Building the Kaiser's Navy

Naval and military history books, recent releases, magazines, related documents, articles, etc.
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Ulrich Rudofsky
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Building the Kaiser's Navy

Post by Ulrich Rudofsky »

In order to understand the German naval politics of 1933-45, a good start is a book by Gary E. Weir: Building of the Kaiser's Navy: The Imperial Naval Office and the German Industry in the von Tirpitz Era, 1890-1919. Naval Institute Press 1992. Many of the well known officers, ship designers, and industrialists who became involved with the rebuilding of the Kriegsmarine, were from that era, too.

Another insight into the Kriegsmarine leadership is a recent book by G.H. & R. Bennett: Hitler's Admirals, Naval Institute Press, 2004. This book is a collection of essays written the POW admirals (Dönitz, Schniewind, Heye, Schuster, Boehm, Krancke, Weichold ect.) by request of the British captors. It is sort of amazing that these essays are quite uninhibited and, to me at least, they sound factual and in the best tradition of the high standards of naval officers.
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Matthias
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Post by Matthias »

Really interesting Ulrich, thank you! ;)
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Ulrich Rudofsky
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Post by Ulrich Rudofsky »

HAT TALLIES: There have been some questions in past years about the hat tallies (cap ribbons) of the Kriegsmarine. As far as I know, the tallies “SCHLACHTSCHIFF BISMARCK” and “KREUZER PRINZ EUGENE [sic]” are British post-war replicas of ribbons that were never service issued items. The RN and the Kriegsmarine switched to just “RN” or “KRIEGSMARINE” to avoid identifications of the crews and ships in port. Some of us collect these ribbons, and sly counterfeits are hard to detect.

One recent book clearly depicts hundreds of hat tallies of the Kaiser’s Navy; moreover, it is actually a very engaging compendium of outstanding portraits of hundreds of German sailors, all bright-eyed and proud. The book: Die Mützenbänder der Deutschen Marine 1815-1918: Königlich Preußische Marine, Norddeutsche Bundesmarine, Kaiserliche Marine [The Hat Tallies of the German Navy 1815-1918: the Royal Prussian Navy, the North German Federal Navy, the Imperial Navy], by Bernd Wedeking and Markus Bodeux, VDM, 2005. http://www.VDMedien.de .
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Re: Building the Kaiser's Navy

Post by USS ALASKA »

Sorry to drag up an old thread. Just finished reading this book about 2 weeks ago. Good story about the rise of German naval power as driven by Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz. Well recommended. Start with Terrell D. Gottschall’s book about Otto von Diederichs, ‘By Order of the Kaiser: Otto von Diederichs and the Rise of the Imperial German Navy, 1865-1902’, to lead into the Tirpitz era. (Diederichs is the gent that had an up-front role in the acquisition of the Jiaozhou Bay Concession and then had a little standoff with the American Rear Admiral George Dewey) Mix those two with William Manchester’s ‘The Arms of Krupp’ to get some of the builder’s side and it makes for a nice trilogy of German based view points.
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RF
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Re: Building the Kaiser's Navy

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Ulrich Rudofsky wrote:
Another insight into the Kriegsmarine leadership is a recent book by G.H. & R. Bennett: Hitler's Admirals, Naval Institute Press, 2004. This book is a collection of essays written the POW admirals (Dönitz, Schniewind, Heye, Schuster, Boehm, Krancke, Weichold ect.) by request of the British captors. It is sort of amazing that these essays are quite uninhibited and, to me at least, they sound factual and in the best tradition of the high standards of naval officers.
One aspect on this is that given the captive situation of these writers, together with actual war crimes proceedings against Donitz and the possibility of charges against the others (such as crimes against peace viz the invasion planning against Norway) it is likely that they are to some extent motivated by self-justification.
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RF
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Re:

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Ulrich Rudofsky wrote:HAT TALLIES: There have been some questions in past years about the hat tallies (cap ribbons) of the Kriegsmarine. As far as I know, the tallies “SCHLACHTSCHIFF BISMARCK” and “KREUZER PRINZ EUGENE [sic]” are British post-war replicas of ribbons that were never service issued items. The RN and the Kriegsmarine switched to just “RN” or “KRIEGSMARINE” to avoid identifications of the crews and ships in port. Some of us collect these ribbons, and sly counterfeits are hard to detect.
I have been bemused by the whole issue of cap tallies and the need for security. If you think about it the whole issue of security can be turned on its head by the issue of false tally names, to create fictitous units and to disguise the real location of ships. I am surprised that that sort of thing wasn't done.
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