"Damn it, how did this war end up like this?" Richard Haldane's face was filled with frustration and unwillingness.
In just five days, the British Army had suffered a crushing defeat on the southern defensive line. Of more than six hundred thousand men, only a little over one hundred thousand had escaped back. Such losses were simply too great! London's total defensive force had plummeted to just over nine hundred thousand, not even a million. Meanwhile, the German military had suffered little loss of strength in the two great battles, and still had at least over a million troops. This meant that in the Battle of London, the British Army no longer even held an advantage in numbers.
Although the British Army still had more than a million troops elsewhere in Britain, the forces in Ireland and Scotland clearly could not be moved. The Irish people had already risen up against British rule under the Germans' instigation. Many Irish soldiers had even directly defected. This left the British forces stationed in Ireland hard-pressed merely to cope, with no way to suppress them at all. The Scottish troops were much the same. There had always been a rift between the Scots and the English. When the British Empire had been imposing its might in every direction, they had still been willing to remain in Britain. But now that Britain was clearly down on its luck, staying in Britain would not only bring them no benefit, but might instead bring disaster upon them. Under such circumstances, the British government's rule was beset by dangers on all sides.
As for the troops stationed in northern England and Wales, they too had to remain on alert. If they were redeployed, no one could guarantee that the Germans would not send troops to land in