German Naval Laws - The Naval Laws

The Naval Laws

At the turn of the 20th century, Britain adhered to the so-called "Two-Power Standard": the Royal Navy had to be equal in strength to that of the next two naval powers combined. The standard, long accepted unofficially, was made official by the Naval Defence Act 1889, and designated the French and Russian navies as the most likely adversaries for Britain on the high seas. However, the German Naval Laws advocated by Tirpitz began to threaten this standard.

The First Naval Law, introduced to the Reichstag in late 1897, outlined the composition of the fleet by vessel class and the number of ships to be constructed by 1904 and also set a cost limit. It authorized a fixed number of battleships that would not be altered by an annual parliamentary vote, proposing that 16 battleships be built in the following three years. The law passed the Reichstag on March 26, 1898 over the opposition of the Conservative Party and the Social Democratic Party, who were against spending vast amounts of money. Its ramifications were not immediately evident, as the seven battleships it called for would not be sufficient to fight either the British or French navies.

Germany's real threat to the Royal Navy began with the Second Naval Law. During the Second Boer War (1899–1902), the Germans greatly sympathized with the Boers, whom they considered a racially and culturally akin people. In January 1900, British cruisers on patrol detained three German mail steamers off the coast of Africa to search them, suspecting them of carrying materiel to the Boers. Although the British quickly apologized, Germans were outraged, and Admiral von Tirpitz took advantage of the anger to introduce a new naval bill, which passed through the Reichstag with very little opposition on June 20 of that year. This law doubled the size of the fleet from 19 to 38 battleships; two flagships, four battle squadrons of eight battleships each, and four reserve battleships were to be constructed over seventeen years, from 1901 to 1917. This law made clear that not only was the German Navy to be a powerful battle fleet instead of a coastal defence force (in the process turning Germany into the second-strongest naval power in the world), but that the primary opponent of this enlarged fleet was to be the United Kingdom.

The next 12 years saw the Reichstag pass three more Naval Laws, in 1906, 1908, and 1912; in each case, Tirpitz took advantage of a sense of crisis and alarm in Germany to ensure the success of the legislation. In June 1906, the Third Naval Law, mandating the construction of six large cruisers, became law following the German failure to break the Entente cordiale at the Algeciras Conference. The Fourth Naval Law of April 1908 pared down the age at which battleships were to be replaced from 25 to 21 years, and was sparked by a feeling that King Edward VII and Great Britain were trying to encircle Germany. The Fifth Naval Law, sparked by the German retreat in the Agadir Crisis of 1911, passed in June 1912 and added three more battleships to the building program.