by RockyMountainNavy, 4 April 2024
Kriegsspiel is commonly accepted as the original wargame. Introduced in Prussia in 1824, it started as a game for military officers to practice maneuvering units in an army unable to afford regularly putting an actual army into the field. By the 1860s Kriegsspiel had evolved into a powerful tool for teaching officers about decision making in the fog and friction of war. In the journal article “‘Sharp like cut iron’: Albrecht von Stosch and the beginning of naval wargaming in the German navy,” wargamer and senior lecturer of history Jorit Wintjes writes of a lesser-known German wargame of this period, the Seekriegsspiel, that first appeared in the 1870s (Wintjes, p. 88).
For the Prussian army in the 1870s, Kriegsspiel was not a singular game. At that time there were three prominent versions of the wargame in use:
- The “small war game” Klein Kriegsspiel which was a tactical game for teaching battlefield tactics;
- The “large war game” Grosse Kriegsspiel which was an operational game for larger scenarios and;
- The “strategic war game” Strategisches Kriegsspiel for fighting entire campaigns (Vego, p. 111).
By the 1870s there were also other Kriegsspiel variants such as Festungskriegsspiel (siege warfare), Sanitatskriegsspiel(casualty management), and Nachschub- or Verpfleugungskriegsspiel (supply or logistics). It should be no surprise that a naval variation, Seekriegsspiel, appeared around this same time (Wintjes, p. 88).
From Krieg to See
The aftermath of the Franco-Prussian War saw the birth of a new German empire. In 1872, William I appointed General Albrecht von Stosh as chief of the Imperial Admiralty over the Kaiserliche Marine. Though nominally an admiral, “General von Stosh” initiated a program (System Stosh) to transform the navy. Stosh’s major goal was to professionalize navy officers. Amongst the changes introduced by Stosh was the creation of a Naval Academy (Marineakademie) modeled after the army’s War Academy (Kreigsakadamie) and the world’s first war college which predated the U.S. Navy War College by a dozen years (Sonderhaus, p. 106).
Why a navy wargame?
The introduction of Seekriegsspiel to the German navy was not without issue. In 1872 when Stosh looked to use wargaming for the navy he had those several versions of Kriegsspiel to choose from. The strategic version (Strategisches Kriegsspiel) was relatively easy to transfer to the navy given it focused not on tactical details of a battle but more generally on the movement of forces. The ‘strategic’ Kriegsspiel was for the most part easily adaptable for the German navy (Wintjes, pp. 88-89). As a tactical wargame, however, neither the “small” Klein Kriegsspiel nor “large” Grosse Kriegsspiel was directly useful for the navy. The reason, in part, was how Kriegsspiel had developed since the 1820’s. What started out as a maneuver simulator to provide players a sense of how much space armies occupied on the field of battle had evolved by 1872 into a decision simulator for training officers under stress from the friction and fog of war (Wintjes, p. 89).
Army vs. Navy
Stosh recognized the German navy needed a maneuver simulator capable of showing how warships move, turn, and fight. A major problem in developing a Seekriegsspiel was that there was no hard data to base the “game model” on. Few navies collected data on a ship’s performance beyond a top speed achieved on sea trials. Other data related to maneuvering (especially turning circles) was simply not collected making the first Seekriegspiel little more than a (barely) educated guess (Wintjes, p. 89).
Despite the lack of hard data, the German navy under Stosh pressed ahead with a Seekriegspiel composed of two parts: a strategic game for locating an enemy battlefleet and a tactical game fought on 1:2000 scale navigation charts. No records of these rules apparently exist, but there is some evidence the games used some form of turning and movement templates as well as umpires and possibly dice to resolve outcomes (Wintjes, p. 90). What does seem clear is that by 1876 the German naval academy was using some form of Seekriegsspiel to train officers (Wintjes, p. 85).
Castle maneuvers
At the same time the German Seekriegsspiel was developing, across the English Channel the Royal Navy took an interest in wargaming. The first naval wargame in Britain was ‘On the Game of Naval Tactics’ by Lieutenant William McCoy Fitzgerald Castle, RN, published in 1873 in Britain and translated into German in 1877. Castle’s game—which lacked a combat mechanism—focused strictly on maneuvering ships. (Wintjes, p. 91).
[Interlude – ‘On the Game of Naval Tactics’]
[On the surface, Castle’s ‘On the Game of Naval Tactics’ appears very much to be the tactical maneuver simulator the German navy needed. When Castle spoke to the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in 1873 about his game, this interesting exchange on “design intent” took place that most every wargamer—and wargame designer—can likely relate to:
“Lieutenant BROWN, R.N.: I should like to ask the lecturer, as no arms are used by the ships, what is the ultimate issue of the game as played between the two players according to the present rules. I mean, what influences the decision of the umpire with respect to various ships and the ultimate issue of the game?”
