Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea

Dreadnought #2

by Robert K. Massie

In a work of extraordinary narrative power, filled with brilliant personalities and vivid scenes of dramatic action, Robert K. Massie, the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Peter the Great, Nicholas and Alexandra, and Dreadnought, elevates to its proper historical importance the role of sea power in the winning of the Great War.

The predominant image of this first world war is of mud and trenches, barbed wire, machine guns, poison gas, and slaughter. A generation of European manhood was massacred, and a wound was inflicted on European civilization that required the remainder of the twentieth century to heal.

But with all its sacrifice, trench warfare did not win the war for one side or lose it for the other. Over the course of four years, the lines on the Western Front moved scarcely at all; attempts to break through led only to the lengthening of the already unbearably long casualty lists.

For the true story of military upheaval, we must look to the sea. On the eve of the war in August 1914, Great Britain and Germany possessed the two greatest navies the world had ever seen. When war came, these two fleets of dreadnoughts—gigantic floating castles of steel able to hurl massive shells at an enemy miles away—were ready to test their terrible power against each other.

Their struggles took place in the North Sea and the Pacific, at the Falkland Islands and the Dardanelles. They reached their climax when Germany, suffocated by an implacable naval blockade, decided to strike against the British ring of steel. The result was Jutland, a titanic clash of fifty-eight dreadnoughts, each the home of a thousand men.

When the German High Seas Fleet retreated, the kaiser unleashed unrestricted U-boat warfare, which, in its indiscriminate violence, brought a reluctant America into the war. In this way, the German effort to “seize the trident” by defeating the British navy led to the fall of the German empire.

Ultimately, the distinguishing feature of Castles of Steel is the author himself. The knowledge, understanding, and literary power Massie brings to this story are unparalleled. His portrayals of Winston Churchill, the British admirals Fisher, Jellicoe, and Beatty, and the Germans Scheer, Hipper, and Tirpitz are stunning in their veracity and artistry.

Castles of Steel is about war at sea, leadership and command, courage, genius, and folly. All these elements are given magnificent scope by Robert K. Massie’s special and widely hailed literary mastery.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War I, Military History, War, Military Fiction, Naval History

880 pages, Hardcover

First published October 28, 2003

About the author

Robert Kinloch Massie was an American historian, writer, winner of a Pulitzer Prize, and a Rhodes Scholar.

Born in Versailles, Kentucky, Massie spent much of his youth there and in Nashville, Tennessee. He studied American history at Yale University and modern European history at Oxford University on his Rhodes Scholarship. Massie went to work as a journalist for Newsweek from 1959 to 1964 and then took a position at the Saturday Evening Post.

After he and his family left America for France, Massie wrote and published his breakthrough book, Nicholas and Alexandra, a biography of the last Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II, his wife, Alexandra of Hesse, and their family and cultural/political milieu. Massie's interest in the Tsar's family was triggered by the birth of his son, the Rev. Robert Kinloch Massie, who suffers from hemophilia, a hereditary disease that also afflicted the last Tsar's son, Alexei. In 1971, the book was the basis of an Academy Award–winning film of the same title. In 1995, in his book The Romanovs: The Final Chapter, Massie updated Nicholas and Alexandra with much newly discovered information.

In 1975, Robert Massie and his then-wife Suzanne chronicled their experiences as the parents of a hemophiliac child and the significant differences between the American and French healthcare systems in their jointly written book, Journey.

Massie won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Biography for Peter the Great: His Life and World. This book inspired a 1986 NBC mini-series that won three Emmy Awards, starring Maximilian Schell, Laurence Olivier and Vanessa Redgrave.

Reviews

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Increasing speed, [the British light cruiser] Galatea bore down on the smudge and soon a small merchantman appeared hull up. She was the Danish tramp steamer N.J. Fjord, blowing off steam from her boilers and rising and falling in the gentle roll of the sea. Then, suddenly, the binoculars on Galatea’s bridge revealed something else: a low, gray shape coming out from behind the steamer’s hull: a German destroyer. A few moments later, a second destroyer appeared. The bugle sounded ‘Action stations’ and the lookout’s voice came again, ‘Green two five…Cruiser…two cruisers.’ At 2:20, Galatea sent a flag signal to the other ships in her squadron: ‘Enemy in sight.’ Simultaneously, her wireless reported to [Admiral David] Beatty: ‘Two cruisers, probably hostile, bearing east southeast, course unknown.’ Then at 2:28 p.m., Galatea, now making 28 knots, opened fire with her forward 6-inch gun. It was the first shot of the Battle of Jutland…”
- Robert Massie, Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea

The one tremendous advantage history has over fiction is that it does not have to make sense. While a good novel must operate with some sort of coherent logic, history often seems driven by pure coincidence, chance, or whim, and is all the more absorbing because of this fact. There are stories from the past better than any fiction you can ever devise, because the twists and turns are so wild, unpredictable, and true.

Fiction, on the other hand, has the benefit of being able to deliver what an audience wants. Obviously, on many occasions, history is dark, violent, and depressing. Redemption is elusive. Oftentimes, the only lesson is that life is a rigged lottery, and there’s nothing you can do about it. History also refuses to follow any sort of dramatic structure. The resolutions we crave are often denied us in the tales of yesteryear. Good does not always overcome evil. Right does not always prevail.

And sometimes the climatic battle that promises to be the greatest clash in naval history turns out to be a bit of a dud.

Robert Massie’s Castles of Steel is a sequel to Dreadnought, an unforgettable recounting of the naval arms race between Great Britain and Germany in the years leading up to the First World War. Covering the war at sea between 1914 and 1918, Castles of Steel is a worthy successor to Dreadnought, and a prime example of the heights that narrative history can reach when done right.

Unfortunately, because it has to follow the contours of actual events, Castles of Steel is also a bit anticlimactic.

Massie is a fabulous popular historian who has written indelible biographies about Catherine the Great, Peter the Great, and Tsar Nicholas II. His trick – not easy to pull off – is to put you on the ground with the participants, to let you know the players inside and out, and to make you care for the people who are involved. Massie treats history as something experienced on an intimate level, rather than as a huge and incomprehensible force that can only be viewed – if at all – from a distant and godlike perspective. His skills are on full display here.

In Castles of Steel, Massie kicks things off with a retelling of the first naval action of World War I, the escape of the German battle-cruiser Goeben and the light-cruiser Breslau. At the outbreak of war, these two ships were patrolling in the Mediterranean. Upon learning they were at war with France, both ships engaged in some desultory shelling of Algerian port-cities. Then they broke for Constantinople with the British Navy hot on their heels. Eventually, both ships found refuge in the Ottoman Empire (dragging them into the mess, with vast repercussions). To skirt neutrality requirements, the ships were handed over to the Turks, renamed, and the German crews given fezzes, which as consolation prizes go, isn’t too shabby. This sequence was memorably related by Barbara Tuchman in her classic The Guns of August. I’m not saying that Massie did better than Tuchman. I am saying it’s close.

Other sea battles follow, some famous, some forgotten: the Battle of the Bight; Coronel; the Scarborough Raid; the Dogger Bank; Gallipoli; and the much-hyped Jutland.

Without disrupting the narrative, Massie devotes a lot of time to developing his theses that World War I was won and lost on the high seas, namely the English Channel. In my opinion, however, Massie is a bit wide of the mark by focusing so intently on the capital ships. That is, the real importance of the seas was as a supply line, and the threat to the supply lines was not settled by the Grand Fleet versus the High Seas Fleet, but in submarines, blockades, and mines.

Massie does not entirely neglect this reality. He gives his due to these “unchivalrous” modes of warfare. He also devotes space to Britain’s less-effective blockade of Germany, and to the effect that the sinking of the Lusitania had on America’s professed neutrality, while also providing a brisk, gripping account of her demise:

At the end, as Lusitania’s bow plunged toward the granite seafloor 300 feet below, the liner’s stern rose high in the air; at this angle, guy wires snapped and towering seventy-eight-foot funnels and even taller wireless masts toppled onto the decks. Rumbling internal explosions of steam hurled debris, bodies, and huge bubbles of water into the air. When the clouds of steam had cleared, Lusitania was gone. Since the torpedo struck, eighteen minutes had passed. Only six of the liner’s forty-eight lifeboats floated amid the wreckage, and hundreds of men and women were struggling individually in the calm, green, sunlit sea. A ships junior officer swimming through the wreckage found himself listening to the cries of infants floating nearby in their wicker baskets. There was nothing he could do. Gradually, the baskets sank...

