Free Their Finest Hour by Winston Churchill Page A

your good will …
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    Far-reaching changes were now made by M. Reynaud in the French Cabinet and High Command. On the 18th Marshal Pétain was appointed Vice-President of the Council. Reynaud himself, transferring Daladier to Foreign Affairs, took over the Ministry of National Defence and War. At 7 P.M. on the 19th he appointed Weygand, who had just arrived from the Levant, to replace General Gamelin. I had known Weygand when he was the right-hand man of Marshal Foch, and had admired his masterly intervention in the Battle of Warsaw against the Bolshevik invasion of Poland in August, 1920 – an event decisive for Europe at that time. He was now seventy-three, but was reported to be efficient and vigorous in a very high degree. General Gamelin’s final Order (No. 12), dated 9.45 A.M . on May 19, prescribed that the Northern Armies, instead of letting themselves be encircled, must at all costs force their way southward to the Somme, attacking the Panzer divisions which had cut their communications. At the same time the Second Army and the newly forming Sixth were to attack northward towards Mézières. These decisions were sound. Indeed, an order for the general retreat of the Northern Armies southward was already at least four days overdue. Once the gravity of the breach in the French centre at Sedan was apparent, the only hope for the Northern Armies lay in an immediate march to the Somme. Instead, under General Billotte, they had only made gradual and partial withdrawals to the Scheldt and formed the defensive flank to the right. Even now there might have been time for the southward march.
    The confusion of the northern command, the apparent paralysis of the First French Army, and the uncertainty about what was happening had caused the War Cabinet extreme anxiety. All our proceedings were quiet and composed, but we had a united and decided opinion, behind which there was silent passion. On the 19th we were informed (4.30 P.M. ) that Lord Gort was “examining a possible withdrawal towards Dunkirk if that were forced upon him.” The C.I.G.S. (Ironside) could not accept this proposal, as, like most of us, he favoured the southward march. We therefore sent him to Lord Gort with instructions to move the British Army in a southwesterly direction and to force his way through all opposition in order to join up with the French in the south, and that the Belgians should be urged to conform to this movement, or, alternatively, that we would evacuate as many of their troops as possible from the Channel ports. He was to be told that we would ourselves inform the French Government of what had been resolved. At the same Cabinet we sent Dill to General Georges’ Headquarters, with which we had a direct telephone. He was to stay there for four days and tell us all he could find out. Contacts even with Lord Gort were intermittent and difficult, but it was reported that only four days’ supplies and ammunition for one battle were available.
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    At the morning War Cabinet of May 20, we again discussed the situation of our Army. Even on the assumption of a successful fighting retreat to the Somme, I thought it likely that considerable numbers might be cut off or driven back on the sea. It is recorded in the minutes of the meeting: “The Prime Minister thought that as a precautionary measure the Admiralty should assemble a large number of small vessels in readiness to proceed to ports and inlets on the French coast.” On this the Admiralty acted immediately and with ever-increasing vigour as the days passed and darkened. Operational control had been delegated on the 19th to Admiral Ramsay, commanding at Dover, whose resources at that time comprised thirty-six personnel vessels of various sorts based on Southampton and Dover. On the afternoon of the 20th, in consequence of the orders from London, the first conference of all concerned, including representatives of the Shipping Ministry, was held at Dover to consider
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