BLOOD, FIRE AND STEEL ; WW1 THE EUROPEAN WAR AT SEA 1914-1915

THE EUROPEAN WAR AT SEA 1914-1915

Lusitania

The British steamship Lusitania is shown here departing from New York on its last trip in 1915. During this voyage a German submarine torpedoed the ship off the Irish coast, causing it to sink in 20 minutes; 1,198 people perished as a result. The Germans claimed the ship was carrying arms, a charge Britain and the United States denied. The sinking became pivotal in changing U.S. attitudes toward the war in Europe, and was a major factor in America’s decision to enter World War I.

THE BETTMANN ARCHIVE

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

At the start of the war in August in 1914, Great Britain had twenty nine capital ships and thirteen under construction, while Germany had eighteen capital ships and nine under construction. While initially both navies avoided each other, the need to halt trading activities, imports and supplies on the part of both belligerents necessitated some naval action. The Germans raised a squadron of warships known as surface raiders to harass British merchant ships at sea particularly in the South Atlantic and in the Pacific.

The policy was successful to start with, as the German squadron sank and destroyed over 155 Allied ships in the winter of 1914 to early March 1915. The German surface raiders were however systematically eliminated by pursuing British warships until the last of them the “Eminem” was caught and sank by the Australian Cruiser Sydney off the Coco’s Island on November 9 1914.

The German Asiatic fleet meanwhile, moved over to the South Atlantic where it continued to hunt down and sink Allied vessels successfully until it chose to attack the British Falkland Islands, without knowing that a powerful British fleet had been assembling there. On its way out of the Falklands Island, they were tracked and overtaken by the faster and newer British battle Cruisers and Cruisers, eight in all were involved.

 The Germans lost most of their squadrons in the sea battle that followed, and on March 1915 when the light Cruiser Dresden was caught and sunk off the coast of Juan Fernandez Islands in South America, the era of the German commerce raiders was over.

As the surface raiders era came to an end, so did the attacks of the German submarines begin. Whereas, the fighting ships of the navies of both countries were deployed to interdict and destroy each other, the imperative of the war came to demand that both navies play a critical role in extinguishing the maritime trading capacity of each enemy nation so as to weaken their resolve to fight. 

German U-Boat

In February 1915 Germany began using its submarines, or U-boats, to carry out unrestricted submarine warfare against the Allies. They sank ships without warning and without concern for the safety of the crew or passengers. Germany’s submarine warfare was very effective and took a heavy toll on Allied ships.

Hulton Deutsch

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

The British were the first to institute a policy of blockading overseas trade for Germany by subjecting all ships heading to Germany to search and seizure, if any contraband were found. To start with, contra-bands were limited to arms and ammunition, but later on the term was extended to anything that was of material benefit to the enemy nation.

The two routes through which supplies could get to Germany were; through the English Channel and the Dover straits and around the north of Scotland. A minefield laid in the Dover straits with a narrow navigable lane made it relatively easy to stop and search ships using the channel. To the North of Scotland, a huge navigable portion of the North Sea covering over 200,000 km² required a considerable squadron of armed merchant cruisers to patrol it.

This lien on free trade and passage of ships caused considerable difficulty; particularly among neutrals like the United States whose trading rights were being seriously hampered. The British policy was however highly effective as over 3,000 vessels were stopped and searched before the end of the year. Outward-bound trade from Germany was brought to a complete halt in 1915.

The Germans on the other hand began to pursue a policy of hampering Britain’s maritime trade by the use of submarines since it was quite evident that Great Britain depended on the sea lanes to import food as the island nation was not food self-sufficient. The submarine campaign began in October 29, 1914 with the sinking of the British merchant steamship (Glitra) after the evacuation of the crew. Other sinkings followed and soon the Germans were convinced that the submarine could succeed in halting British maritime trade where the surface raiders had failed.

As Germany expanded its campaign, it was soon expanded to targeting ships belonging to neutrals like the sinking of two Japanese liners (Tokamarn and Ikaria) in January 30^th, 1915. It was then announced that as from January 18^th, any ship found around the British Isles was liable to be sunk, whether neutral or belligerent.

In spite of these however, whereas the Allied blockade of German ports was total and complete, Germany’s counter measures were less than totally effectively as less than 10% of British trade was affected by the submarine sinkings.

The German policy, however made her more enemies especially in the light of the sinking of the ‘Lusitania’ on May 7^th, 1915 which cost the lives of 1, 1288 passengers out of the nearly 2,000 on board, amongst them 128 United States citizens.

Lusitania

The British steamship Lusitania is shown here departing from New York on its last trip in 1915. During this voyage a German submarine torpedoed the ship off the Irish coast, causing it to sink in 20 minutes; 1,198 people perished as a result. The Germans claimed the ship was carrying arms, a charge Britain and the United States denied. The sinking became pivotal in changing U.S. attitudes toward the war in Europe, and was a major factor in America’s decision to enter World War I.

THE BETTMANN ARCHIVE

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

The outcry against Germany was so great that many fully expected that the United States would enter the war against Germany. But the United States’ government decided to downplay the issue and only made protests notes to Germany. It took two other sinkings and further protests by the US government before the Germans on September 18^th, 1915 decided to altogether suspend the submarine campaigns around the British Isles in order to avoid United States entry into the war against her.

     

LOSS OF THE GERMAN OVERSEAS COLONIES