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My grandfather at Dunkirk
- erik_landerholm 9y agoCourage like this always impresses me in a profound way. I only hope I could be this brave and humble about it.
- beemanners 9y agoThis is an ad for a movie, thanks social media.
- developerdanny 9y agoNews broadcasters are not allowed to advertise for movies, or anything.
- komali2 9y agoAre you sure? It's a full blown interview from my perspective
- pjc50 9y agoIt coincides with the Christopher Nolan "Dunkirk" film. (Currently considering whether I should Britsplain Dunkirk and its significance to HN. Any takers?)
- 13of40 9y agoI'd read it.
- lostlogin 9y agoI'd read it too, but I'd be very keen on a decent German version too, as the failure to push to the beach is less well covered.
- emondi 9y agoAccording to the movie they didn't need to because it was easier to just drop bombs from the air.
- asdfgadsfgasfdg 9y agoWasn't there a political reason? The air force wanted to show how great it was and the army was prevented from advancing?
- azernik 9y agoThe politics were involved, but in a subtler way, by warping the decision-making process. The army was exhausted and needed to rest, repair their vehicles, and resupply. There was debate about whether it should first finish off the Dunkirk pocket or let the air force finish them off, and the air force chief Göring (who was both politically strong and fantastically overconfident) insisted that he could take care of it. Very similar to his later overconfidence in the Battle of Britain, and the way it warped German strategic decision-making.
- Clubber 9y agoI'd like to hear it. It's better than the USplaining of U571 in that movie. You know, where the US Navy stole the Enigma machine with Bon Jovi. :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-571_(film)#Historical_inaccuracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-571_(film)#Historical_inaccu...
- vertex-four 9y agoWhile true, the BBC has always taken current popular media as a platform to have a frank discussion about the issues that media explores. It's not intended to advertise the film, so much as expand on the events portrayed for those who came out of the film wanting to know more.
- caseysoftware 9y agoOr maybe this is a response to new interest in the actual historic event? (Opening weekend was 3+ weeks ago, the media blitz is long gone.)
- keithpeter 9y agoMy grandfather was left behind at Dunkirk, taken prisoner, spent the rest of the war in Poland and returned home in one piece but very thin (6ft 4 and weighing around 8 stone according to family legend). He died aged 48 a year before I was born - heart problems, which might be expected I suppose. I'm now working with the jigsaw of records and archives in the UK to try and find a little more about what happened and where as a result of the film mainly.
- sctb 9y agoWould you please stop posting only unsubstantive dismissive comments here?
- YouEatThatSoup 9y agoCurrently reading about Dunkirk because of the movie. Interesting how the British told the French and Belgians to fight on while preparing and keeping their evacuation a secret. They even forced the French at gunpoint who wanted to defend Dunkirk to destroy their weapons. French who wanted to embark were shot at by the BEF - at the same time when French destroyers were helping the evacuation by fighting German E-boats. The BEF got away and the French fighting were captured. All RAF fighter squadrons were moved to the UK ahead of the evacuation. It looks this was mostly by the BEF generals in France while Churchill wanted them to fight with the French.
- toomanybeersies 9y agoLet's not forget that Churchill ordered the Royal Navy to attack the French Navy in 1940 as well [1], killing 1300 people. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-K%C3%A9bir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Mers-el-K%C3%A9bir
- celticninja 9y agoContext being everything, the French Navy was at that stage under the control of the Vichy government of France, essentially a German puppet government and had Churchill not attacked the fleet it was likely it would have been used against the British Forces.
- gsnedders 9y agoI think "likely" is overstating it, given ultimately the Vichy government scuttled almost their entire fleet two years later when the German's tried to take control of it. (The German's in the end captured a small number of small vessels, all the technologically modern ones the German's were interested in—the much large destroyers and cruisers—were scuttled.) That said, it may well have seemed likely at the time, and it's only from hindsight that this is clear.
- toomanybeersies 9y agoIt was likely that the French would've tried to scuttle the fleet had the Germans tried to requisition it, as happened 2 years later in Toulon [1]. But obviously, hindsight is 20/20, there was no way for the British to guarantee that this was going to happen. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuttling_of_the_French_fleet_in_Toulon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuttling_of_the_French_fleet_...
- fiftyacorn 9y agoThe World at War documentary series has a good episode about dunkirk. One of the small boat captains describes picking up soldiers from the beach on dunkirk then getting back to sea, where they were met by a UK frigate. The frigate offered to take the soldiers to let the small boat go back to the beach(as was the plan) and the captain said "no chance mate get your own soldiers we're off back to blighty" Some great lines in that series
- pjc50 9y agoAlright then: Britsplaining Dunkirk. Not the actual events, but the significance of it to the national culture. For the actual history it is hard to beat having it narrated to you by Olivier in The World At War. Many countries have a famous defeat or last stand. Dunkirk is ours; our Thermopylae, our Alamo, our Stalingrad, our Pearl Harbour. Many countries also have a famous mobilisation of the people - a revolution, something with a national day to name streets after. Dunkirk is ours. The popular memory of Dunkirk is one of spontaneous organisation. Not an organised event run by the state, but one where the official efforts had already failed and British lives could only be saved by a mass ad-hoc action by whichever members of the public happened to be at hand to crew a boat. This ties in with the wider popular memory of the war as "total effort": everyone was a contributor. This leads to "Dunkirk spirit": spontaneous solidarity in the face of adversity. Often invoked lightheartedly in the face of ordinary disasters like being stuck on a train for hours or squelching about a drenched music festival, but it works for more serious events too. It was invoked a lot when the Ariana Grande concert was bombed in Manchester. This is part of why there is no real counter-part to the individualism of survivalists or "preppers" in the UK: everyone believes that when a real disaster happens, you can rely on your fellow members of the public, and we will survive together. A detail of the news interview that is very relevant to the whole thing is "stiff upper lip", and responding to threats with blithe dismissal and flippancy. The officer on the beach saying "I wish they wouldn't do that" about the strafing is the exemplar here. But there's quite a few famous, extreme examples: https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/major-digby-tatham-warter.html https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/major-digby-tatham...
