An attempt in November 1917 to resupply German forces by Zeppelin airship, an operation codenamed "the China Show", failed. The Zeppelin, LZ 104 (L 59), intended also as a morale-booster to the beleaguered East African troops, was designed to be dismembered on arrival and all its parts cannibalised as spares for the troops - the canvas of its hull used for tents, for example. The airship reached the Sudan, in a single uninterrupted flight from Bulgaria, where it received a message from the German Admiralty that its planned landing area in East Africa was no longer in Lettow-Vorbeck’s hands. Its captain decided to turn back. The British later claimed the about-turn was a result of a fake radio message sent in German by British intelligence in Cairo stating that Lettow-Vorbeck had surrendered, but this has never been proven.