With that said, Massie sticks mainly to the opposing fleets. This makes narrative sense, since even though subs and mines played the preeminent role in the war at sea, there’s only so much that can be said about mines. The action is on the surface.

Sort of.

For most of the First World War, England's Grand Fleet and Germany's High Seas Fleet sparred and poked and prodded, but never really got into a full-on engagement. Nevertheless, Massie heaps loads of detail on pretty trivial encounters. The aforementioned Scarborough Raid, for instance, while much hyped by British propaganda, cost around a hundred casualties and a handful of damaged ships. In other words, it is not exactly a pivotal moment in world events. It is, however, more fun to write about – and read about – than a mine sitting in the water, waiting to explode.

While the war at sea occasionally lacked drama, Massie makes up for it by bringing to bear his amazing biographical abilities. Winston Churchill, John Jellico, and Maximilian von Spee are all finely wrought. By far, the star of the show is Admiral David Beatty:

Beatty’s aura radiated in part from his genuine accomplishments and in part from successful exhibitionism. He was short and trim, easy to miss in a crowd, until he made himself instantly recognizable on board ship and in photographs by turning himself into a seagoing dandy. He tilted his famous extra-wide-brimmed cap over his eyes at a jaunty, devil-may-care angle; he stuck his thumbs rakishly into the pockets of his blue uniform jacket, which his tailor had been instructed to make with six brass buttons instead of the regulation eight. Like other flamboyantly egotistical and successful warriors…Beatty used visual imagery to capture popular fancy.

Behind the imagery in Beatty’s case lay a brilliant, frequently controversial career – and a life of private pain. A hero of colonial wars in the Sudan and China, twice promoted far ahead of other men his age, Beatty had attempted to mesh his naval career with marriage to a wealthy woman and, at her insistence, to present himself as a man of fashion in hunting circles and London society. Over the years, this effort took a heavy toll. Sometimes on the bridge of his flagship, Beatty would release his inner tension by making faces. “For no apparent reason,” said an officer who served with him, “he would screw his face into a fearsome grimace and hold it quite unconsciously for a minute or two.”

For my money, Massie’s chapter on Beatty – including Beatty’s troubled marriage to Ethel Tree (daughter of department store magnate Marshall Field) – is worth the cover price.

As I alluded to above, the only downside to Castles of Steel has nothing to do with the book. Rather, it’s the reality of history. In Dreadnought, we learned the laborious process by which England and Germany created these massive fleets of huge, powerful, well-armed, well-armored battleships. In Castles of Steel, we learn that once these two nations had their shiny, happy ships afloat, they weren't in a hurry to see them blasted apart and sent to the bottom of the ocean.

Throughout the narrative, we are teased with the prospect of one titanic battle. And finally, to an extent, it arrived, in the form of Jutland, a now-mythical meeting between John Jellico, David Beatty and the Grand Fleet for Great Britain, and Franz von Hipper, Reinhard Scheer and the High Seas Fleet for Germany.

In a sense – if you squint – Jutland lives up to expectations. It was the last major engagement between battleships in history. It was also one of the largest naval battles in history, though it would be dwarfed by battles such as Leyte Gulf in the next war, which relied heavily on aircraft carriers and airplanes. Certainly, it was a big fight, with 28 battleships for England engaging 16 battleships for Germany. For those involved, it was the most unforgettable day in their lives. For many others, it was the last.

That said, Jutland has to rank high on the list of indecisive decisive battles. Though it was supposed to be a heavyweight match, it was the undercards – the battlecruisers – that did most of the punching and dying. On both sides, the battleships – sprung from the famed HMS Dreadnought – were unscathed. It was the battlecruisers – big-gun ships stripped of armor to give them speed – that paid the price.

Thus, despite all the build-up of the titular “castles of steel,” we arrive at a non-climax. In other words: No battleships were sunk in the making of this epic battle.

The legendary dreadnoughts, the existence of which unsettled relations between Germany and Great Britain, pushing them closer to war, never got to unleash the powerful broadsides for which they’d been designed. Their existence served mainly to shuttle innovation towards other channels (such as submarines). Indeed, only a handful of dreadnoughts were lost during the war, and these losses came about due to torpedoes or grounding. None were sunk by naval gunfire.

Ultimately, the threat of losing their ships caused both sides to be extremely conservative about risking their presence on open waters. Following Jutland, Germany in particular kept its High Seas Fleet close to shore, only twice more venturing into the Atlantic Ocean. In the end, this meant that Germany ceded the strategic advantage to Great Britain, even though Great Britain – in a dent to its overweening maritime pride – gained that advantage only by surviving a tactical defeat.

At the end of the war, the Germans scuttled their once-proud fleet in Scapa Flow, to deny their ships to Great Britain. The lasting testament to Massie’s book is that I actually felt a twinge of sadness when these leviathans settled onto the ocean floor without ever having faced the ultimate test. It is a testament to Massie’s facility with the human touch that he somehow got me to care about a bunch of colossal inanimate objects.

[Tony · Rating 5 out of 5]

Following on from his excellent Dreadnought, which charts the build up to WW1 through the lens of the naval arms race between Great Britain and Imperial Germany, Massie’s Castles of Steel tells the history of the naval war itself.

As with his earlier book this is a broadly chronological narrative history with mini-biographies of some of the major personalities, but this time with detailed battle descriptions. Again the focus is on Britain and Germany, although primarily the former. And like Dreadnought it’s superb - always interesting, clearly and engagingly written.

Massie is inevitably handicapped by his subject matter. Although there were a number of interesting naval engagements there was only one truly significant battle (Jutland, which I thought was handled excellently) and that occurred roughly mid-way through the war. In general both countries jealously guarded their fleets and used them conservatively, especially their larger ships, but with Massie’s eye for description and character that doesn’t stop this being a fascinating book. I was especially drawn in by Churchill and Fisher, both individually and their somewhat tempestuous relationship with each other, and also by Jellicoe and Beattie.

My only regret is that I waited a year between reading Dreadnought and this book. Massie assumes the reader has read the previous book and is familiar with the subject matter, so in hindsight I wish I had read the two consecutively.

[Veeral · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of Robert Massie’s books concludes with the line “When the last stroke fell, Great Britain was at war with Germany.”

Another one of his books ends with the sentence “The Great War was over.”

What lies between these two lines is an unparalleled work (more than 800 pages long) of history about the war at sea between Britain and Germany in the Great War. That book is Castles of Steel.

“Castles of Steel” is the sequel to Robert Massie’s 1000 page mammoth Dreadnought which chronicles the national rivalries (between Britain and Germany) that led to the first great arms race and eventually to the First World War. “Dreadnought” ends with Britain’s declaration of war on Germany.

I started with “Dreadnought” and when I was about 100 pages in; I stopped and started reading “Castles of Steel” instead. Don’t get me wrong, “Dreadnought” is not bad. In fact, it’s a great work; and its greatness is what led me to stop reading it and start ���Castles of Steel”. I just couldn’t stop myself.

But that’s one of the many benefits of reading history. You can either read it in chronological order, or if you want, you can read it in any damn order you like. Sure, reading in chronological order helps to understand the events more clearly, but even cursory knowledge of previous events would be enough to take you through the rest. That’s why I decided to read “Castles of Steel” before “Dreadnought”.

At the start of The Great War, fleet strategies still revolved around the three “Mahanian dogmas” - the cult of the big gun battleship, the iron rule of concentration, and the annihilation of the enemy fleet in a single decisive battle. It was put forth by Alfred Thayer Mahan, the American naval officer–turned–historian in his first major work, The Influence of Sea Power upon History 1660-1805 which was published in 1890-1892.

In addition to this, the British public was still infatuated with the dream that the feat of Admiral Lord Nelson and his heroic victory in the Battle of Trafalgar would be repeated, where the British sunk 22 French and Spanish ships without losing a single battleship. The press and public alike were waiting for their next Trafalgar in The Great War. But it never came. The technology had improved leaps and bounds since that legendary battle and had changed all the rules of engagement. The transition from old tactics to the newer ones was gradual, which did come eventually, but not even at the end of The Great War. (Only with the sinking of “Repulse” and “Prince of Wales” in World War-II by Japanese airplanes, the era of battleship came to an end.)

