Fox of France

Cobbler Philippe Treville had a berth in the third class of the ship. The third-class cabins of this era are slightly better than the fourth-class cabins that are completely Chase bunks in terms of conditions. Everyone has at least one bed that is temporarily their own, as well as a narrow one that is separated by canvas, and it is easy to get up. Small cubicles with less than any sound insulation and anti-theft effect. In terms of size, this cubicle is very similar to a cage house in a Pearl City in later generations.

Similar to the "cage house", except that it is narrow, there is another point that the third-class cabin is already near the waterline of the ship, so the entire third-class cabin has no windows. It was stuffy and hot inside. Of course, the fourth-class cabin that is completely underwater is not to mention.

Passenger ships do not restrict third-class and fourth-class passengers from going on deck. Honestly, it's much more comfortable on deck than in the cabin. However, not many people actually go to the deck. The reason is very simple.

First of all, most of these third-class people are used to suffering, and they are quite used to this kind of environment. The second is that they all carry luggage, and the third-class compartments are not anti-theft at all. Unless you carry all the luggage on your back, go to the deck to feel comfortable for a while, and when you come back, you will find that the luggage has been divided by some second senior brother.

But Philip, Treville is not the same. He has very little luggage, a small bag is put down, so he can carry this bag on his back and go to the deck to relax.

But Philip didn't like to appear too different from the others. He has a special task on his body, so he can be as unobtrusive as possible without attracting attention. As for the discomfort in the cabin, well, after experiencing exile and struggle in the era of the Great Revolution, Philip no longer cared about this so-called discomfort.

As in history, when steam-powered ships were transferred to civilian use, they were first widely used on passenger ships. As for the reason, of course, it is because passengers generally have higher requirements for sailing time, while cargo does not have too high requirements for this. Moreover, ocean freight can use the same high-speed clipper ship, but the comfort level of the clipper ship is completely unsuitable for passenger transportation.

The ship that Philip is on now is also a steam-powered passenger ship. This ship is much faster than the previous sail-powered passenger ship, but it still takes a lot of time to reach Cape Town.

During this period of time, what the French have to do is to continue to find ways to keep the British exhausted. In order to cover their planned operation in Cape Town.

It is actually not difficult to achieve this. First of all, in Gibraltar, the struggle between mine-laying and mine-sweeping is still going on. It has to be said that laying mines is a much simpler and more efficient activity than minesweeping. In a month or so, the U.S. Navy reported successes frequently. They used mines to sink seventeen British ships in a row, including two minesweepers.

Of course, accidents also happened. For example, one night, the "Americans" who went out to re-mine areas that had been swept by the British during the day also hit a mine. Bray's warship sank, and many men were sacrificed. After the "Americans" who survived by chance swam back to their own side, they scolded the Spanish for being irresponsible and not even clearing the mines.

There were also two "Americans", unfortunately captured by the British. When the British interrogated them, they found that they could not even speak English. Then they honestly confessed to the British: "We are French. Employed by the American government."

Angry, the British held a press conference first, accusing the French of violating the principle of neutrality. And threatened to hang these "mercenaries" as pirates.

Regarding this matter, the French certainly will not remain silent. However, it was not the French government that first held a press conference, but the US embassy in France.

The Americans admitted at the press conference: "Some French warriors who have a sense of justice and are willing to fight for democracy and freedom have voluntarily joined our army. Although they are not American citizens, they are indeed members of the American army. In addition, We have also consulted relevant legal professionals. French law does not prohibit French citizens from joining the army of a friendly country. Just as French law does not prohibit citizens of a friendly country from joining the French army-as long as they are indeed voluntary."

After acknowledging that the French helped the U.S. military fight, the Americans began to talk about the unbreakable friendship formed by the blood of France and the United States. The US and France share similar republics, share the same ideology, and are truly reliable allies. In the end, they directly and openly issued a call to the French people, hoping that the French people would use it to join the U.S. military to protect the democracy and freedom that France and the United States cherish.

For the friendship between the two countries that Americans talk about, in fact, the French don't have much feeling. Because in the eyes of many proud French roosters, the United States is also a barbarian. However, many people are interested in the call of the Americans to call on the French to join the American army, because the price offered by the Americans, ah, no, it should be that the military pay is quite high. Of course, the requirements of the Americans are not low. What they need are people with military experience.

After the Americans held a press conference, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs also held a press conference. At the press conference, Foreign Minister Talleyrand said that the participation of the French in the U.S. military does not violate the existing laws of France at present, which is completely personal freedom. Since they joined the U.S. military, if they died on the battlefield, the French government could only express their condolences. But although they joined the U.S. military, they were still French citizens. Their human rights as prisoners of war should be guaranteed. If the British kill French prisoners of war indiscriminately, the French government will never sit idly by.

Immediately afterwards, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs proposed to the British to send diplomatic officials to visit the captured French citizens. Guarantee that their basic human rights will not be violated.

This request was of course angrily rejected by the British. Then, of course, various newspapers in France are full of energy to accuse the British of not respecting the most basic human rights. Then the French Ministry of Truth added fuel to the fire, publishing a document called the White Paper on the Situation of Human Rights in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

In this white paper, the French listed various human rights violations by the British, such as artificially creating famine in the colonies, shooting to suppress the labor movement in the country, and massacring peaceful residents in wars... In short, through With such a series of propaganda, the image of the British has completely changed from a civilized person to a barbarian, just a barbarian who understands science.

