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August Crisis and Sweden Enters to the
Great War
Commander of Russian Baltic Navy admiral Nikolai von Essen
It was August 9, 1914. Great War was begun only couple weeks earlier. Commander of Russian Baltic Navy admiral Nikolai Von Essen approached with some of his ships Gotland and Fårosund naval base. Von Essen was sure that Sweden might enter to war side of Central Powers so he was going commit pre-emptive strike against Swedish navy. At 6.21 AM Russian navy arrived to the naval base but navy wasn't there. But there was some defensive batteries so Essen decided destroy these and then go search Swedish ships. Soon Russians met Swedes who were returning from Stockholm Archipelago. There was some shoot exchange between the navies. Then Russians returned to their base. Both sides suffered some damages and during incident 92 Swedes and 12 Russians were killed.
News about events of Fårosund arrived soon to Stockholm. King Gustav V called government to meeting. On same time there was demonstrations front of parliament and embassy of Russia. People demand reparation and some even demand declaration of war for Russia. On same day government of Sweden sent letter to government of Russia where they demand apology, reparations, firing of Von Essen and promising to respect neutrality of Sweden. Two days later Russia answered and refused about reparations and firing of the admiral. It too stated that they didn't know about Essen's acts. Government of Sweden wasn't happy and this caused serious crisis which United Kingdom and France tried mediate. UK and France weren't happy for acts of Russia but they wanted keep Sweden outside of the war. But they couldn't got any agreement and finally Sweden declared war for Russia on August 18. United Kingdom and France tried pressure Sweden to peace but they failed and them had declare war to Sweden on August 23.
Sweden mobilised its forces relatively quickly. Swedish army and navy were pretty good condition but bigger problem was that the country hasn't been on war since days of Napoleon. First shootings happened on August 20 on border of Sweden and Russia. On next day Swedish navy met Russian navy nearby Åland.