The German navy began the war with three principal codes. The decisive advantage that the British had over their German counterparts was that that they were in possession of all three within four months of the war. By the end of the war, Room 40 (code-breaking unit) at the British Admiralty had eventually decoded 20,000 German naval wireless messages.

Without breaking the German codes, the battles of Dogger Bank and Jutland would not have been fought. Nor, later, would the U-boats have been defeated as the British had no other way of knowing to be at the right place at the right time. Curiously enough, the Germans never doubted that their codes were compromised even though the ships of British Grand Fleet suspiciously arrived every time with greater forces whenever the ships of German High Seas Fleet went on a raiding mission.

Massie does a great job of describing all the major players of the war and among those, he does not spare Winston Churchill (who was First Lord of the British Navy in World War-I for some time) whom he describes as overzealous and often arrogant and who did not have the first-hand knowledge of naval tactics (as he was a politician, not a seaman) compared to the likes of Lord Fischer, Jellicoe and Beatty but who repeatedly put forth his own battle plans and tactics for the Grand Fleet, which often wrought disastrous results.

Churchill confiscated two Turkish battleships (which were being constructed in Britain for Turkey at the start of the war) by saying, “We could not afford to do without these two fine ships.” But when the Turkish acquired the German battle cruiser ‘Goeben’ which found a safe haven in Turkish waters while being chased by the British ships through the Mediterranean Sea, Churchill rumbled that Turkey’s behavior in the acquisition of the ‘Goeben’ (and ‘Breslau’) was “insolent,” “defiant,” and “openly fraudulent.”

Churchill’s war as The First Lord came to an end with the debacle at Dardanelles where he proposed to destroy the Turkish shore guns with the British fleet. Effective shore bombardment from the ships was considered impossible at that time. And with good reasons. The gunners of the ship could not correct their aim while firing on land for the lack of water spray which sprouts whenever a shell hits the sea water which could be used as a reference point.

So, even though Fischer opposed the attack on Dardanelles, it was proposed to land an army on Gallipoli. Hence, the front was stalemated yet again in a trench war. The Allies could not seize the ridges; the Turks could not hurl their enemies back into the sea; and the killing ground of the Western Front was reproduced at Gallipoli. The offensive eventually ended, along with Churchill’s and Fisher’s posts.

While Massie makes fun of Churchill, he praises Jellicoe as a consummate professional, calm, deliberate, and meticulous, with a thorough mastery of his ships and guns, acquired over a long career afloat and ashore.

On the other hand, Massie describes Beatty as brave, but high-strung and impatient for action. Beatty’s career had advanced in fits and starts. Brilliant performance under fire had led to rapid promotions, leapfrogging him over his contemporaries—but then he had held himself back by his own unorthodox and arrogant behavior. Moreover, Beatty had a troubled married life and also an extra marital affair, some details of which Massie describes shamelessly.

While his extra marital affair was in full swing, Beatty wrote and send some poetry to his lover, which Massie did not fail (with some glee, I suppose) to include in his book.

Here’s to you and here’s to Blighty,
I’m in pajamas, you in a nighty,
If we are feeling extra flighty,
Why in pajamas and Why the nighty?

Well, whether Beatty was the hero of Jutland or not is still debatable (Massie thinks he was not); everyone could agree that he was no poet.

The Great War was peculiar in many ways. New technology was often ridiculed. But nothing seemed more contemptible and hilarious to the oldies of Royal Navy than the submarines.

Submarines were still referred as “playthings” at the start of The Great War and some considered it “ungentlemanly” to sink a ship with a submarine as it remained hidden until the very last moment (The submarines in World War-I had to resurface in order to fire their torpedoes).

No one at the start took submarines seriously. Some of the “tactics” (I am not going to call it ASW) that Royal Navy strategists came up with to “fight” German submarines were extremely ridiculous.

Tactic 1: A few motor launches carried two swimmers, one armed with a black bag, the other with a hammer. If a periscope was sighted, the launch was to come as close as possible. The swimmers were to dive in and one man would attempt to place his black bag over the periscope; if he failed, the other would try to smash the glass with his hammer.

Tactic 2: Attempting to teach seagulls to defecate on periscopes.

My only gripe with this book is that Massie failed to mention the name of the genius who came up with the idea of teaching seagulls to defecate on periscopes.

But ridiculed as they were, U-boats did have a major impact on the war. During fifty-one months of war, German submarines sunk a total of 5,282 British, Allied, and neutral merchant ships totaling 11,153,000 tons at the cost of 178 U-boats and 511 officers and 4,576 men. Three hundred and ninety-two submarines had been built before and during the war; therefore, the loss rate was almost 50 percent. At the time of the armistice, the German navy still possessed 194 U-boats, with a further 149 under construction.

The surface boats never had such an impact on the war, although one early major victory for the British came at the Battle of the Falkland Islands where they sunk all the German ships. But that feat was never repeated.

But as this was the first war after major technological innovations, there were numerous accounts of “firsts” which might seem routine and boring to us today.

For example, The Cuxhaven Raid was history’s first aircraft-carrier-based air strike. It was also the first naval battle in which, on both sides, the striking forces were made up exclusively of aerial machines.

In Cuxhaven Raid, 150 British warships were to be employed to deliver to the German mainland exactly 81.50 pounds (weight, not the currency) of explosives. This was the combined weight of the bursting charges in the 27 bombs to be carried by the seaplanes.

As expected, hilarity ensued.

Almost simultaneously, ten miles nearer the coast, another seaplane had landed alongside the destroyer Lurcher, from which Keyes was supervising his submarines. The pilot taxied up to the destroyer, shouted that he had only five minutes’ worth of fuel remaining, and asked the direction to the carriers. Realizing that the rendezvous was too far off, Keyes invited the pilot to come on board and took the seaplane in tow.

Here’s another one.

Casting off the towline, he maneuvered so close to one of the newly arrived seaplanes that the pilot and observer were able to step directly onto the submarine’s deck; he told the two airmen in the other plane to swim to his boat.

Yes, you read that right. They actually stepped off an airplane directly onto a submarine, without even wetting their shoes. The other two were wussies, they had to swim for it.

One of the other major naval engagements of the Great War was the Battle of Dogger Bank. But as Room 40 already had the codes, the British knew Admiral Hipper was coming even before his ships left harbor. The result was that as Hipper’s ships departed, British warships were weighing anchor and heading for the Dogger Bank. Germany lost her battle cruiser ‘Blücher’ while the rest made it to port with more or less damage.

Although all these flavorless poking battles were followed enthusiastically by the people in both countries, the British were still waiting for their Nelson, whether he arrived in the form of Jellicoe or Beatty. On 31st May 1916, it seemed that the British’s Trafalgar had finally arrived at Jutland.

150 British ships were pitted against 99 of the Germans. Once again, Room 40 made it possible.

After much poking and thrusting, Britain lost 14 ships (3 battle cruisers, 3 armored cruisers, and 8 destroyers), while the German navy lost 11 (1 battle cruiser, 1 predreadnought battleship, 4 light cruisers, and 5 destroyers). British casualties were much heavier: 6,768 men were killed or wounded, while the Imperial Navy lost 3,058.

Battleships lost on either side: 0.

But the fact remained that the superior British fleet still ruled the North Sea and that was enough to cripple Germany’s international trade in the Great War.

So, although one can surmise from the figures that the Germans had an upper hand at Jutland, the status quo remained unchanged.

It was put aptly by a New York City newspaper: “The German fleet has assaulted its jailor, but it is still in jail.”

Finally the Great War ended, leaving the British relieved, the Germans chagrined but content, and the French furious.

The Germans scuttled their fleet at Scapa Flow so as not to let the victors enjoy their spoils of victory. The British were relieved as they didn't need any additional firepower and at last the second best navy in the world was totally destroyed. The Germans were content as they denied the victors their spoils. The French, on the other hand, were furious, as they were eagerly waiting to seize some excellent German ships for their own navy, but the scuttling spoiled their plans. No wonder the Versailles treaty came into being.

