The French fleet : ships, strategy and operations, 1870-1918 /Ruggero Stanglini and Michele Cosentino.

"At the end of the 1870-1 Franco-Prussian war, the French Navy began to reconstruct its fleet, but the process was slow and erratic principally because priority was initially given to the army. Nevertheless, French naval yards and private shipyards were tasked with building a fleet of ironclads, cruisers and minor vessels which led France to become the second European naval power, at least quantitatively. The rise of the 'Jeune áEcole' (Young School) strategic naval concept in the early 1880s then changed shipbuilding priorities, and emphasis was given to coastal torpedo boats and cruisers. As a consequence, the French Navy implemented the dreadnought concept later than Great Britain and Germany. The 1904 Entente Cordiale contributed to yet further radical changes to foreign, naval and shipbuilding policies, so that at the outbreak of World War One the French fleet comprised a limited number of dreadnoughts, many obsolete armoured cruisers, an impressive array of torpedo boats and a fleet of submarines whose efficiency was questionable. The book provides a complete overview of the French Navy during this long era, and the complex French foreign and naval policy, shipyards and industrial organisation, technology and operations are all described in the first part of the volume, while the second and larger part is focused on the different categories of warships, including their qualitative and quantitative evolution during the period of 1871?1918 and their employment during the Great War. A chapter is also dedicated to naval aviation. Superbly illustrated with rare and carefully selected photographs, this major new volume paints a clear and detailed overview of the French navy during this era and is destined to become a classic reference work for this period."--Provided by the publisher.