SMS Goeben
Template:Short description Template:Use shortened footnotes Template:Infobox ship SMS Template:LangTemplate:Efn was the second of two Template:Sclasss of the Imperial German Navy, launched in 1911 and named after the German Franco-Prussian War veteran General August Karl von Goeben. Along with her sister ship, Template:Lang was similar to the previous German battlecruiser design, Template:SMS, but larger, with increased armor protection and two more main guns in an additional turret. Template:Lang and Template:Lang were significantly larger and better armored than the comparable British Template:Sclass.Template:Efn
Several months after her commissioning in 1912, Template:Lang, with the light cruiser Template:SMS, formed the German Mediterranean Division and patrolled there during the Balkan Wars. After the outbreak of World War I on 28 July 1914, Template:Lang and Template:Lang bombarded French positions in North Africa and then evaded British naval forces in the Mediterranean and reached Constantinople. The two ships were transferred to the Ottoman Empire on 16 August 1914, and Template:Lang became the flagship of the Ottoman Navy as Template:Lang, usually shortened to Template:Lang. By bombarding Russian facilities in the Black Sea, she brought Turkey into World War I on the German side. The ship operated primarily against Russian forces in the Black Sea during the war, including several inconclusive engagements with Russian battleships. She made a sortie into the Aegean in January 1918 that resulted in the Battle of Imbros, where Template:Lang sank a pair of British monitors but was herself badly damaged by mines.
In 1936 she was officially renamed TCG Template:Lang ("Ship of the Turkish Republic Template:Lang"); she carried the remains of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk from Istanbul to İzmit in 1938. Template:Lang remained the flagship of the Turkish Navy until she was decommissioned in 1950. She was scrapped in 1973, after the West German government declined an invitation to buy her back from Turkey. She was the last surviving ship built by the Imperial German Navy, and the longest-serving dreadnought-type ship in any navy.
Design
As the German Template:Lang (Imperial Navy) continued in its arms race with the British Royal Navy in 1907, the Template:Lang (Imperial Navy Office) considered plans for the battlecruiser that was to be built for the following year. An increase in the budget raised the possibility of increasing the caliber of the main battery from the Template:Cvt guns used in the previous battlecruiser, Template:SMS, to Template:Cvt, but Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the State Secretary of the Navy, opposed the increase, preferring to add a pair of 28 cm guns instead. The Construction Department supported the change, and ultimately two ships were authorized for the 1908 and 1909 building years; Template:SMS was the first, followed by Template:Lang.Template:Sfn
Characteristics
Template:Lang was Template:Convert long overall, with a beam of Template:Convert and a draft of Template:Convert fully loaded. The ship displaced Template:Convert normally, and Template:Convert at full load. She had a long forecastle deck that extended for most of the ship, stepping down to the main deck at the rearmost 27 cm gun turrets. The ship's superstructure consisted of a pair of conning towers, a larger one forward as the primary position, and a smaller, secondary position aft. She was fitted with a pair of pole masts for signaling and spotting purposes. Her crew consisted of 43 officers and 1,010 enlisted men.Template:Sfn
Template:Lang was powered by four Parsons steam turbines that drove four screw propellers, with steam provided by twenty-four coal-fired Schulz-Thornycroft water-tube boilers. The boilers were vented through a pair of widely spaced funnels. The propulsion system was rated at Template:Convert and a top speed of Template:Convert, though she exceeded this speed significantly on her trials. At Template:Convert, the ship had a range of Template:Convert.Template:Sfn
The ship was armed with a main battery of ten [[28 cm SK L/50 gun|Template:Cvt SK L/50 guns]] mounted in five twin-gun turrets; of these, one was placed forward, two were en echelon amidships, and the other two were in a superfiring pair aft. Her secondary armament consisted of twelve [[15 cm SK L/45|Template:Cvt SK L/45 guns]] placed in individual casemates in the central portion of the ship. For defense against torpedo boats, she carried twelve [[8.8 cm SK L/45 naval gun|Template:Cvt SK L/45 guns]], also in individual mounts in the bow, the stern, and around the forward conning tower. She was also equipped with four Template:Cvt submerged torpedo tubes, one in the bow, one in the stern, and one on each broadside.Template:Sfn
The ship's armor consisted of Krupp cemented steel. The belt was Template:Cvt thick in the citadel where it covered the ship's ammunition magazines and propulsion machinery spaces. The belt tapered down to Template:Cvt on either end. The deck was Template:Cvt thick, sloping downward at the side to connect to the bottom edge of the belt. The main battery gun turrets had Template:Cvt faces, and they sat atop barbettes that were equally thick.Template:Sfn
Service history
