Winston S. Churchill Fears the Worst

Abstract

German naval expansion in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century down to the outbreak of the First World War was delivered by a number of German naval laws and the enthusiasm of Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz and Kaiser Wilhelm II (Emperor from 1888–1918). Not unlike members of the British Government, Tirpitz and the Kaiser saw a navy as promoting national industrial and economic development. Tirpitz, as Secretary of the German Imperial Navy from 1897, promoted a large German fleet from the start of his tenure in office and he believed that with modern ships, efficient training and sensible deployment the German Navy could even threaten the supremacy of the Royal Navy. This programme also depended on how the British would respond and the technical developments they were capable of producing, but at best the German position was still very optimistic and had the strategic assumption that an Anglo-German naval conflict would largely be confined to an area between the River Thames estuary and Heligoland in the south-eastern edge of the North Sea. An interpretation of this position is that Tirpitz wanted the German Navy to serve as deterrence to the British rather than for Germany to necessarily go to war with them in the North Sea. This new German approach was ‘kick started’ with a German Naval Law in 1898 and followed by another in 1900 and after 1906 they appeared to respond to the British lead in building Dreadnoughts.

‘The spectacle which the naval armaments of Christendom afford at the present time will no doubt excite the curiosity and the wonder of future generations.’

(Winston S. Churchill, 18 March 1912)¹