Recaps

After Britain rejected Germany’s harsh peace terms, Oscar and the German Navy prepared to force a decisive battle. Dönitz’s submarine raid crippled British battleships, and bombardments drew the Grand Fleet into the North Sea as the two fleets converged.

• Asquith authorized Grey to seek peace, but Oscar set terms Britain rejected, so Asquith ordered Britain to prepare for war.
• Oscar approved Dönitz’s attack on Scapa Flow, where U-037 struck five British battleships and escaped back to Wilhelmshaven.
• Churchill urged Jellicoe to risk the Grand Fleet to cripple Germany’s capital ships, while Oscar ordered bombardments to force the British fleet into battle.
• Scheer sent Spee to bombard Edinburgh, and the attack destroyed the port and killed civilians, prompting Asquith to order the Royal Navy to sea.
• Jellicoe led more than 150 British vessels out of Scapa Flow and assigned Beatty a strengthened battlecruiser force to engage the Germans.
• After German aircraft spotted Beatty’s battlecruisers, Hipper and Spee raced north to join forces, while Beatty held his battleships back as a possible surprise.

The German fleet devastated the British battlecruisers and battleships, while carrier-based aircraft sank several more ships. The German main fleet then engaged the weakened Royal Navy, sinking Agincourt and Ramillies as Jellicoe ordered the British to keep fighting.

• Vice Admiral Hipper and Vice Admiral Beatty brought their battlecruiser squadrons into a fierce exchange, and German fire sank Indomitable and HMS Invincible.
• Vice Admiral Spee trapped Rear Admiral Benjamin’s three Queen Elizabeth-class battleships, and German fire sank New Zealand, HMS Barham, and HMS Malaya while badly damaging HMS Queen Elizabeth.
• Admiral John Jellicoe committed the Grand Fleet, but German battlecruisers sank HMS Queen Mary and HMS Royal Princess before the British main fleet forced Hipper to withdraw.
• Heinrich Marshal Prince launched German carrier aircraft, which sank Bellerophon, Magnificent, Reckless, and three St. Vincent-class battleships without aircraft losses.
• Admiral Reinhard Scheer brought the High Seas Fleet against the fourteen surviving British battleships and split his capital ships into two battle lines.
• German battleships concentrated fire on the British line, and a shell from Regent Leopold detonated Agincourt’s magazine and destroyed its stern.
• Admiral John Jellicoe refused Ramillies permission to withdraw as Sachsen battered it, killed its captain, and forced its crew to abandon ship.

Germany destroyed the British fleet in a decisive naval battle, leaving Britain facing defeat and prompting Churchill to seek American warships. Wilson agreed in principle to sell them, and Churchill accepted a deal worth 1.07 billion dollars.

• Sachsen and Resolution sank Ramillies and Ireland, while the German fleet continued battering the British ships.
• Scheer and Hipper brought both German battle lines against the British fleet, which lost its remaining battleships in a nightfall victory for Germany.
• The German government celebrated the victory, while Scheer ordered the Commerce Raiding Fleet to resume the blockade of Britain.
• Jellicoe and Beatty accepted the British defeat, and Churchill learned that the Royal Navy had lost twenty-two battleships and five battlecruisers.
• Asquith’s Cabinet considered peace talks, but Churchill urged continued resistance and proposed rebuilding Britain’s fleet with foreign warships.
• Churchill persuaded the Cabinet to seek American ships and traveled secretly to the United States, where Wilson’s Cabinet reaffirmed neutrality and refused to join the war.
• Churchill requested twelve American capital ships, and Wilson agreed in principle to sell them while demanding high prices and British naval technology.
• Churchill and Daniels negotiated prices for capital ships, cruisers, and destroyers, and Churchill accepted the 1.07-billion-dollar deal.

Britain traded five Caribbean colonies for American warships and naval technologies, while France joined Britain against Germany. Oscar led the German offensive across the Marne, and after costly Allied counterattacks, Joffre turned to trench warfare.

• Churchill offered the Bahamas, Jamaica, and Grenada to settle Britain’s payment for American warships, and Bryan and Daniels reported the proposal to Woodrow Wilson, who demanded two more colonies.
• Asquith and Churchill accepted the American terms, and Britain and the United States secretly agreed to exchange five Caribbean colonies for a fleet and naval technologies.
• Poincaré committed ten French capital ships, fifteen light cruisers, and thirty destroyers to a joint fleet with Britain, while Wilhelm II appointed Oscar to command the German Western Front campaign.
• Oscar assigned German army corps to attack the Marne defenses, and Joffre rallied Anglo-French commanders to hold the line and prepare a counterattack.
• German artillery and aircraft battered Allied defenses and inflicted severe losses, while German fighters overwhelmed French aircraft in the struggle for air superiority.
• German forces crossed the Marne on April 1, broke through the Allied first line, and built pontoon bridges as Oscar prepared for an Allied counterattack.
• Joffre committed fresh French reserves and more than six hundred thousand troops to a counterattack, but German artillery, aircraft, mortars, and machine guns devastated the advancing Allies.
• After the fighting continued until sunset, Dubail and Foch reported severe French losses, and Joffre concluded that the Allies could not counterattack soon and would have to rely on trench warfare.