The Imperial Navy ordered Template:Lang, the third German battlecruiser, on 8 April 1909 under the provisional name "H" from the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg, under construction number 201.Template:Efn Her keel was laid on 12 August; the hull was completed and the ship was launched on 28 March 1911. At the launching ceremony, the ship was christened Goeben after August Karl von Goeben, who had commanded VIII Corps during the Franco-Prussian War; the current commander of VIII Corps, General Paul von Ploetz, performed the christening. Fitting-out work followed, and she was ready to begin acceptance trials in June 1912. These were completed by the end of the month, and Goeben was commissioned into active service on 2 July under the command of Template:Lang (KzS—Captain at Sea) Otto Philipp. She thereafter began sea trials, but these were interrupted on 29 August by the start of the annual fleet training exercises, during which Goeben was assigned to the temporarily created II Scouting Group. On 24 September, Goeben returned to trials.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Mediterranean Division
1912–1913
When the First Balkan War broke out between the Balkan League and the Ottoman Empire in October 1912, the German General Staff determined that a naval Mediterranean Division (Template:Lang) was needed to project German power in the Mediterranean, and thus dispatched Template:Lang and the light cruiser Template:SMS to Constantinople. The two ships left Kiel on 4 November and arrived on 15 November 1912; the unit also included the unprotected cruiser Template:SMS, the old station ship Template:SMS, and the training cruisers Template:SMS and Template:SMS. Template:Lang served as the flagship of the unit, commanded by Template:Lang (KAdm—Rear Admiral) Konrad Trummler. At the time, the major European powers—German, Britain, France, Russia, and Austria-Hungary—all had interests in the region; they pressured the warring states to agree to an armistice in December, but fighting quickly resumed in February 1913. Greece captured Salonika from the Ottomans in March, and during a visit there, the Greek king, George I was assassinated. Template:Lang led an international fleet that escorted the Greek state yacht Amphitrite, which carried the body back to Piraeus.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Trummler detached Template:Lang and Template:Lang to return home in February 1913. Beginning in April 1913, Template:Lang visited many Mediterranean ports including Venice, Pola, and Naples, while Trummler sent Template:Lang Template:Lang to the Albanian coast during the Siege of Scutari. The European powers had decided at the London Conference that Scutari would be awarded to the newly created Principality of Albania, but Montenegro and Serbia both claimed it for themselves and had laid siege to the city. An international fleet was assembled there to pressure Montenegro and Serbia to abandon the siege. Template:Lang joined the fleet off Scutari on 6 August, by which time the Mediterranean Division had been reinforced in the meantime by the cruisers Template:SMS and Template:SMS. Following this trip, Template:Lang returned to Pola and remained there from 21 August to 16 October for maintenance. Soon thereafter, the First Balkan War came to an end on 3 December.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
On 23 June 1913, Trummler met with Admiral Anton Haus, the commander of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, to sign an agreement for coordinated war plans in the event of a conflict with the Triple Entente (which comprised Britain, France, and Russia). The plan called for the Mediterranean Division to operate with Austro-Hungarian and Italian light forces to intercept French troop convoys bringing soldiers from French North Africa. On 29 June, the Second Balkan War broke out and the Mediterranean Division was retained in the area, though another armistice was soon signed on 30 August. The war was formally ended on 10 September with the signing of the Treaty of Bucharest, though the European powers assumed the peace was temporary. Nevertheless, Template:Lang and Template:Lang were sent home, though the squadron was not seriously weakened, as by that time the training cruisers Template:SMS and Template:SMS had arrived in the Mediterranean, and could be employed if the fighting resumed. On 23 October 1913, Template:Lang (Rear Admiral) Wilhelm Souchon assumed command of the squadron. In December, the ship sailed to Italy for Souchon to meet with Italian naval leadership to ratify their agreements to the plans Trummler had concluded with Haus. Template:Lang then sailed back to Greek waters, cruising primarily in the Aegean Sea. Template:Lang ended the year anchored at Smyrna in the Ottoman Empire.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
1914
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The ship embarked on a tour of Italy on 2 January 1914, and during this time, Souchon to traveled to Rome to meet with the naval minister. Part of the purpose of the trip was to familiarize the Germans with the main Italian ports in the event of a war with the Triple Entente. In March, Template:Lang made another stop in Pola for a conference between Souchon and Haus. Later that month, on the 27th, the ship rendezvoused with the imperial yacht Template:Lang during Kaiser Wilhelm II's visit to the island of Corfu. In April, KzS Richard Ackermann arrived to take command of the ship. The two ships then sailed north to Genoa, Italy, on 4 May. Five days later, Template:Lang met the cruiser Template:SMS in Naples, which was passing through the Mediterranean. The battlecruiser then sailed to Constantinople to deliver a message to the sultan, where on 24 May, a contingent of 300 men from Template:Lang went ashore to help suppress a major fire in the city. Three crewmen were killed in the effort. Template:Lang departed on 5 June to sail to Alexandria, Egypt, in company with Template:Lang.Template:Sfn
