Their Finest Hour (9 page)

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The direction of the German thrust had now become more obvious. Armoured vehicles and mechanised divisions continued to pour through the gap towards Amiens and Arras, curling westward along the Somme towards the sea. On the night of the 20th, they entered Abbéville, having traversed and cut the whole communications of the Northern Armies. These hideous, fatal scythes encountered little or no resistance once the front had been broken. The German tanks – the dreaded “chars allemands” – ranged freely through the open country, and aided and supplied by mechanised transport advanced thirty or forty miles a day. They had passed through scores of towns and hundreds of villages without the slightest opposition, their officers looking out of the open cupolas and waving jauntily to the inhabitants. Eye-witnesses spoke of crowds of French prisoners marching along with them, many still carrying their rifles, which were from time to time collected and broken under the tanks. I was shocked by the utter failure to grapple with the German armour, which, with a few thousand vehicles, was compassing the entire destruction of mighty armies, and by the swift collapse of all French resistance once the fighting front had been pierced. The whole German movement was proceeding along the main roads, at no point on which did they seem to be blocked.

Already on the 17th I had asked the Chief of the Air Staff: “Is there no possibility of finding out where a column of enemy armoured vehicles harbours during the dark hours, and then bombing? We are being ripped to pieces behind the front by these wandering columns.”

I now telegraphed to Reynaud:

21.V.40.

Many congratulations upon appointing Weygand, in whom we have entire confidence here.

It is not possible to stop columns of tanks from piercing thin lines and penetrating deeply. All ideas of stopping holes and hemming in these intruders are vicious. Principle should be, on the contrary, to punch holes. Undue importance should not be attached to the arrival of a few tanks at any particular point. What can they do if they enter a town? Towns should be held with riflemen, and tank personnel should be fired upon should they attempt to leave vehicles. If they cannot get food or drink or petrol, they can only make a mess and depart. Where possible, buildings should be blown down upon them. Every town with valuable cross-roads should be held in this fashion. Secondly, the tank columns in the open must be hunted down and attacked in the open country by numbers of small mobile columns with a few cannon. Their tracks must be wearing out, and their energy must abate. This is the one way to deal with the armoured intruders. As for the main body, which does not seem to be coming on very quickly, the only method is to drive in upon the flanks. The confusion of this battle can only be cleared by being aggravated, so that it becomes a melee. They strike at our communications; we should strike at theirs. I feel more confident than I did at the beginning of the battle; but all the armies must fight at the same time, and I hope the British will have a chance soon. Above is only my personal view, and I trust it will give no offence if I state it to you.

Every good wish.

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Weygand’s first act was to cancel Gamelin’s Instruction No. 12. It was not unnatural that he should wish to see the situation in the north for himself, and to make contact with the commanders there. Allowances must be made for a general who takes over the command in the crisis of a losing battle. But now there was no time. He should not have left the summit of the remaining controls and have become involved in the delays and strains of personal movement. We may note in detail what followed. On the morning of the 20th, Weygand, installed in Gamelin’s place, made arrangements to visit the Northern Armies on the 21st. After learning that the roads to the north were cut by the Germans, he decided to fly. His plane was attacked, and forced to land at Calais. The hour appointed for his conference at Ypres had to be altered to 3
P.M
. on the 21st. Here he met King Leopold and General Billotte. Lord Gort, who had not been notified of time and place, was not present, and the only British officer in attendance was Admiral Keyes, who was attached to the King and had no military command. The King described this conference as “four hours of confused talking.” It discussed the co-ordination of the three armies, the execution of the Weygand plan, and if that failed the retirement of the British and French to the Lys, and the Belgians to the Yser. At 8
P.M.
General Weygand had to leave. Lord Gort did not arrive till eight, when he received an account of the proceedings from General Billotte. Weygand drove back to Calais, embarked on a submarine for Dieppe, and returned to Paris. Billotte drove off in his car to deal with the crisis, and within the hour was killed in a motor collision. Thus all was again in suspense.

