Chapter 879 Dunkirk Evacuation

At this time, Germany was full of vigor and had already taken the initiative in this super war.

After controlling the entire territory of Belgium, Germany, on the one hand, divided its troops to attack the Netherlands and Luxembourg, and on the other hand, tried to march alone into Amiens and encircle the British, French and Belgian troops in Lille and the west of Kortrijk.

According to the data, there were at least 400,000 troops from the three countries staying in these areas, including 150,000 British troops and 200,000 French troops.

If these troops could be fully surrounded and swallowed, Germany's attack on France would be much easier, and the British and French forces would also lose a considerable part.

However, Britain and France naturally understood the disaster after being surrounded. As early as when Kortrijk was besieged, the British and French Joint Operations Command had held an emergency meeting and determined the evacuation point of 400,000 troops on the Franco-Belgian border, which was Dunkirk, the northernmost port in France.

Speaking of Dunkirk, the geographical location of this port city is still relatively important on the Franco-Belgian border.

As the northernmost city in France, Dunkirk is actually located in the rear of the entire Belgium, and it is also the best evacuation point for the British and French forces in Belgium.

More importantly, this place is across the sea from the British city of Dover, and the straight-line distance between the two cities is only about 70 kilometers.

On June 29, the German army launched a full-scale attack on the line from Dunkirk to Lille.

As long as any city is captured, the British and French coalition forces' plan to retreat will be shattered, and the 400,000 troops will officially enter the encirclement of the German army.

At the beginning of the attack, the German army's offensive was very smooth.

The elite German armored forces made Britain and France unable to resist at all, and even the defense line carefully deployed by the French army in Lille failed.

Although it was extremely difficult, Britain and France also understood the importance of defending Lille.

Once Lille fell, not only Dunkirk would be in danger, but even cities like Calais and Amiens would face the attack of the German army, and even Paris would be threatened.

While resolutely resisting in Lille, Britain and France organized a large-scale retreat in Dunkirk.

In order to delay the Germans and not arouse their suspicion, about 50,000 French troops will be left as bait to protect more British and French forces from withdrawing from Dunkirk to Britain.

There is no other way. Relying on the Belgian army to cover the rear is equivalent to handing the hope of victory in the Dunkirk retreat to Belgium.

According to the combat capabilities and attitudes of most Belgian troops, this retreat will only fail.

In order to save more than 300,000 British and French forces, it is necessary to sacrifice more than 50,000 French troops.

As for why it is not the British army that covers the rear? After all, this is the border between France and Belgium. If most of them are British troops, it will inevitably arouse the suspicion of the Germans.

In the planning of all parties, Germany's attack on France was officially launched, and the British and French Dunkirk retreat plan was officially carried out.

The so-called retreat plan was named "Dynamo Operation", and the main purpose of this name was to cover up.

After all, if the name of the plan is the Dunkirk retreat plan, wouldn't it be equivalent to telling the Germans all the main contents of the plan?

For this great retreat, Britain had actually been prepared for it.

If Germany's consecutive defeats of Poland and the Austrian Empire only made the British see the strength of the German Army, then Germany's encirclement and annihilation of more than 100,000 French troops on the front battlefield made the British see the arduousness and difficulties of the early war.

With such a premise, Britain would naturally not be optimistic about the Belgian battlefield.

Although more than 250,000 troops were transported to France and Belgium at the request of its ally France.

But the British wartime cabinet held an emergency meeting on the day when Brussels, the capital of Belgium, was breached, and formulated a plan for the rapid withdrawal of British troops in Belgium.

According to this plan, the British government will mobilize more than 800 transport ships within a week.

Every additional ship will give the British army in Belgium more hope of survival.

On the front battlefield, the French army in Lille could no longer resist the attack of the German army. How to evacuate more than 300,000 British and French troops from Dunkirk in a short period of time has become the biggest problem for Britain and France.

On June 30, the Dunkirk evacuation code-named "Operation Dynamo" officially began.

In order to create enough opportunities and time for Dunkirk, the French army on the Lille front launched a counterattack against the German army, using all means to entangle with the German army.

On the first night of the operation, the British successfully evacuated about 1,100 people from Dunkirk.

