Anglo-German naval arms race
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The arms race between Great Britain and Germany that occurred from the last decade of the nineteenth century until the advent of World War I in 1914 was one of the intertwined causes of that conflict.
HMS Dreadnought
HMS Dreadnought under construction
German Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz was the primary architect of the strategy of creating a "fleet in being" to force concessions from Britain after 1897.
Imperial German Navy
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The Imperial German Navy or the Kaiserliche Marine was the navy of the German Empire, which existed between 1871 and 1919. It grew out of the small Prussian Navy, which was mainly for coastal defence.
Anglo-German naval arms race
…by German Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz in 1897 to create a fleet in being to force Britain to make diplomatic concessions; Tirpitz did not expect the Imperial German Navy to defeat the Royal Navy. With the support of the Kaiser Wilhelm II, Tirpitz began advancing a series of laws to construct an increasing number of large…
Major elements of the High Seas Fleet in the early 1910s
Proclamation of Wilhelm I as Emperor of Germany at Versailles, France in 1871
Wilhelm II in German Admiral's uniform in 1913