On the Crimean Peninsula, Britain, France, and Russia were still locked in a bloody struggle. More precisely, Britain and France were on the offensive, while the Russians defended with all their strength.
Their inferiority in weapons and equipment was a fatal flaw. Unlike the Russian army on the Balkan Peninsula, which had been uniformly reequipped with Austrian-made arms and was evenly matched with Britain and France in equipment, the Russian forces on the Crimean Peninsula were not so fortunate. They had originally been second-line domestic troops, then had been thrown into battle in haste. Coupled with the corruption of the Tsarist government's bureaucracy, multiple factors had combined to create their tragedy.
In fact, Nicholas I had already decided to fully reequip the army with Austrian-made arms. But because production lines had been introduced domestically, the bureaucrats who excelled at sabotaging their own side had slapped their heads and handed the orders to domestic military enterprises.
Setting up production lines took time, and retraining workers also took time. In peacetime, that would have been no problem. But this was wartime—the Russian troops at the front could not wait!
To this day, the Russians had still failed to bring their production capacity up to its peak. At their current pace, fully reequipping the Russian forces on the Crimean Peninsula would take at least one or two years.
General FitzRoy Somerset, who had just been transferred to the Crimean Peninsula as commander-in-chief, was furious. When fighting on the Balkan Peninsula, he had not felt it so keenly—whatever was lacking could simply be purchased from Austria.
Only after arriving here did he discover just how atrocious Russian logistics were. Not only was the reequipping with new weapons delayed, but even ordinary logistical supplies were frequently mishandled.
Fortunately, the Allied forces across from them were