Britain's Great Security Mirage: The Royal Navy and the Franco-Russian Naval Threat, 1898–1906

Abstract

This article focuses on the relationship between the threat perception analyses of the British Admiralty and the strategic orientation of the Royal Navy at the outset of the twentieth century. The current view is that this was an era when fear of France and Russia drove British naval policy. However, as this article will show, Britain's Naval Intelligence Department formed a low opinion of French and Russian naval capabilities at this time and this negative evaluation exerted considerable influence over decision making. The belief that, owing to multiple qualitative deficiencies, these powers could definitely be beaten in battle lessened the standing of the Franco-Russian naval challenge and freed the Admiralty to consider the danger posed by other possible enemies, most notably Germany.

Key Words:

• Royal Navy
• Threat Perception
• Armaments Races
• Anglo-French Rivalry
• Anglo-Russian Rivalry
• Anglo-German Antagonism
• Intelligence Information

Notes

¹Arthur J. Marder, From the Dreadnought to Scapa Flow: Vol. 1: The Road to War, 1904–1914 (Oxford: Oxford UP 1961), 110.

²Nicholas A. Lambert, ‘Transformation and Technology in the Fisher Era: The Impact of the Communications Revolution’, Journal of Strategic Studies 27 (2004), 273. See, also, Keith Neilson, Britain and the Last Tsar: British Policy and Russia, 1894–1917 (Oxford: Oxford UP 1995), 120–1.

³John Tetsuro Sumida, ‘British Preparation for Global Naval War, 1904–14: Directed Revolution or Critical Problem Solving?’, in Talbot C. Imlay and Monica Duffy Toft (eds), The Fog of Peace and War Planning: Military and Strategic Planning under Uncertainty (London: Routledge 2006), 126.

⁴Ibid.

⁵The Evstafi class are a good example: ordered in 1903, they entered service in 1911. Stephen McLaughlin, Russian and Soviet Battleships (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press 2003), 147–9.

⁶Nikolai Afonin, ‘The Navy in 1900: Imperialism, Technology and Class War’, in Dominic Lieven (ed.), The Cambridge History of Russia: Vol. 2. Imperial Russia (Cambridge: Cambridge UP 2006), 578–80.

⁷Paul G. Halpern, The Mediterranean Naval Situation 1908–1914 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP 1971), 47–52.

⁸Aaron L. Friedberg, The Weary Titan: Britain and the Experience of Relative Decline, 1895–1905 (Princeton: Princeton UP 1988), 154.

⁹Theodore Ropp, The Development of a Modern Navy: French Naval Policy, 1871–1904 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press 1987), 242.

¹⁰Nicholas Papastratigakis, Russian Imperialism and Naval Power: Military Strategy and Build-up to the Russo-Japanese War (London: I.B. Tauris 2010), 225.

¹¹Nicholas Papastratigakis, ‘British Naval Strategy: The Russian Black Sea Fleet and the Turkish Straits, 1890–1904’, International History Review 32 (2010), 647–53. Unless otherwise indicated all quotations in this section are taken from this article.

¹²Report by Williams, 12 Aug. 1900. [Kew, United Kingdom, The National Archives]: ADM[iralty papers] 1/7483.

¹³Report by Ottley, 1 Jan. 1902. TNA: ADM 1/7555.

¹⁴Report by Calthorpe, 8 Jan. 1903. TNA: ADM 1/7621.

¹⁵Minute by Custance, 10 Sept. 1900. TNA: ADM 1/7472.

¹⁶Papastratigakis, ‘British Naval Strategy’, 652.

¹⁷Memorandum by Custance, 21 Mar. 1901. TNA: ADM 116/866B.

¹⁸Arthur J. Marder, The Anatomy of British Sea Power (New York: Alfred Knopf 1940), 188.

¹⁹Report by Jackson, 30 Mar. 1899. TNA: ADM 231/29.

²⁰Report from 1902. TNA: ADM 231/36.

²¹Report by Gamble, 3 Sept. 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7534.

²²Ottley to DNI, 13 Feb. 1903. ADM 1/7600.

²³Report from 1902. TNA: ADM 231/36.

²⁴Report by Jackson, 30 Mar. 1899. TNA: ADM 231/29.

²⁵Report by Gamble, 24 July 1899. TNA: ADM 1/7482.

²⁶Report by Gamble, 3 Sept. 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7534

²⁷Admiralty to C-in-C Mediterranean, 26 Oct. 1898. TNA: ADM 1/7379B.

²⁸Minute by Custance 2 Mar. 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7516.

²⁹Minute by Selborne, 23 Mar. 1901. Ibid.

³⁰Report by Jackson, 30 Mar. 1899. TNA: ADM 231/29, 10.

³¹Gamble to Director of Naval Intelligence, 6 Apr. 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7518.

³²Marder, Anatomy, 338.

³³Minute by Sturdee, 24 Apr. 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7518.

³⁴Custance to Bridge, 13 June 1902. [Greenwich, United Kingdom, National Maritime Museum]: Bridge Papers, BRI/15.

³⁵Custance, ‘Food Supply in Time of War’, 15 July 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7734.

³⁶Admiralty, ‘Memorandum on the Protection of Ocean Trade in War Time’, Oct. 1903, 9–10. TNA: CAB[inet papers] 17/3.