The navy made plans to replace Template:Lang with her sister Template:Lang so that the former could be returned for a major overhaul in mid-1914. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on 28 June 1914 and the subsequent rise in tensions between the Great Powers made the transfer impossible. After the assassination, Souchon assessed that war was imminent between the Central Powers and the Triple Entente, and ordered his ships to make for Pola for repairs. By that time, the two training cruisers had returned home, leaving just Template:Lang, Template:Lang, and Template:Lang in the region. Template:Lang arrived in Pola on 10 July, and work on her boilers began immediately. Engineers came from Germany to work on the ship. Template:Lang had 4,460 boiler tubes replaced, among other repairs. Upon completion of the work, the ship departed for Messina; she met Template:Lang off Brindisi on 1 August. While underway on the night of 2 August, both vessels received their mobilization orders.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
World War I
Pursuit of Goeben and Breslau
Wilhelm II had ordered that in the event of war, Template:Lang and Template:Lang should either conduct raids in the western Mediterranean to prevent the return of French troops from North Africa to Europe, or break out into the Atlantic and attempt to return to German waters, on the squadron commander's discretion. On the evening of 2 August, Souchon received word that war had begun with Russia; he was told to expect hostilities with France in the immediate future. In the absence of specific instructions from the naval command, Souchon decided to attack French North Africa in accordance with pre-war plans. Template:Lang and Template:Lang sailed from Messina at 01:00 on 3 August, bound for French North Africa. While they were en route to French Algeria, Souchon received confirmation of the declaration of war against France. At 02:35 the next morning, Souchon received orders from Tirpitz and Admiral Hugo von Pohl directing him to sail to Constantinople, in direct contravention of the Kaiser's instructions and without his knowledge. Souchon nevertheless decided to continue on and bombard the North African coast. At around 06:00 that morning, Template:Lang arrived off Philippeville, Algeria, and bombarded the port facilities for about 10 minutes while Template:Lang shelled nearby Bône. The attack prompted the French naval command to concentrate the fleet off Algiers and Oran, as they assumed Template:Lang would continue westward. The French also prohibited troopships from sailing independently.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Since Template:Lang could not reach Constantinople without coaling, Souchon headed for Messina. The Germans encountered the British battlecruisers Template:HMS and Template:HMS, but Germany was not yet at war with Britain and neither side opened fire. The British turned to follow Template:Lang and Template:Lang, but the German ships were able to outrun the British, and arrived in Messina by 5 August. Refueling in Messina was complicated by the declaration of Italian neutrality on 2 August. Under international law, combatant ships were permitted only 24 hours in a neutral port.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Sympathetic Italian naval authorities in the port allowed Template:Lang and Template:Lang to remain in port for around 36 hours while the ships coaled from a German collier.Template:Sfn While the Germans were in Messina, Souchon evaluated his options; he decided that attempting to break into the Adriatic Sea was hopeless, and allowing his ships to be interned by neutral Italy was unacceptable. Britain's declaration of war precluded any attempt to return to Germany, so he decided the Ottoman Empire was the best option. Souchon contacted Haus to request the support of the Austro-Hungarian fleet at the southern end of the Adriatic, but received an unclear reply. Haus was reluctant to support the Germans in the hopes that Austria-Hungary could avoid a direct conflict with Britain. He nevertheless ordered the fleet south on 7 August to cover the Germans should they decide to enter the Adriatic.Template:Sfn
In the meantime, Template:Lang and Template:Lang sailed from Messina at 17:00 on 6 August.Template:Sfn Despite the additional time to coal in Messina, Template:LangTemplate:'s fuel stocks were not sufficient to permit the voyage to Constantinople, so Souchon arranged to rendezvous with another collier in the Aegean Sea. The French fleet remained in the western Mediterranean, since the French naval commander in the Mediterranean, Admiral Augustin Boué de Lapeyrère, was convinced the Germans would either attempt to escape to the Atlantic or join the Austrians in Pola.Template:Sfn The two British battlecruisers were 100 miles away, while a third, Template:HMS, was coaling in Bizerta, Tunisia. The only British naval force in Souchon's way was the 1st Cruiser Squadron,Template:Sfn which consisted of the four armored cruisers Template:HMS, Template:HMS, Template:HMS and Template:HMS under the command of Rear Admiral Ernest Troubridge.Template:Sfn The Germans headed initially towards the Adriatic in a feint; the move misled Troubridge, who sailed to intercept them in the mouth of the Adriatic. After realizing his mistake, Troubridge reversed course and ordered the light cruiser Template:HMS and two destroyers to launch a torpedo attack on the Germans. Template:LangTemplate:'s lookouts spotted the ships, and in the darkness, she and Template:Lang evaded their pursuers undetected. Troubridge broke off the chase early on 7 August, convinced that any attack by his four older armored cruisers against Template:Lang—armed with her larger 28 cm guns—would be suicidal.Template:Sfn Souchon's journey to Constantinople was now clear.Template:Sfn