[Jill H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a "must read" if you are a Massie fan, a student of WWI history or interested in the developing stages of modern sea power. This is a wonderful narrative of the war at sea between the Grand Fleet of Great Britain and the High Seas Fleet of Imperial Germany. Massie weaves a fascinating tale of the tug-of-war between the politicians and the naval commanders on one side, and the power of the Kaiser over the Navy on the other.
Massie gives interesting insights into the personal and professional lives of the major players in the drama and pulls no punches in his critcism of many of the decisions made which cost the lives of valiant mariners. Churchill, as First Lord of the Admiralty, is cast in a negative light and apparently with good reason as some of his major decisions are suspect. Many of the myths of the major battles at sea are put to rest, such as the Battle of Jutland, in which both sides declared victory. This is 700+ page book and there are sections where battles are described in infinite detail which make it a somewhat slow read. But, overall, this is a magnificent telling of an important period in world history. Massie's "Dreadnought" is a good preface to this book and should be read first.

[Elliot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Castles of Steel is a difficult book to categorize. It masquerades as a military history of the Anglo-German naval aspect of the First World War but is first and foremost a narrative history in the grand scope and style which Massie is famous for. Massie’s affinity for biography is on display as well, as in Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War, but is not exercised to nearly the same degree. British admirals John Jellicoe and David Beatty are the only figures to receive full chapter-length biographical treatment; all other significant characters only receive brief sketches.

Massie’s priority is to trace the Anglo-German conflict at sea, in a natural follow-up to his Dreadnought. However, during the Great War at sea, there was only one major fleet action—that infamous clash at Jutland. Most of the conflicts consisted of smaller scale encounters, from the Battles of Coronel and Falkland Islands in the South Pacific and South Atlantic, respectively, to the Battle of the Dogger in the heart of the North Sea. Massie’s accounts of these and other actions are admirable for their clarity and detail. The series of chapters covering Admiral von Spee’s voyage up to its conclusion at the Falkland Islands was particularly good. (I will talk about Jutland a little later).

Besides the chapters focusing on the direct conflicts between the two navies, there are a number of chapters covering other aspects of the war. These chapters include changes and developments at the Admiralty, a lengthy account of the naval activities in the Dardanelles and the subsequent landings at Gallipoli, and then later on the story about the gradual American involvement in the war. I have some mixed feelings about some of these sections and am tempted to call some of them filler. Certainly, the chapter about Admiral Jacky Fisher’s return to the Admiralty was relevant, but I did not think that the number of pages dedicated to the Dardanelles and Gallipoli was warranted—even if they were well-written. It seemed to me the only connection to the greater story of Britain v. Germany at sea that that campaign had was that it ended both Churchill’s and Fisher’s careers at the Admiralty.

The final few chapters, which cover the war after Jutland, were by far the weakest part of the book. The submarine war was undoubtedly important, but Massie spent much more time discussing the gradual build-up to unrestricted submarine warfare than how the British were eventually able to overcome this adversity. A few thrilling accounts about the exploits of Q-ships were followed up by just a couple pages about convoys and statistics and that was that. Moreover, I thought the sections about the American involvement and the discussions about the war on the Western Front, among others, were totally extraneous. In my opinion, the final three chapters should have been severely condensed for I was definitely skimming through some of these pages. The book is already sprawling in scope. There is simply no need to cover internal American politics or Beatty’s extra-marital affairs—they add nothing to the heart of the book.

I am pleased to report that the four chapters covering the infamous Battle of Jutland were excellent. Massie clearly explains how the gradual pressure of the British blockade was one of the underlying causes of the battle, along with the aggressiveness and decisiveness of the new Commander-in-Chief of the High Seas Fleet, Reinhard Scheer. The one-hundred-and-thirty-page account again is notable for its clarity and objectivity. I came in knowing next to nothing about the battle but left with a firm grasp of its essentials. I was also left with a firm distaste for Admiral Sir David Beatty. As a rule, Massie refrains from declaring absolute judgments, choosing instead to let the reader make up their own mind. For my part, I was thoroughly unimpressed with Beatty from the start of the book. What little regard I had remaining for him evaporated when I read about his conduct after the battle of Jutland.

Overall, Castles of Steel is very good book, but ultimately not as good as its predecessor, Dreadnought. I think Massie’s style is more suited to the latter book than to a military history such as this. Nevertheless, I enjoyed reading Castles of Steel and learned quite a bit from it.

[Jerome Otte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unfamiliar with most of the naval aspects of the war except for Jutland, I figured I couldn’t go wrong with this. And Massie does provide us with an excellent account of the arms race and buildup to the war as well as an exhaustive study of the war at sea. Please be aware, this is not really a comprehensive look at the entire naval war of 1914-1918. Other than the North Sea actions, the U-boat war, and the Dardanelles, all other aspects are left out. The Russians, Italians, Austrians, Turkish and French are left out, as are operations in the Mediterranean.

Ironically, once war broke out, neither side had much idea of what to do with their massive naval power. Nor were they prepared for all-out war. The British were skeptical of new weapons like mines and submarines, and at the start of the war, Germany had less submarines than the allies.

From the beginning, as Massie points out, the naval war was a war of contradictions. The British public clamored for a Trafalgar-like defeat over the German navy from the beginning. The German naval leadership was willing to risk their dreadnoughts in a decisive battle, but the Kaiser fought to preserve his prestigious battleships. The British still believed Nelson's maxim "No captain can do very wrong if he places his ship alongside that of the enemy," and found themselves in a war of improvisation. Instead of a close blockade of Germany’s ports followed by a massive "final battle," they spent most of the war simply trying to lure the German fleet out of port and into a trap.

Massie is excellent at covering strategy, but he’s also very good with the personalities of the war: from the sailors to the admirals to the leaders that led their nations into the war. Winston Churchill rampages through the story like a colossus: seemingly more intelligent and determined than anyone else in the Admiralty, but at times he comes across as the world’s worst diplomat. David Beatty, Tirpitz, Scheer, and von Spee are also given good coverage. Beatty’s insanely rich wife was also an interesting character (“What? Court-martial my David? I’ll buy them a new ship”).

The chapter on the U-boat war was fine, but he doesn’t tell it with the same passion as he does the rest of the book. Massie’s take on the German perspective is extremely sketchy in places. None of the Germans, except for Kaiser Wilhelm II (whose name has been anglicized to William), are well developed, and the reader never quite gets "inside the head" of their naval leaders. This doesn't render the book one-sided, but a closer look at the German naval establishment would have made their decisions easier to understand.

There are also a few errors: he calls the Lion a twin-screw vessel when she actually had four, and the Hindenburg is described as having 15-inch guns.

Massie also states in a footnote that (US Battleships) Utah, Oklahoma, Arizona, and West Virginia were sunk at Pearl Harbor, and Pennsylvania, Mississippi, New Mexico, Colorado, and Tennessee were severely damaged.

What an incredible gaffe!

Mississippi and New Mexico were not only not damaged at Pearl Harbor, they weren't even in the same ocean! They were in the Atlantic Fleet at the time! At least Colorado was in the same ocean, but it was thousands of miles away in Washington state at the time! He fails to mention California, which was present and sunk. Pennsylvania, which was present, was in dry dock at the time and remained almost untouched. Tennessee received only minor damage. Furthermore, Utah was no longer a battleship, but had long before been converted to a target ship.

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderfully written and very comprehensive history of World War I at sea. Author Robert K. Massie has been on my 'Want to Read' list for a long time. This is the first book of his I've read, but it won't be the last. He's a first rate writer of history, on par for me with the likes of Barbara Tuchman, David McCullough, and Shelby Foote among others.
This book is long (inevitable given the subject), but is quite interesting. The jacket summary and the most popular reviews on Goodreads give excellent summaries of the content, I won't repeat that here. He takes you through detailed accounts of the action, examines key personalities on both the British and German sides, gives background for decisions, and debunks a number wrong notions that have arisen in the century since WW I. What is readily apparent is the confusion, miscommunication, egos, and luck that is involved in war. What also is apparent is the extraordinary bravery of the sailors on both sides. If the subject interests you, I recommend 'Castles of Steel'.

[Sonny · Rating 5 out of 5]

What comes to mind when you think of World War I? If you had to read All Quiet on the Western Front while in high school as I did, perhaps World War I conjures up images of trenches—miles of muddy trenches, coils of barbed wire, mortar barrages, horrific scenes of slaughter, and the widespread use of chemical warfare. My paternal grandfather was one of millions of Americans who fought on the western front during “the Great War.” He was gassed during the war and later died of lung disease while in his 40s, years before I was born. Based on most histories of World War I, it would be easy to forget that there was also a significant naval component of the war.

