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  #31  
Old 19-08-17, 06:36
Bruce Parker (RIP) Bruce Parker (RIP) is offline
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The bigger mystery about the withdrawal from France in 1940 is what happened to the Hastings & Prince Edward Regiment's wooden indian mascot. A 6 foot tall colourful beauty it was. It traveled from the roof of a Picton, Ontario canning plant (stolen of course) to England and thence to France. Not risking that it might fall into enemy hands it was hidden. Rumors suggest it was found by some incredulous French farmer but that remains only a rumor.
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  #32  
Old 19-08-17, 06:39
Lang Lang is offline
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Here is a good timeline

Interesting points are about 40% of rescued troops were French and the air losses were much fewer than advertised. Big losses of boats.

This is from Encyclopedia Britannica (current on-line) and from the British Admiralty Historic Section.
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Last edited by Lang; 19-08-17 at 06:48.
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  #33  
Old 19-08-17, 20:12
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I believe the "Golden Bridge" theory that Hitler paused the advance to allow a negotiated settlement with Britain has been widely discredited over the years...It seems that "pause" was Hitler exerting his authority over overzealous commanders like Rommel and Guderian who had out stretched their supply lines and exposed their flanks...
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  #34  
Old 19-08-17, 23:24
Lang Lang is offline
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John

I think you are correct except it was Rundstedt who stopped the advance for sound tactical reasons. At that stage of the war Hitler was still acting normally and not becoming involved in "minor" unit actions of divisional commanders.

Guderian and Rommel were a PR gift for the public with their dashing performance and I think Hitler would have looked upon them more kindly than Rundstedt their field commander.

Hitler showed sound management and did come to France to see what was going on and endorsed his expert commander Rundstedt's actions as he did for Goering's offer to fill the gap and continue the assault by air (much to the chagrin of the Luftwaffe command)

The use of the the term "Fuhrer Command" normally just indicated it came from the top level High Command not necessarily personally from Hitler (although endorsed by him). Later in the war as he became more unstable a Fuhrer Order was a personal direction of Hitler.

When the army got its act together the order went out to continue the assault but by that time the Dunkirk defenses had been organised and the fox escaped the trap.

Last edited by Lang; 20-08-17 at 10:54.
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  #35  
Old 20-08-17, 17:48
Gordon Yeo Gordon Yeo is offline
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Originally Posted by Bruce Parker View Post
The bigger mystery about the withdrawal from France in 1940 is what happened to the Hastings & Prince Edward Regiment's wooden indian mascot. A 6 foot tall colourful beauty it was. It traveled from the roof of a Picton, Ontario canning plant (stolen of course) to England and thence to France. Not risking that it might fall into enemy hands it was hidden. Rumors suggest it was found by some incredulous French farmer but that remains only a rumor.
Bruce

From Farley Mowat's book The Regiment, describing the destruction of vehicles and equipment before evacuating to England.

It was here that we lost Little Chief. He had come over to France with us because he was too heavy to go with the fighting troops. Since he was made of pewter and weighed 500 pounds, we knew we could never take him back to England. Rather than have him taken prisoner, we buried him in a roadside ditch.
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  #36  
Old 21-08-17, 10:20
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Hanno Spoelstra Hanno Spoelstra is offline
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Saw the movie last week in Imax format (recommended).

I think it is a great movie - not a historic documentary - as I and my two boys thought it did capture the anxiety, disarray, sometimes even sheer terror, of what it must have been to be on that beach and out on the sea close to Dunkirk.

Ever since I read (in Wheels & Tracks magazine) the comment of a movie director that "if the public comments on vehicles being incorrect, I did not do a good job to make a good movie" (or something along those lines), I have stopped looking at the details and try to get into the flow of the story they are trying to tell. I would have liked to see a little more background/depth in the main characters, but other than that the movie was very much able to keep our attention and even led to some discussion afterwards.

Of course there are many spoilers if you look into the details. One guy I know is a specialist in uniforms and webbings, he had comments I myself did not see. I did note the container cranes in the background and wondered if they could not have edited them out? And then forgot about it and focussed on what happened in the foreground. It must have worked well as I dit not spot the CMP!

On the plus side, they did put a lot of effort in getting the details right where possible: real, flying Spitfires, but of course the ones crashing and burning on the ground are replicas.

Another big plus: this is a movie about the Commonwealth armies! So it might even drop a coin in Joe Public's mind that it weren't only the Americans fighting WW2.

