Matthew S. Seligmann – författare

''Naval tradition? Naval tradition? Monstrous. Nothing but rum, sodomy, prayers and the lash.'' This quotation, from Winston Churchill, is frequently dismissed as apocryphal or a jest, but, interestingly, all four of the areas of naval life singled out in it were ones that were subject to major reform initiatives while Churchill was in charge of the Royal Navy between October 1911 and May 1915. During this period, not only were there major improvements in payand conditions for sailors, but detailed consideration was also given to the future of the spirit ration; to the punishing and eradicating of homosexual practices; to the spiritual concerns of the fleet; and to the regime of corporal punishment that underpinned naval discipline for boy sailors. In short,under Churchill, the Royal Navy introduced a social reform programme perfectly encapsulated in this elegant quip. And, yet, not only has no one studied it; many people do not even know that such a programme even existed. This book rectifies that. It shows that Churchill was not just a major architect of welfare reform as President of the Board of Trade and as Home Secretary, but that he continued to push a radical social agenda while running the Navy.

Why did the British government declare war on Germany in August 1914? Was it because Germany posed a threat to British national security? Today many prominent historians would argue that this was not the case and that a million British citizens died needlessly for a misguided cause.This book counters such revisionist arguments. Matthew Seligmann disputes the suggestion that the British government either got its facts wrong about the German threat or even, as some have claimed, deliberately ''invented'' it in order to justify an otherwise unnecessary alignment with France and Russia. By examining the military and naval intelligence assessments forwarded from Germany to London by Britain''s service attachés in Berlin, its ''men on the spot'', Spies in Uniformclearly demonstrates that the British authorities had every reason to be alarmed. From these crucial intelligence documents, previously thought to have been lost, Dr Seligmann shows that in the decade before the First World War, the British government was kept well informed about military and naval developments inthe Reich. In particular, the attachés consistently warned that German ambitions to challenge Britain posed a real and imminent danger to national security. As a result, the book concludes that the British government''s perception of a German threat before 1914, far from being mistaken or invented, was rooted in hard and credible intelligence.

When and why did the Royal Navy come to view the expansion of German maritime power as a threat to British maritime security? Contrary to current thinking, Matthew S. Seligmann argues that Germany emerged as a major threat at the outset of the twentieth century, not because of its growing battle fleet, but because the British Admiralty (rightly) believed that Germany''s naval planners intended to arm their country''s fast merchant vessels in wartime and send them outto attack British trade in the manner of the privateers of old. This threat to British seaborne commerce was so serious that the leadership of the Royal Navy spent twelve years trying to work out how best to counter it. Ever more elaborate measures were devised to this end. These included building''fighting liners'' to run down the German ones; devising a specialized warship, the battle cruiser, as a weapon of trade defence; attempting to change international law to prohibit the conversion of merchant vessels into warships on the high seas; establishing a global intelligence network to monitor German shipping movements; and, finally, the arming of British merchant vessels in self-defence.The manner in which German schemes for commerce warfare drove British naval policy for over a decade before 1914 has not been recognized before. The Royal Navy and the German Threat illustrates a new and important aspect of British naval history.

When and why did the Royal Navy come to view the expansion of German maritime power as a threat to British maritime security? Contrary to current thinking, Matthew S. Seligmann argues that Germany emerged as a major threat at the outset of the twentieth century, not because of its growing battle fleet, but because the British Admiralty (rightly) believed that Germany''s naval planners intended to arm their country''s fast merchant vessels in wartime and send them outto attack British trade in the manner of the privateers of old. This threat to British seaborne commerce was so serious that the leadership of the Royal Navy spent twelve years trying to work out how best to counter it. Ever more elaborate measures were devised to this end. These included building''fighting liners'' to run down the German ones; devising a specialized warship, the battle cruiser, as a weapon of trade defence; attempting to change international law to prohibit the conversion of merchant vessels into warships on the high seas; establishing a global intelligence network to monitor German shipping movements; and, finally, the arming of British merchant vessels in self-defence.The manner in which German schemes for commerce warfare drove British naval policy for over a decade before 1914 has not been recognized before. The Royal Navy and the German Threat illustrates a new and important aspect of British naval history.

A bold and wide-ranging reassessment of British seapower on the cusp of the First World War.In the decade and a half before the First World War, Britain was at the height of its global dominance and British seapower played an increasingly important role in national life. The sea enriched the country in peacetime and the sea was expected to play a pivotal role in any future global conflict.Focusing on all the elements of seapower--military, political, commercial and economic--leading naval historian Matthew Seligmann offers a thoroughgoing reassessment of Britain's relationship with the sea in this crucial, but much misunderstood, period. Utilizing previously unused and underused archival sources, he shows that most existing interpretations of the period have fallen for the erroneous and self-serving narrative spun by Admiral Sir John 'Jacky' Fisher: that a conservative establishment needed to be shocked by his efforts into radical change and that it was only due to his foresight and labours that Britain was first made ready for war and then saved from disaster in 1914. In reality, there were many figures driving necessary change and Fisher, in particular, did as much to hinder this progress as to push it forward. Thus, Britain's readiness for maritime conflict in 1914, such as it was, was often in spite of rather than because of his efforts. In so doing, the book contests the popular idea of a 'Fisher Revolution', decentres figures like Fisher and Churchill from the explanatory framework, and offers instead an original and provocative interpretation of British naval and maritime developments on the eve of world war.

