The Naval Race

In 1897 Admiral Tirpitz began the construction of a German High Seas Fleet fit to rival the Royal Navy. The argument went (and it was not lost on the British by any means) that although the British could build and maintain more warships, the Germans only needed to be able (initially) to gain mastery of one area - the North Sea. The Royal Navy was enormous, but it had to patrol the entire world. A localised powerful threat would be a serious problem.

In 1904 the British First Sea Lord: Sir John Fisher began a radical reorganisation of the Royal Navy. In 1906 Britain launched a new type of battleship: HMS Dreadnought. This death star of its day instantly reduced all previous warships to the status of relics.

The naval race was on with Germany making good speed despite Britain building firstly 6 Dreadnought class ships a year and ultimately 8 a year. By 1912 though the German High Seas Fleet was two thirds the size of the Royal Navy - with a greatly reduced area of operation.

Britain threatened

Britain - the Island Nation - suddenly felt very seriously threatened. Without control of the seas for her merchant ships Britain's wealth and prosperity accrued from her colonial possessions was put in jeopardy.

In January and February 1913 Britain signed three Naval agreements with France. These basically stated that in the event of a war the Royal Navy would look after the North Sea whilst the French Navy would police the Mediterranean.

A month later a Military agreement was also signed where Britain agreed to send a 6 Division Expeditionary Force to France in the event of a German invasion. This would operate under General Joffre, the French Commander in Chief. Such a thing even a year before hand would have been unthinkable. What brought this about?

Germany's fear of encirclement

Russia

Germany had a deep seated feeling of being surrounded by powerful enemies. To the east lay Russia under its autocratic Tsar: Nicolas II. Whilst by one of those ironies of fate Nicolas was also related to the Kaiser there was little love between the two of them. The reason being - the Balkans. The Balkans had long been (even today) a politically unstable area and it threatened Germany's ally, the crumbling Austro-Hungarian Hapsburg Empire.

Various crises over this period between Austria, Serbia and Russia came very close to bringing war - and of course it was here in Sarajevo that the fatal shot was fired bringing Europe to war.

France

On Germany's western frontier lay France, seething over her defeat by Prussia in 1870 and all too ready to find an excuse to strike and take back the lost provinces of Alsace and Lorraine which had been ceded to Prussia in 1870.

To counter the Germanic block (Which had added Italy as an ally on 18 May 1882 - forming the Triple Alliance) France approached Russia in 1890. Over the next three years a general agreement became an alliance of mutual support. If one was attacked the other would go to war against the aggressor.

This Franco-Russian alliance added to Germany's and in particular the Kaiser's paranoia.

Thus by 1904 we have two powerful alliances in being. One a central core in Europe and the other surrounding it. Perhaps Germany could have been forgiven some of its fears but as if to add further fuel to those fears worse was to come for Wilhelm II.

Britain

On 8 April 1904 Britain and France signed an Entente Cordiale. This was not really an alliance as such, more of a friendly agreement. France was well aware of her own ambitions to gain revenge for 1870, but she was equally aware of the seemingly unstopable economic and military build up within Germany.

It should be perhaps pointed out that whilst Austro-Hungary was in theory a threat to Russia (and by Alliance therefore to France) it was Germany that was considered to be the real danger. Indeed after war had broken out a German general made the disparaging remark about his allies that it was like being shackled to a corpse.

Thus France decided that she did not want a war with Britain and wanted to put aside certain territorial rivalries. On 31 August 1907 a similar agreement was signed between Britain and Russia. This had been proposed initially by the French who were looking to strengthen their position against Germany. Once more the British agreed to settle territorial rivalries (this time principally in the area of Afghanistan - how the world goes around!).

The feeling of isolation within Germany was now complete. For if she attempted to go to war (or was attacked by France) she would find herself not only surrounded on land, but cut off by sea.

	Introduction
	Testing Britain's Resolve