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Imperial German plans for the invasion of the United States were ordered by Germany's Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm II from 1897 to 1903. Wilhelm II did not intend to conquer the US; he wanted only to reduce the country's influence. His planned invasion was supposed to force the US to bargain from a weak position; to sever its growing economic and political connections in the Pacific, the Caribbean and South America; and to increase Germany's influence in those places. The first plan was made in the winter of 1897–1898 by Lieutenant Eberhard von Mantey; it mainly targeted American naval bases in Hampton Roads in order to reduce and constrain the US Navy and threaten Washington, D.C.. In March 1899, after significant gains made by the US in the Spanish–American War, the plan was altered to focus on a land invasion of New York City and Boston. In August 1901, Lieutenant Hubert von Rebeur-Paschwitz spied on the target areas and reported back. A third plan was drawn up in November 1903 by naval staff officer Wilhelm Büchsel, called Operation Plan III (''Operationsplan III'' in German), with minor adjustments made to the amphibious landing locations and immediate tactical goals. The Imperial German Navy under Grand Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz expanded greatly from 1898 to 1906 but was never large enough to carry out the plans, and there is no indication that they were ever seriously considered. The German Army under Field Marshal Alfred von Schlieffen, responsible for at least 100,000 troops in the invasion, was certain the proposal would end in defeat. The plans were permanently shelved in 1906 and did not become public until 2002 when they were rediscovered in the German military archive in Freiburg. The general staffs of all major powers make hypothetical war plans. The main objective is to estimate the amount of resources necessary to carry it out, so that if the crisis ever emerged, precious time would not be wasted. Since all nations do it routinely, there is no sense that the plans developed by junior officers had any impact on national decision-making. Most of these plans never leave the war department. ==Background== Germany was a latecomer in the Empire Race, which was already well under way when the country was unified in 1871. Germany, like almost all Western European states during the late 19th century, wanted the honor and security of having a large colonial empire so it could increase its power and wealth. German foreign policy in that period was intensely nationalistic; it changed from ''Realpolitik'' to the more aggressive ''Weltpolitik'' in an effort to expand the German Empire.〔Fromkin, David (2004). ''Europe's Last Summer: Who started the Great War in 1914?'', Vintage Books, pp. 17–20〕〔Lyons, Michael J. (2000). ''World War I: A Short History'', Prentice Hall, pp. 11–17.〕 Kaiser Wilhelm II was jealous of the growing economic influence of the United States over the Pacific and South America. He determined to intervene and replace US with German economic power. He felt that having a major Caribbean naval base in Cuba or Puerto Rico would be the first step in this intervention, and that this would also serve to counter US control of the Panama Canal, then under construction. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Imperial German plans for the invasion of the United States」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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