SMS Kaiser Barbarossa with of armor plating, and the secondary casemates received of armor protection. Kaiser Wilhelm II, the Emperor of Germany, believed that a strong navy was necessary for the country to expand its influence outside continental Europe. As a result, he initiated a program of naval expansion in the late 1880s; the first battleships built under this program were the four "Brandenburg"-class ships. These were immediately followed by the five "Kaiser Friedrich III"-class battleships, of which "Kaiser Barbarossa" was a member. "Kaiser Barbarossa"s keel was laid down on 3 August 1898, at the Schichau-Werke in Danzig, under construction number 640. She
Kaiser-class battleship the last ship of the class to be sunk, slipped beneath the surface at 14:00. She was raised on 14 May 1936, and broken up that year in Rosyth. Kaiser-class battleship The "Kaiser" class was a class of five battleships that were built in Germany prior to World War I and served in the Imperial German Navy during the war. They were the third class of German dreadnoughts, and the first to feature turbine engines and superfiring turrets. The five ships were , , , , and . As was usual for German battleships of the period, the "Kaiser" class