The 28th October 1934, in the San Marco shipyards of the CRDA (Cantieri Riuniti Dell'Adriatico), it was laid the keel of a battleship which, for the first time in the world, had exceeded the displacement limit for her class imposed by the Washington Treaty (35000 tonnes). Designed by General of Naval Engineers Umberto Pugliese, the unit received the name "Vittorio Veneto". Launched the 25th July 1937, she would be incorporated to the Fleet the 28th April 1940, starting operations in August of the same year. She was a unit of slender and elegant line which featured diverse advantages: good armament, first battleship fitted in 1942 with a radar (a "Gufo" E.C.4) of Italian manufacture, sufficient speed and modest operational range. She had also excellent safety features, of which she would give proof when continuing navigating on her own after having taken impacts from bombs and torpedoes. The propulsion plant had been designed in such a way that, in the event of malfunction, the eight boilers could ensure the independent operation of any propeller with two of those. The protection of the unit was like this: the hull had a triple bottom and, in the sides, "Pugliese" hydrodynamical protection cylinders, which in that time were the best and most modern system of underwater protection. The vertical armor reached a maximum of 350 millimeters and the horizontal one 220 millimeters. The rudders allowed to maneuver with a turning radius equal to twice the length of the ship. Let us finish with a note from the Anglo-Saxon technicians who inspected her many times during her postwar internment period: "from a constructional point of view, the Italians were ahead of us in 1939". From Shipbuilding and Shipping Record, 25 November 1948.