France & Spain were very strategic to how things played out, but they joined years into the war after the failure of the Germain plan at Saratoga. Once the US revolution got under way, England had a herculean task of trying to occupy the entire east coast & US population of 2.5 million, the entire British army was only 48k people (spread across 3 continents) at the start of the war. The war was also incredibly un-popular in England, until France got involved, so devoting resources was difficult. It was almost a civil war since the colonists were British, not a foreign threat. Top military brass actually turned down the post of overseeing the war rather than fight their countrymen & opposition MP's wore the colors of Washington's Army to parliament.
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France & Spain were very strategic to how things played out, but they joined years into the war after the failure of the Germain plan at Saratoga. Once the US revolution got under way, England had a herculean task of trying to occupy the entire east coast & US population of 2.5 million, the entire British army was only 48k people (spread across 3 continents) at the start of the war. The war was also incredibly un-popular in England, until France got involved, so devoting resources was difficult. It was almost a civil war since the colonists were British, not a foreign threat. Top military brass actually turned down the post of overseeing the war rather than fight their countrymen & opposition MP's wore the colors of Washington's Army to parliament.