I'm on vacation. As I have done each year, I have prepared a number of posts on historical and cultural subjects unlikely to be overtaken by events, with at least one appearing daily. This is the second of four posts on the escape across the Mediterranean of the German warships Goeben and Breslau to Constantinople in August, 1914, a century ago. Part I appeared last week and introduiced the main players and the ships. This post deals with the chase itself and the rapid negotiations between Germany and Turkey during the course of their flight. The third part will deal with the idea of transferring the ships to Turkey, and the fourth with their reception in the Turkish capital.
Wikimedia Commons (Creator Attribution: MartinD)
By 6 o'clock therefore on the morning of August 7 the Goeben, already the fastest capital unit in the Mediterranean, was steaming on an unobstructed course for the Dardanelles, carrying with her for the peoples of the East and Middle East more slaughter, more misery and more ruin than has ever before been borne within the compass of a ship.--Winston Churchill, The World Crisis, Volume I, Chapter XIChurchill always had a way with words, and in his discussion of the Goeben affair in the same chapter quoted above, he delivers another passage that opens with an often-quoted line:
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