When the British refused the visitation request made by the French, they certainly expected that the French would set off a new round of public opinion offensive. They feel that if they agree to the French's request, the French will definitely make a lot of things in the future, and then the British are still barbarians. On the other hand, some people in the country also feel that the government is too weak to protect national interests.

Now that they have determined to fight the war of public opinion, the British naturally retorted, calling the French a warmonger, and Napoleon a warlord leader, and a warlord leader who has no faith and lies. When he signed peace agreements with other countries, he declared that France only wanted to live its own life freely and did not intend to export revolution to other countries. He told the world that France is willing to respect the sovereignty of all countries and will not interfere in a country's internal affairs. But today, if he is not interfering in the internal affairs of Britain, what is he doing?

For this accusation, Napoleon Bonaparte, the first ruler of France, personally responded. He said that of course he respects the sovereignty of the United Kingdom. It is not the French government or Napoleon who really disrespects the sovereignty of the United Kingdom, but the British government itself.

"The reason why sovereignty is worthy of respect is that the sovereignty of each country is the concentrated expression of the human rights of the people of each country. This is just as Jean-Jacques Rousseau mentioned in his "The Social Contract". The sovereignty of a country , is the application of the general will of the people. And our country's "Declaration of Human Rights" also clearly pointed out that 'the origin of the entire sovereignty exists in the people'. Therefore, anyone who maintains respect for the people of other countries must respect sovereignty of other states.

However, if the government of a country does not represent the general will, on the contrary, it continues to violate the general will. It tramples on the people recklessly internally, shoots at the people demonstrating peacefully, and throws those representatives of the true general will into prison. How can such a government be said to represent the sovereignty of a country? You know, human rights are higher than sovereignty, because human rights are the mother of sovereignty..."

Napoleon scattered about his point of view from society, law, history, and many other angles. As for his speech this time, it is very appropriate to have such a comment from later generations:

"Napoleon's views and arguments are quite successful in terms of arguments, logic, and arguments. Even if they cannot be called perfect, they should be called close to perfect. But in actual implementation, there have been A huge question is who has the right to judge whether a country’s government can represent the country’s sovereignty. Napoleon set a very dangerous precedent, that is, as a foreign government, it can override the country’s government and do whatever it wants To judge whether the government of the country concerned can represent the sovereignty of the country. This makes the judgment of "sovereignty" finally become Napoleon's military superiority, saying that whose government has sovereignty, only that government has it' Sovereignty without interference'. So the "principle of respect for sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs" was randomly stepped into the quagmire by Napoleon..."

In fact, even when Napoleon made this speech, some people saw the cannon hidden behind Napoleon's beautiful words. The British in fact saw the sinister intentions behind Napoleon's rhetoric almost immediately. And immediately refuted it.

But they immediately discovered that they had fallen into a huge dilemma on the battlefield of public opinion, that is, their voices were too small, at least on the European continent, so that on the European continent, their voices could be heard The only channel that everyone heard was actually through the French scientific truth. In the French newspaper Scientifique Pravda, people naturally cannot read their entire articles. They can only see some fragmentary words of the British from the articles of Scientology Pravda criticizing the British.

As the saying goes: "Open your mouth when spreading rumors, and lose your legs when dispelling rumors." Many times, the reason for this phenomenon is not necessarily because the people are inherently stupid and like to listen to baseless rumors. The more decisive factor is probably the voice of the rumormonger and the voice of the rumormonger, in terms of power, they are not at the same level. When someone yells, everyone in the city can hear them; when you yell, only people within a dozen or so steps can hear them. If you want to refute rumors, how can you not run away?

So at that time, the whole of Europe was cheering for Napoleon's theory of "human rights above sovereignty", especially the European academic circles. Even in many British universities, some scholars sincerely sided with France, thinking that Napoleon's views were more reasonable.

The French are not just talking about it. After the British refused the visitation request of the French, another fleet, escorted by the French fleet, sailed into Port Carroll. According to the news obtained by the British through spies, the French sent a lot of new weapons and a large number of military advisers to the Irish in one go.

Just two days after this "free voyage", a British patrol ship hit a mine and sank outside the port of Galway. The Americans quickly stood up again and claimed responsibility for it. Then the US special envoy Speer appeared in Ireland and issued a joint statement with Russell, the president of the United Irish Federation. In this joint statement, they announced that in order to combat the British colonists, they formed an alliance to fight against Britain.

In retaliation, the British began an offensive minefield off Port Carroll. But they soon discovered that it was very difficult to mine Port Carroll offensively. Because the Irish themselves have preemptively filled the vicinity of Port Carroll with various mines.

Yes, the Irish themselves mined Port Carroll. Of course the Irish would not block themselves, so they left a safe passage in the middle of their minefield. But what this safe passage is like, the British don't know. Therefore, the British minelaying ship crashed into the mine array prepared by the Irish, and then, before it had time to lay mines in the Irish port, it was sunk by the mine first.

However, this idea of ​​the Irish also gave the British a lot of inspiration. At the moment, the British are worried that they don’t know how to deal with the endless French-speaking American troops who ran out of the British port to mine in the dark, so They immediately copied the Irish idea and began laying mines near some of their own ports that might be attacked.

Doing so can indeed hinder the actions of the "U.S. Navy", but it is not without cost. One of the costs is that the artificially set curved channels have greatly reduced the efficiency of these ports.