³⁷Kerr to Selborne, 7 May 1901. D. George Boyce (ed.), The Crisis of British Power: The Imperial and Naval Papers of the Second Earl of Selborne, 1895–1910 (London: Historian's Press 1990), 120.

³⁸Hopkins to Admiralty, 27 Jan. 1898. TNA: ADM 1/7376B.

³⁹Hopkins to Admiralty, 5 Apr. 1898. Ibid.

⁴⁰Fisher to Admiralty, 1 Nov. 1899. TNA: ADM 1/7417.

⁴¹Fisher, ‘Remarks on Criticisms of Designs of New Cruisers of the First and Second Class’, n.d. [Apr. 1895], in Notes for Navy Debates, 1896–97. Portsmouth, United Kingdom, Admiralty Library.

⁴²Fisher to Selborne, 8 May 1901. TNA: ADM 121/27.

⁴³Fisher, ‘Notes on the Imperative Necessity of possessing fast Armoured Cruisers and their Qualifications’, n.d. [Feb. 1902]. Cambridge, United Kingdom, Churchill Archive Centre: Fisher papers, FISR 5/9, FP4198.

⁴⁴Memorandum by White, 10 June 1897. TNA: ADM 116/46. Minute by White, 25 Feb. 1898. TNA: ADM 1/7376B.

⁴⁵Minute by Sir Frederick Richards, 19 Mar. 1898. Ibid.

⁴⁶Selborne to Curzon, 19 Apr. 1901. Boyce, Crisis, 113.

⁴⁷Minute by Kerr, 9 July 1901. TNA: ADM 1/7504.

⁴⁸Admiralty to Fisher, 19 Feb. 1900. TNA: ADM 1/7417.

⁴⁹Charles H. Fairbanks, Jr., ‘The Origins of the Dreadnought Revolution: A Historiographical Essay’, International History Review 12 (1991), 271.

⁵⁰Nicholas Lambert, Sir John Fisher's Naval Revolution (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press 1999), 177

⁵¹Ruddock F. Mackay, Fisher of Kilverstone (Oxford: Oxford UP 1973), 236.

⁵²Fisher to Mrs Neeld, 22 Feb. 1902. Arthur J. Marder (ed.), Fear God and Dread Nought: The Correspondence of Admiral of the Fleet Lord Fisher of Kilverstone 3 vols. (London: Cape 1952–9), Vol. I, 229.

⁵³Admiralty, ‘The Home Fleet and Admiralty Reforms’, n.d. [printed Jan. 1907]. Admiralty Library: Naval Necessities IV.

⁵⁴Beresford to Admiralty, 2 Dec. 1904 and minutes by Ottley, 26 Apr. 1905, and Fisher, 3 May 1905. TNA: ADM 1/7729.

⁵⁵Memorandum by Ottley, n.d. [before 12 July 1905]. TNA: ADM 116/3111.

⁵⁶Admiralty, ‘The Question of Further Naval Economies’, n.d. [printed Jan. 1906]. Portsmouth, United Kingdom, R[oyal] N[avy] M[useum]: Tweedmouth Papers, I.

⁵⁷Admiralty, ‘Report of the Navy Estimates Committee’, 16 Nov. 1905. CAC: FISR 8/6, FP4709.

⁵⁸See, ‘Remarks of the Director of Naval Ordnance. Comparison of French Proposed Design and HMS Dreadnought as regards Gun Power’, in Admiralty, ‘The Balance of Naval Power, 1906’, n.d. [printed Apr. 1906]. Admiralty Library: Naval Necessities, IV.

⁵⁹Fisher to Prince of Wales, 16 Oct. 1907. Marder, Fear God Vol. II, 147.

⁶⁰Fisher to Thursfield, 29 Nov. 1901. Ibid, Vol. I, 218.

⁶¹Fisher to White, 6 Aug. 1902. Ibid., 259–60.

⁶²Fisher to Knollys, Aug. 1904. Ibid., 327.

⁶³Admiralty, ‘The Question of Further Naval Economies’, enclosing ‘The German Navy Bill (Being an Article in the Fortnightly Review for January 1906, by Excubitor)’, n.d. [printed Jan. 1906]. RNM: Tweedmouth Papers, I.

⁶⁴Admiralty, ‘The Building Programme of the British Navy’, 15 Feb. 1906. Admiralty Library: Naval Necessities IV.

⁶⁵Mackay, Fisher, 328–9; Christopher Martin, ‘Un nouveau regard sur la mutations de la Royal Navy au début de XX^e siècle’, Review Historique des Armées 257 (2009).

⁶⁶Admiralty, ‘Admiralty Policy. Replies to Criticisms’, Oct. 1906. CAC: FISR 8/9, FP4720.

⁶⁷Fisher to Tweedmouth, 26 Sept. 1906. Marder, Fear God Vol. II, 92.

⁶⁸Admiralty, ‘Admiralty Policy. Replies to Criticisms’, Oct. 1906. CAC: FISR 8/9, FP4720.

⁶⁹Andrew Lambert, ‘The German North Sea Islands, the Kiel Canal and the Danish Narrows in Royal Navy Thinking and Planning, 1905–1918’, in Michael Epkenhans and Gerhard P. Groß (eds), The Danish Straits and German Naval Power 1905–1918 (Potsdam: Militärgeschichtles Forschungsamt 2010), 39.

⁷⁰Minute by Selborne, 27 Sept. 1901. Marder, Anatomy, 463.