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A fascinating look at the British naval intervention in the Baltic in 1918–20, and at the British, Soviet and Baltic nationalist fleets that fought. Following the Russian Revolution of October 1917, the Baltic states became a battleground between Russian Reds and Whites, German troops and emerging Baltic independence forces. In November 1918, the British government decided to intervene, to protect British interests and to support the emerging Baltic states. This initial small force of cruisers and destroyers was eventually augmented by other British warships, including aircraft carriers, a monitor, as well as a handful of submarines and torpedo boats. Opposing them was the far more powerful Russian Baltic Fleet, now controlled by the Bolsheviks. The campaign that followed involved naval clashes between the two sides, the most spectacular of which was an attack on the Soviet naval base of Kronstadt in June 1919 by a force of small British torpedo boats. They torpedoed and sunk the Russian cruiser Oleg, an action which effectively bottled the Baltic fleet up in port for the remainder of the campaign. Finally, in early 1920, the British squadron was withdrawn, following Soviet recognition of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. This New Vanguard title explores the naval side of this little-known but strategically crucial campaign fought by the war-weary navies of Britain and Russia and by warships of the emerging Baltic states. Describing the political background to the conflict, and the key points of the naval campaign as well as the warships involved, this is a concise and fascinating account of an overlooked naval campaign that helped reshape the map of Europe.
Though, for most participants, the First World War ended on 11 November 1918, the Royal Navy found itself, despite four years of slaughter and war weariness, fighting a fierce and brutal battle in the Baltic Sea against Bolshevik Russia in an attempt to protect the fragile independence of the newly liberated states of Estonia and Latvia. This new book by Steve R Dunn describes the events of those two years when RN ships and men, under the command of Rear Admiral Alexander-Sinclair, found themselves in a maelstrom of chaos and conflicting loyalties, and facing multiple opponents - the communist forces of the Red Army and Navy, led by Leon Trotsky; the gangs of freebooting German soldiers, the Freikorps, intent on keeping the Baltic states under German domination; and the White Russian forces, bent on retaking Petrograd and rebuilding the Russian Empire. During this hard-fought campaign there were successes on both sides. For example, the Royal Navy captured two destroyers that were given to the Estonians; but the submarine L-55 was sunk by Russian warships, lost with all hands. Seeking revenge in a daring sequence of attacks and using small coastal motor boats, the RN sank the cruiser Oleg and badly damaged two Russian battleships.
Packed with illustrations, this is a study of the Polish warships such as the Grom-class destroyers that were developed and built in the interwar years. Newly independent Poland's naval force was created in 1920, initially with six ex-German torpedo boats. However, after German-Soviet exercises off the Polish coast in 1924, funding for warships was hastily allocated. Two destroyers and three submarines were built in France but, disappointed with their quality, Poland ordered new ships, mostly from British and Dutch shipyards. By summer 1939, the Polish Navy comprised four destroyers, five submarines, one minelayer, six minesweepers and a handful of lesser ships. Although the Grom-class destroyers were two of the fastest and best-armed destroyers of the war, the tiny Polish fleet would stand little chance against the Kriegsmarine, and on 30 August three destroyers were dispatched to Britain, followed by two submarines that escaped internment. The remaining Polish surface fleet was sunk by 3 September. In exile, the Polish Navy operated not only their own ships, but also Royal Navy warships, including a cruiser, destroyers, submarines and motor torpedo boats which fought alongside the Allies in the Battle of the Atlantic, the Arctic Convoys, and at the Normandy landings. This detailed account not only describes the Polish Navy's contribution to the Allied war effort but also the episode of the Polish destroyer Piorun which took on the Bismarck in a lone gun duel leading to the sinking of the great German battleship.
Though, for most participants, the First World War ended on 11 November 1918, the Royal Navy found itself, despite four years of slaughter and war weariness, fighting a fierce and brutal battle in the Baltic Sea against Bolshevik Russia in an attempt to protect the fragile independence of the newly liberated states of Estonia and Latvia. This new book by Steve R Dunn describes the events of those two years when RN ships and men, under the command of Rear Admiral Walter Cowan, found themselves in a maelstrom of chaos and conflicting loyalties, and facing multiple opponents – the communist forces of the Red Army and Navy, led by Leon Trotsky; the gangs of freebooting German soldiers, the Freikorps, intent on keeping the Baltic states under German domination; and the White Russian forces, bent on retaking Petrograd and rebuilding the Russian Empire. During this hard-fought campaign there were successes on both sides. For example, the Royal Navy captured two destroyers that were given to the Estonians; but the submarine L-55 was sunk by Russian warships, lost with all hands. Seeking revenge in a daring sequence of attacks and using small coastal motor boats, the RN sank the cruiser Oleg and badly damaged two Russian battleships. Today few people are aware of this exhausting campaign and the sacrifices made by Royal Navy sailors (three VCs were won), but the pages of this book retell their exciting but forgotten stories and, using much first-hand testimony, bring back to life the critical naval operations that prevented the retaking of the new Baltic countries that Churchill saw as an essential shield against the encroachment of the Bolsheviks into Europe. An uneasy peace prevailed until 1939.
