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A cruiser is a type of warship. The term has been in use for several hundred years, and has had different meanings throughout this period. During the Age of Sail, the term ''cruising'' referred to certain kinds of missions – independent scouting, raiding or commerce protection – fulfilled by a frigate or sloop, which were the ''cruising warships'' of a fleet. In the middle of the 19th century, ''cruiser'' came to be a classification for the ships intended for this kind of role, though cruisers came in a wide variety of sizes, from the small protected cruiser to armored cruisers that were as large (although not as powerful) as a battleship. By the early 20th century, cruisers could be placed on a consistent scale of warship size, smaller than a battleship but larger than a destroyer. In 1922, the Washington Naval Treaty placed a formal limit on cruisers, which were defined as warships of up to 10,000 tons displacement carrying guns no larger than 8 inches in calibre. These limits shaped cruisers until the end of World War II. The very large battlecruisers of the World War I era were now classified, along with battleships, as capital ships. In the later 20th century, the obsolescence of the battleship left the cruiser as the largest and most powerful surface combatant (excluding aircraft carriers). The role of the cruiser varied according to ship and navy, often including air defense, commerce raiding, and shore bombardment. The U.S. Navy in the Cold War period built guided-missile cruisers primarily designed to provide air defense, while the navy of the USSR built battlecruisers with heavy anti-ship missiles designed to sink NATO carrier task forces. Currently only three nations operate cruisers: the United States, Russia, and Peru. ( is still in service with the Peruvian Navy, and is the last gun cruiser currently in service in any navy), though the line between cruisers and destroyers is once again blurred. New models of destroyers (for instance the ) are often larger and more powerful than cruiser classes they replace. ==Early history== The term "cruiser" or "cruizer"〔The alternative spelling could be found at least as late as 1900: Jackie Fisher wrote "We a require an increase.... in all classes of cruizer" in a letter dated 20th Feb 1900. Mackay, R. ''Fisher of Kilverstone'', p. 242.〕 was first commonly used in the 17th century to refer to an independent warship. "Cruiser" meant the purpose or mission of a ship, rather than a category of vessel. However, the term was nonetheless used to mean a smaller, faster warship suitable for such a role. In the 17th century, the ship of the line was generally too large, inflexible, and expensive to be dispatched on long-range missions (for instance, to the Americas), and too strategically important to be put at risk of fouling and foundering by continual patrol duties. The Dutch navy was noted for its cruisers in the 17th century, while the Royal Navy—and later French and Spanish navies—subsequently caught up in terms of their numbers and deployment. The British Cruiser and Convoy Acts were an attempt by mercantile interests in Parliament to focus the Navy on commerce defence and raiding with cruisers, rather than the more scarce and expensive ships of the line.〔Rodger, N. A. M.: ''The Command of the Ocean, A Naval History of Britain 1649–1815''. Allen Lane, London, 2004. ISBN 0-7139-9411-8〕 During the 18th century the frigate became the preeminent type of cruiser. A frigate was a small, fast, long range, lightly armed (single gun-deck) ship used for scouting, carrying dispatches, and disrupting enemy trade. The other principal type of cruiser was the sloop, but many other miscellaneous types of ship were used as well. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「cruiser」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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