Robert K. Massie was an American journalist and historian who devoted much of his career to studying and writing about czarist Russia. He studied American history at Yale and European history at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. Massie was awarded the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Biography for Peter the Great: His Life and World, as well as the 2012 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction for his book Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman. Kathryn Harrison of The New York Times has rightly praised Massie as a literary stylist and “a biographer with the instincts of a novelist.” He excels at expansive narrative histories that are filled with interesting vignettes and personal portraits.

Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea is an impressive and exhaustive study covering the naval action of World War I. The book is a sequel of sorts to his 1991 classic work Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War, in which Massie examined the buildup of the British and German navies that did much to poison international relations in the years before the First World War. "Castles of steel" was Winston Churchill's phrase for the Royal Navy’s “Grand Fleet” and the German Imperial Navy’s counterpart, the “High Seas Fleet.” Displaying his usual talent for bringing history to life, Massie gives us a comprehensive account that is based on thorough research of available material, as well as telling a completely engrossing tale.

Once Germany built the High Seas Fleet, war with England was inevitable. In the first world war, the aim of naval forces was to prevent or deliver invasions, and to starve the enemy through a blockade. Oddly enough, Germany never seriously discussed or planned an invasion of England. However, from 1914 to 1919, the British fleet maintained a prolonged, strangling blockade of Germany to restrict the maritime supply of goods to the Central Powers. Yet both fleets pursued rather cautious naval strategies. The British in particular were skeptical of new weaponry such as mines and submarines (“tools of cowards who refused to fight like men on the surface”). The first major clash did not occur until May 1916 off Jutland.

Yet Massie is not only concerned with naval strategy. He draws on a great cast of larger-than-life characters—from the sailors to the admirals, down to the politicians who decided their fate. Massie portrays the main players on each side. His portraits of major figures include the towering figure of Winston Churchill, who was the impetuous First Lord of the Admiralty from 1912 to 1916—a pivotal role. His portrait of Churchill is both perceptive and riveting. Young Churchill was an inspirational force who had a knack of enraging others. Massie portrays him as both hero and villain. Churchill made good decisions and bad. It was Churchill who saw the potential for air power in naval warfare; but it was also Churchill who badgered his admirals into undertaking the disastrous Gallipoli campaign in the Dardanelles. The coverage of the Gallipoli campaign is one of the more interesting accounts included in the book.

His portraits of key British players also include John Jellicoe, the First Sea Lord, Commander-in-Chief, and commander of the Grand Fleet at Jutland. Jellicoe was a control freak who received much criticism for failing to seize opportunities to annihilate the German fleet. Massie argues that to have done so would have been to have put his ships at great risk, potentially jeopardizing the control of the seas on which British security rested. The destruction of the German fleet, Massie correctly argues, "was a secondary object.” Another key British player was Admiral David Beatty, the dashing commander of the battlecruiser fleet at Jutland, who maintained a decade-long love affair with the wife of a British captain. Beatty disregarded signaling and staff procedures, but had a gut-instinct for battle. On the German side, there are Alfred von Tirpitz, Reinhard Scheer, Franz Hipper, and Admiral Maximilian von Spee.

Massie provides the reader with a number of outstanding battle narratives, including the Battle of the Bight, the Battle of Coronel, the Battle of the Falkland Islands, and the Battle of Dogger Bank. The inevitable, decisive and critically important engagement finally comes in 1916, at the Battle of Jutland involving 58 warships. Massie devotes a full sixth of the narrative to this critically important battle. Thanks to Massie’s clear grasp of tactics and his thrilling narration, the battle comes to life. The outcome is so muddled that both sides claimed victory. Without radar, it was impossible for command to track enemy ships. At best, it yielded a pyrrhic victory for Britain at tremendous cost—the loss of three battle cruisers, two light cruisers, and many other craft.

German battleships, however, proved less of a threat to Britain than the submarine, and Massie gives a thorough account of that new instrument of destruction. The submarine proved the most effective part of the sea war in the German blockade of the western allies. Yet the very effectiveness of the submarine and its indiscriminate nature lost the Central Powers the war for reasons that were largely political. Unable to break the British blockade with High Seas Fleet, Germany felt compelled to choose between a negotiated peace and unrestricted use of submarine warfare. Once the Germans chose the latter course, American intervention and ultimate defeat became nearly unavoidable. Massie describes how the Allies used well-protected convoys to deal with the U-boat menace, enabling transatlantic troop ships to bring millions of American troops to Europe. In addition to convoys, the British also deployed submarine-killing “Q-ships” late in the war.

Massie's book ends with the defeated Germans scuttling of 74 vessels of their High Seas Fleet while held at the British stronghold of Scapa Flow in 1919. Compared to other popular histories, Massie's style is elaborate. Neither is he succinct; the book is hardly a page-turner. No detail is too small to escape Massie’s eye.

“This effort notwithstanding, however, certain British institutions were not be trifled with: “Sent hands to tea at 3:30 with Indefatigable to go to tea after us,” Kennedy recorded in his action report. By 3:45 p.m., Goeben and Breslau were pulling away into a misty haze; at 4:00, Goeben was only just in sight against the horizon. Dublin held on, but at 7:37 p.m. the light cruiser signaled, “Goeben out of sight now, can only see smoke; still daylight.” By nine o’clock, the smoke had disappeared, daylight was gone, and Goeben and Breslau had vanished. At 9:52 p.m., on Milne’s instructions, Dublin gave up the chase. At 1:15 a.m., a signal from Malta informed the Mediterranean Fleet that war had begun.”
― Robert K. Massie, Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany and the Winning of the Great War at Sea

Yet Massie is an accomplished popular historian, and the result is a credible, fascinating and readable work that is deeply satisfying. Castles of Steel deals with an important period in military history just before land and sea forces yielded to the supremacy of air power.

[Bob H · Rating 5 out of 5]

The logical sequel to Dreadnought, which chronicled the Anglo-German naval arms race, a proximate cause of WWI. Here, the navies built for such an unimaginable conflict now stalk each other, and although the book focuses on the British and German parts of the war it still is valuable for those interested in history or in vivid historical writing. Particularly valuable are the little-known but critical clashes outside Europe, notably the battles off Chile and Argentina that aren't well-remembered today -- Coronel and the Falklands -- but which were important at the time. (Indeed, Coronel was the first fleet action that Britain had lost in a century). Indeed, the end result of the naval war was the victory that the stalemated land war never achieved: the siege-by-sea that threatened both Britain and Germany with starvation, the latter breaking first, a collapse signaled by the German navy's revolt. The book does not neglect an important postscript: the post-war scuttling of the German fleet at the British naval base at Scapa Flow.

Very worthwhile.

[Ridel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Citadel of Success

Despite a preponderance of science fiction speculating otherwise, the First World War was likely the apex of the battleship. As a lover of stories with million-ton vessels blasting each other with gigatons of energy, every page of Castles of Steel was a joy to read. The thrilling tale of the Grand Fleet vs the High Seas Fleet is legend. The author delivers suspense and drama with the satisfying authenticity of true events sourced from letters between figures like Churchill, Jellicoe, and Scheer. The scope of this novel is tremendous, leading to an equally large page count. An enterprising author would split this into three volumes. The opening moves of WW1 tickle my grand strategic fancies. Innovation, politics, logistics, economics and sheer hubris define the lead-up to the Battle of Coronel. The Dardanelles deserves its own time in the spotlight, portraying the rise and fall of Churchill. And then comes Jutland. I couldn’t put this book down. The Battle of Jutland, as regaled by this author, is some of the finest storytelling in the world.

The maxim ‘truth is stranger than fiction’ finds its defence in the annals of Castles of Steel. Perhaps it’s the power of hindsight, but WW1 is rife with strategic and tactical blunders on both sides. Were this fiction, I would cry foul and lay seething critiques about plot contrivances. The initial positioning of German warships led to darkly humorous political results. Internal personality clashes and organizational challenges resulted in multiple own-goals for the British Admiralty. Hidebound anti-innovationists shackled the Grand Fleet, while the Kaiser was his own Empire’s worst enemy. These strategic mistakes set the stage for skirmishes and battles full of tactical errors. Miscommunicated orders and signals contributed to thousands of lives lost, with root causes as banal as a Flag Lieutenant lowering the flags too early. Aside from incredulity and astonishment, my takeaway is that military fiction writers are simultaneously trying too hard and not enough. Quiet competence is rare enough, but tactical brilliance is a once-in-a-generation event. Similarly, failure can originate from the most unassuming of errors. The trick is making everything feel natural.

