Yes, indeed. I think that he merely simplified the story a bit there, in order to advance the plot, David. What point would be served by having Ogilvie fail to see most of the launches on account of cloudy skies? Suppose he had, due to weather and other factors, failed to see even three quarters of them....would it have made any useful addition to the story or have altered its conclusion in any way? The Earth is a big planet, relatively speaking...although there certainly are bigger ones...but you'd need hundreds of such alien craft landings, maybe thousands, in order to effectively invade all the major powers and nations on Earth. The French, of course, might have been simultaneously both annoyed and nevertheless rather relieved at not having received the aliens' primary attention...and so too the Germans, the Austrians, the Russians, the Americans, etc...but I do think Wells was wise not to worry about those complications when he wrote his story.
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