“Lieutenant CASTLE: I am rather afraid the Lieutenant Brown has mistaken what I wish to convey to the meeting. What I have been working at for some time, is to show what I have shown you this evening. I have not attempted — nor do I intend to attempt, until I have worked through the whole of the Evolutionary Signal-Book and really fought this battle – to enter into the subject of the power of one ship against another while fighting….It appears to me that the climax of what is to be done at present is to bring the squadrons into contact with one another…Whenever I have played this game, these are the points that we have always argued about. I have not the power at present of deciding which ship will have the advantage when in actual contact. One man would say, ‘My guns will penetrate your armour.’ Another will say, ‘My armour will resist your guns;’ and all this provokes discussion. I do not think, at the present moment, that I am prepared to discuss with anybody that portion of the game.” (Curry, p. 39)]
The Grosser Kurfürst affair
In mid-1878 a catastrophe occurred in the German navy that would call the value of the tactical Seekriegsspiel into question. On 31 May 1878, a German squadron of three ironclads was sailing down the English Channel when disaster struck. As Wintjes relates:
“The German squadron was sailing in two divisions, the ironclads SMS Kronprinz Wilhelm (flag) and SMS Pruessen forming the port division while SMS Grosser Kurfürst, Germany’s newest ironclad which had been commissioned barely a month earlier, formed the starboard division. The flagship and SMS Grosser Kurfurst both turned to give way to sailing vessels, but when the later turned to resume its old course, SMS Kronzprinz Wilhelm instead seemed to turn in the opposite direction. As both ships were close to each other, a collision was unavoidable. The flagship struck SMS Grosser Kurfürst abaft the mainmast, and the results were immediate and catastrophic. Watertight bulkheads had been open, and with water gushing in through the large hole torn by SMS Kronprinz Wilhelm‘s ram, the wounded ironclad soon heeled over, and sank in less than ten minutes. Despite immediate assistance by the two other ironclads and fishermen from Folkestone, more than 250 officers and men perished, the single largest loss of life in the history of the Prusso-German navy to date” (Wintjes, p. 84).
In the four court martials that followed it was System Stosh that came under fire. Specifically, the seemingly failed efforts by Stosh to professionalize the officers of the German navy. Inevitably, the question of the usefulness of Seekriegsspiel arose given it was introduced into the naval academy in 1876 (Wintjes, p. 85).
[Interlude – Don’t blame the game?]
[H.W. Wilson’s account of the sinking of SMS Grosser Kurfürst, written in 1926, is perhaps one of the more detailed written and allows us to make our own analysis of ship movements in terms of Castle’s ‘On the Game of Naval Tactics.’ As Wilson relates:
“The formation adopted was a triangular one, the König Wilhelm leading, and the Preussen following astern, in line with her. To starboard of the flagship, slightly abaft the beam, was the Grosser Kurfürst. Her distance to König Wilhelm had originally been 400 yards, but an hour before the collision, she had been ordered to draw closer, till only 110 yards parted the two vessels, and from the shore it was noticed they were in dangerous proximity. While steaming thus, two sailing vessels, hauled to the wind on the port tack, crossed the bows of the squadron. In obedience to the rule of the road, the Kurfürst ported her helm, and turned to starboard to clear them. Having done this, she turned sharply to port to recover her original direction.”
“The König Wilhelm at first tried to pass ahead of the sailing vessels, but finding this impossible, turned to starboard, and found the Grosser Kurfürst lying across her bows, at right angles to her course. To avoid the collision now imminent, the Grosser Kurfürst’s captain went full steam ahead, and tried to cross the bows of the oncoming ship in time to clear her. Seeing this was impossible, he essayed to turn to starboard, hoping to come round on a course parallel to the König Wilhelm, or at least to receive only a glancing blow. On board the König Wilhelm, both admiral and captain were below, and in these few critical instants there was not time to summon them on deck, or for them to do anything if they had been summoned. The helm was in charge of a petty officer, a one-year volunteer of no experience, and six raw recruits. When the watch officer gave orders for the helm to be starboarded, to bring the ship round to port, the men got confused, and instead of obeying the order, did the exact opposite, and ported the helm, thus swinging the ram more round to starboard, whilst the Kurfürst’s stern swung round to port to meet it. As the collision was now inevitable, the order on board the König Wilhelm was given to reverse the engines, and they were actually going astern at the moment of impact” (Wilson, pp. 288-289).
By my analysis, given that each division of Castle’s Playing Board—drawn at 4″ increments—represents one nautical mile (2,000 yards) the extremely close formation of the German squadron would have placed all three ships within the same 1″x1″ area of the Playing Board. Though the game has tables for distance travelled down to five second increments, the inability to clearly plot those small distances render those movement tables useless. At best, Castle’s naval wargame had use for showing the approach two fleets but little use for squadron close formation maneuvering. It seems that I am not the only one to feel that way. In his 1873 RUSI game discussion, Castle was questioned on the movement scale of the game:
“Lieutenant BROWN: Have you ever tried the game at quarter scale?”
“Lieutenant CASTLE: No, I have not; and I do not put much faith in it. It might be necessary when you are within 200 yards of each other, and when you come to fight with individual ships; but otherwise I do not put much faith in it. It would only be necessary when you come to fighting individual vessels within 200 yards of each other” (Curry, p. 39).]
The Duel
In 1879, a second naval wargame was published in Britain when Captain Philip Howard Columb, RN, published The Duel. Columb’s game depicted a ship-on-ship fight in an interesting design:
“The intention to keep the game as close to available data as possible resulted in a number of design decisions that seem slightly outlandish at first. The game assumed both ships were operating at fixed speeds, and it was not possible for the participants to alter the speed once the game was underway; in addition, the movement and turn templates provided by the game allowed only two different speeds, 10.4 knots and 8.2 knots. Two different scales were used as it was assumed that the engagement would have two distinct phases, and artillery duel for which a 1:7,200 scale was used, followed by ramming attempts for which a 1:2,400 scale was provided (Wintjes, p. 91).”
[At 1:2,400 scale the SMS Grosser Kurfürst collision would have taken place in about a 2″x2″ area. Not great, but still a bit better than Castle’s naval war game…]
The Duel was translated into German within a year but with a significant change that allowed the ‘inactive’ player to change course and speed during the ‘active’ player’s turn (an early form of “reaction movement” in a wargame design). Wintjes speculates that German navy officers likely adapted the rules of The Duel to meet their needs and preferences (Wintjes, pp. 92-93). It looks like wargames and house rules have long been associated!
While The Duel never caught on in Britain for 30 years it remained an important part of German naval wargaming. Yet, as soon as 1885 the need for a better combat model was being heard (Wintjes, p. 93).
Admiralstabsreise
As tactical wargaming in the German navy grew the focus on the larger-scale Kriegsspiel never waned. An example of German naval wargaming in the 1880’s is found in the book By Order of the Kaiser by Terrel D. Gottschall. For the 1887-1888 academic year, Kapitan zur See Otto von Diederichs was ordered to direct an Admiralstabsreise, or “naval staff tour,” which was in effect a floating naval wargame version of the strategic Kriegsspiel. The intention of Diederichs’ particular Admiralstabreise was to develop a strategic and tactical program for the next summer’s maneuvers. The standard subject analyzed was a possible two-front war with Russia and France. The first phase of the game simulated defensive torpedo attacks against an enemy fleet striking Wilhemshaven. The second phase tested elements of a new operational plan titled, “Coastal War in the North Sea” that postulated a defensive war against a stronger naval power (i.e. France) (Gottschall, pp. 106-107).
Combat by Freddie
Following the publication of another British naval wargame by Fred Jane around the turn of the century a proper combat model was finally incorporated into Seekriegsspiel. This adoption in turn led to Seekriegsspiel becoming less a maneuver aid and even more of a decision aid (Wintjes, p. 93).
[Interlude – The Fred Jane Wargames]
[In his book Over Open Sights, John Curry explains that the Fred Jane Wargame was actually several wargames. Like so many titles today, the game quickly evolved over a short period of time with several versions coming out. The first version was The Jane Naval Wargame presented to RUSI in June 1898. Later in 1898 the first edition of “Rules for The Jane Naval War Game” were formally published. By 1904 Strand Magazine, a major global publication, carried a long article on the Fred Jane Game that talked about not only the game but how it was used to analyze the just-ended Russo-Japanese War (Curry, pp. 82-161).]
Wargames also became popular in official navy journals. In a 1903 edition of Marine Rundschau, an official navy publication, there appeared a long article on a wargame run by the Portsmouth Naval War Game Society—where Fred Jane was the Secretary—which played out a major conflict between Germany and the United States (aka “Plan Black”). Within the wargame several tactical scenario were played using Fred Jane’s naval wargame. The German author concluded that “attempts to resolve tactical situations by using this type of wargame [i.e. Jane’s wargame] were commendable” (Wintjes, p. 93).
The 1904 Strand Magazine article on the Fred Jane naval wargame includes an anecdote concerning a game supposedly played by the German Kaiser themself. The story goes this way:
“One of the earliest experimenters with the naval war game was the ubiquitous Kaiser. He took to it keenly, and himself played it often with his admirals. One day, so runs the story in the German Navy, the Kaiser was winning hand over fist, his fleet, led by his flagship, bearing down upon the enemy. Excitement was high, when at the critical moment the Kaiser’s fleet suddenly disappeared!”
“The Kaiser gazed at the deserted board and then at his admirals. An ‘awkward pause’ is said to have ensued, and the writer for one can quite believe that. It is undoubtably an awkward thing to seem to have played tricks with an Emperor so as to cheat him out of victory.”
“‘Where is my fleet?’ asked the Kaiser.”
“‘I do not know, sire,’ exclaimed his chief opponent, a famous admiral. He saluted as he spoke, and thereupon fell to the floor, apparently from down the admiral’s sleeve, three of the missing warships! What the admiral felt is better imagined than described.”
“Fortunately for his reputation one model still remained stuck in his sleeve. In moving his own ships he had rested his arm on the Kaiser’s vessels, and so had lifted the lot unawares. All’s well that ends well, and the Kaiser laughed most heartily; but there is an admiral in the German fleet whom it is in no way wise to talk about naval war game” (Curry, p. 155).
A more believable example of the employment of Seekriegsspiel leading up to World War I was the May 1914 report of Admiral Maximilian von Spee, commanding the German East Asia Squadron. Spee forwarded the scenario and after action reports of two Seekriegsspiel testing the viability of German war plans which indicated that the plans for the East Asia Squadron to stay in the Far East were unrealistic. The wargame results led to Spee suggesting a new course of action of sailing for Europe by way of South America. When the war started Spee followed the new course of action, alas only to come to a tragic end off the Falklands (Wintjes, p. 94).
[Interlude – The U.S. Navy Chart Maneuvers]
[But what about the U.S. Navy? A short history of the early years of U.S. Navy wargaming is found in the book Playing War: Wargaming and U.S. Navy Preparations for World War II by John M. Lillard. In 1887, only three years after it was opened, the U. S. Naval War College incorporated a wargaming program based on the three prominent Kriegsspiel of the day. The three games were a ship-vs-ship duel, a fleet-vs-fleet game, and a strategic game to depict an entire theater of operations. Like the Royal Navy, the dueling tactical game quickly fell out of favor in the U.S. Navy.
Over time, however, the U.S. Navy version of Kriegsspiel evolved into an exercise called the Navy Chart Maneuvers. In this game two teams first prepared plans and then issued orders to their forces using a chart of the operations area. The physical separation of the teams—in different rooms—created the “fog of war.” As both sides scouted for the other, game umpires maintained a “master plot” which was used to parse out reports to either side. When the fleets had moved to engagement range, play transitioned from the charts to large-scale play on the floor using small models of individual ships. The floor of Luce Hall had 40 inch square grids on the floor with each square subdivided into smaller four inch squares. The scale used was 250 yards per inch and each turn was three minutes of time (thus taking advantage of the “3-Minute Rule” where the distance a ship moves in three minutes is the speed of the ship in knots times 100 equaling the distance in yards moved). Each turn students maneuvered their ships and fired at the other side. Umpires were responsible for evaluating hits and assessing damage (Lillard, pp. 5-6).]
Do you want to know more?
For as much a maritime nation Britain was it was Germany that was the leader in using naval wargames from the 1870s through to World War I. After Columb brought The Duel to RUSI in 1879 the Royal Navy expressed an interest but never officially adopted the wargame. The German navy, on the other hand, adopted The Duel and used it in some form for almost 30 years until it was superseded by a version of Fred Jane’s naval wargame. Yet, beyond a few examples such as Diederichs’ 1877-1888 Admiralstabsreise, the (apocryphal?) Strand Magazine article in 1904, or Spee’s Seekriegsspiels of 1914, little other direct impact of Seekriegsspiel within the German navy is known. As Wintjes point out, there are still many questions and much more research to be done. (Wintjes, p. 95).
References:
- Curry, J. (2022). Over Open Sights: Early Naval Wargaming Rules 1873-1904 – Early Wargames Volume 6. History of Wargaming Project.
- Gottschall, T. (2003). By Order of the Kaiser: Otton von Diederichs and the Rise of the Imperial German Navy, 1865-1902. Naval Inst. Press.
- Lillard, J. M. (2016). Playing War: Wargaming and U.S. Navy Preparations for World War II. Potomac Books, an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press.
- Sondhaus, L. (1997). Preparing for Weltpolitik: German Sea Power Before the Tirpitz Era. Naval Inst. Press.
- Vego, M. (2012) “German War Gaming,” Naval War College Review: Vol. 65: No. 4, Article 10. Available at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol65/iss4/10.
- Wilson, H. W. (1995). Battleships in Action: Volume I. Naval Inst. Press.
- Wintjes, J. (2024) ‘Sharp like cut iron’: Albrecht von Stosch and the beginning of naval wargaming in the German navy, The Mariner’s Mirror, 110:1, 84-96, DOI: 10.1080/00253359.2024.2291953
Feature image: “The German ironclad Grosser Kurfurst, lately sunk off Folkestone.” Illustration for The Illustrated London News, 15 June 1878. Volume: 72, Issue: 2033.
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