The two "Delaware"-class battleships were ordered in response to the British battleship , the first all-big-gun battleship to enter service. The previous American dreadnoughts, the , had been designed before the particulars of HMS "Dreadnought" were known. The Navy decided that another pair of battleships should be built to counter the perceived superiority of "Dreadnought" over "South Carolina", and so Rear Admiral Washington L. Capps prepared a design for a ship with an additional main battery gun turret to match "Dreadnought"s ten guns. But unlike "Dreadnought", all ten of "North Dakota"s guns could fire on the broadside. At the time of her construction, "North Dakota" was the largest and most powerful battleship then building in the world.