A compelling account of the heavily armed and highly mobile Soviet river gunboats which took on the Germans during World War II. Russia's enormous river system has long been its highway and, as early as 1908, the Tsar's armies were developing armoured riverboats that brought tank-like mobility, firepower and survivability to Russian battlefields. This book, the first history of these vessels in English, explains how this concept led to one of the most remarkable naval weapons of World War II, the Soviet 'river tank', or Armoured Motor Gun Boat (AMGB). Highly mobile, capable of carrying up to 20 infantrymen directly into action and providing immediate firepower from their tank turrets, machine guns or Katyusha rockets, their military value was widely recognized. They were versatile enough to be used in naval landing operations off the Gulf of Finland, the Azov Sea and the Black Sea, and their capabilities were prized by local commanders. Using meticulously researched new colour profiles, rare photos and spectacular artwork, this book uncovers the history of river warfare on the Eastern Front, and the boats that played such a key part in the fighting.
A fascinating look at the British naval intervention in the Baltic in 1918–20, and at the British, Soviet and Baltic nationalist fleets that fought. Following the Russian Revolution of October 1917, the Baltic states became a battleground between Russian Reds and Whites, German troops and emerging Baltic independence forces. In November 1918, the British government decided to intervene, to protect British interests and to support the emerging Baltic states. This initial small force of cruisers and destroyers was eventually augmented by other British warships, including aircraft carriers, a monitor, as well as a handful of submarines and torpedo boats. Opposing them was the far more powerful Russian Baltic Fleet, now controlled by the Bolsheviks. The campaign that followed involved naval clashes between the two sides, the most spectacular of which was an attack on the Soviet naval base of Kronstadt in June 1919 by a force of small British torpedo boats. They torpedoed and sunk the Russian cruiser Oleg, an action which effectively bottled the Baltic fleet up in port for the remainder of the campaign. Finally, in early 1920, the British squadron was withdrawn, following Soviet recognition of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. This New Vanguard title explores the naval side of this little-known but strategically crucial campaign fought by the war-weary navies of Britain and Russia and by warships of the emerging Baltic states. Describing the political background to the conflict, and the key points of the naval campaign as well as the warships involved, this is a concise and fascinating account of an overlooked naval campaign that helped reshape the map of Europe.
Europe ruled the waves for most of the modern era and even when its navies were eclipsed in size by the US force, they continued to dominate world wars. In this unique history of Europe's naval forces, Larry Sondhaus charts the development of naval warfare from the transition to steam to recent actions in the Persian Gulf. Combining detailed technical information with an in-depth comparison of warfare and tactics across some of the key conflicts of the modern world, this is an absorbing account of European and British seapower, past and present.
"To win in the Pacific during World War II, the U.S. Navy had to transform itself technically, tactically, and strategically. It had to create a fleet capable of the unprecedented feat of fighting and winning far from home, without existing bases, in the face of an enemy with numerous bases fighting in his own waters. Much of the credit for the transformation should go to the war gaming conducted at the U.S. Naval War College. Conversely, as we face further demands for transformation, the inter-war experience at the War College offers valuable guidance as to what works, and why, and how."
A comprehensive overview of the activities of the British navy in the Baltic Sea from the earliest times until the twentieth century.
An account of the little-known involvement of Royal Marines as they engaged the new Bolsheviks immediately after the Russian Revolution. After three years of great loss and suffering on the Eastern Front, Imperial Russia was in crisis and on the verge of revolution. In November 1917, Lenin’s Bolsheviks (later known as “Soviets”) seized power, signed a peace treaty with the Central Powers and brutally murdered Tsar Nicholas (British King George’s first cousin) and his children so there could be no return to the old order. As Russia fractured into loyalist “White” and revolutionary “Red” factions, the British government became increasingly drawn into the escalating Russian Civil War after hundreds of thousands of German troops transferred from the Eastern Front to France were used in the 1918 “Spring Offensive” which threatened Paris. What began with the landing of a small number of Royal Marines at Murmansk in March 1918 to protect Allied-donated war stores quickly escalated with the British government actively pursuing an undeclared war against the Bolsheviks on several fronts in support of British trained and equipped “White Russian” Allies. At the height of British military intervention in mid-1919, British troops were fighting the Soviets far into the Russian interior in the Baltic, North Russia, Siberia, Caspian and Crimea simultaneously. The full range of weapons in the British arsenal were deployed including the most modern aircraft, tanks and even poison gas. British forces were also drawn into peripheral conflicts against “White” Finnish troops in North Russia and the German “Iron Division” in the Baltic. It remains a little-known fact that the last British troops killed by the German Army in the First World War were killed in the Baltic in late 1919, nor that the last Canadian and Australian soldiers to die in the First World War suffered their fate in North Russia in 1919 many months after the Armistice. Despite the award of five Victoria Crosses (including one posthumous) and the loss of hundreds of British and Commonwealth soldiers, sailors and airmen, most of whom remain buried in Russia, the campaign remains virtually unknown in Britain today. After withdrawal of all British forces in mid-1920, the British government attempted to cover up its military involvement in Russia by classifying all official documents. By the time files relating to the campaign were quietly released decades later there was little public interest. Few people in Britain today know that their nation ever fought a war against the Soviet Union. The culmination of more than 15 years of painstaking and exhaustive research with access to many previously classified official documents, unpublished diaries, manuscripts and personal accounts, author Damien Wright has written the first comprehensive campaign history of British and Commonwealth military intervention in the Russian Civil War 1918-20. “Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War remains forgotten. Wright’s book addresses that oversight, interspersing the broader story with personal accounts of participants.” —Military History Magazine