Template:Lang refilled her coal bunkers off the island of Donoussa near Naxos.Template:Sfn During the afternoon of 10 August, the two ships entered the Dardanelles. They were met by an Ottoman picket boat, which guided them through to the Sea of Marmara.Template:Sfn To circumvent neutrality requirements, the Ottoman government proposed that the ships be transferred to its ownership "by means of a fictitious sale."Template:Sfn Before the Germans could approve this, the Ottomans announced on 11 August that they had purchased the ships for 80 million Marks. In a formal ceremony the two ships were commissioned in the Ottoman Navy on 16 August. On 23 September, Souchon accepted an offer to command the Turkish fleet. Template:Lang was renamed Template:Lang and Template:Lang was renamed Midilli; their German crews donned Ottoman uniforms and fezzes, and some Ottoman sailors came aboard to complete the "transfer".Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Black Sea operations
1914
Enver Pasha, the Ottoman Minister of War, ordered offensive operations to begin on 22 October, though the two countries were not at war.Template:Sfn On 29 October Template:Lang bombarded Sevastopol in her first operation against Imperial Russia, though the Ottoman Empire was not yet at war with the Entente; Souchon conducted the operation under Enver's direction. A Template:Convert shell struck the ship in the after funnel, but it failed to detonate and did negligible damage.Template:Sfn Two other hits inflicted minor damage. The ship and her escorts passed through an inactive Russian minefield during the bombardment.Template:Sfn As she returned to Turkish waters, Template:Lang came across the Russian minelayer Template:Ship which scuttled herself with 700 mines on board.Template:Sfn During the engagement the escorting Russian destroyer Template:Ship was damaged by two of Template:LangTemplate:'s secondary battery Template:Convert shells. In response to the bombardment, Russia declared war on 1 November, thus forcing the Ottomans into the wider world war.Template:Sfn From this engagement, the Russians drew the conclusion that the entire Black Sea Fleet would have to remain consolidated so it could not be defeated in detail (one ship at a time) by Template:Lang.Template:Sfn
France and Great Britain bombarded the Turkish fortresses guarding the Dardanelles on 3 November and formally declared war two days later.Template:Sfn During the bombardment, Template:Lang and Template:Lang stood guard, ready to intervene if the British attempted to pass through the straits. Template:Lang thereafter returned to the Black Sea. On 6 November, Template:Lang and the torpedo cruiser Template:Ship, operated off Sevastopol to distract the Russian fleet from troop transports moving along the Ottoman Black Sea coast.Template:Sfn
Template:Lang, escorted by Template:Lang, intercepted the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the Battle of Cape Sarych on 18 November, some Template:Convert off the Crimean coastline as the Russians returned from a bombardment of Trebizond. Despite the noon hour the conditions were foggy and none of the capital ships were spotted initially. The Black Sea Fleet had experimented with concentrating fire from several ships under the control of one "master" ship before the war, and Template:Ship held her fire until Template:Ship, the master ship, could see Template:Lang. When the gunnery commands were finally received they showed a range over Template:Convert in excess of Template:LangTemplate:'s own estimate of Template:Convert, so Template:Lang opened fire using her own data before Template:Lang turned to fire her broadside.Template:Sfn She scored a hit with her first salvo as a 12-inch shell partially penetrated the armor casemate protecting one of Template:LangTemplate:'s Template:Convert secondary guns. It detonated some of the ready-use ammunition, starting a fire that filled the casemate and killed the entire gun crew.Template:Sfn A total of thirteen men were killed and three were wounded.Template:Sfn Template:Lang returned fire and hit Template:Lang in the middle funnel; the shell detonated after it passed through the funnel and destroyed the antennae for the fire-control radio, so that Template:Lang could not correct Template:LangTemplate:'s inaccurate range data. The other Russian ships either used Template:LangTemplate:'s incorrect data or never saw Template:Lang and failed to register any hits. Template:Lang hit Template:Lang four more times, although one shell failed to detonate,Template:Sfn before Souchon decided to break contact after 14 minutes of combat.Template:Sfn The four hits out of nineteen Template:Convert shells fired killed 34 men and wounded 24.Template:Sfn
