Germany despatches the gunship SMS Panther to Morocco, sparking the Agadir Crisis.
The Agadir Crisis, Agadir Incident or Second Moroccan Crisis (also known as the Panthersprung in German) was a brief crisis sparked by the deployment of a substantial force of French troops in the interior of Morocco in April 1911 and the deployment of a German gunboat to Agadir, a Moroccan Atlantic port. Germany did not object to France's expansion but wanted territorial compensation for itself. Berlin threatened warfare, sent a gunboat, and stirred up German nationalists. Negotiations between Berlin and Paris resolved the crisis on 4 November 1911: France took over Morocco as a protectorate in exchange for territorial concessions to Germany from the French Congo.In Britain, David Lloyd George, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, made a dramatic "Mansion House" speech on 21 July 1911 with the consent of the prime minister and Foreign Secretary Grey, bypassing the non-interventionist majority in the Cabinet, that denounced the German move as an intolerable humiliation. There was talk of war and Germany backed down; relations between Berlin and London worsened and the British moved closer to France. Berlin felt humiliated and began to realize that it was operating with no allies against multiple adversaries.
SMS Panther was one of six Iltis-class gunboats of the Kaiserliche Marine and, like its sister ships, served in Germany's overseas colonies. The ship was launched on 1 April 1901 in the Kaiserliche Werft, Danzig. It had a crew of 9 officers and 121 men.