But at the same time, Eulenburg's rejection of navalism was based on the idea that it was the wrong way to pursue German ambitions.

The Naval Aristocracy: The Golden Age of Annapolis and the Emergence of Modern American Navalism.

Raeder was later to argue that Wilhelm had made many mistakes during his reign, but stated that Wilhelm's navalism and his commitment to making Germany a global power were not one of them.

Finally, Raeder's endless championship of the Seemachtideologie and of the need for the Navy to have primacy in the defence budget bore fruit, and Hitler was won over to the cause of navalism.

General Franz Halder after reading some of Raeder's memos wrote in his diary of "navalism run amuck" and commented about Raeder and other admirals that: "These people dream in continents".

Through Raeder had doubts about Hitler's commitment to navalism, the banning of the SPD and KPD together with the militarist and ultra-nationalist tone of the new regime were appealing to him.

Eulenburg, who was a strong German imperialist, had some doubts about Wilhelm's navalism and became the most prominent member of Wilhelm II's entourage being promoted from being a member of the diplomatic corps to an ambassador.

Shortly afterwards, Raeder had his first private meeting with Hitler, and came away impressed, believing that if Hitler was no navalist, then he could be made into one just like his mentor Tirpitz had converted Wilhelm II to navalism.

For Raeder, the first step towards persuading decision-makers to adopt navalist policies again was to end the damaging debates about what went wrong in the First World War, and instead project a positive image of the Navy's history that was meant to sway decision-makers into navalism.

In private, Raeder often fumed against the Social Democrats for playing "party politics" with the naval budget, as he deemed their opposition to navalism, and which was incensed that the S.P.D were against even building up the Navy to the levels allowed by the Treaty of Versailles.

Raeder's testimony had been intended to help clear the consciences of Müller and other S.P.D ministers who were planning to perform a policy U-turn on the "pocket battleships" by stressing that he was supposedly not returning to the policy of Tirpitz and aggressive navalism.

One strand associated with Tirpitz, Raeder and others was focused on navalism, colonialism overseas and was very anti-British while another stand associated with the NSDAP and the Army was very anti-Slavic and focused on obtaining lebensaum in Eastern Europe.