Italian offensives in North Africa and the island of Rhodes, but did not see combat with the Ottoman fleet. They were reduced to harbor defense ships by the outbreak of World War I, and spent the war in Venice. The ships were discarded shortly