Editing Erich Raeder (section)

=== Imperial German Navy ===
Raeder joined the ''Kaiserliche Marine'' (Imperial Navy) in 1894 and rapidly rose in rank, becoming Chief of Staff for Franz von Hipper in 1912. From 1901 to 1903 Raeder served on the staff of Prince Heinrich of Prussia, and gained a powerful patron in the process.<sup>[2]</sup> Raeder's rise up the ranks was due mostly to his intelligence and hard work.<sup>[3]</sup> Owing to his cold and distant personality, Raeder was a man whom even his friends often admitted to knowing very little about.<sup>[3]</sup> The dominating figure of the Navy was Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the autocratic State Secretary of the Navy. Tirpitz's preferred means of obtaining "world power status" was through his ''Risikotheorie'' (risk theory) where Germany would build a ''Risikoflotte''
(Risk Fleet) that would make it too dangerous for Britain to risk a war
<nowiki> </nowiki>with Germany, and thereby alter the international balance of power 
decisively in the ''Reich'''s favor. Tirpitz transformed the Navy from the small coastal defense force of 1897 into the mighty High Seas Fleet of 1914.
Raeder was married in 1903 and had three children by his first wife.<sup>[4]</sup> In 1904, Raeder, who spoke fluent Russian, was sent to the Far East as an observer of the Russo-Japanese War.<sup>[4]</sup>
Starting in 1905, Raeder worked in the public relations section of the
Navy, where he first met Tirpitz and began his introduction to politics 
by briefing journalists to run articles promoting the ''Seemachtideologie'' and meeting politicians who held seats in the ''Reichstag'' in order to convert them to the ''Seemachtideologie''.<sup>[5]</sup> Working closely with Tirpitz, Raeder was heavily involved in the lobbying the ''Reichstag'' to pass the Third Navy Law of 1906 which committed Germany to building "all big gun battleships" to compete with the new British ''Dreadnought'' class in the Anglo-German naval race that had begun early in the 20th century.<sup>[6]</sup>

Raeder was the captain of Kaiser Wilhelm II's
<nowiki> </nowiki>private yacht in the years leading up to [[World War I]]. In itself, this 
was not a rewarding post, but often people in this post were quickly 
promoted afterwards.<sup>[7]</sup>