Castles of Steel also deals with the calculus of dreadnaughts. The cold numbers of speed and range are indifferent. While engaging the enemy is never assured, once combat begins, holding the range and battering the foe is a straightforward application of technological superiority. A single older generation or damaged vessel could sink the entire squadron. Coal and ammunition resupply constraints, along with accuracy measurements below two percent, delight the analyst in me. That this level of detail was covered while crafting a suspenseful story is splendid. My primary critique is that the author should have ended with the Battle of Jutland. It’s not chronologically sound, and the naval war did continue into the U-boat era, but the story’s momentum halted after the definitive confrontation of dreadnaughts. America’s entry into the war had an air of inevitability, and none of the events leading to and after the armistice ever approached the same level of suspense or drama. However, that’s a minor nitpick. Castles of Steel will forever be my recommendation for anyone interested in battleships. I'll even sneak it into my military science-fiction recommendations. It’s an absolute triumph.

Highly Recommended.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

Robert Massie's approach to understanding World War I through the naval battles is original and thought provoking. It is one of the best he has ever written and the prefect accompaniment to his book Dreadnought. The book tracks how the German and British navies reacted during the war and the strategies employed by both. Whether it is the chasing of cruisers around South America or the battles between the Grand Fleet (Great Britain) and the High Seas Fleet (Germany) the detail and analysis is top notch. One of the more interesting side stories that Massie pursues is the invasion of the Turkish straights. This British naval disaster is captured perfectly by Massie and its overall importance in the war done well. Through his book you see a crystallization of British strategy that explains many of their actions in World War I as well as what will occur in World War II. Wireless telegraphy being new allows the First Sea Lord Winston Churchill to personally move ships which will become his method of operation in World War II.

The battle of Jutland is obviously a major focus of the book and done very well. The basic fleet movements are captured as well as the implications of strategy and the realities of command in World War I. The new development of Room 40 which was decoding German dispatches and relaying them to the British fleet proved pivotal over the course of the war. The British were not sure what to make of these initially and only used them sparingly. Following Jutland the book does an excellent job of showing how America was able to enter the war through the defeat of the German U-boats via the convoy. Overall the book is excellent and an amazing read for those who want to understand the aspects of naval warfare and World War I.

[Bas Kreuger · Rating 4 out of 5]

A slight, but only very, very slight, disappointment in reading Castles of Steel. Massie again writes compulsive and with an eye for detail, but what I miss is the view from both sides as he did in "Dreadnought" where the thoughts and actions of the leading politicians and naval officers was examined. After finishing "Dreadnought" I had a much better understanding how WWI came about and how and why the Germans and Brits clashed over their naval policy.
"CoS" has less policy and diplomacy and much more strategy and thought and feel for the battles in WWI. Specially the early battles of Coronel and the Falklands gave me an almost Medieval sense of chivalry and despondancy of both commanders, Craddock and Von Spee.
The later naval efforts were more in line with the feeling that Britain could lose the war in an afternoon while Germany had not much to gain from a naval victory by its Hochsee Flotte.
The choice Germany made for unrestricted submarine warfare and the way they almost got Britain on her knees was revelling for me. At a certain point Britain had only for six weeks foodstuff left. Germany came close, but because they hadn't planned for such an operation and thus had not build sufficient numbers of submarine, they could not succeed and esspecially not when the US entered the war and brought its industrial might in play.
The end, where revolutionay sailors in the German fleet in late 1918 refused to sail for one last battle plus the scutteling of the German fleet is described well, but then the book abruptly ends. I would have liked to get some more reflection on the naval policy of both countries and how their naval campaings had been fought.

[Jonny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Telling the story of the Great War at sea is a massive undertaking, and Mr Massie does it very well. The account is very readable throughout, whether he is dealing with one of the sea battles or the political machinations occurring behind the scenes. One of the difficulties of this topic to my mind is that the climactic event if the sea war occurs roughly halfway through the timeline. Thankfully the narrative doesn't slacked on either side of this event. As with Dreadnought, wonderful pen portraits are provided of the main players, although reading of the earlier book is assumed for some individuals (notably Churchill). Less emphasis is given to the Imperial German side, but this doesn't detract from the book in any way.
I particularly liked the way that elements familiar to anyone who has a knowledge of World War Two at sea have their genesis. Here we see the start of naval aviation, workable submarine warfare although the battleship remains king.
A very good successor to Dreadnought, well written and eminently readable.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the characteristics of examining the past is that otherwise mundane or ordinary aspects of life become romanticized. For example, travel on trains or steamers becomes more interesting than it almost certainly was to those that took advantage of such modes of transportation. Naval warfare is not exempt from this phenomenon. The rigorous skill of the crews and the intensity of yardarm-to-yardarm brawls during the Age of Sail cover up the general tedium, filth, and sheer terror during battle that life at sea held during that age. Likewise, the subjects of ‘Castles of Steel’ possess a elegance that is perhaps lost in a modern guided missile destroyer or nuclear submarine. These subjects, the giant turreted battleships of the Royal Navy and Imperial German Navy and the men that fought on them, were very much at home in the late-Victorian and Edwardian or Imperial eras in which they sailed and lived. Even while being made for battles at speeds exceeding 20 knots while firing shells the size of horses at ships 10 miles away, these technological wonders still relied on distinctly analog (or worse) techniques of aiming and firing and of communication. This is perhaps best demonstrated in while engaging German battles cruisers in a running battle in the North Sea in 1915, Admiral Sir David Beatty was unable to bag the lot because he could not signal his captains by flag the “Engage the enemy more closely” message that Nelson had sent his fleet at Trafalgar a hundred years prior, as it had been removed from the signal book. Such were the contradictions of war at sea during the First World War.

‘Castles of Steel’ is full of these contradictions and obstacles, as well as the successes that came through the mitigation of these forces. Under Robert Massie’s excellent pen, the repeated clashes of the German and British fleets are vividly described, as are the politicking and strategizing that occurred behind the scenes at fleet headquarters, the halls of the Admiralty, and meetings of cabinets. Picking up where his book ‘Dreadnought’ ends, the same care that Massie took in describing the decades of declining relations between Britain and Germany is exerted in describing the 52 months of war at sea during World War One. The cast of characters is immense, and while the most famous—Winston Churchill, who served as First Lord of the Admiralty between 1911 and 1915—is amply covered, the rest are more than capably described as well. Crucially, Massie provides plenty of words on the commanders of the principle battle fleets on both sides: Jellicoe, Beatty, Hipper, and Scheer. These men and the fleets they commanded were the most important commanders at sea during the war; the former two were both responsible for a fleet that could have in one day lost the war for Britain. No other British commanders, not even French and Haig in France, bore such a burden. Such was the importance of Britain’s “wooden walls,” only now they were clad and armored in steel.

Every relevant action, from the initial chase of German battle cruisers in the Mediterranean at the onset of the war to the epic voyage and chase of Maximilian von Spee across the Pacific and South Atlantic during the same time, to the battle cruiser battles in the North Sea in 1915 and 1916 and the attempted naval storming of the Dardanelles, to the only clash of the entirety of both battle fleets during the war at Jutland and the eventual victory over the U-boats and the freeing of the lifeline to America is described. Massie’s ability to clearly and succinctly describe naval warfare during the Age of Steam is impressive, and the actions he describes were very easy to follow. Likewise, his command of the subjects of naval strategy, naval architecture, the command structure of the two navies, and the biographical details of the major players was exemplary. His analysis, especially in one key area, was greatly appreciated.

