Bismarck Research Paper

A stray mine sunk the French battleship Bouvet with its’ six hundred sailors still on board. Another French battleship, Inflexible, struck a mine close to where Bouvet had sunk earlier. Inflexible, however, did not sink. It stayed afloat and eventually became beached. Due to the inexperience of the men sailing the minesweepers, the constant bombardment of Ottoman artillery proved to be too much for them. Many retreated and abandoned their ships, leaving many mines still intact. Seventeen of the Allied ships were damaged or sunk by the time the battle had ended.

Naval warfare had not turned out to be an especially critical factor for either the Germans or the British, and there were no truly decisive naval battles. The submarine, however, produced some earth-shaking results. Submarine warfare led to the sinking of the Lusitania, a passenger ship. This occurred during a submarine blockade of Britain. The Germans placed no limit on their campaign of submarine warfare. This campaign helped draw the United States into the conflict. Without submarine warfare, perhaps the U.S. never enters the conflict. By June of 1918, the Allied lines were so devastated that the German commander Ludendorff felt he could wire the Kaiser and state that the war might end soon. Then, U.S. troops began to arrive, as many as 250,000 a month. The Allies rallied. Germany may well have won without the infusion of U.S. troops into the battle. So, in a very unexpected way, new technology-- the deadly submarine warfare of the Germans had a decided impact on the war.

had sunk both merchant and passenger ships without warning. Then later on Germany was trying

On May 7th, a British-owned Ocean liner was fired upon without waring off the coast of Ireland. Of the 1,959 passengers, 1,198 were killed, including 128 Americans. The U.S demanded compensation and an end to German attacks on unarmed passenger and merchant ships. In August, Germany pledged to see the safety of passengers before sinking unarmed vessels. Although, in November another liner was sunk without warning, killing 227 people, including 27 Americans.

May 4th 1916: Fearing the entry of the United States into war, Germany attempted to appease them by issuing the Sussex pledge, which promised a change in Germany’s naval warfare policy; passenger ships would not be targeted, merchant ships would not be sunk until the presence of weapons had been established and would not be sunk without provision for the safety of

torpedo 750 yards away from the ship, later called it the most horrible sight he

The reason that more of the battleships did not attempt to flee the harbor was that they did not have enough power to get themselves moving (p. 103 WL). The same was true for most of the destroyers and cruisers, only three destroyers had an advantage (p. 103

The French Army realized that the Germans were preparing for an offense operation when they villages surrounding Verdun began to be evacuated. General Herr, the commander of Verdun, requested additional Soldiers and equipment from General Joffre, the French Commander and Chief. General Joffre did not believe the Germans would attack Verdun, but sent on of his aides to investigate the situation at Verdun. When it became apparent that Verdun was the target, two divisions were sent to General Herr which would not arrive until 12 February 1916.

Due to the United States aiding Britain, tensions rose between the Americans and Germans when Germany attempted to establish a blockade around the British Isles. After the failure of the blockade, Germany announced unrestricted warfare on any ship that assisted the Allies cause or any ship in  the war zone. As a result, “On May 7, the… Lusitania... was torpedoed without warning”, the ocean liner was sunk by a German submarine under the suspicion there were munitions on board(History.com Staff). Due the Americans engagement with the Allies, Germany did not hesitate to take down any ship, no matter their stance in the War, if they had a suspicion of weapons on board. Later on, in 1917 Germany sank four more U.S. merchant ships. This was the final act the Americans could handle, eventually they declared War on

Because of the Britain’s fear of growing dependence on foreign oil, the following class of destroyers was built to burn coal. However, the ineffectiveness of this class clearly illustrated that oil was superior to coal, and henceforth all other destroyers were built using oil. Furthermore, In 1912, the Queen Elizabeth class of super dreadnoughts became the first British battleship which only used oil. Not only was this ship substantially faster than its predecessors, it was also more efficient. Previous Dreadnoughts of comparable size required 260 men to work the engine, while the Elizabeth class reduced this number to 110. The Queen Elizabeth became the flagship of the fleet and on November 15, 1918, a German representative boarded the ship and accepted the terms of surrender for the German High Fleet This event aboard the first British Oil powered Battleship symbolizes the continuation of British Naval dominance as a result of

MV Wilhelm Gustloff was a German military ship which sank on January 30,1945. It was evacuating German people from Gdynia when it was attacked by Soviet submarine S-13 in the Baltic Sea. The ship could not defend itself as the anti-aircraft guns were frozen.The Soviet’s sent 4 torpedos in the ship’s direction out of which 3 were successful.Many people died in the torpedo attack and many jumped into the freezing waters and died there. In all,more than 9,400 people perished out of 10,600 people on board making it the deadliest shipwreck of all time.After the attack Wilhelm Gustloff sank bow first in less than 40

On February 3, 1915 the Germans set for a Proclamation which state that the waters around the British Isles were to be considered an official war zone. Therefore the Germans felt they had the right to sink any ship that entered what they consider to be the war zone. Germany continued to sink merchant vessels without thinking of the safety of passengers and its crew. This was violation of the international rules of warfare.

The cause of the sinking is happened because of the mistakes of the captains. The radio message came from a mysterious source – with no actual reports of a minesweeper in the area – yet the Captain Peterson brought illuminated the ship and alerted the Soviets. During this time, it was common for German to resort to being spies for the Soviets, especially since in this area was so close to the Soviet Motherland. The Red Army was extremely close to Poland in 1945, so it would be likely there was Soviet spies aboard since a handful passengers were unregistered. The Wilhelm Gustloff was also equipped with anti-aircraft guns and was carrying injured military personnel, so the Soviets did not know or believe it was a passenger ship.

128 Americans that were on board were killed. However, the ‘Lusitania’ was not an American ship and Wilson accepted the Germans change in policy that their U-boats would now adopt ‘cruiser’ tactics and surface to attack ships with guns fitted onto their decks. While the German chancellor managed to avoid a major diplomatic issue this time, the German military was adamant that the ‘cruiser’ tactic was not going to be used as it was to dangerous for the lightly armored U-boats of the time.

Meanwhile, as Beatty and his battle cruisers continued northward, they began angling north-northeast, while Jellicoe and the dreadnoughts began moving southeast in six columns with an armored cruiser screen. The Grand Fleet formed a “crossing the T,” position, in which the Germans found themselves crossing in front of the British fleet and suffering heavy hits. Once again, Scheer ordered another retreat.