World War: Battleship Arms Dealers

"And what about Lanfang?" Balfour asked. "How did we treat them?"

Asquith pondered for a moment. "Maintain relations for now. No public accusations, but suspend all new procurement negotiations. Express our...disappointment through informal channels. Meanwhile, have the intelligence department gather all available technical details about the Bismarck-class and other Lanfang-class weapons."

He glanced at his pocket watch: 3:20 PM. The meeting had been going on for four hours.

"Gentlemen, that concludes today." Asquith rose. "Sir Grey, please prepare immediately for your visit to Washington. Sir Balfour, the Admiralty requires a detailed assessment report regarding what we need from the Merica. Lord Kitchener… also keep a close eye on the Army's situation; a defeat at sea could affect Army morale."

One by one, everyone rose and left. When only Asquith and Jellicoe remained in the meeting room, the Prime Minister asked softly, "John, to be honest, do we still have a chance?"

General Jellicoe looked at the weary prime minister and recalled their time studying together at Oxford thirty years ago. Back then, the British Empire was at its zenith, and no one would have imagined things would turn out this way.

“There is an opportunity, Herbert,” Jellicoe said, “but it takes time, it takes resources, it takes… a change in the way we think about war. This is no longer the world we know.”

Asquith nodded without saying a word.

The two walked out of the conference room together, down the long corridor of the Admiralty. Portraits of naval heroes throughout history, such as Nelson, Rodney, and Saint Vincent, hung on the walls, their dignified gazes fixed on those who passed by.

At the end of the corridor, Asquith suddenly stopped and looked at an oil painting on the wall depicting the Battle of Trafalgar. In the painting, Nelson's HMS Victory was leading the fleet toward the Franco-Spanish fleet, its cannons spitting flames.

"One hundred and ten years ago," Asquith murmured, "Nelson laid the foundation for a century of British maritime dominance with a decisive victory."

"And now," Jericho continued, "we need another victory, or that era may be coming to an end."

The rain was still falling. Through the window at the end of the corridor, people could be seen hurrying by with umbrellas on Whitehall Street. Little did they know that just moments before, the fate of this nation had quietly shifted.

At the same time, in East London, on a narrow street.

Rain dripped from the eaves, forming small puddles on the cobblestone pavement. Margaret Wilson stood on the steps of her front door, clutching a newly delivered extra edition of The Times tightly in her hand.

Her fingers were trembling.

It wasn't because of the cold, although October in London is already quite chilly. It was because of the huge, bold headline on the front page of the newspaper:

Royal Navy in heroic combat

HMS Hood sank in the North Sea

Survivors are being rescued

Below the title is a blurry photo, supposedly taken when the "Queen" returned to port. Details are unclear in the photo; only the silhouette of a huge ship can be seen moored at the pier.

But Margaret didn't care about the photos. She only cared about the words.

She quickly scanned the main body of the report—the official language, the "heroic sacrifices," the "pride of the empire"—until the last paragraph, which listed some of the confirmed fallen officers.

Her gaze stopped.

Captain John Tovey, Captain of Hood

Major General Horatio Wellesley, Task Force Commander

……

Scroll down the list.

List of officers (partial)

……

John Miller, Corporal, Portsmouth

The world stood still at that moment.

Raindrops pattered on the newspaper, and the ink began to bleed. The name became blurred, but it was already imprinted in Margaret's eyes and etched into her heart.

"No..." she whispered, her voice broken and incoherent.

Her John. Her son. The son who had just returned home three weeks ago, laughing and saying that he would apply to be transferred back to the home fleet after this mission, and that he would take her to Brighton for a vacation.

"Margaret?"

Mrs. Smith, the neighbor, peeked out from next door and, seeing Margaret's pale face, immediately understood. The middle-aged woman hurried over, wiping her hands with her apron: "Oh, dear, no...it can't be John, can it?"

Margaret couldn't speak, she just handed over the newspaper and pointed to the name.

Mrs. Smith glanced at him and covered her mouth. "My God... I saw him just last week, such a spirited young man..."

More neighbors gathered. Many of the men on the street served in the Navy, and the women all understood what the death notice meant. There were whispered words of comfort, sympathetic glances, and suppressed sobs—whether for Margaret or for their own impending fate, it was unclear.

"How could he..." Margaret finally managed to speak, her voice hoarse, "The newspapers said the Hood was the most powerful warship, how could he..."

"That's war, my dear," said Thomson, an old sailor who had served in the Royal Navy for thirty years and now ran a small grocery store on this street after retiring. "Even the most powerful ship can't withstand cannon fire and luck."

"But five salvos!" a young woman exclaimed excitedly. "My husband works at the shipyard, and he said the Hood could sink any German ship in half an hour! But the newspapers say it only fired five salvos..."

"The newspaper won't tell us everything." Thomson shook his head, took the newspaper from Margaret, and squinted his dim eyes to read it carefully. "'A shell hit a vital spot'... Hmph, a vital spot. The vital spot of a warship is the ammunition magazine, but the armor should be protecting that."

"So there's something wrong with the ship?" someone asked.

"I don't know," Thomson sighed. "All I know is that in a hundred years, the Royal Navy has never lost so badly in a one-on-one naval battle. Sir Nelson's spirit in heaven will weep."

Margaret could no longer hear the sounds around her. She turned and went into the house, gently closing the door behind her, shutting out the sympathy and gossip.

In the cramped living room, the fireplace had gone out. On the wall hung a photograph of John—in his sailor's uniform, taken when he enlisted at sixteen, his smile dazzlingly bright. Next to him was a photograph of her husband, who sank with the battlecruiser HMS Indomitable in the Battle of Jutland in May 1916.

Now, in November 1916, her son.

Margaret sat down in the chair and picked up the unfinished sweater from the sewing basket. It was for John, knitted with his favorite dark blue yarn. She had intended to finish it before Christmas and give it to him during his next vacation.

The needle and thread slipped from her hands.

She looked at her hands, hands that had washed clothes for thirty years, raised two children, seen her husband go, and now had to see her son go. Why? For the empire? For glory? Did those gentlemen living in Kensington, riding in cars, drinking afternoon tea, know what the real price was?

The distant, indistinct cries of a newsboy drifted in from outside the window: "Extra! Extra! The Admiralty has issued a new statement! The spirit of the Royal Navy will never sink!"

Never sink.