Editing Anglo–Dutch wars (section)

=== First war: 1652–1654 ===
{{Main|First Anglo-Dutch War}}
[[File:Battle of Scheveningen (Slag bij Ter Heijde)(Jan Abrahamsz. Beerstraten).jpg|thumb|The [[Battle of Scheveningen]], 10 August 1653]]

As a result of Cromwell's ambitious programme of naval expansion, at a time when the Dutch admiralties were selling off many of their own warships, the English came to possess a greater number of larger and more powerful purpose-built warships than their rivals across the North Sea did. However, the Dutch had many more merchant ships, together with lower freight rates, better financing and a wider range of manufactured goods to sell – although Dutch ships were blocked by the Spanish from operations in most of [[southern Europe]], along the coasts of the 
[[Mediterranean Sea]], giving the English an advantage there.<ref>{{cite book |first=Jonathan I. |last=Israel |title=The Dutch Republic: Its Rise, Greatness and Fall, 1477–1806 |location=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1995 |page=713 |isbn=0-19-873072-1 }}</ref>

To protect English commercial interests in North America, in October 1651 the English Parliament passed the first of the [[Navigation Acts]], which mandated that all goods imported into England must be carried by English ships or vessels from the exporting countries, thus excluding (mostly Dutch) middlemen. Agitation among the Dutch merchants as a result of the Navigation Acts was further increased by Admiral Sir [[George Ayscue]]'s (1616-1652) capture in early 1652 of 27 Dutch merchant ships illegally trading with the English still royalist colony of [[Barbados]] in the [[West Indies]] islands chain of the [[Americas]], in contravention of an embargo imposed by the Parliamentarians. The Dutch responded to the growing tensions by enlisting large numbers of armed merchantmen into their navy. In 1652, Lord Protector Cromwell required all foreign warships in the [[North Sea]] or the [[English Channel]] to [[Striking the colors|lower their colours]] when encountering English warships. On 29 May 1652, Lieutenant-Admiral [[Maarten Tromp]] (1598–1653), refused to lower the colours of his ships after encountering an English fleet led by [[General at Sea]] [[Robert Blake (admiral)|Robert Blake]] (1598–1657). This resulted in a skirmish, the [[Battle of Dover (1652)|Battle of Dover]], off-shore of [[Dover, England]] in the [[English Channel]] in 1652, after which the Commonwealth of England then declared war on the Dutch Republic on 10 July.

After some inconclusive minor fights the English were successful in the first major battle, with Blake defeating the Dutch Vice-Admiral [[Witte de With]] (1599–1658), in the [[Battle of the Kentish Knock]] in October 1652. Believing that the war was all but over, the English divided their forces and in December were routed by the fleet of Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp at the [[Battle of Dungeness]] in the [[English Channel]]. The Dutch were also victorious in March 1653, at the [[Battle of Leghorn]] near Italy and had gained effective control of both the Mediterranean and the [[English Channel]]. Blake, recovering from an injury, rethought, together with Duke of Albemarle [[George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle|George Monck]] (1608–1670), the whole system of naval tactics, and after the winter of 1653 used the [[line of battle]], first to drive the [[Netherlands Navy|Dutch navy]] out of the English Channel in the [[Battle of Portland]] and then out of the [[North Sea]] in the [[Battle of the Gabbard]]. The Dutch were unable to effectively resist as the [[States General of the Netherlands]] had not in time heeded the warnings of their admirals that much larger warships were needed.

In the final [[Battle of Scheveningen]] on 10 August 1653, Tromp was killed, a blow to Dutch morale, but the English had to end their blockade of the Dutch coast. As both nations were by now exhausted and Cromwell had dissolved the aggressive warlike [[Rump Parliament]], ongoing peace negotiations could be brought to fruition, albeit after many months of slow diplomatic exchanges. The war ended on 5 April 1654, with the signing of the [[Treaty of Westminster (1654)|Treaty of Westminster]] of 1654 (ratified by the States General on 8 May), but the commercial rivalry was not resolved, the English having failed to replace the Dutch as the world's dominant trade nation. The treaty contained a secret annex, the [[Act of Seclusion]], forbidding the infant [[William III of England|Prince William III of Orange]] (future King [[William III of England|William III]] of England) from becoming also the Dutch stadtholder of the province of [[Holland]], which would prove to be a future cause of discontent. In 1653 the Dutch had started a major naval expansion programme of their own, building sixty larger vessels, partly closing the qualitative gap with the English naval fleet. Cromwell, having already started the [[Anglo-Spanish War (1654)|Anglo-Spanish War]] against Spain in 1654 without Dutch help, during his rule then avoided a new conflict with the fellow Republic on the continent, even though the Dutch in the same time period defeated his [[History of Portugal|Portuguese]] and [[Kingdom of Sweden|Swedish]] allies.