Ostasiengeschwader
"Chikuma" participated in World War I, as part of Japan's contribution to the Allied war effort under the Anglo-Japanese Alliance. She was in the Japanese squadron which gave chase to the German East Asia Squadron led by Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee in 1914. The Imperial Japanese Navy also dispatched the cruisers , "Chikuma" and to the Indian Ocean to deal with the threat posed to shipping by the German cruiser .