HMAS Australia (1911) fighter—and operated them until the end of the war. The 2nd BCS again supported minelayers in the North Sea between 25–26 June and 29–30 July. During September and October, "Australia" and the 2nd BCS supervised and protected minelaying operations north of Orkney. When the armistice with Germany was signed on 11 November 1918 to end World War I, one of the conditions was that the German High Seas Fleet was to be interred at Scapa Flow. The German fleet crossed the North Sea, and on 21 November, the British Grand Fleet sailed out to meet it; "Australia" led the port
Historiography of the causes of World War I from Grand Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, who supported the idea of starting a war but argued that the German Navy needed more time to prepare and asked that the war be put off until the summer of 1914. The Kaiser agreed to Tirpitz's request. In 1973, the British historian John Röhl noted that in view of what Fischer had uncovered, especially the War Council meeting of December 8, 1912, that the idea that Germany bore the main responsibility for the war was no longer denied by the vast majority of historians, although Fischer later denied claiming that the war was