Zeppelins, scouting, and German risk theory

Rigid airships offered Germany long range, endurance, altitude, a broad ocean view, enough lift for contemporary wireless equipment, and early immunity from aerial attack. Alfred von Tirpitz doubted their reliability and resisted diverting money from battleships and torpedo boats, while the enormous craft also required equally substantial bases and shelters. German planning expected the Royal Navy to attempt a close blockade in coastal waters where mines and torpedoes could reduce British dreadnought superiority. Britain instead adopted a distant blockade after studying mine losses in the Russo-Japanese War. Tirpitz's risk theory assumed even a victorious Britain would lose enough ships to become vulnerable to another naval power, but Britain's two-power standard demanded losses Germany was unlikely to inflict. Constrained from risking its capital ships, the High Seas Fleet pursued traps and ambushes intended to isolate parts of the Grand Fleet, a policy that demanded continual reconnaissance. The fleet had underinvested in scout cruisers, so Zeppelins became a rapid if vulnerable answer to the resulting scouting gap.