The following month, on 5–6 December, Template:Lang and Template:Lang provided protection for troop transports, and on 10 December, Template:Lang bombarded Batum.Template:Sfn On 23 December, Template:Lang and the protected cruiser Template:Ship escorted three transports to Trebizond. While returning from another transport escort operation on 26 December, Template:Lang struck a mine that exploded beneath the conning tower, on the starboard side, about one nautical mile outside the Bosphorus.Template:Sfn The explosion tore a Template:Convert hole in the ship's hull, but the torpedo bulkhead held. Two minutes later, Template:Lang struck a second mine on the port side, just forward of the main battery wing barbette; this tore open a Template:Convert hole. The bulkhead bowed in Template:Convert but retained watertight protection of the ship's interior. However, some 600 tons of water flooded the ship.Template:Sfn There was no dock in the Ottoman Empire large enough to service Template:Lang, so temporary repairs were effected inside steel cofferdams, which were pumped out to create a dry work area around the damaged hull. The holes were patched with concrete, which held for several years before more permanent work was necessary.Template:Sfn
1915
Still damaged, Template:Lang sortied from the Bosphorus on 28 January and again on 7 February 1915 to help Template:Lang escape the Russian fleet; she also covered the return of Template:Lang. Template:Lang then underwent repair work to the mine damage until May.Template:Sfn On 1 April, with repairs incomplete, Template:Lang left the Bosphorus in company with Template:Lang to cover the withdrawal of Template:Lang and the protected cruiser Template:Ship, which had been sent to bombard Odessa. Strong currents, however, forced the cruisers Template:Convert east to the approaches of the Dnieper-Bug Liman (bay) that led to Nikolayev. As they sailed west after a course correction, Template:Lang struck a mine and sank, so this attack had to be aborted.Template:Sfn After Template:Lang and Template:Lang appeared off Sevastopol and sank two cargo steamers, the Russian fleet chased them all day, and detached several destroyers after dusk to attempt a torpedo attack. Only one destroyer, Template:Ship, was able to close the distance and launch an attack, which missed. Template:Lang and Template:Lang returned to the Bosphorus unharmed.Template:Sfn
On 25 April, the same day the Allies landed at Gallipoli, Russian naval forces arrived off the Bosphorus and bombarded the forts guarding the strait. Two days later Template:Lang headed south to the Dardanelles to bombard Allied troops at Gallipoli, accompanied by the pre-dreadnought battleship Template:Ship. They were spotted at dawn from a kite balloon as they were getting into position. When the first Template:Convert round from the dreadnought Template:HMS landed close by, Template:Lang moved out of firing position, close to the cliffs, where Queen Elizabeth could not engage her.Template:Sfn On 30 April Template:Lang tried again, but was spotted from the pre-dreadnought Template:HMS which had moved into the Dardanelles to bombard the Turkish headquarters at Çanakkale. The British ship only managed to fire five rounds before Template:Lang moved out of her line of sight.Template:Sfn
On 1 May, Template:Lang sailed to the Bay of Beikos in the Bosphorus after the Russian fleet bombarded the fortifications at the mouth of the Bosphorus. Around 7 May, Template:Lang sortied from the Bosphorus in search of Russian ships as far as Sevastopol, but found none. Running short on main gun ammunition, she did not bombard Sevastopol. While returning on the morning of 10 May, Template:LangTemplate:'s lookouts spotted two Russian pre-dreadnoughts, Template:Ship and Template:Ship, and she opened fire. Within the first ten minutes she had been hit twice, although she was not seriously damaged. Souchon disengaged and headed for the Bosphorus, pursued by Russian light forces.Template:Sfn Later that month two of the ship's 15 cm guns were taken ashore for use there,Template:Sfn and the four 8.8 cm guns in the aft superstructure were removed at the same time.Template:Sfn Four 8.8 cm anti-aircraft were installed on the aft superstructure by the end of 1915.Template:Sfn
On 18 July, Template:Lang struck a mine; the ship took on some Template:Convert of water and was no longer able to escort coal convoys from Zonguldak to the Bosphorus. Template:Lang was assigned to the task, and on 10 August she escorted a convoy of five coal transports, along with Template:Lang and three torpedo boats. During transit, the convoy was attacked by the Russian submarine Template:Lang, which sank one of the colliers. The following day, Template:Lang and another submarine tried to attack Template:Lang as well, though they were unable to reach a firing position.Template:Sfn Two Russian destroyers, Template:Ship and Template:Ship, attacked a Turkish convoy escorted by Template:Lang and two torpedo boats on 5 September. Template:LangTemplate:'s Template:Convert guns broke down during combat, and the Turks summoned Template:Lang, but she arrived too late: the Turkish colliers had already been beached to avoid capture by the Russian destroyers.Template:Sfn