Although it was only a small number compared to the British and French forces stranded on the Franco-Belgian border, the smooth success of the retreat plan on the first day also gave Britain and France hope.

On the second day, the Lille garrison launched a more fierce attack on the German army.

Originally thought it was a tough battle, but unexpectedly, there were problems within the German army itself.

It was the German Army Group B that captured Belgium and continued to attack France. This army group had a large number of armored forces and infantry, as well as a sufficient number of artillery.

But in the offensive on July 1, the armored forces led by German General Guderian did not cooperate with the infantry's actions.

In the questioning of the German infantry, Guderian gave the reason that he had not received any orders from the head of state and let his armored forces rest for two days.

This also gave the French army an opportunity.

On the afternoon of July 1, a German infantry division that had rashly launched an attack was surrounded by two French infantry divisions and a tank brigade. The two sides fought fiercely for a long time, and finally ended with the victory of the French army.

This was also the first time that the French army directly defeated the German division-level organization when facing the German army.

The cessation of the advance of the armored forces and the failure of the infantry created enough opportunities for the Dunkirk retreat.

Starting from the evening of July 1, a larger-scale retreat was fully carried out, and more than 7,500 soldiers were successfully evacuated on the same day, which was 7 times the number of the previous day.

On July 2, Guderian, who received orders from the German government again, set out his own armored forces.

The German army continued to attack the British and French coalition forces, trying to eliminate the British and French coalition forces in France.

Germany dispatched a large number of air forces to carry out air strikes on Dunkirk and bombed the Lille garrison.

But because France had evacuated the people of the two cities in time, the German air strikes caused only small casualties to the army, and most of the shells fell on the seashore or in open areas.

That night, the evacuation plan continued.

In order to conceal the Germans as much as possible, only about 4,000 people were evacuated on the third day of the evacuation, and the longest route was chosen.

There was no way, the Germans were not completely stupid.

In order to prevent the possible retreat of Britain and France, the Germans deployed a large number of mines in the English Channel, and there were also submarines cruising.

On July 3, the Dunkirk area was suddenly foggy. The bad weather directly prevented the German Air Force from bombing Dunkirk, and also helped Britain and France to evacuate troops in such weather.

That night, the number of evacuated soldiers reached 17,800, setting a new record for the number of evacuees in a single day.

On July 5, the war on the front line of Lille and Dunkirk finally subsided a little because the Germans stopped the attack.

Why stop the attack? This is an unknown mystery for Britain and France.

But all German troops knew in their hearts, because this was an order from the German government, issued by their trusted and loyal prime minister.

Since it was an order from the Prime Minister, the German army naturally had to obey unconditionally.

It was also because of this that even though he knew that Lille was in danger and that it would only take a few days to break through Lille, Guderian still chose to stop the attack and wait for further orders from the Prime Minister.

Why did the German Prime Minister order the army to stop the attack?

When the German army was in a very good situation and the attack was going smoothly, such an order seemed very brainless, and even seemed like a stupid order from the Prime Minister who did not understand military affairs to interfere with military command.

But if we put the perspective back to Germany, we will understand the reason why the German Prime Minister issued such an order.

From the overall perspective, although the situation of the German army was very good at this time, the consumption of weapons and equipment was unprecedented.

Especially the armored forces, although the advancement speed was very fast, Britain and France could not let the German army advance in vain.

The consumption of those armored forces, any jump in the numbers made the German government feel heartbroken.

You know, Germany currently has only two allies, Italy and the island country.

The resources of the island country itself are very poor, and because of the distance of thousands of miles, it is naturally impossible to provide material assistance to Germany.

The only country that can help Germany is Italy. But Italy itself is not rich in mineral resources, and Germany's domestic mineral resource reserves are even more abundant than Italy.

Under such circumstances, the German government has to face the major impact of large-scale wars and the situation of overall shortage of materials.

Under such circumstances, if there is a way to save some material consumption and preserve the strength of the armored forces, it will naturally attract the attention of the German government.

You know, the actions of the armored forces are extremely dependent on oil. If there is no oil energy, no matter how many armored forces there are, they are just a pile of scrap metal.

Under such circumstances, the Air Force Commander Goering, who was promoted by the German Prime Minister, put forward his own opinion to the Prime Minister, that is, the Air Force took over the Dunkirk battlefield and withdrew most of the armored forces.

