Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Maps and Tables
- Introduction
- 1 Bismarck and Empire: 1885–1888. Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Marshall Islands and Nauru
- 2 The Acquisition of Kiautschou: 1897
- 3 China 1897–1914: Colonial Development and Political Turbulence
- 4 Tectonic Shift 1: 1898–1899. Spain and the USA, Germany, Micronesia and Samoa
- 5 Tectonic Shift 2: 1902–1914. Japan and Russia, Britain and Dominion Defence, the United States
- 6 War. August 1914
- 7 Naval Plans and Operations 1897–1914
- 8 Kiautschou: Naval and Military Operations 22 August–28 September 1914
- 9 Tsingtau: Naval and Military Operations 28 September–7 November 1914
- 10 Aftermath
- Notes to the Text
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - Bismarck and Empire: 1885–1888. Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Marshall Islands and Nauru
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Illustrations
- List of Maps and Tables
- Introduction
- 1 Bismarck and Empire: 1885–1888. Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, the Bismarck Archipelago, the Marshall Islands and Nauru
- 2 The Acquisition of Kiautschou: 1897
- 3 China 1897–1914: Colonial Development and Political Turbulence
- 4 Tectonic Shift 1: 1898–1899. Spain and the USA, Germany, Micronesia and Samoa
- 5 Tectonic Shift 2: 1902–1914. Japan and Russia, Britain and Dominion Defence, the United States
- 6 War. August 1914
- 7 Naval Plans and Operations 1897–1914
- 8 Kiautschou: Naval and Military Operations 22 August–28 September 1914
- 9 Tsingtau: Naval and Military Operations 28 September–7 November 1914
- 10 Aftermath
- Notes to the Text
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The extra-European colonial history of Imperial Germany was very different from that of other European powers, not least because of its relative brevity. Sir John Robert Seeley, writing of the British Empire in 1883, commented that ‘we seem, as it were, to have conquered and peopled half the world in a fit of absence of mind.’ The entry of Imperial Germany into colonialism cannot be attributed to ‘absent mindedness’, but rather to cold Bismarckian calculation. Having said that, we do not know exactly what that calculation was, indeed the Imperial Chancellor Otto von Bismarck's apparently sudden interest in the acquisition of African colonial territory in 1884 has given rise to a great deal of debate.
Some have seen it as designed to provoke a quarrel with the British just at the moment when the Anglophile Crown Prince Frederick William, who was married to ‘Vicky’, formerly Britain's Princess Royal, might have succeeded his father Kaiser Wilhelm I. For example Herbert Bismarck, speaking in 1890, apparently confirms such an argument:
When we started our colonial policy we had to assume that the Crown Prince's reign would be a long one with English influence predominant. To prevent this we had to embark on a colonial policy because it was popular and also able to provoke conflict with England at any given moment.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Germany's Asia-Pacific EmpireColonialism and Naval Policy, 1885–1914, pp. 1 - 16Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2009