On 21 September, Template:Lang was again sent out of the Bosphorus to drive off three Russian destroyers which had been attacking Turkish coal ships. Escort missions continued until 14 November, when the submarine Template:Ship nearly hit Template:Lang with two torpedoes just outside the Bosphorus. Admiral Souchon decided the risk to the battlecruiser was too great, and suspended the convoy system. In its stead, only those ships fast enough to make the journey from Zonguldak to Constantinople in a single night were permitted; outside the Bosphorus they would be met by torpedo boats to defend them against the lurking submarines.Template:Sfn By the end of the summer, the completion of two new Russian dreadnought battleships, Template:Ship and Template:Ship, further curtailed Template:LangTemplate:'s activities.Template:Sfn
1916–1917
Souchon sent Template:Lang to Zonguldak on 8 January to protect an approaching empty collier from Russian destroyers in the area, but the Russians sank the transport ship before Template:Lang arrived. On the return trip to the Bosphorus, Template:Lang encountered Template:Lang. The two ships engaged in a brief artillery duel, beginning at a range of 18,500 meters. Template:Lang turned to the southwest, and in the first four minutes of the engagement, fired five salvos from her main guns. Neither ship scored any hits, though shell splinters from near misses struck Template:Lang.Template:Sfn This was the only battle between dreadnoughts on the Black Sea to ever occur.Template:Sfn Though nominally much faster than Template:Lang, the Turkish battlecruiser's bottom was badly fouled and her propeller shafts were in poor condition. This made it difficult for Template:Lang to escape from the powerful Russian battleship, which was reported to have reached Template:Convert.Template:SfnTemplate:Efn
Russian forces were making significant gains into Ottoman territory during the Caucasus Campaign. In an attempt to prevent further advances by the Russian army, Template:Lang rushed 429 officers and men, a mountain artillery battery, machine gun and aviation units, 1,000 rifles, and 300 cases of munitions to Trebizond on 4 February.Template:Sfn On 4 March, the Russian navy landed a detachment of some 2,100 men, along with mountain guns and horses, on either side of the port of Atina. The Turks were caught by surprise and forced to evacuate.Template:Sfn Another landing took place at Kavata Bay, some 5 miles east of Trebizond, in June.Template:Sfn In late June, the Turks counterattacked and penetrated around 20 miles into the Russian lines. Template:Lang and Template:Lang conducted a series of coastal operations to support the Turkish attacks. On 4 July, Template:Lang shelled the port of Tuapse, where she sank a steamer and a motor schooner.Template:Sfn The Turkish ships sailed northward to circle back behind the Russians before the two Russian dreadnoughts left Sevastopol to try to attack them. They then returned to the Bosphorus,Template:Sfn where Template:Lang was docked for repairs to her propeller shafts until September.Template:Sfn
Over the course of the year, the Russian Navy embarked on a campaign of offensive minelaying off the Bosporus, which hampered Ottoman operations in the Black Sea.Template:Sfn In addition, the coal shortage continued to worsen until Souchon was forced to suspend operations by Template:Lang and Template:Lang through 1917.Template:Sfn Early on 10 July 1917, a Royal Naval Air Service Handley Page Type O bomber, flying from Moudros, Greece, tried to bomb Template:Lang from Template:Cvt with eight Template:Cvt bombs. It missed but instead sank the destroyer Template:Ship, the largest ship sunk by air during the First World War.Template:Sfn An armistice between Russia and the Ottoman Empire was signed in December 1917 following the Bolshevik revolution. The agreement, which ended fighting in the Black Sea, was formalized in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918, coal started to arrive again from eastern Turkey.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
1918
In January 1918, KzS Albert Stoelzel relieved Ackermann as the ship's commander.Template:Sfn On 20 January, Template:Lang and Template:Lang left the Dardanelles under the command of Vice Admiral Hubert von Rebeur-Paschwitz, who had replaced Souchon the previous September. Rebeur-Paschwitz's intention was to draw Allied naval forces away from Palestine in support of Turkish forces there.Template:Sfn Outside the straits, in the course of what became known as the Battle of Imbros, Template:Lang surprised and sank the monitors Template:HMS and Template:HMS which were at anchor and unsupported by the pre-dreadnoughts that should have been guarding them. Rebeur-Paschwitz then decided to proceed to the port of Mudros; there the British pre-dreadnought battleship Template:HMS was raising steam to attack the Turkish ships.Template:Sfn While en route, Template:Lang struck several mines and sank;Template:Sfn Template:Lang hit three mines as well.Template:Sfn Retreating to the Dardanelles and pursued by the British destroyers Template:HMS and Template:HMS,Template:Sfn she was intentionally beached near Nagara Point just outside the Dardanelles.Template:Sfn The British attacked Template:Lang with bombers from No. 2 Wing of the Royal Naval Air Service while she was grounded and hit her twice, but the bombs from the light aircraft were not heavy enough to do any serious damage. The monitor Template:HMS attempted to shell Template:Lang on the evening of 24 January, but only managed to fire ten rounds before withdrawing to escape the Turkish artillery fire.Template:Sfn The submarine Template:HMS was sent to destroy the damaged ship, but was too late;Template:Sfn the old ex-German pre-dreadnought Template:Lang had towed Template:Lang off and returned her to the safety of Constantinople.Template:Sfn Template:Lang was crippled by the extensive damage; cofferdams were again built around the hull,Template:Sfn and repairs lasted from 7 August to 19 October.Template:Sfn
