Naval warfare of World War I: Encyclopedia II - Naval warfare of World War I - Theaters

Naval warfare of World War I - Theaters

Naval warfare of World War I - North Sea

The North Sea was the main theatre of the war for surface action. The British Grand Fleet took position against the German High Seas Fleet. Britain's larger fleet could maintain a blockade of Germany, cutting it off from overseas trade and resources. Germany's fleet remained mostly in harbour behind their screen of mines, occasionally attempting to lure the British fleet into battle in the hopes of weakening them enough to break the blockade or allow the High Seas Fleet to attack British shipping and trade. Britain strove to maintain the blockade and, if possible, to damage the German fleet enough that British ships could be used elsewhere.

Majors battles included the Battle of Heligoland Bight, the Battle of the Dogger Bank, the Battle of Jutland, and the Second Battle of Heligoland Bight. In general, Britain, though not always tactically successful, was able to maintain the blockade and keep the High Seas Fleet in port, although the High Seas Fleet remained a threat that kept the vast majority of Britain's capital ships in the North Sea.

Naval warfare of World War I - Atlantic

Main article: First Battle of the Atlantic

While Germany was greatly inconvenienced by Britain's blockade, Britain, as an island nation, was heavily dependent on foreign trade and imported resources. Germany found that their submarines, or U-boats, while of limited effectiveness against surface warships on their guard, were greatly effective against merchant ships, and could easily patrol the Atlantic even when Allied ships dominated the surface.

By 1915, Germany was attempting to use submarines to maintain a naval blockade of Britain by sinking cargo ships, including many passenger vessels. Submarines, however, depending on stealth and incapable of withstanding a direct attack by a surface ship (possibly a Q-ship disguised as a merchant ship), found it difficult to give warning before attacking or to rescue survivors, which meant that civilian death tolls were high. This was a major factor in galvanizing neutral opinion against the Central Powers, as countries like the United States suffered casualties and loss to their trade, and was one of the causes of the eventual entry of the US into the war.

Over time, the use of defended convoys of merchant ships allowed the Allies to maintain shipping across the Atlantic, in spite of heavy loss. This was also assisted by the entry of the US into the war and the increasing use of primitive sonar and aerial patrolling to detect and track submarines.

Naval warfare of World War I - Mediterranean

In the Mediterranean Sea, the war began with most of the French fleet deployed to guard against the smaller Austrian fleet and against possible Italian entry into the war. Several British ships were sent to Malta to back up the French fleet, and the German ships SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau were patrolling the area at the start of the war. Pursued by superior forces, the Goeben and Breslau reached Turkey, where they were transferred to the Turkish fleet when Turkey entered the war.

Although there was some submarine activity, the Austrian and Turkish fleets remained on the defensive for much of the war, with Russian fleets dominating the Black Sea but the Allies unable to pass the Dardanelles to supply Russia. The Battle of Gallipoli, an attempt to break through the Dardanelles and knock Turkey out of the war in 1915 was unsuccessful, with a naval assault deterred by mines and a land assault defeated with heavy casualties on both sides.

After Italy entered the war on the allied side in 1915, the addition of the Italian fleet to the French meant that Austria would be blockaded in the Adriatic Sea for the rest of the war. Although they suffered various losses to submarines, the Allied fleets were able to bombard Austrian and Turkish ports regularly. Japan also sent destroyers at Britain's request to Malta to patrol for submarines, their only action in the war now that the German Pacific colonies were occupied.

Allied fleets also played a role in supplying the campaigns in Palestine and Macedonia later in the war. Although Germany was able to gain control of the Black Sea and part of the Russian fleet after the collapse of the Russian Empire, they were never able to break out into the Aegean. Allied fleets occupied Constantinople briefly after the armistice, until the new Turkish Republic under Mustafa Kemal took back control of the city in 1923.

Allied ships did continue to intervene in Russia after the war ended, bringing expeditionary forces and supplies to the White armies by way of ports on the White Sea, the Black Sea, and the Pacific.

Naval warfare of World War I - Baltic

In the Baltic Sea, Germany and Russia were the main combatants, with a number of British submarines sailing through the Kattegat to assist the Russians. With the German fleet larger and more modern (many High Seas Fleet ships could easily be deployed to the Baltic when the North Sea was quiet), the Russians played a mainly defensive role, at most attacking convoys between Germany and Sweden.

With heavy defensive and offensive mining on both sides, fleets played a limited role in the Eastern Front. The Germans mounted major naval attacks on the Gulf of Riga, unsuccessfully in August 1915 and successfully in October 1917, when they occupied the islands in the Gulf and damaged Russian ships departing from the city of Riga, recently captured by Germany.

By March 1918, the Russian Revolution and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk made the Baltic a German lake, and German fleets transferred troops to support newly independent Finland and to occupy much of Russia, halting only when defeated in the West.

Naval warfare of World War I - Distant Oceans

A number of German ships stationed overseas at the start of the war engaged in raiding operations in poorly defended seas, such as the SMS Emden, which raided into the Indian Ocean, sinking or capturing thirty Allied merchant ships and warships, bombarding Madras and Penang, and destroying a radio relay on the Cocos Islands before being sunk there. Better known was the flotilla of Graf Maximilian von Spee, who sailed across the Pacific, winning the Battle of Coronel before being defeated and killed at the Battle of the Falkland Islands.

Allied naval forces captured many of the isolated German colonies, with Samoa, Micronesia, Qingdao, German New Guinea, Togo, and Cameroon falling in the first year of the war. Only German East Africa held out in a long guerilla land campaign.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Theaters", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki