Hard-Pressed

The situation of HMS Queen Elizabeth in Halifax was roughly as the France had predicted. Although Harry was Britain's most important naval base in North America, its port facilities couldn't compare to those of ports on the mainland. It was only suitable for maintaining cruiser-class warships; a vessel like the Queen Elizabeth would find it difficult to receive proper maintenance there.

"A large part of a navy's strength comes from the ports that support it. Without suitable ports, or ports lacking the capacity to maintain warships, a navy's combat effectiveness is greatly diminished. Once naval vessels are damaged in battle, their combat power cannot be effectively restored. Thus, a seemingly powerful fleet becomes a kind of disposable fleet. In fact, apart from ours and the France, the naval fleets of other countries in the world today can basically be considered disposable fleets. This is because once they participate in battle, they inevitably suffer damage, and this damage cannot be recovered. Therefore, a fleet only has full combat capability during its first battle. After one important battle, the entire fleet becomes unusable." "In fact, if we're far from Europe, in North America, our Britain fleet is largely a 'one-off fleet'... I've heard that the France have rather luxurious port facilities in New Orleans, with facilities capable of maintaining the 'Infernal-class' battleships. In this respect, the France are ahead of us again. If our navy and the France fleet were to engage in battle in North America, our disadvantage would be even more obvious. Furthermore, the general backwardness of our naval defense systems is a major problem, especially the gun emplacements in our naval ports. Due to outdated equipment, they often lack the ability to confront enemy warships..." Nelson jotted down these words in his notebook, then sighed and put down his pen.

A few days earlier, he had received orders from home, delivered by fast ship. The orders were for the fleet to return to the UK as soon as possible after delivering the army to Canada. Although the letter did not explicitly describe the situation at home, Nelson could tell with his life that the France were causing trouble for the United Kingdom again.

The Queen Elizabeth is still not fully repaired, and in fact, it will never be fully repaired in Halifax. The Britain still don't understand how the explosion happened. However, because the Queen Elizabeth was built with a compartmentalized design, although a hole was blown open in the hull, the amount of water entering was not significant because the compartments were closed in time. The ship only listed slightly.

Upon arriving in Halifax, the Britain first plugged the large hole created by the bomb from the outside, and then used pumps to remove the water from the compartment. As a result, the list disappeared.

However, due to a lack of equipment in Halifax, the makeshift patch was not airtight, and the leakage was quite severe, requiring the pumps to be run continuously. Furthermore, the patch was not robust enough, and the probability of it failing in rough seas was very high.

However, this was the limit of Halifax's repair capabilities. Therefore, the Queen Elizabeth had no choice but to return to port despite its defects.

Fearing that excessive speed would damage the patches, the Queen Elizabeth's speed was limited to below six knots, thus slowing down the entire fleet. Their speed suddenly dropped to that of the sailing age.

When the Britain fleet arrived in Halifax, the Free Trade and Common Market, which were leased to the United States Navy, had already received radio intelligence from the France cruisers that had been tracking the Britain fleet. They then left Cabot Strait and returned to New Orleans for repairs.

The two ships even flew the American flag as they approached Halifax. Having passed through Halifax last time, they knew the forts Halifax still used outdated cannons, so Halifax considered them no threat. Steam-powered ships had a significant weakness: the boilers required a considerable amount of time to start up—boiling water doesn't happen instantly, and the same is true for steam engine boilers. If the British Army were unprepared and their boilers weren't pressurized, it meant they could be without power for nearly an hour. In such a situation, although the Britain fleet was far superior to the two France supercruisers, the France could use this vulnerable time to deliver a sound beating, posing as the United States Navy.

Because both the "Free Trade" and the Common Market " were steam-powered warships, they emitted black smoke while sailing. Enemy forces could spot them from a considerable distance using this smoke, allowing them to prepare in advance. Therefore, the France chose to approach the port at dawn. However, as they approached the port, they were still spotted by patrol ships arranged by the Britain — Nelson had long been aware of this situation.

The Britain patrol ship fired alarm flares into the sky as it charged toward the two supercruisers, attempting to buy more time for the fleet in port with its fearless attack.

The fate of this Britain patrol ship was no different from that of the United States patrol ship that attacked the Britain fleet outside Savannah harbor. France cannons easily turned the Britain ship into a burning torch.

However, the sacrifice of the Britain patrol boats did buy time for their fleet. By the time the two "United States warships" approached Halifax, some Britain warships had already left the harbor and begun to form battle lines outside the port. More plumes of smoke were rising from inside the harbor—clearly, the plan to strike while the Britain were burning boilers had failed.

So the two United States warships made a nimble turn just outside the British Army firing range and then headed south.

As for the Britain fleet, they did not attempt to pursue them—none of their ships could catch up with the two "United States warships."

A few days later, Nelson bid farewell to General Wellesley and embarked on the long journey back to Britain with his fleet.

Just as the Britain fleet was leaving, a rumor was spreading like wildfire across United States. This rumor claimed that the United States federal government had sent an envoy to Europe, but that this envoy's mission was not to garner Europe support for the United States, but rather to negotiate peace with the Britain government.

The rumor claimed that after a series of defeats, the United States federal government had completely lost faith in victory and was prepared to cede territory, pay reparations, and unconditionally open its markets to Britain in exchange for Britain King's forgiveness for Britain aggression.

In fact, anyone with a modicum of common sense who understands the current predicament of the Britain would not believe such rumors. Given Britain's current state, if the United States were willing to sue for peace and end the conflict, the Britain would probably be overjoyed. They certainly wouldn't need the United States to cede territory or pay reparations.

However, making such a judgment requires a prerequisite: the person making the judgment must have intelligence. However, United States, at least in that era, intelligent people were few and far between, especially in the southern states.

This is actually normal. Plantation owners, due to their traditional way of life, are generally quite unsophisticated and know very little about changes in the outside world. A direct consequence of this isolated lifestyle is that they become less intelligent.

Secondly, the South suffered heavy losses in this war. Yes, the war should have been a matter for the North. But unexpectedly, the British Navy attacked from the South, killing and burning along the coastline, causing devastating losses to the South.

The mines that the federal government purchased in an emergency later played a very important role, preventing the British Army from ever achieving a victory like Savannah again. However, by the time the mines arrived, many southern states had already been ravaged by the Britain.

Those Southerners didn't believe that the North suffered fewer attacks because their purchased mines had arrived. They thought the reason the northern coastal cities were attacked less was because the Northern army was larger. And the Northern army was larger because the federal government had transferred troops from the Southern states to the North, leaving the Southern states with virtually no troops, leaving them vulnerable to Britain aggression.

Now that the South has made such great sacrifices, the federal government is actually going to sell out the country?! This is simply intolerable!

The result was that a large group of reporters surrounded Jefferson, pressing him to tell him whether he intended to make peace with the Britain, or even cede territory and pay reparations to Britain.

Jefferson knew, of course, that if he showed even the slightest intention to compromise with the Britain at this time, it would immediately trigger a political storm. For one thing, if he really made peace with the Britain, Georgia would probably immediately declare its secession from the Union.

President Jefferson, of course, immediately denied this, telling reporters that although the Britain had temporarily gained a slight advantage through their despicable attacks on civilians, the United States people, blessed by God, would ultimately prevail. As for his special envoy, he insisted that he had absolutely no contact with the Britain. His actions in Europe were solely aimed at gaining more support.

However, President Jefferson's statement did not reassure the United States people, as various rumors continued to emerge. This situation persisted until Presidential Envoy Speer returned from Europe, bringing back various public and secret treaties he had signed with the France, Spain, and Ireland.

Those secret treaties, of course, could not be made public, just like those of the United States fighting in Spain today; but even those treaties that could be made public, such as the alliance with the Ireland, clearly showed that the president's envoys were indeed working to win the war, not to surrender.

This certainly cleared President Jefferson of suspicion of being a "traitor to the United States." However, to dispel this suspicion, President Jefferson had to slightly exaggerate the support he received in the diplomatic arena. For example, he claimed that the Ireland would launch a large-scale counterattack to completely win independence. This exaggeration convinced the United States people that they would definitely win. As a result, the possibility of peace talks became smaller.

Of course, it's not entirely an exaggeration to say that the Ireland will launch a large-scale counterattack. After their previous defeats, the Ireland have recently received a lot of aid, and they do need to launch an offensive to improve their offensive capabilities and boost morale.

However, this offensive was not the "large-scale," "decisive" operation that the United States had touted. Chairman Russell and their France friends did not believe that the time was ripe for such an operation. This was evident from the fact that the operation was named "Learning Plan."

In short, the objectives of this attack plan were actually quite limited: to continuously attack the railway that runs through Ireland, and ultimately make the area along the railway unsustainable.

"This Britain railway is a Noose around our necks. But the railway line is so long that they can't maintain enough troops at every point. Now, with more weapons, our assault capabilities have significantly improved. Although we don't yet have the ability to quickly take the most fortified core positions, we do have the ability to quickly destroy a few small strongholds, sabotage a section of the railway, and launch small-scale raids on reinforcements before they can react," said Chairman Russell. "If we launch such an attack on the railway line every day, killing a few, a dozen, dozens, or even more Britain soldiers, how long can this railway last?"

Russell's confidence largely stemmed from another new weapon they had acquired from the France —a light infantry gun.

This is a type of artillery capable of direct fire. Its design incorporates a series of weight-reduction measures, such as two types of barrels: a shorter 60mm barrel (which limits the muzzle velocity of its projectiles and makes their trajectory relatively curved) and a longer 40mm barrel. Moreover, each component is required to be quickly disassembled and carried by soldiers.

Although the relatively short barrel resulted in a lower muzzle velocity, it was still a genuine direct-fire gun, designed to strike things like bunkers. It had a longer range, higher accuracy, and a higher rate of fire than recoilless rifles. Furthermore, if necessary, by replacing the barrel with a 40mm caliber barrel, it could be used to ambush Britain armored trains from a relatively safe distance.