The Battle of the River Plate

Set during the early years of World War II, the War in the Atlantic. The Royal Navy was fighting a desperate battle to keep the convoy routes open to keep the British Isles supplied. One great danger was the surface raiders, huge cruisers called "pocket battleships" that slipped out of German waters just before war was declared. The "Bismarck", The "Scharnhorst", The "Gneissau", and The "Graf Spee" were supplied by tanker and could strike anywhere. This is the story of how three lightly armed cruisers with only six and eight inch guns boldly took on a powerful pocket battleship armed with eleven inch guns. They should have been blown out of the water before they could fire a single shot, but...