1912 was a year of shifting winds and gathering storms. While the Entente was carrying out internal consolidation, the Alliance was also making corresponding strategic deployments. The most obvious sign was that the Germans had accelerated their shipbuilding pace.
At the end of 1912, Wilhelm II announced Germany's new shipbuilding plan to the outside world. Over the next three years, the German government planned to add another three super-dreadnoughts and four battlecruisers!
The German response provoked the British. However, fierce arguments broke out within the London government over whether they should continue implementing the current naval bill.
The British Empire finally realized that its finances were on the verge of collapse! Under the previous naval bill, they now had to add six more super-dreadnoughts and eight battlecruisers. This was no small sum—at least over twenty-four million pounds, more than Bulgaria's entire military expenditure for 1911!
The ironic part was that it had been the British Empire that created the super-dreadnought in the first place. They had intended to crush the Germans in quality, yet just as things had begun, the Germans had caught up again!
Asquith, who served as both Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer, said, "Mr. Churchill, please calm down. Think carefully about the problem we are facing. Although our fiscal revenue is twice that of the Germans, even if they must also account for their army, we have colonies to defend as well. If we keep competing like this, I'm afraid we will still be the first to fail to hold out!"
Well, this was also one of the aftereffects of the British Empire's welfare reforms. They had eased internal conflicts, but fiscal expenditures had also risen dramatically.
Churchill, the First Lord of the Admiralty, still said excitedly, "But Prime Minister, can we withdraw now?