Pressure

"Colonel Edward Stanford," General Wilson said, "You've been in Ireland for several years now. What's the longest period of continuous fog you've ever seen?"

"About three or four days. I don't remember exactly," Edward Stanford replied.

"We should be able to hold out for three or four days," General Wilson said. "If we use ammunition at any cost, we should be able to hold out for at least two weeks. Two weeks is enough time for us to call for reinforcements—even if there's a week of dense fog, we can hold out until reinforcements arrive."

Colonel Edward Stanford understood General Wilson's thinking. For General Wilson, abandoning a potentially high-stakes operation due to a minor weather issue was unacceptable. Edward Stanford also felt General Wilson's reasoning was sound; his earlier suggestion was largely motivated by a desire to appear prudent. The atmosphere in the Britain Army differed somewhat from that in the Navy. The Navy expected every officer to be a passionate, impulsive rogue; but in the Army, officers of regimental rank and above needed to project a more conservative and reliable image.

Now that the general had made his decision clear, everyone naturally expressed their support. Then everyone went back to set up defenses.

After repelling the Ireland attack, the Britain naturally wanted to seize the time to strengthen their defenses, such as repairing the barbed wire and even re-laying mines. But those damned, dishonorable France gave the equally dishonorable Ireland rebels a lot of vicious things. For example, they specially produced a rifle that used smokeless powder, equipped them with a telescopic sight, and gave them brightly colored clothes made of tattered rags that even beggars wouldn't wear, clothes that showed absolutely no sense of honor.

Then these guys, armed with these guns and dressed like that, hid far away, somewhere, and started firing at the Britain soldiers who came out to repair barbed wire and lay mines. And the Ireland were quite good marksmen; almost every time they fired, someone would be hit.

Moreover, those Ireland rebels were not only excellent marksmen, but also exceptionally vicious. Their first shot often wouldn't kill the Britain soldier outright, but rather wound him, leaving him lying there bleeding and calling for help, before shooting down any soldiers who tried to come to his rescue—it was truly unfair.

Of course, some people say that the Ireland rebels usually speak French, and some even say that those who shoot in the back are just damned France. This kind of statement was quite popular before the war resumed. (At that time, these guys were already active in small-scale conflicts.) This was because the higher-ups needed to use this method to blame the France, and at the same time maintain a psychological advantage over the Ireland rebels—that the Ireland were so stupid, they couldn't possibly be that capable.

However, once the war resumed, such propaganda decreased, because the Britain quickly discovered that it had an unexpected consequence—many soldiers felt that dealing with the Ireland was no problem, but encountering the France on the battlefield seemed rather daunting...

Therefore, the British Army no longer claims that those guys are France.

Regardless of whether it was publicized or not, these suspected France caused some casualties to the Britain, disrupted their work in repairing Britain, and greatly affected Britain morale. In order to drive these guys away, the Britain had to send out cavalry, but the cavalry were hit by two volleys of fire from infantry positioned further away, and then by several "Boar Herd Driver," before being driven back.

While the cavalry were away, the Britain repaired some of the barbed wire and rescued the wounded soldiers—although they were now useless and a burden, not rescuing them would have been devastating to morale.

As for delicate tasks like patching up landmines and hanging bells on barbed wire, considering that those snipers are still outside, these really can't be done during the day; they can only be done at night.

Of course, by nightfall, they were still unable to do anything, because the Ireland attacked again under cover of darkness. The minefield outside the barbed wire was no longer there, and since it was late at night and the moon wasn't out, the surroundings were plunged into darkness as soon as the sun set.

The Ireland, of course, wouldn't let such an opportunity pass, as reduced visibility would significantly diminish the effectiveness of enemy fortifications and firepower. This was naturally advantageous to the Ireland, who were at a disadvantage in terms of firepower. In fact, historically, armies with high morale but inferior or even out-of-equipment equipment often favored night battles, such as the armies of some Eastern countries in later periods. This trend continued until the great development of night vision technology reversed. And in this era, launching night raids was also a common tactic used by the Ireland.

However, there was no fog at night, so visibility was actually better than in the morning. Combined with the searchlights, the Britain defenses were more organized than during the day. But the searchlights suffered unexpected damage; the Ireland seemed to be equipped with rifles with extremely long range specifically designed to shoot them down, resulting in the searchlights being frequently extinguished at crucial moments.

The Ireland easily destroyed the barbed wire with demolition charges, and the Britain began firing grapeshot from their artillery to suppress the Ireland charge. But soon, the Britain noticed something strange on the Ireland side. They seemed to have dragged cannons to the front lines under cover of darkness. A flash of light appeared in the darkness, followed by a deafening roar of cannon fire, and then... and then explosions would occur near the Britain gun emplacements—damn the France, high-explosive shells!

In reality, these high-explosive bombs didn't cause particularly large losses to the Britain, but they dealt a significant blow to Britain morale. Their appearance seemed to indicate that the Ireland's siege capabilities exceeded their previous expectations. Imagine preparing only one table of food, only to have two tables of guests arrive—what are you going to do?!

After a night of fighting, with the support of recoilless rifles, the Ireland managed to capture several positions, and the Britain were unable to drive them out until dawn—in just one day, several breaches were made in Athlone's defensive line.

The next day, the Britain launched a counterattack on the positions captured by the Ireland. However, the counterattack was unsuccessful, with both sides suffering considerable casualties, and the Britain were unable to drive the Ireland out of their positions. Thus, the question of whether to immediately request reinforcements once again arose.