This one area, the nature of command and leadership at sea during the age of naval artillery under steam power, was seen in the comparative qualities of Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, and his one-time subordinate David Beatty. Jellicoe was named commander-in-chief of the Grand Fleet, the principle British battle fleet in home waters during the war, at the onset of the conflict. Beatty was the commander of Britain’s battle cruisers, ships that possessed high speeds and the heavy guns of battleships, but lacked the protective armor of the dreadnoughts. Jellicoe was methodical, brilliant, unassuming, and totally beloved. He had a firm grasp on the weight that lay upon his shoulders and the importance of the fleet he commanded. Beatty, due both in part to a meteoric rise through the ranks and decidedly cocksure attitude, was dashing, impetuous, and tenacious in a fight. Their different attitudes towards command were most evident at Jutland. Beatty’s most important task as commander of the battle cruisers was to make sure Jellicoe’s battleships were placed in the best position to annihilate their opposite numbers. When Beatty encountered his opposite number, Franz Hipper and his battle cruisers, off the coast of Denmark in June, 1916, he drove hard after them without maintaining the integrity of his force. He ran smack into the massed battleships of Reinhard Scheer’s High Seas Fleet and lost three of his cruisers, but never relayed the proper information to Jellicoe. Beatty dutifully lured the German fleet into a trap laid by Jellicoe, but without the full picture Jellicoe was forced to rely upon his considerable instinct to best place his dreadnoughts to face the approaching German ships. Smart-sailing and fortunate weather allowed the vast majority of the High Seas Fleet to escape. In hindsight, Jellicoe could have destroyed this fleet, but his calculating mind prevented him from giving chase, as his chief concern was the survival of his battleships. After the battle he was excoriated for this decision, most viciously by Beatty, a man Jellicoe considered a friend. He never received the honor he deserved. While Beatty’s Nelson-like tendency to engage whatever force was placed before him was praised, that Jellicoe had maintained Britain’s command of the sea through his tactical awareness of the strategic picture was overlooked. Looking back, Jellicoe’s command of his ships was virtually flawless given the circumstances.

In this respect, Massie’s account is magnificent. The British and German fleets were essentially learning on the job about what their respective fighting capabilities were. British ships were generally faster and more heavily armed, but German gunnery, ship construction, and armor were superior. The chess match that developed from these relative advantages was a fascinating one, and in this work Robert Massie delivers an extremely lively and satisfying account. The central complaint is that Massie does jump around a bit within the story, and will tease future events in a manner that detracts from the drama and the building up of tension. This isn’t a thriller, it is a work of military history, so he can be excused to a degree, but a more careful writer might be more sure to maintain the even flow of the events as they unfolded.

[Reynold Witmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Something about Robert Massie's writing transports me back to an experience of adolescence; of reading with such absorption and fascination where suddenly you jump and realize your eyes hurt, there's a crink in your neck, and hours have slipped away. Massie may be my Conan Doyle of adulthood, the drama and diplomacy, politics and personalities of the Great War my new Sherlock. If Massie wrote an encyclopedia, I would devour it. Castles of Steel is the sequel to his book Dreadnought, and picks up with little interruption, telling the story of Britain and Germany's Naval struggle during WW1. Massie's true genius is in his character portrayals. I learned more in these two books about men, leadership, and strategy than many books dedicated to the subjects. Here is the impetuous, and popular Beatty, perfectionist John Jellicoe, hated by his opponents, loved by his men. There's Hipper and Scheer, Bentham-Hollweg and Hindenburg, Ludendorf, and of course, Kaiser Willhem II. There's Asquith and George, Kitchener and Churchill, Foch and Pershing and Wilson, and many many more. These men, brilliant and belligerent and blustering, crafty, conniving, convicted, desperate, deliberate, defeated make a drama far stranger and fascinating than any fiction.

[Mac · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buy.

Fantastic, unbelievably deep and well explained. Massie never disappoints.

[Johnny · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a hefty volume, but it covers WWI naval history better than any I've read before. Robert K. Massey writes with more color and illuminates more character than Barbara Tuchman (The First Salute and Guns of August) such that the details behind and concerning the build-up to these engagements at sea and the engagements themselves read more like "story" than "history." Frankly, I read Alexander Fullerton's novel about the chase of the Goeben into the Dardanelles and on into the Black Sea, but even though it had a different angle, Massey's account seemed more lively and satisfying in the long run.

I've also never understood why the kaiser had such an inferiority complex until I read this account. Churchill is shown to be both brilliant and naive, resulting in exactly the kind of diverse consequences you'd expect from that combination. Churchill's struggles to get the Chancellor of the Exchequer to loosen the purse strings in the build-up to WWI certainly casts the struggles described in his memoirs on WWII's build-up (The Gathering Storm) into intriguing relief. Also, how could I possibly not like a book that regularly reflects on the work of Jackie Fisher in creating the modern British navy (at that time) and often quotes from the great admiral's acerbic observations about command fitness with regard to naval officers who are merely part of the old boys' network.

It was incredibly interesting to read about the post-Jutland controversy with regard to Jellicoe's actions versus Beatty's. Beatty's carelessness seems to have cost an opportunity for Jutland to be a more decisive action as did Jellicoe's cautiousness. Certainly, Massie's account is no friend to Beatty.

Of course, Churchill doesn't fare too well at Massie's hand either. Churchill's ham-handed telegraphy when serving in the admiralty probably cost a lot of men their lives when he insisted that the old aging hulk known as Canopus was sufficient to respond to a request for reinforcement.

Most importantly, I had no clue that, in spite of the Armistice in November of 1918, there were more German casualties in June of 1919 when the crews of the surrendered German vessels scuttled them in Scapa Flow and tried to evacuate. Fascinating!

[Christopher Saunders · Rating 3 out of 5]

Robert K. Massie's Castles of Steel is the kind of doorstop military history I've grown weary of reading. Massie's book is an extremely detailed, generally readable account of the First World War at sea, discussing a combination of the war's fleet actions, individual combats, submarine warfare and amphibious operations. Obviously, the main protagonists in this war on Britain's Royal Navy, the lifeblood of the British Empire, and the Imperial High Seas Fleet of Germany, anxious to secure the Kaiser's "place in the Sun." Massie does impressive work showing the scope of the combat, from the actions at Coronel and the Falklands to the Dardanelles landings and massive North Sea clashes, culminating in the epochal Battle of Jutland. He also does a fine job sketching the key personalities: the ambitious Winston Churchill and prickly Admirals Beatty and Jellicoe, the chivalrous Graf von Spee and vacillating Admiral Keppler. Yet it must be said that the book often bogs down in detail about naval maneuvers, battleship specs and strategic assessments to a degree that's more often tedious than engrossing. Massie, such an elegant writer in his works on Russian history, struggles to make this subject nearly as compelling, though not for want of trying. Books like this have a definite niche, but mostly I'd recommend it for hardcore military buffs who don't mind long discussions of battleship armor and maneuverability. Something like Richard Hough's The Great War at Sea (half as long, and more spritely written) should suffice for everyone else.

[Marcus · Rating 5 out of 5]

After having the tremendous pleasure of reading "Dreadnought", Massie's book which deals with the decades immediately preceding outbreak of World War I, I had very high expectations for this book. I am absolutely delighted to announce that they have not been disappointed, but actually exceeded.
When it comes to history books, I try to evaluate them from two perspectives - content and narrative. In regard of content, "Castles of steel" - a single volume naval history of World War I - covers admirably all the bases. The initial phase of the conflict, the cruiser warfare period, Dardanelles, Gallipoli, Dogger Bank, the titanic and anti-climactic clash at Jutland and Germany's submarine campaigns are all dealt with in slow, easy to comprehend and methodical manner. The author is admirably clear both in his narrative of the operations and battles as well as his personal analysis of the events he describes. As a history book, this is one of the best I've read.
And yet, it is not the academic qualities of this book that make it into a gem that it is, but its literary quality. "Castles of steel" is simply a pure joy to read due to Massie's narrative style, deceptively simple and unhurried and yet extremely rich both in detail as well as emotions of the moment.
"Castles of steel" needs to be read for anyone interested in World War I, naval warfare in general, but also for readers who simply enjoy a history book by an extremely talented writer.

