"Kansas" began a series of extensive maneuvers in early 1912, based out of Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. She returned to Hampton Roads to greet a squadron of German warships—the battlecruiser and the light cruisers and —that visited the port from 28 May to 8 June. "Kansas" then embarked on a training cruise along the east coast of the United States for midshipmen from the US Naval Academy on 21 June. She returned the midshipmen to Annapolis on 30 August. On 15 November, she began a training cruise to the Gulf of Mexico, arriving back in Philadelphia for an overhaul on 21 December. She returned to duty on 5 May 1913 and cruised the east coast for the next several months. On 25 October, she crossed the Atlantic and cruised the Mediterranean Sea, which included a stop in Genoa, Italy. After returning to Guantánamo Bay, she was sent to the coast of Mexico to protect US interests during the Mexican Revolution. The ship was back in Norfolk on 14 March 1914, and another overhaul at Philadelphia followed on 11 April. On 1 July, "Kansas" steamed out of Norfolk to carry the remains of the recently deceased Venezuelan ambassador to the United States back to his home country. She arrived in La Guaira on 14 July before returning to the Mexican coast to support the forces occupying Veracruz. She left the area on 29 October to respond to unrest in Port au Prince, Haiti, arriving on 3 November. She remained there for a month before departing on 1 December for Philadelphia. The ship then resumed the normal peacetime routine of training exercises off the east coast and off Cuba until 30 September 1916, when she underwent another overhaul in Philadelphia.