Franco-British plans for intervention in the Winter War Soviet Union. An allied war against the Soviet Union was part of the plan. The main naval launching point would be Royal Navy's base at Scapa Flow in the Orkney Islands. The Soviet invasion of Finland excited widespread outrage at popular and elite levels in support of Finland not only in wartime Britain and France but also in neutral United States. The League of Nations declared the USSR was the aggressor and expelled it. "American opinion makers treated the attack on Finland as dastardly aggression worthy of daily headlines, which thereafter exacerbated attitudes toward Russia." The real Allied goal was
Maritime history of the United Kingdom - did not have orders to raid shipping and was instead underway to Germany when it was defeated by the British at the Battle of the Falkland Islands in December 1914, with only "Dresden" escaping destruction. The Battle of Jutland was the major sea battle of the First World War. Although the British Grand Fleet suffered greater losses than the German High Seas Fleet, the latter withdrew to port and the British retained control of the North Sea. Soon after the outbreak of hostilities the British initiated a Naval Blockade of Germany, preventing supplies from reaching its ports. The strategy