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Through their time moving North towards the shores of Canada, one thing had been made abundantly clear to the Germans, raiding the area for merchant traffic would not be a tenable strategy. All of the shipping that had been encountered with the exception of specially chartered HMCHS Prince George had been American flagged, leaving the raiders simply burning fuel and twiddling their thumbs in anticipation. While they were likely undetected at this time, wading around the empty sea lanes until Japan joined the war or British reinforcements arrived was an obvious waste of a valuable situation. The situation in question was a once in a life time moment, something that a career military man could only dream of, near complete superiority over an entire theater of engagement. With Rainbow being sunk days prior with minimal effect to their own vessel, the only major threat to any operations on this coast was the currently unaccounted for Royal Navy sloops HMS Algerine and HMS Shearwater. Either vessel served no immediate threat to Leipzig or Seelowe at sea as their pedestrian top speed allowed battle with them to simply be avoided, although in confined waters, their armament of 4”/40 guns could rather troublesome. Haun had become acquainted with both of the ships captains when they were part of the peacekeeping force off Mexico and while they were both seemingly reasonable men, the British had an annoying habit of quickly becoming unreasonable men in times of war. The threat of the Canadians acquiring submarines had been raised by the Consul General’s notes yet, these were another unknown and could only be counteracted by an open eye and deft planning. The only remaining factor was the coastal defenses of British Columbia which almost entirely consisted of antique emplacements left over by the formerly British caretakers of Esquimalt Naval Base. From the pre-war intelligence at their disposal, it was largely evident to the German’s that the coastal defenses overall scope was limited and able to be easily bypassed. The various batteries of 6” and 3” guns were erected in a manner to provide effective covering fire to the harbors of Esquimalt and Victoria however, their limited firing range meant that they could barely cover halfway out to the territorial boundary with the United States. If the area was traversed in the dead of night, it could be possible for a raiding force to slip by the defenses relatively unnoticed, although this would leave the Esquimalt Naval Base and Victoria Harbor completely untouched by any raiding force, unless they wished to duel the shore batteries into submission.
Even with that fact being evident though, the target rich coast of British Columbia still offered a variety of essential infrastructure to destroy. To their knowledge, Vancouver and its harbor infrastructure was completely undefended and would serve as the largest target present on the coast. With the assistance of their local pilot, a large number of secondary targets were identified within the area. The city of Nanaimo and the surrounding area featured a rather large amount of coaling ports which supplied massive amounts of fuel for shipping on the coast. Besides the various coastal infrastructure that existed around the Vancouver Island area, the only other major port in the area was identified as Prince Rupert. A nearly completed floating dry dock, shipyard and port infrastructure existed here, although it was over 500 nautical miles up the coast from the bulk of the targets around Vancouver. Any other targets would be located and destroyed on a when found basis. All of these internal areas would also be filled with a glut of civilian shipping, the order to clear the shipping lanes did not extend to these internal protected waters and as such, the vessels sheltering and sailing here would not be expecting such an attack. Mr. Baumann and their new bevy of naval charts opened up a trio of options that the Germans could utilize attack the Canadian infrastructure in the area. Due to the treacherous nature of the coast and the presence of a single pilot, breaking off Seelowe for independent coastal operations was ruled out entirely. The three options leveled by the German officers consisted of the following:

1. Entering the Juan de Fuca Strait at night, holding close to the US territorial boundary and heading towards Vancouver. After all infrastructure in the area is destroyed, the pair of vessels will move towards Nanaimo and her coal ports before looping around and departing back out the Strait, fleeing out into the Pacific.
   
   
   
2. Same as described above but with the vessels moving along the ‘Inside Passage’, up the coast and towards Prince Rupert following the raids around Vancouver. After Prince Rupert and any Northerly infrastructure is properly destroyed, both vessels will leave for the Pacific.
   
   
   
3. Both ships will move in unison out to the Pacific shipping lanes offshore, using them to transit North to Prince Rupert without being detected. From Prince Rupert, the pair will transit down the Inside Passage, attack the greater Vancouver/Nanaimo area and flee out the Juan de Fuca Strait into the Pacific.
   
   
   
   Rough authors impression of the three plans listed above. Plan 1 is coded in Red, Plan 2 in Blue and Plan 3 in Yellow. These tracks shown are for the purposes of informing the reader and are not entirely accurate due to space restrictions.​

The third option was fairly quickly ruled out due to many of the officers anxieties. Leipzig’s fuel bunkers were around half full, meaning that any extended actions such as taking the long way up to Prince Rupert first and moving back down would be somewhat dangerous. Seelowe was in even more peril, she had a fair amount of fuel still aboard but her all oil propulsion meant that shaking down nearby colliers wouldn't be possible. Striking the main targets first was the priority, doing it backwards was nonsensical. It was thought that the possibility of being detected, even out in the sea-lanes, increased significantly the longer they were at sea. Prince Rupert could very easily sound the alarm and tighten security around the real high value targets. The potential for submarine attack in the Inside Passage was also very high due to the narrow and treacherous nature of the route, especially if the Canadians were tipped off to them making their way down the Passage, which they would almost certainly be. In order to capitalize on the element of surprise they possessed, it was decided to slide through the Strait and go directly for Vancouver. Haun described the importance of this mission as such,

“We held in our hands an opportunity almost unheard of in modern warfare, the ability to directly attack the very heart of our enemy’s infrastructure. Such an attack would be a devastating blow to enemy morale, stuck watching helplessly as the long reaching arm of the Kaiser's Navy sweeps across her cities. Even though our true reach would be limited, the citizens would believe nowhere to be safe and that their precious Canadian or Royal Navy would be powerless to help them in those moments.”

The German officers predicted that if the Canadian did possess submarines, they would be stationed out of the naval base. If they entered the area undetected and departed through the Inside Passage, it could be possible the submarines would not have the speed or time to muster an ambush ahead of their formation. Alternatively if they attempted to flee back out of the strait, it would be fairly easy to set a trap on the Canadian side of the territorial boundary. The submarines themselves could indeed be anywhere but as with many things in war, the unexpected simply had to be dealt with as it arose. In the end, the Germans decided on a daring midnight dash through the strait with their eventual escape being up the Inside Passage. If they received debilitating damages or burned through too much of their fuel reserves, Haun could be satisfied with scuttling his ship and turning his crew over to the Canadians or Americans. As satisfied as an officer could be in such a situation. Such damage inflicted would be a worthy transaction for the loss of his vessel, although fleeing off into the Pacific to find a collier would be ideal if somewhat unlikely.

As it would turn out, even the most seemingly solid plans are sometimes thrown for a loop before they can be put into action...