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On the 21st, Ironside returned and reported that Lord Gort, on receiving the Cabinet instructions, had put the following points to him:

(1) That the southward march would involve a rearguard action from the Scheldt at the same time as an attack into an area already strongly held by the enemy armoured and mobile formations. During such a movement both flanks would have to be protected.

(2) That sustained offensive operations were difficult in view of the administrative situation; and

(3) That neither the French First Army nor the Belgians were likely to be able to conform to such a manoeuvre if attempted.

Ironside added that confusion reigned in the French High Command in the north; that General Billotte had failed to carry out his duties of co-ordination for the past eight days and appeared to have no plans; that the British Expeditionary Force were in good heart and had so far had only about five hundred battle casualties. He gave a vivid description of the state of the roads, crowded with refugees, scourged by the fire of German aircraft. He had had a rough time himself.

Two fearsome alternatives therefore presented themselves to the War Cabinet. The first, the British Army at all costs, with or without French and Belgian co-operation, to cut its way to the south and the Somme, a task which Lord Gort doubted its ability to perform; the second, to fall back on Dunkirk and face a sea evacuation under hostile air attack with the certainty of losing all the artillery and equipment, then so scarce and precious. Obviously great risks should be run to achieve the first, but there was no reason why all possible precautions and preparations should not be taken for the sea evacuation if the southern plan failed. I proposed to my colleagues that I should go to France to meet Reynaud and Weygand and come to a decision. Dill was to meet me there from General Georges’ Headquarters.

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This was the moment when my colleagues felt it right to obtain from Parliament the extraordinary powers for which a bill had been prepared during the last few days. This measure would give the Government practically unlimited power over the life, liberty, and property of all His Majesty’s subjects in Great Britain. In general terms of law the powers granted by Parliament were absolute. The Act was to “include power by Order in Council to make such Defence Regulations making provision for requiring persons to place themselves, their services, and their property at the disposal of His Majesty as appear to him to be necessary or expedient for securing the public safety, the defence of the Realm, the maintenance of public order, or the efficient prosecution of any war in which His Majesty may be engaged, or for maintaining supplies or services essential to the life of the community.”

In regard to persons, the Minister of Labour was empowered to direct anyone to perform any service required. The regulation giving him this power included a fair wages clause which was inserted in the Act to regulate wage conditions. Labour supply committees were to be set up in important centres. The control of property in the widest sense was imposed in equal manner. Control of all establishments, including banks, was imposed under the authority of Government orders. Employers could be required to produce their books, and excess profits were to be taxed at 100 per cent. A Production Council to be presided over by Mr. Greenwood was to be formed, and a Director of Labour Supply to be appointed.

This bill was accordingly presented to Parliament on the afternoon of the 22d by Mr. Chamberlain and Mr. Attlee, the latter himself moving the second reading. Both the Commons and the Lords with their immense Conservative majorities passed it unanimously through all its stages in a single afternoon, and it received the Royal Assent that night:

For Romans in Rome’s quarrel
Spared neither land nor gold,
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life,
In the brave days of old.

Such was the temper of the hour.

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When I arrived in Paris on May 22, there was a new setting. Gamelin was gone; Daladier was gone from the war scene. Reynaud was both Prime Minister and Minister of War. As the German thrust had definitely turned seaward, Paris was not immediately threatened. Grand Quartier Général (G.Q.G.) was still at Vincennes. M. Reynaud drove me down there about noon. In the garden some of those figures I had seen round Gamelin – one a very tall cavalry officer – were pacing moodily up and down. “C’est l’ancien régime,” remarked the aide-de-camp. Reynaud and I were brought into Weygand’s room and afterwards to the map room, where we had the great maps of the Supreme Command. Weygand met us. In spite of his physical exertions and a night of travel, he was brisk, buoyant, and incisive. He made an excellent impression upon all. He unfolded his plan of war. He was not content with a southward march or retreat for the Northern Armies. They should strike southeast from around Cambrai and Arras in the general direction of St. Quentin, thus taking in flank the German armoured divisions at present engaged in what he called the St. Quentin-Amiens pocket. Their rear, he thought, would be protected by the Belgian Army, which would cover them towards the east, and if necessary towards the north. Meanwhile a new French army under General Frère, composed of eighteen to twenty divisions drawn from Alsace, from the Maginot Line, from Africa, and from every other quarter, were to form a front along the Somme. Their left hand would push forward through Amiens to Arras, and thus by their utmost efforts establish contact with the armies of the north. The enemy armour must be kept under constant pressure. “The Panzer divisions must not,” said Weygand, “be allowed to keep the initiative.” All necessary orders had been given so far as it was possible to give orders at all. We were now told that General Billotte, to whom he had imparted his whole plan, had just been killed in the motor accident. Dill and I were agreed that we had no choice, and indeed no inclination, except to welcome the plan. I emphasised that “it was indispensable to reopen communications between the armies of the north and those of the south by way of Arras.” I explained that Lord Gort, while striking southwest, must also guard his path to the coast. To make sure there was no mistake about what was settled, I myself dictated a résumé of the decisions and showed it to Weygand, who agreed. I reported accordingly to the Cabinet and sent the following telegram to Lord Gort:

