From June 1905 to April 1908, the Royal Navy's strategic interests were wedded to the debate over Norwegian and Scandinavian neutrality. At issue were the Baltic entrances and Russo-German attempts to turn the sea into a mare clausum. British policy hinged upon Foreign Office and Admiralty efforts to preserve the Navy's access to the Baltic in the event of war. The Admiralty's response was to implement a series of operational plans against Germany in late 1906. Unlike their antecedents, however, the Ballard Committee's 1907 war plans were a deliberate reaction to the possibility that the Navy's freedom of action in the North Sea and Baltic, and Britain's influence on the European balance of power, were jeopardized by the uncertain status of the Baltic entrances.

The Admiralty's 1907 war plans reflected the same themes developed in the 1890s, especially the projection of the Royal Navy's power against an enemy's vulnerable regions. By 1902–5, these areas included the Kiel Canal, the Baltic, and German North Sea littoral. Inshore, observational blockade, and amphibious operations against these points were repeated by the same planners involved in earlier contingencies. The 1907 plans also explored an offensive economic campaign directed at Germany's substantial overseas trade, an aspect marginally outlined in preceding studies.