After the surrender of France, Britain was in a desperate situation for a while.

At this time, the land forces of the British mainland were basically ineffective. The only thing that comforted the old English gentlemen was the English Channel.

The German Admiralty feared that the French fleet would sail towards the British Royal Navy, and the British Admiralty was equally concerned that the French fleet would serve as the vanguard of the German Imperial Fleet's attack on the British Isles.

After all, the French Navy, which has the fifth strongest power in the world, is a large modern fleet. Whichever side it joins will have an important impact on the strategic scales.

Because the German High Seas Fleet defeated the British Home Fleet in the North Sea, and the German Navy captured a large number of Polish, Danish, Belgian, and British warships, the strength of both sides was lost.

In fact, the ranking of maritime combat power in this time and space is no longer the United States, Britain, Japan, France, Italy and Germany in the original history, but the United States, Germany, Japan, Britain, France, and Italy.

As the fifth most powerful naval power, the French Navy actually had 2 battle cruisers, 7 battleships, 7 cruisers armed with 8-inch guns and 11 cruisers armed with 6-inch guns, plus 27 light cruisers, 26 destroyers, 27 submarines and an aircraft carrier, as well as a large number of small ships.

That's right, you heard it right, the French fleet, there are aircraft carriers!

Some people may find it incredible, because in the Second World War, the navies of the United States, Britain, and Japan shone brightly. Aircraft carriers, it seems, are also the patents of the above three countries.

Even the famous "Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers of the Third Reich only existed in the plan, and they were difficult at the beginning of their construction, and finally died in the middle of the process.

However, France, a country that was completely defeated by the Third Reich in less than six weeks, has aircraft carriers that even the historical Third Reich does not have.

This French aircraft carrier is the little-known "Béarn".

And how powerful is this aircraft carrier "Byann"? Just give an example.

In terms of full load displacement, that is, tonnage, it has reached 28,900 tons, which is close to the "Essex" class fleet aircraft carriers built in large numbers by the United States later.

However, there are also a lot of immature features in it. For example, it has a total of eight 155 mm naval guns around the hull, six 75 mm and eight 37 mm high-level guns on both sides, and four torpedo launchers in the bow.

Such a large number of artillery torpedoes are enough to arm a light cruiser, but they have no effect on the thinking of "fighter is king" in aircraft carrier operations.

It can be seen that the thinking of the French is still stuck in the era of giant ships and cannons, and their understanding of the new naval warfare model is not sufficient. Their aircraft carriers, compared to those built by the German Navy under the intervention of Reinhardt, had a large number of flaws and shortcomings.

However, the French Navy still has an aircraft carrier after all, which is better than nothing. Because of its aircraft carrier, it has also firmly sat on the throne of the world's fifth-strongest navy.

Unlike the British navy, which was large in number but mostly old, the French navy was overwhelmingly new in the twenties and thirties. For example, the two battle cruisers "Dunkirk" and "Strasbourg" were just built in 1937 and 1938, each equipped with eight 13-inch guns, and had powerful firepower. Among the other seven battleships, the "Richelieu" and the "Jean Bar" are the two newest types of battleships that are nearing completion, and they are equipped with 15-inch guns.

The "Richelieu", which started construction in 1935, was not built at a faster rate than that of Britain and the United States because of the relatively weak shipbuilding industry in France, and only 95% of the construction progress was completed by June 1940.

However, on the occasion of the French surrender, the Richelieu left Brest on 15 June and arrived in Senegal in French West Africa on 18 June.

At the same time, the other main warships of France also left the ports of the French mainland, and a few small ships, led by Vice Admiral Michelier, secretly went to England to join de Gaulle, but more warships, under the instruction of Admiral Darlan, followed Governor Bérant to the ports of the French colonies of North Africa and remained in a wait-and-see state.

"Knock knock!" Outside Churchill's office, there was a regular knock on the door.

"Enter!" Churchill, who was reviewing the documents, shouted without raising his head.

After all, Operation Ballista has been confirmed to be executed, and there are too many related matters waiting for Churchill to deal with.

Personnel scheduling, intelligence confidentiality, material allocation, troop deployment, and fund allocation.......

After all, Churchill had failed too many times, and he really didn't want to face any new defeat.

Before Churchill became prime minister, he suggested a sneak attack on Norway to cut off Germany's iron ore imports from Sweden.

As a result, the Anglo-French army used more than two divisions to invade strongly, but only one division was transferred by Reinhardt to lead the Norwegian army, and it was quite cost-effective to surrender 2 divisions of British troops and 1 regiment of French troops.

Losing more than less, this is already a loss-making business. To make matters worse, Britain and France not only suffered a complete military defeat, but also left a bad influence on the international community, giving Germany a chance to become Norway's savior.

It was because of this crushing defeat that almost directly contributed to the downfall of Chamberlain. And Churchill became the new prime minister of the British Empire.

Norway was defeated, and in fact, Chamberlain became Churchill's scapegoat and unjustly accepted the responsibility for this failure.

But in the later "Operation Dynamo", Churchill, who was already the British Prime Minister, could no longer shirk his responsibility.

The destruction of the 200,000 elite expeditionary force was ten times higher than the number of British troops surrendered in Norway.

And in "Operation Dynamo", the huge losses of the Royal Navy's home fleet are ten, twenty, or even more than in the Norwegian naval battle!

The current Churchill is actually worse than the defeat that Chamberlain faced at the beginning.

The reason why he has not fallen like Chamberlain is even more bizarre - because no one wants to rise to the top and take over the current mess, so Churchill can only continue to do it.

Churchill was well aware that for the current British Empire, it could no longer afford to lose. And he himself can't afford to lose!

"Prime Minister, General de Gaulle of France has asked to see you." A confidential secretary pushed the door open.

"Charles de Gaulle? Who is he? Churchill, who didn't react for a while, raised his head from the copywriter with a swoop: "Why haven't I heard of it?" ”

It is no wonder that Churchill was very unfamiliar with the name de Gaulle, after all, de Gaulle in this life is just a little major general with ambitions at the moment.