22.V.40.

I flew to Paris this morning with Dill and others. The conclusions which were reached between Reynaud, Weygand, and ourselves are summarised below. They accord exactly with general directions you have received from the War Office. You have our best wishes in the vital battle now opening towards Bapaume and Cambrai.

It was agreed:

1. That the Belgian Army should withdraw to the line of the Yser and stand there, the sluices being opened.

2. That the British Army and the French First Army should attack southwest towards Bapaume and Cambrai at the earliest moment certainly tomorrow – with about eight divisions – and with the Belgian Cavalry Corps on the right of the British.

3. That as this battle is vital to both armies and the British communications depend upon freeing Amiens, the British Air Force should give the utmost possible help, both by day and by night, while it is going on.

4. That the new French Army Group which is advancing upon Amiens and forming a line along the Somme should strike northward and join hands with the British divisions who are attacking southward in the general direction of Bapaume.

It will be seen that Weygand’s new plan did not differ except in emphasis from the cancelled Instruction No. 12 of General Gamelin. Nor was it out of harmony with the vehement opinion which the War Cabinet had expressed on the 19th. The Northern Armies were to shoulder their way southward by offensive action, destroying, if possible, the armoured incursion. They were to be met by a helpful thrust through Amiens by the new French Army Group under General Frère. This would be most important if it came true. In private I complained to M. Reynaud that Gort had been left entirely without orders for four consecutive days. Even since Weygand had assumed command three days had been lost in taking decisions. The change in the Supreme Command was right, The resultant delay was evil.

I slept the night at the Embassy. The air raids were trivial; the guns were noisy, but one never heard a bomb. Very different indeed were the experiences of Paris from the ordeal which London was soon to endure. I had a keen desire to go to see my friend General Georges at his headquarters at Compiègne. Our liaison officer with him, Brigadier Swayne, was with me for some time and gave me the picture of the French armies so far as he knew it, which was only part of the way. I was persuaded that it would be better not to intrude at this time, when this vast and complicated operation was being attempted in the teeth of every form of administrative difficulty and frequent breakdowns in communication.

In the absence of any supreme war direction, events and the enemy had taken control. On the 17th, Gort had begun to direct troops to the line Ruyaulcourt-Arleux and to garrison Arras, and was constantly strengthening his southern flank. The French Seventh Army, less the Sixteenth Corps, which had suffered heavily in the Walcheren fighting, had moved south to join the First French Army. It had traversed the British rear without serious disturbance. On the 20th, Gort had informed both Generals Billotte and Blanchard that he proposed to attack southward from Arras on May 21 with two divisions and an armoured brigade, and Billotte had agreed to co-operate with two French divisions from the First French Army. This army of thirteen divisions was gathered in an oblong some nineteen miles by ten – Maulde-Valenciennes-Denain-Douai. The enemy had crossed the Scheldt on the 20th around Oudenarde, and the three British corps, which still faced east, withdrew on the 23d to the defences we had erected in the winter along the Belgian frontier, from which they had advanced so eagerly twelve days before. On this day the B.E.F. were put on half rations. The impression of French helplessness derived from many sources led me to protest to Reynaud.