As long as you put off your nitty-gritty-military-equipment-details-anorak, it is well worth viewing on the big screen, I'd say.

HTH,
Hanno
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  #37  
Old 21-08-17, 11:54
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra View Post
I think it is a great movie - not a historic documentary
I guess we all have different definitions of what a good movie is .. it's a subjective thing isn't it !

Me, I reckon the movie industry does a great job of perpetuating fantasy in its many forms. Primarily, at the end of the day, these blockbuster movies are made with the movie company shareholders in mind and the hopeful big profits involved.

I would rather watch a well researched documentary myself , but again , all of history is subjective to some degree and even doco's are open to many types of opinions and imperfections.

I noticed in the Dunkirk movie preview ( shown on tellie here ATM and repeated endlessly ) some of the smallish naval vessels seen off shore the Dunkirk beach look similar to the post war built RN Ton class minesweepers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ton-class_minesweeper
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  #38  
Old 21-08-17, 17:04
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Hanno Spoelstra Hanno Spoelstra is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike Kelly View Post
I guess we all have different definitions of what a good movie is .. it's a subjective thing isn't it !

Me, I reckon the movie industry does a great job of perpetuating fantasy in its many forms. Primarily, at the end of the day, these blockbuster movies are made with the movie company shareholders in mind and the hopeful big profits involved.
Movies are entertaiment, for which as many people as possible want to pay. People go to the movies to be entertained and be distracted from their daily life. Maybe dreaming away being a princess, succesfull dancer , boxer or musician - or travelling through space battling species on planets they never heard of.
Come to think of it, one wonders why are people willing to look at movies like Dunkirk? It isn't all singing and dancing, is it? Maybe seeing the misery makes the viewers feel better, as compared to that, their life isn't too bad after all? Psychologists can surely tell, and I am sure they are employed by Hollywood movie producers. Meanwhile, we must count ourselves lucky with producers and directors being willing and able to make war movies!

H.
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  #39  
Old 22-08-17, 07:28
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I can highly recommend the 4 part BBC doco series, FINEST HOUR made in the 1990's , it details the 1940 battles very well with first hand interviews with veterans .

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Finest-Hour-DVD/dp/B000JLTE98

I recall they interviewed an ex-British armoured regiment recce officer. His comments were something like this.

Here is 21 year old me leading the whole regiment to where the German armoured columns were advancing. Within ten minutes our regiment ( equipped with Matilda 1 tanks ) was almost completely decimated . My tank managed to escape , at night we crept into a German column of transport, our black berets looked similar to the German tankers berets ! We actually rammed the truck in front of us accidently and a tirade of German swear words came on.

After abandoning the tank, he and his driver attempted to swim a river but the driver drowned . The doco makers go to an abandoned villa where the pair tried to rest , here is where the driver carved his name into a wall and its still there today.

They also interview a British corporal, who was in charge of a mortar platoon behind the Dunkirk beaches , this chap describes how a mixup in orders had his men send a a mortar barrage over onto their own chaps , which caused mortal casualties.
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Last edited by Mike Kelly; 22-08-17 at 07:33.
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  #40  
Old 22-08-17, 08:51
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Afraid I didn't enjoy the movie , it really did need a back story to link it all together , soldiers don't fight in silence they have banter. Jumps around so much and is so loud I didn't know whether I was in a sinking ship or a crashing plane after an hour and wanted it to finish.
Best bit is the opening scene which really captures the fine line between life and death in war , but again just a bit of rubble and wreckage in the street would have made it so much better.

The Dunkirk scenes in the movie Atonement were much better done with real attention to detail even including building dozens of Morris CS8 replicas that were quite convincing. Not so sure about the casting tho!
Here's five minutes of the 20 min continuous Dunkirk shot-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QijbOCvunfU


Dunkirk a bit of a pet subject so rambling on-
All the theories about Hitler pausing to let Brits escape are hogwash IMHO.
Churchill and Admiral Ramsay in full possession of all the facts thought at best we would get no more than 30,000 away . No doubt the Germans thought they would be able to stop all but a handful by air bombardment ( and why would they continuously bomb the port if they wanted us to escape ? )
So there was no need to waste resources attacking trapped troops in a heavily defended town that would be needed to fight their way south across the rest of France .

