navy had to pull trained enlisted men from the rest of the fleet just to put together crews for them. Both vessels suffered from condenser troubles after they entered Ottoman service, which reduced their speed to . A year later, in September 1911, Italy declared war on the Ottoman Empire. The two battleships and the ancient central battery ironclad —which had been built in the mid-1870s—had been on a summer training cruise since July, and so were prepared for the conflict. On 1 October, shortly after the outbreak of war, and the rest of the Ottoman fleet was moored at Beirut. The following day, the fleet departed for Constantinople for repairs in preparation to engage the Italian fleet. Nevertheless, the bulk of the Ottoman fleet, including , remained in port for the duration of the war. By the end of the war, and her sister were in very poor condition. Their rangefinders and the ammunition hoists for their main battery guns had been removed, their telephones did not work, and the pipes for their pumps were badly rusted. Most of the watertight doors could not close, and the condensers remained problematic. Balkan Wars The First Balkan War broke out in October 1912, when the Balkan League attacked the Ottoman Empire after the war with Italy had revealed the scale of Ottoman weakness. The condition of , as with most ships of the Ottoman fleet, had deteriorated significantly. During the war, conducted gunnery training along with the other capital ships of the Ottoman navy, escorted troop convoys, and bombarded coastal installations. On 17 October, and steamed to İğneada. Two days later, the two battleships bombarded Bulgarian artillery positions near Varna. On 30 October, was back outside Varna to blockade the port along with the destroyer . On 17 November, and bombarded Bulgarian positions in support of I Corps, with the aid of artillery observers ashore. The battleships' gunnery was poor, though it provided a morale boost for the defending Ottoman army dug in at Çatalca. From 15 to 20 November, the ship was stationed at Büyükçekmece along with her sister ship and several other warships, but they saw no action against the small Bulgarian navy. In December 1912, the Ottoman fleet was reorganized into an armored division, which included as flagship, two destroyer divisions, and a fourth division composed of warships intended for independent operations. Over the next two months, the