[Garick Black · Rating 5 out of 5]

Massie has quickly become one of my favorite writers. His blend of technical detail with the human drive really appeals to me. For an American, Massie tells the story the way a European would. There is no quick exposition or future telling of future American glory. Massie understands both the German and British mindset before and during the war. He does not condemn the Germans for being the 'bad guys'. He does point out more flaws in the German thinking than the British, but that can also be attributed to who won the war.
Massie holds Jellicoe in high regard. Jellicoe is the only admiral who has his mistakes defended and a sizable portion of the post Jutland account in Castles of Steel is spent illustrating how the defensive posture of the Grand Fleet was the best choice for the war. He has a much lower opinion of Beatty, Massie holds Hiddenburgh and Ludendorff responsible for the downfall of the German Empire. In particular, Ludendorff is made a fool out of and is the only German who is implicitly connected to Hitler by Massie in this book. These judgements are not wrong, but do seem to carry more emphasis to Massie than other prominent leaders.
This is one of the best and most rounded books I have read that deals with WWI. I firmly recommend this.

[Melinda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been listening to the book-on-CD of this, read masterfully by Richard Matthews. (his reading of Churchill is wonderful!) At 33 CD's, it is a long book. However, surprisingly to me, it is gripping reading (or listening). I have found myself learning with real anticipation about Admiral John Jellico, Admiral of the British Fleet during most of WW1; Admiral David Beatty, who led the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron under Jellicoe and then succeeded Jellicoe as Admiral of the British Fleet in 1919; Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty until 1916; David Lloyd George, Prime Minister after the fall of Asquith as PM.... and the list goes on. History lives!

I have enjoyed this book tremendously, and especially the quotes from letters and diaries which tells history in the words of those who lived it. I have a deeper appreciation of the desire for "noble warriors" among both the German and British Navy as they fought each other. Hampered by those in authority over them (the Kaiser in Germany's case, Churchill in Britain's case), the real men who fought and WERE THERE, impress me as none other.

Highly recommended.

[N.N. Heaven · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a much anticipated re-read for me. Having the pleasure of owning Dreadnought by Massie, I was tingling with anticipation to get my hands on this sequel. Re-reading it gave me the same sense of pleasure. Massie is able to capture, in vivid detail, every aspect of the Royal Navy in it's clash with Germany in World War 1. For a fan of Naval History this is a must own. With the 100th anniversary of World War 1 upon us this is a timely read for everyone. Some take issue with the presentation of Churchill but the truth hurts. When young Churchill was driven and dedicated but willful and that led to him charging forward when taking a long second look would have been better.

This book is 11 stars out of 5 but I suppose 5+ is the best that can be conventionally awarded.

[Dj · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a well researched and well presented book. (I listened to it on CD.)
If I was more interested in the topic at large I would have been enraptured.
The book takes incidents and lets you know information about the ships involved as well as the commanding officers. It doesn't overwhelm you with minutiae and it keeps your interest. Even mine.
For those with an interest in WWI naval actions I would suggest rushing out and getting this book.

[Audrey Knutson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book might seem ridiculously long for a war that only have 1 major naval battle and I never thought I could finish such a long book about naval warfare in WWI! But now that I have, I wish there was more to read.

I first read Massie's "Dreadnought" and loved it. However, again, it was a long book and didn't EVEN touch on WWI so I took a few years break before picking up "Castles of Steel." I wish I had read them closer together. Dreadnought provides all the relevant context and background of both the Royal and Imperial Navies from the Victorian Era/unification of the German Empire up until WWI. While it's not necessary to read it, I would highly recommend doing so before reading "Castles." I continually had to flip to it to remind myself the differences between the types of ships and the character histories of some of the main players. I know it's a lot, but they really are best read one after another.

Just like "Dreadnought," "Castles" is a suprisingly easy read considering the length and the material. I like books on military history but admittedly have never read a book about navies and know next to nothing about naval history. Massie does a great job of making the information accessible to a novice and I especially appreciated his habit of repeating and summarizing relevant information before, during, and after events in a way that wasn't boring or redundant. And unlike other military histories, Massie makes battles and action sequences come alive with detail and description and doesn't just throw a bunch of numbers around at the reader.

I also like how much research Massie has thrown into this and has dispelled a lot of misinformation disseminated since the Battle of Jutland and I am proud to say I am team J.Jellicoe. He makes me want to pick up more advanced books now about Jutland and Gallipoli. I will definitely be reading this book again.

[Redsteve · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m definitely getting out of my historical comfort zone with this book – other than local (New Orleans) history, 1900 is about as recent as I get (and generally much further back than that). I have to admit that going into this I was somewhat clueless about WWI and very clueless about naval history at that time. I know about the Lusitania, and my knowledge of the Dardanelles Campaign can pretty much be summed up in the lyrics to “And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda”. I did very much enjoy this. It’s well-written, readable and well-researched. Be advised, though, that it ISN’T short. It covers everything from detailed accounts of the battles, strategic planning, politics, espionage, technology and even the personal lives of key figures. Massie’s histories are as much biographical as they are historical. I assume that he subscribes to the “great man” theory, at least to the extent that the events are shaped by the actions and personalities of individuals (not always great, and, in many cases, severely flawed) rather than impersonal forces. Events in this book are often attributed to mistakes made by key people; victories were usually by one side not screwing up while someone on the other side screwed the proverbial pooch (or made false assumptions or failed to communicate with his co-officers). Well worth the read. Castles of Steel is actually the sequel to Dreadnought (also excellent) , which documents the rise of modern navies and the growing competition and distrust between Britain and Germany. You don’t need to read Dreadnought first, but it helps, especially with the technology and background details.

[Peter Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a solid book that despite the length, doesn't ever outstay its welcome. The writing is engaging and the research very thorough. The prose can be dramatic on occasion, such as the description of the High Seas Fleet emerging through the smoke and mist to see the Grand Fleet bearing down upon it.

Despite being about Britain and Germany, the book is mostly written from a British perspective, with the events of the Germans not given quite the same depth. The personalities of Jellicoe and Beatty get far more space than Hipper and Sheer, for whom you don't get anywhere near the same feel.

Jellicoe comes out of this very well, whereas Beatty is shown to be mendacious and vain. Churchill comes out of it badly, with his meddling in areas outside his competence and understanding costing efficiency, opportunities and lives.

The sections on Jutland show how lucky the Germans were to get off so lightly. The battleships of the Grand Fleet were ready to return to the North Sea within a day or so, due to the damage they received, the Germans within a couple of months.

There were two notable omissions from this work. The raid on Zeebrugge and the K class submarines and subsequent debacle at May Island. Neither made an impact upon the wider course of the conflict, but are interesting in their own rights.

[Jordan McMullen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Robert Massie unfolds a story of naval action during the First World War. Often times this is overshadowed by the deadlock of the Trench warfare on land. This story is full of honor and bloodshed, individual valor, chaos and confusion. The men on both sides fought the first modern war.. where the latest tactics and writings were from those of the age of wooden ships and sail. Now they find themselves with fast moving steel ships, armed with 12-16 inch naval guns with the range of over a mile. Massie keeps the story flowing and entertaining. His chapters on the horrific experiences during the battle of Jutland just left me in reflective silence… where in an instance the lives of a thousand men on one ship can be wiped out in an flash of light and a magazine detonation like what occurred of HMS Indefatigable and HMS Queen Mary.

“As long as we live, they too will live as they are now apart of us as We remember them”

“Ich hatt einen kameraden, einen berssern findst du nicht”

[Richard Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thorough account.

This is a very good account of the naval war between Britain and Germany. The depth to which Robert Massie goes in analysing the strengths and weaknesses of both navies is astounding. As well as being excellent history, the book is elegantly written with a plethora of insights into the minds of the lords of both fleets. I can’t really praise it too highly. On a minor note, the book refers to possible submarine incursions into Scapa Flow. There is a reef called the Barrel of Butter which looks remarkably like a submarine at some stages of the tide and was shelled by nervous naval gunners. But this is an invaluable history of the times which doesn’t shrink from judgment of the shortcomings of both hierarchies,notably Beatty and Churchill.

[Marshall Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book! A follow on book to the author’s Dreadnought, this book tells the story of the naval war in WW I. Massie describes the major battles and events of the naval war - while he addresses the technical aspects of the ships that were engaged, his emphasis is on the personalities - the Kaiser, Churchill, Jellicoe, Beatty, Tirpitz, and other admirals and politicians.

[Георги Марков · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterpiece. Robert Massie achieves that rarest of feats - to deal with a specific academic problem and to write as a novelist. You can almost see the "Castles of Steel" sailing through the waves across the North Sea as if you were watching a motion picture.