Last edited by chalky; 23-08-17 at 10:37.
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  #41  
Old 23-08-17, 00:59
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Well said Hanno

At least they are still making WW2 films to remind the generations so detached from it that it actually happened...maybe the movie will spark some interest and some kid will pick up a book, or get on the computer and get hooked on the history...that's my hope...then inaccuracies aside, the movie served a useful purpose...I remember as kid watching Kelly's Heroes and Where Eagles Dare with my father...neither being what you would call accurate depictions of history...but they sparked and interest in me that has lasted my whole life

John
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  #42  
Old 23-08-17, 01:32
Lang Lang is offline
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I think the difference between other war movies and Dunkirk is the others (including all those old John Wayne WW2 efforts) were full complete adventure stories with developed characters in a war setting.

Dunkirk has no adventure/character story (if you discount a couple of young blokes looking for a ride and a fellow driving his boat) but uses the event to produce a disjointed under-done film.

Film techniques have changed but dated as they are, equivalent movies about actual events such as "The Longest Day" and "A Bridge Too Far" are way and beyond Dunkirk both as a historical record and entertainment.

Lang
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  #43  
Old 23-08-17, 03:17
Lang Lang is offline
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It was strange that the operations in Dunkirk did not go smoother because all three teams had been to a practice match 150 years earlier.

Must have been a Round Robin competition because Britain and Germany were teamed up to play the French.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Dunkirk_(1793)

Last edited by Hanno Spoelstra; 29-08-17 at 22:18. Reason: fixed link
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  #44  
Old 23-08-17, 10:43
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It;s also interesting to note that when the Germans were defending Dunkirk from the allied advance in 1944 . Montgomery 'paused' outside the heavily defended town from September 1944 until the German capitulation in May 1945 !

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Dunkirk _1944–45)

Last edited by Hanno Spoelstra; 29-08-17 at 22:17. Reason: fixed link
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  #45  
Old 29-08-17, 17:45
Eric B Eric B is offline
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Re: Reason for Panzer halt

On page 117 in Panzer Leader by Gen Guderian he states On this day (the 24th) The Supreme Command intervened in the operations in progress, with the results which were to have a most disastrous influence on the whole future course of the war. Hitler ordered the left wing to stop on the Aa. The order contained the words, " Dunkirk is to be left to the Luftwaffe."

On page 120 he does not agree with Churchill's memoires that holding up the tanks was to give the English an opportunity to sue for peace or create a settlement. He agrees that Hitler and Goering thought that German air supremacy was strong enough to prevent any evacuation.

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  #46  
Old 31-08-17, 12:01
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Guderian was unhappy because his forward units had crossed the river towards Dunkirk but they were not a strong organised force and running far ahead of the supply system and with exposed flanks. Guderian saw himself as taking out the whole British army to his everlasting glory (and he may well have done if let run but he was on thin ice). He thought he had been stopped while he was on a roll and he had an axe to grind and a motive to avoid criticism by blaming Hitler.

The decision to stop was Rundstedt's who was looking at the whole picture of the battle for France not just the Dunkirk pocket. He convinced Hitler that the armour risked heavy losses in the muddy going and was needed in the bigger battle and the tail had to catch up to the dog. The order to stop came from Hitler after he agreed with Rundstedt's assessment.

At this stage Goering stepped in and volunteered the Luftwaffe and it is natural that the order to stop indicated the battle would continue from the air - nobody was being let off the hook.

It became apparent that the defenses were getting organised and the ground forces needed to get going again, Luftwaffe or no Luftwaffe. Only 3 days after the stop order Brauchitsch the Commander in Chief of the German Army convinced Hitler to endorse an order to renew the advance, which they did.

They were always going to make Dunkirk a ground battle - they had built 5 bridges over the river in preparation - and the Luftwaffe were in use to keep the pressure on. Goering and his PR machine might have promoted a total victory from the air but it was never going to happen and the Luftwaffe generals never claimed such a possibility. Nobody in the world at that time knew the capabilities and limitations of massed air attacks as a major battle winning tactic and it is not unreasonable that Hitler agreed to go along with Goering's super optimism.

The effect of the 3 (4 before they actually got rolling) days was to change Dunkirk from a fleeing rabble gathering point to an organised, very tough defensive ring that held on long enough to allow the huge numbers to escape before capitulating.

The defensive ring, of course was sacrificed, with not only French units but the whole 51st Highland Division marching into prison camps. The generals, both French and British, who organised the defenses at such short notice and to such effect are the heroes of the day but they are little known or acknowledged.

Lang

Last edited by Lang; 01-09-17 at 08:24.
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