- tolien 9y agoA little prior to Dunkirk but there is the case of ("Mad") Jack Churchill, the only known member of the British Army to kill someone during WW2 with a longbow: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Churchill#France_.281940.29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Churchill#France_.281940....
- corford 9y agoJesus. Now that's a grandfather I'd have liked to have had. Imagine the stories!
- arethuza 9y agoFor anyone interested in finding out more about Dunkirk and the events leading up to the evacuation I can strongly recommend "Dunkirk: Fight to the Last Man" by Hugh Sebag-Montefiore. It gives the British, French and German viewpoints and covers the incredible scale of the operation in a way that the movie couldn't really do.
- zerkten 9y agoI'm about halfway through "The Miracle of Dunkirk: The True Story of Operation Dynamo" by Walter Lord. Finding it to be a good read and it looks like it's still only $2.99 on Kindle if that sways it for anyone.
- darod 9y agowhat's interesting is the faces they decided not to portray in the movie. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/01/indian-african-dunkirk-history-whitewash-attitudes https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/01/indian...
- barking 9y agoThe movie is a commercial enterprise not the agent of government policy, designed to direct public attitudes.
- oblio 9y agoIt would have been government policy if it had some sort of positive discrimination, let's say. But in this case we're talking about a plain lie, which doesn't seem justified from an artistic point of view...
- barking 9y agoHow likely was one to stumble upon a non-white British soldier on the beach at Dunkirk?
- oblio 9y agoDid you read the article? Based on their numbers, at least 10% odds.
- kyberias 9y agoWhat is the lie exactly?
- criddell 9y ago> in this case we're talking about a plain lie, which doesn't seem justified from an artistic point of view... It wasn't a documentary. The movie was a fantastic bit of story telling (IMHO) and I think it's one of the best movies I've seen this year.
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- Bulkington 9y agoSide note, forgotten (by me): Post-Dunkirk, Britain and France--represented by Churchill and DeGaulle--planned to unite. From The Atlantic story: "Although that battle story is fairly well known, the accompanying political drama that almost saw Britain and France merge is now largely forgotten. But the drama of that near-fusion can help explain the origins of European integration—and the reasons why Britain ultimately pulled away from the European Union in the decision we know as Brexit." Common knowledge in GB/France? How's the Brexit analysis? https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/08/dunkirk-brexit/536106/ https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/08/du...
- mercurial 9y agoI don't think this is common knowledge in France, but I did know about it.
- lmm 9y agoI thought this was going to be about later on, during Suez - I understand a union was proposed then too. This one I didn't know about, so I expect few Brits do. The Brexit analogy is... eh, kind of overblown IMO, though I guess that's my views on cultural history in general. Brexit is more a result of domestic party politics than a reflection of our foreign relations, and it was Eastern Europe that loomed larger in the public consciousness when talking about the EU.
- dba7dba 9y agoFor those who want to know more about why Dunkirk came about and why it was so shocking that France capitulated so quickly, I recommend this book. > Nineteen Weeks: America, Britain, and the Fateful Summer of 1940 Few things I learned that I didn't know. 1. After Dunkir, UK govt was actually quite seriously considering suing for peace and to leave the Continental Europe to Nazi Germany. One reason was the financial cost. UK could've sued for peace and save their treasury (already seriously depleted after WW1). Or decide to fight and pay for the cost of war (like in money). 2. As Prime Minister Chamberlain resigned, he was faced with picking a successors: Lord Halifax and Churchill. Churchill was the 2nd choice.
- gadders 9y agoI love this example of sang froid: "I wish they wouldn't do that," said the officer with impressive cool. I tried to copy his nonchalant tone and said, "I suppose you get quite used to that sort of thing." "Not a bit of it, old man," he replied, lowering his voice. "What you get used to is pretending you are not as scared as your men are." Anyone got a link to the whole account?
- jlebrech 9y agoI'm kinda surprised he's not a black guy.
- fundabulousrIII 9y agoGermans could have ended the war there. Hitlers hubris saved the western world (to it's current state).
- kikimaru 9y ago> "I wish they wouldn't do that," said the officer with impressive cool. I tried to copy his nonchalant tone and said, "I suppose you get quite used to that sort of thing." "Not a bit of it, old man," he replied, lowering his voice. "What you get used to is pretending you are not as scared as your men are." I guess Lindybeige wasn't spoofing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrauBQf7FpI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrauBQf7FpI