Talk:Dunkirk evacuation

Last off the beach

"General Alexander was the last British soldier taken off the beach". Although a good story of heroism, that seems unlikely in practice. Good Generals are too valuable to risk like this, and know too much if they are captured. In fact I seem to remember that one of the British commanders at Dunkirk had to be given explicit orders that he was to return immediately and not risk himself.

Do we have any references for this statement? DJ Clayworth 15:52, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Not, I, said the guy who wrote the comment in question. I got it from some history or another and published it my book, but I'd be hard pressed to back it up now. Paul, in Saudi

Lord Gort was the general ordered by Churchill not to risk capture (this order was the model of the one given to Douglas Macarthur in the Philippines in 1942). Harold Alexander was the commander of the rearguard. It seems rather doubtful that Alexander was evacuated from the beach at all, since evacuation continued from the mole after the beaches were empty. [1] reprints a 1940 BBC story from 4 June 1940 that includes the text:

Major-General Harold Alexander inspected the shores of Dunkirk from a motorboat this morning to make sure no-one was left behind before boarding the last ship back to Britain

"On the last ship" is not the same as "last soldier taken off the beach". I changed the article to quote the BBC story rather than make an unsubstantiated claim. Gdr 12:15, 2004 Dec 13 (UTC)

That sounds rubbish to me, i lost relatives at dunkirk and all of this searching for the last man stuff is rubbish. By the time we had 3/4 of our men off, the area was overrun, the rest were killed.

February 23 2006 cleanup

The recently added section of text (from February 16) which was included from a deleted section of the Battle of Dunkirk page mostly repeats or contradicts information which is already in this article. Since the changes to these two related articles seem controversial, I'm including detailed reasons for all the changes I just made. Hopefully, this information will end the slow-motion edit war around them.

1) The first sentence repeats the codename, commander, and headquarters location from the first paragraph of the article. The only new information is the date preparations began, which I preserved.

2) The initial recovery plans and actual number of rescued soldiers on the first day is already included in the first paragraph of the next section.

3) The expanded five-day plan is stylistically redundant, since the next section reports the actual number of rescued soldiers for each day. It's also missing a source.

4) Likewise, the decision to use smaller vessels (2nd paragraph of original section) repeats early information and muddles the timeline, since these craft were already in use.

5) Stylistically, the size of the pocket on a given day adds nothing to this article, which focuses on the evacuation. Any value greater than zero is good enough, and must be true or the events wouldn't happen. It matters for the other article about the battle, and is already described there.

6) Every source I know about only mentions a halt of German armor from May 24 to May 26. I have no idea where the claim for an additional halt on May 29 arises.

7) The remaining text in the same paragraph just repeats information on the number of troops evacuated on specific days, which already exists in the next section.

StephenMacmanus 12:04, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

On 29 May the German armoured forces were in their entirety removed from the battle.--MWAK 12:22, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Losses

In this article: The Royal Air Force lost 177 planes during Operation Dynamo, compared to 240 for the Luftwaffe (Murray and Millett 2000).

I know this is from an earlier source, but this is contradicted by Ronald Atkin in his book, Pillar of Fire: Dunkirk 1940 (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1980, Pg 132). "In the nine days of Operation Dynamo the RAF lost 145 planes, 99 of them from fighter command. Of these, 42 were treasured spitfires. Afterwards, Churchill claimed the RAF had inflicted four-fold destruction on the Luftwaffe, but the true total of German losses in the same conflict was 132." I have also encountered several sources which say that the British Government and reporting agencies not only adulterated their numbers but outright lied about them. I find it highly unlikely that the RAF lost so few compared to the Luftwaffe.

Mole

What is a "mole"? Or a "protective mole"? I assume it is not a tunnel boring machine.--Henrygb 17:07, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

It seems to be a mole (architecture). But someone could fill that out. --Henrygb 17:54, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

resentment

"In France, the perceived preference of the British Navy for evacuating British forces at the expense of the French led to some bitter resentment" are you sure about that? the article states the BBC said they have waited until the very last man before sailing back to england, so it means everyone was rescued. the French article states the French resentment vis-à-vis the BEF came from Gort's refusal to launch a "traditional counter-attack" as planned by French commander General Weygand. Gort wanted an evac as he claimed it was inevitable in the medium-term. the british chief of staff supported Gort and the british operation was launched instead of the french plan. Shame On You 01:05, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

silver lining

wasnt operation dynamo a case where a dark clouds silver lining was maximised to such an extent that people forget that the british army suffered one of their biggest defeats ever at the hands of a ruthless efficent german war machine the only thing that saved britain from being invaded was it was an and had a much stronger navyBouse23 11:50, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Dunkirk spirit merge

The article Dunkirk spirit seems to me to belong in this article, either as a new section or as part of the Aftermath section. There's not a lot there that isn't already in this article, so the merge wouldn't even add much in the way of length. Orpheus 13:31, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

As it turns out, there was virtually nothing to merge and no objections, so I went ahead. Orpheus 05:22, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Clarification on the fate of evacuated French Soldiers

The article had previously implied that while some french soldiers went back to fight, and some joined the Free French, most dallied around until the armistice, where they placidly returned to France. This is false! Most of 100 000 troops were repatriated extremely quickly, some spending less 48 hours in Britain. They were repatriated to France, maintained as divisions, and used by the French army during the remainder of the Battle of France. Just thought I'd correct that. --Cacofonie (talk) 03:43, 17 December 2007 (UTC)