What is Goering's basis?

Dunkirk is full of swamps and low-lying terrain. Such terrain is not suitable for armored forces, which is why the attack was blocked when it reached the French region.

But such terrain has no effect on the Air Force, which can continue to threaten the British and French troops in Dunkirk and Lille, and help the Army occupy these areas.

If you don't look at it from a God's perspective, such a decision is actually understandable.

After all, from the perspective of foundation and national strength, Germany has no strength to compete with Britain and France.

In fact, it is hard to say who is right or wrong in the choice of the German Prime Minister.

But history is so coincidental. It just so happens that the British and French armies have reached the most critical moment at this time, and even the French defenders in Lille have reached the point of survival and can't hold on for a few days.

If the armored forces are not withdrawn, although they may suffer greater losses, they are likely to complete their offensive as planned and prevent the British and French troops from retreating from Dunkirk.

But the Germans withdrew the armored forces, which also made the British and French coalition forces on the entire defense line completely relieved.

Although the Air Force is also bombing Dunkirk all the time, such bombing is destined to be impossible to maintain all day, and there is still a certain amount of relaxation time at night.

In the opportunity created by the Germans for Britain and France, Britain and France lived up to expectations, evacuating more than 45,000 people per day on average, and evacuating nearly 140,000 people in three days.

In summer, the air humidity in the Dunkirk area is relatively high. The high humidity produced a hazy fog that not only covered the entire beach, but also this small port city.

If it were an armored unit, the impact of the fog could actually be ignored. But at this time, it was the Air Force that was responsible for assisting the Army, and the Air Force was the army that was seriously affected by the fog.

In foggy weather, it was difficult for the Air Force to successfully complete the combat plan, and even casualties due to foggy weather were inevitable.

In such weather, the German Air Force naturally canceled the operation, which also gave Britain the greatest opportunity.

On July 9, relying on the fog, nearly 57,000 people were evacuated throughout the day, setting a new evacuation record.

Although there were also thousands of people who were unfortunately killed and injured by the bombing of German planes, it didn't matter compared to the number of evacuees.

But this also meant that Britain's evacuation operation was exposed. The number of British and French forces in the defense line was greatly reduced, and the German army naturally felt something was wrong.

As of July 9, the British and French forces evacuated more than 220,000 troops in just 10 days, which was an extremely exaggerated figure.

Although the German army discovered the actions of Britain and France, the evacuation operation was nearing its end at this time, and the German army could no longer stop the trend.

On July 10, the German Air Force and the British and French Air Forces, who had reacted, engaged in a fierce battle in the sky over Dunkirk.

German Air Force Commander Goering was very angry at this time. He boasted to the Prime Minister at the time, vowing that only the Air Force could complete the attack on Dunkirk and eliminate the 400,000 British and French forces.

But now the reality has given Goering a loud slap in the face. Britain and France evacuated most of their troops under his nose. Even if the Air Force could help the Army occupy Dunkirk, Britain and France would only lose two cities without population, and the casualties of the army were not actually large.

Imagining the Prime Minister's angry eyes, Goering shuddered and quickly ordered the Air Force to launch a full-scale attack in Dunkirk to prevent the British and French forces from retreating.

At least there are still nearly 200,000 British and French troops on the line from Dunkirk to Lille, and these troops must not let them escape to Britain.

If all these troops were allowed to escape, I am afraid Goering's position as the commander of the German Air Force would be unstable.

Under the order of the angry Air Force Marshal Goering, the German Air Force almost went out in full force, dispatching more than 1,800 aircraft and engaging in fierce battles with the 1,500 aircraft composed of the British and French forces.

In order to protect the evacuation of the fleet, the British and French Air Force was actually distracted from fighting.

This also led to the Germans taking advantage in the direct air battle, winning the air battle, and shooting down at least 200 British and French planes, sinking more than 21 large ships, severely damaging at least seven British destroyers, and causing tens of thousands of people to die directly at sea.

The retreat operation on this day suffered an unparalleled resistance. A total of 46,000 British and French soldiers boarded the ship, but less than half of them eventually escaped to the UK, to be precise, only about 21,000 people.

I will update once today and take a break.