The Excited British

Time flew by, and the German sailors' training was soon over, and all ten dreadnought battleships were delivered.

The Germans piloted their super battleships, the sailors on either side of the hull, hands clasped behind their backs, looking as happy as children. They had been suppressed by the Royal Navy for far too long…

Suez Canal...

"coffee?"

Dispatcher Jason Evans waved without turning his head, his eyes fixed on the eyepiece of his binoculars. The morning mist over the Nile Delta was dissipating, and the canal surface shimmered with a leaden gray light.

"This is the third batch, this morning." His assistant, the young Egyptian dispatcher Mohammed Ali, held two tin cups, steam rising in the cool morning air. "The Germans have had more merchant ships transiting this month than in the entire previous year."

Jason finally straightened up, his fingers stiff as he took the coffee cup. "This isn't a merchant ship."

Muhammad raised an eyebrow and moved closer to another pair of binoculars. "What's that? A warship? But we haven't received any Royal Navy intelligence..."

His words stuck in his throat.

As the morning mist dissipated, six enormous silhouettes appeared at the northern entrance of the canal. They advanced in a neat single-file formation, their bows cleaving the calm water, leaving broad white trails in their wake. Even from a distance, their outlines were already breathtakingly clear.

"My God..." Muhammad murmured.

Jansen had returned to his binoculars, his fingers rapidly adjusting the focus. The details in the lens gradually became clear: an excessively long hull, two massive twin-gun turrets fore and aft, and another in the middle. There were none of the haphazard secondary gun galleries found on traditional battleships; the deck was as clean as if razor-scraped.

"Count the turrets." Jason's voice was taut like a steel wire.

"One, two... five twin-mounted main gun turrets." Muhammad's voice trembled. "The caliber... I can't see clearly, but the barrel length is at least forty times the caliber. God, what kind of monster is this?"

Jason didn't answer. His gaze swept across the midships—three compact funnels, not the thick black smoke of traditional steam-powered warships, but only a faint mist. The speed was frighteningly fast, estimated to be over twenty knots.

"Steam turbines," Jason whispered. "Only Parsons' steam turbines could make such a heavy ship run so fast."

"What kind of ship?" Muhammad asked. "Does the Royal Navy have anything similar?"

"No," Jason's voice was hoarse. "Not a single one."

The first ship had approached close enough to make its side number clearly visible. The black German letters stood out against the gray paint: SMS Westfalen.

"The Westphalia," Jason murmured, his mind racing through his memories. "Not any known class of German capital ship. A newly built ship? But how did the Germans manage to keep it a secret until now?"

The second, the third… six identical steel behemoths passed through the narrowest part of the canal in succession. The distance between them was so precise, as if measured with a ruler. On the deck of each ship, one could see sailors in dark blue uniforms lined up, but the number was unusually small—a traditional battleship would require nearly eight hundred men, while these ships appeared to have only four or five hundred.

"The level of automation is very high," Jensen continued, his professional instincts outweighing his shock. "It reduces the need for manpower and increases combat sustainability. Damn, where did the Germans get this technology?"

Mohammed had already grabbed the phone: "Get the canal management office! Quickly!"

"No." Jason pressed his hand down. "Connect directly to the Cairo Governor's Office military hotline. Use the red-level security code."

"Red? That's the highest..."

"Do as I say!" Jansen's roar made Muhammad tremble. "Do you know what this means? Six new battleships of a uniform design, all heavily armed, and powered by steam turbines! And the Royal Navy's intelligence service knew nothing about it! This is the biggest intelligence failure since the Battle of Trafalgar!" (Should we add a 007 scene later, hahaha)

The call connected. Jason grabbed the receiver and spoke at breakneck speed: "This is the Suez Canal Central Control Tower, dispatcher Jason Evans, number 774. I need to be immediately transferred to Colonel Harrison, Commander-in-Chief of British Forces in Egypt. Yes, now. Tell him it's about unusual movements of the German Navy, red-level."

While waiting for the connection to be established, he watched the last ship pass by through the glass window. On the bridge of that ship, a German officer in a white uniform was looking at the control tower through binoculars. The distance was too great to see his expression clearly, but Jansen could sense the look in his eyes—calm, scrutinizing, and even with a hint of mockery.

"Colonel Harrison?" Jason's voice was sharp with tension. "Yes, sir. I need you to send a trusted intelligence officer to the control tower immediately. No, you'd better come in person. The Germans have just passed six... I don't know what to call them, but they'll render all of the Admiralty's active ships obsolete in an instant. I repeat: obsolete in an instant."

After hanging up the phone, Jason leaned against the wall, his hands trembling.

Muhammad asked cautiously, "Is it that serious?"

"Are you familiar with the concept of 'all-heavy guns'?" Jansen lit a cigarette, striking the match three times before it finally caught fire. "Lord Fisher—the First Sea Lord—mentioned it in an internal memo three years ago. A unified caliber main gun, a unified fire control system, enabling salvo firing at greater distances. Theoretically, the next generation of battleships."

"And then the Germans built it?"

"Not only did they build them," Jensen said, pointing to the departing fleet. "They built six. And judging from their completion, they've been in service for at least six months, with highly trained crews. And what about us? Our 'Dreadnought' only had its keel laid last month, and it won't be launched until 1906!"

Mohammed fell silent. Although he wasn't British, he had worked in the canal district for ten years and understood all too well the weight of those words.

"There's something even more terrifying," Jason exhaled a puff of smoke. "Did you notice how deep their draft is?"

"It's very deep. At least 28 feet."

“Yes. That means they weren’t designed for the shallow waters of the Baltic Sea.” Jason’s eyes sharpened. “They’re ocean-going fleets. Who are they targeting? France? Russia? No. In the North Sea and the North Atlantic, there’s only one adversary that needs this range and seaworthiness.”

Muhammad swallowed hard: "Royal Navy."

"To be precise, it's a fleet preparing to challenge the Royal Navy's global dominance." Jason stubbed out his cigarette. "Go and bring the cameras over. I need clear photos of every ship, the more the better."