Abdication of Wilhelm II and the Dutch government, however, refused the Allies' requests to extradite him. King George V wrote that his cousin was "the greatest criminal in history", but opposed Prime Minister David Lloyd George's proposal to "hang the Kaiser". U.S. President Woodrow Wilson also opposed extradition, arguing that punishing Wilhelm would destabilize international order and lose the peace. Wilhelm first settled in Amerongen, where on 28 November he issued a belated statement of abdication of both the Prussian and imperial thrones. He also released his soldiers and officials in both Prussia and the empire from their oaths of loyalty to him. Wilhelm
SMS Kaiser Wilhelm II from this role in February 1915, after which she served as a command ship for the High Seas Fleet, based in Wilhelmshaven. Following the end of the war in November 1918, "Kaiser Wilhelm II" was stricken from the navy list and sold for scrap in the early 1920s. Her bow ornament is preserved at the Military History Museum of the Bundeswehr in Dresden. After the German "Kaiserliche Marine" (Imperial Navy) ordered the four s in 1889, a combination of budgetary constraints, opposition in the "Reichstag" (Imperial Diet), and a lack of a coherent fleet plan delayed the acquisition of further