Before the repair work was carried out, Template:Lang escorted the members of the Ottoman Armistice Commission to Odessa on 30 March 1918, after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed. After returning to Constantinople she sailed in May to Sevastopol where she had her hull cleaned and some leaks repaired. Template:Lang and several destroyers sailed for Novorossiysk on 28 June to intern the remaining Soviet warships, but they had already been scuttled when the Turkish ships arrived. The destroyers remained, but Template:Lang returned to Sevastopol.Template:Sfn During the return trip, she carried Field Marshal Hermann von Eichhorn back to Sevastopol. The ship got underway again on 6 July and arrived back in Constantinople on 12 July; at that time, she was commanded by Template:Lang (Corvette Captain) Heinrich Lampe, who had been the executive officer under Stoelzel.Template:Sfn Two days later, the ship was laid up for the rest of the war.Template:Sfn While in Sevastopol, dockyard workers scraped fouling from the ship's bottom. Template:Lang subsequently returned to Constantinople, where from 7 August to 19 October a concrete cofferdam was installed to repair one of the three areas damaged by mines.Template:Sfn
On 1 November, the Armistice of Mudros went into effect, ending the war for the Ottoman Empire.Template:Sfn The German navy formally transferred ownership of the vessel to the Turkish government the next day.Template:Sfn According to the terms of the Treaty of Sèvres between the Ottoman Empire and the Western Allies, Template:Lang was to have been handed over to the Royal Navy as war reparations, but this was not done due to the Turkish War of Independence, which broke out immediately after World War I ended, as Greece attempted to seize territory from the crumbling Ottoman Empire. After modern Turkey emerged from the war victorious, the Treaty of Sèvres was discarded and the Treaty of Lausanne was signed in its place in 1923. Under this treaty, the new Turkish republic retained possession of much of its fleet, including Template:Lang.Template:Sfn
Post-war service
Repair and refit
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During the 1920s, a commitment to refurbish Template:Lang as the centerpiece of the new country's fleet was the only constant element of the various naval policies which were put forward.Template:Sfn The battlecruiser remained in İzmit until 1926, in a neglected state:Template:Sfn only two of her boilers worked, she could not steer or steam, and she still had two unrepaired scars from the mine damage in 1918. Enough money was raised to allow the purchase of a new Template:Convert floating dock from Germany, as Template:Lang could not be towed anywhere without risk of her sinking in rough seas.Template:Sfn The French company Atelier et Chantiers de St. Nazaire-Penhöet was contracted in December 1926 to oversee the subsequent refit, which was carried out by the Gölcük Naval Shipyard.Template:Sfn Work proceeded from 1927 to 1930; it was delayed when several compartments of the dock collapsed while being pumped out. Template:Lang was slightly damaged before she could be refloated and the dock had to be repaired before the repair work could begin. The Minister of Marine, Ihsan Bey (İhsan Eryavuz), was convicted of embezzlement in the resulting investigation.Template:Sfn
Other delays were caused by fraud charges which resulted in the abolition of the Ministry of Marine. The Turkish Military's Chief of Staff, Marshal Fevzi, opposed naval construction and slowed down all naval building programs following the fraud charges. Intensive work on the battlecruiser only began after the Greek Navy conducted a large-scale naval exercise off Turkey in September 1928 and the Turkish government perceived a need to counter Greece's naval superiority.Template:Sfn The Turks also ordered four destroyers and two submarines from Italian shipyards.Template:Sfn The Greek government proposed a 10-year "holiday" from naval building modeled on the Washington Treaty when it learned that Template:Lang was to be brought back into service, though it reserved the right to build two new cruisers. The Turkish government rejected this proposal, and claimed that the ship was intended to counter the growing strength of the Soviet Navy in the Black Sea.Template:Sfn
Over the course of the refit, the mine damage was repaired,Template:Sfn her displacement was increased to Template:Convert, and the hull was slightly reworked. She was reduced in length by a half meter but her beam increased by Template:Convert. Template:Lang was equipped with new boilers and a French fire control system for her main battery guns. Two of the 15 cm guns were removed from their casemate positions.Template:Sfn Her armor protection was not upgraded to take the lessons of the Battle of Jutland into account, and she had only Template:Convert of armor above her magazines.Template:Sfn Template:Lang was recommissioned in 1930, resuming her role as flagship of the Turkish Navy,Template:Sfn and performed better than expected in her speed trials, reaching a speed of Template:Convert. Her subsequent gunnery and fire control trials were also successful. The four destroyers, which were needed to protect the battlecruiser, entered service between 1931 and 1932; their performance never met the design specifications.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn In response to Template:LangTemplate:'s return to service, the Soviet Union transferred the battleship Template:Ship and light cruiser Template:Ship from the Baltic in late 1929 to ensure that the Black Sea Fleet retained parity with the Turkish Navy.Template:Sfn The Greek government also responded by ordering two destroyers.Template:Sfn
