Upon the outbreak of war the British Royal Navy was deployed globally whilst the Imperial German Navy was concentrated in two areas
- Home Waters & Tsingtao the home port of the crack East Asia Cruiser Squadron which under the command of Admiral von Spee contained some of Germanys most modern cruisers. As Spee made his way to the Chilean port of Valparaiso he met the British 4th Cruiser Squadron which had been ordered to engage & defeat the German force. This resulted in the battle of Coronel where the antiquated British warships proved no match for Spees modern cruisers. It was the first naval defeat suffered by the Royal Navy in over 100 years. When news reached London panic reigned & two ships HMS Inflexible & Invincible were sent to lead the force against Spee. When bad weather delayed the German arrival Spee knew that he had to stand & fight unaware that amongst the ships opposing him were two modern battlecruisers which outclassed any of his own squadrons ships. Given the presence of Inflexible & Invincible the result of the battle had an inevitable outcome & after several hours hard combat Spees ships were defeated.