'Naval tradition? Naval tradition? Monstrous. Nothing but rum, sodomy, prayers and the lash.' This quotation, from Winston Churchill, is frequently dismissed as apocryphal or a jest, but, interestingly, all four of the areas of naval life singled out in it were ones that were subject to major reform initiatives while Churchill was in charge of the Royal Navy between October 1911 and May 1915. During this period, not only were there major improvements in pay and conditions for sailors, but detailed consideration was also given to the future of the spirit ration; to the punishing and eradicating of homosexual practices; to the spiritual concerns of the fleet; and to the regime of corporal punishment that underpinned naval discipline for boy sailors. In short, under Churchill, the Royal Navy introduced a social reform programme perfectly encapsulated in this elegant quip. And, yet, not only has no one studied it; many people do not even know that such a programme even existed. This book rectifies that. It shows that Churchill was not just a major architect of welfare reform as President of the Board of Trade and as Home Secretary, but that he continued to push a radical social agenda while running the Navy.

Why did the British government declare war on Germany in August 1914? Was it because Germany posed a threat to British national security? Today many prominent historians would argue that this was not the case and that a million British citizens died needlessly for a misguided cause. This book counters such revisionist arguments. Matthew Seligmann disputes the suggestion that the British government either got its facts wrong about the German threat or even, as some have claimed, deliberately 'invented' it in order to justify an otherwise unnecessary alignment with France and Russia. By examining the military and naval intelligence assessments forwarded from Germany to London by Britain's service attachés in Berlin, its 'men on the spot', Spies in Uniform clearly demonstrates that the British authorities had every reason to be alarmed. From these crucial intelligence documents, previously thought to have been lost, Dr Seligmann shows that in the decade before the First World War, the British government was kept well informed about military and naval developments in the Reich. In particular, the attachés consistently warned that German ambitions to challenge Britain posed a real and imminent danger to national security. As a result, the book concludes that the British government's perception of a German threat before 1914, far from being mistaken or invented, was rooted in hard and credible intelligence.

When and why did the Royal Navy come to view the expansion of German maritime power as a threat to British maritime security? Contrary to current thinking, Matthew S. Seligmann argues that Germany emerged as a major threat at the outset of the twentieth century, not because of its growing battle fleet, but because the British Admiralty (rightly) believed that Germany's naval planners intended to arm their country's fast merchant vessels in wartime and send them out to attack British trade in the manner of the privateers of old. This threat to British seaborne commerce was so serious that the leadership of the Royal Navy spent twelve years trying to work out how best to counter it. Ever more elaborate measures were devised to this end. These included building 'fighting liners' to run down the German ones; devising a specialized warship, the battle cruiser, as a weapon of trade defence; attempting to change international law to prohibit the conversion of merchant vessels into warships on the high seas; establishing a global intelligence network to monitor German shipping movements; and, finally, the arming of British merchant vessels in self-defence. The manner in which German schemes for commerce warfare drove British naval policy for over a decade before 1914 has not been recognized before. The Royal Navy and the German Threat illustrates a new and important aspect of British naval history.

The intense rivalry in battleship building that took place between Britain and Germany in the run up to the First World War is seen by many as the most totemic of all armaments races. Blamed by numerous commentators during the inter-war years as a major cause of the Great War, it has become emblematic of all that is wrong with international competitions in military strength. Yet, despite this notoriety, ’the Great Naval Race’ has not received the attention that this elevated status would merit and it has never been examined from the viewpoint of both of its participants simultaneously and equally. This volume, which contains a comprehensive survey of the existing scholarship on this topic, both English-language and German, as well as important primary source materials from a range of archives in both Britain and Germany, fills this gap. By putting the actions of the British Admiralty side-by-side with those of its German counterparts, it enables the naval race to be viewed comparatively and thereby facilitates an understanding of how the two parties to this conflict interacted. By offering a comprehensive range of German documents in both their original text and in English translation, the book makes the German role in this conflict accessible to an English speaking audience for the first time. As such, it is an essential volume for any serious student of naval policy in the pre-First World War era.

The intense rivalry in battleship building that took place between Britain and Germany in the run up to the First World War is seen by many as the most totemic of all armaments races. Blamed by numerous commentators during the inter-war years as a major cause of the Great War, it has become emblematic of all that is wrong with international competitions in military strength. Yet, despite this notoriety, ’the Great Naval Race’ has not received the attention that this elevated status would merit and it has never been examined from the viewpoint of both of its participants simultaneously and equally. This volume, which contains a comprehensive survey of the existing scholarship on this topic, both English-language and German, as well as important primary source materials from a range of archives in both Britain and Germany, fills this gap. By putting the actions of the British Admiralty side-by-side with those of its German counterparts, it enables the naval race to be viewed comparatively and thereby facilitates an understanding of how the two parties to this conflict interacted. By offering a comprehensive range of German documents in both their original text and in English translation, the book makes the German role in this conflict accessible to an English speaking audience for the first time. As such, it is an essential volume for any serious student of naval policy in the pre-First World War era.

This publication is an essential volume for any serious student of naval policy in the pre-First World War era. The intense rivalry in battleship building that took place between Britain and Germany in the run up to the First World War is seen by many as the most totemic of all armaments races. It has been blamed by numerous commentators during the inter-war years as a major cause of the Great War.'The Great Naval Race' has never been examined from the viewpoint of both of its participants simultaneously and equally. This volume will fill this gap. It draws on documents both English-language and German, and will therefore make the German role in this conflict accessible to an English speaking audience for the very first time. The book addresses the build up of the German Navy and it's threat to Britain. All in all, crucial documents leave no doubt that the Imperial German Navy deliberately challenged the Royal Navy. Tirpitz certainly did not want a war before the navy was ready, which he hoped it would be in the 1920s.