Active service
In 1933, she took Prime Minister İsmet İnönü from Varna to Istanbul and carried the Shah of Iran from Trebizond to Samsun the following year.Template:Sfn Template:Lang had her name officially shortened to Template:Lang in 1930 and then to Template:Lang in 1936.Template:Sfn Another short refit was conducted in 1938, and in November that year she carried the remains of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk from Istanbul to İzmit.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn She and the other ships of the navy were considered outdated by the British Naval Attache by 1937, partly due to their substandard anti-aircraft armament, but in 1938 the Turkish government began planning to expand the force.Template:Sfn Under these plans the surface fleet was to comprise two 10,000-ton cruisers and twelve destroyers. Template:Lang would be retained until the second cruiser was commissioned in 1945, and the navy expected to build a 23,000-ton ship between 1950 and 1960. The naval building program did not come about, as the foreign shipyards which were to build the ships concentrated on the needs of their own nations leading up to World War II.Template:Sfn
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Template:Lang remained in service throughout World War II, but Turkey remained neutral during the conflict. Template:Lang was kept at Gölcük, defended by torpedo nets and reinforced anti-aircraft units. The ship had her main mast removed to make it more difficult to determine her course and to improve fields of fire for her anti-aircraft guns.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn In November 1939 she and Template:Lang were the only capital ships in the Black Sea region, and Life magazine reported that Template:Lang was superior to the Soviet ship because the latter was in poor condition.Template:Sfn In 1941, her anti-aircraft battery was strengthened to four Template:Convert guns, ten Template:Convert guns, and four Template:Convert guns. These were later increased to twenty-two 40 mm guns and twenty-four 20 mm guns.Template:Sfn Degaussing equipment was installed aboard the ship (and several other Turkish warships) in 1943 to protect them against magnetic mines.Template:Sfn
On 5 April 1946, the American battleship Template:USS, light cruiser Template:USS, and destroyer Template:USS arrived in Istanbul to return the remains of Turkish ambassador Münir Ertegün.Template:Sfn Template:Lang greeted the ships in the Bosphorus, where she and Missouri exchanged 19-gun salutes.Template:Sfn After 1948, the ship was stationed in either İzmitTemplate:Sfn or Gölcük.Template:Sfn The ship continued to participate in the annual fleet maneuvers that were held every September until 1950.Template:Sfn She was decommissioned from active service on 20 December 1950 and placed in reserve; another ceremonial decommissioning was performed on 7 June 1954, and she was soon stricken from the Navy register on 14 November.Template:Sfn When Turkey joined NATO in 1952, the ship was assigned the hull number B70.Template:Sfn Though the ship had been removed from the naval register, she continued to be used as a stationary headquarters of the Battle Fleet Command and the Mine Fleet Command until 1960.Template:Sfn
The Turkish government offered to sell the ship to the West German government in 1963 as a museum ship, but the offer was declined due to financial reasons.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Unable to afford the cost of preserving the ship itself,Template:Sfn and with no other buyers available,Template:Sfn Turkey sold the ship to M.K.E. Seyman in 1971 for scrapping.Template:Sfn She was towed to the breakers on 7 June 1973, and the work was completed in February 1976.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn By the time of her disposal she was the last dreadnought in existence outside the United States.Template:Sfn She was the last surviving ship built by the Imperial German Navy, and the longest-serving dreadnought-type ship in any navy.Template:Sfn Several parts of the ship have been preserved, including three of her screws (which were sent to the Naval Command and to the Istanbul Naval Museum) and her foremast (which was placed at the naval academy).Template:Sfn Some additional artifacts from the ship were sent to Germany, where they were displayed at the Historical Museum at the Mürwik Naval School in Flensburg and the Deutsches Museum in Munich. Additionally, a Template:Cvt field gun that had been carried aboard the ship for use by landing parties was removed from the ship in Messina during preparations for war in August 1914 was placed on display at the La Spezia Naval Base museum.Template:Sfn
Notes
Footnotes
Citations
References
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Further reading
External links
- Yavuz in Turkey in the First World War website.
Template:Moltke class battlecruiser Template:Blohm + Voss Template:January 1918 shipwrecks Template:Featured article