Winston Churchill: Their Finest Hour
SIBU BABU
June 18, 1940
I spoke the other day of the colossal military disaster which occurred
when the French High Command failed to withdraw the northern Armies
from Belgium at the moment when they knew that the French front was
decisively broken at Sedan and on the Meuse. This delay entailed the
loss of fifteen or sixteen French divisions and threw out of action for
the critical period the whole of the British Expeditionary Force. Our
Army and 120,000 French troops were indeed rescued by the British Navy
from Dunkirk but only with the loss of their cannon, vehicles and
modern equipment. This loss inevitably took some weeks to repair, and
in the first two of those weeks the battle in France has been lost.
When we consider the heroic resistance made by the French Army against
heavy odds in this battle, the enormous losses inflicted upon the enemy
and the evident exhaustion of the enemy, it may well be the thought
that these 25 divisions of the best-trained and best-equipped troops
might have turned the scale. However, General Weygand had to fight
without them. Only three British divisions or their equivalent were
able to stand in the line with their French comrades. They have
suffered severely, but they have fought well. We sent every man we
could to France as fast as we could re-equip and transport their
formations.
I am not reciting these facts for the purpose of recrimination. That I
judge to be utterly futile and even harmful. We cannot afford it. I
recite them in order to explain why it was we did not have, as we could
have had, between twelve and fourteen British divisions fighting in the
line in this great battle instead of only three. Now I put all this
aside. I put it on the shelf, from which the historians, when they have
time, will select their documents to tell their stories. We have to
think of the future and not of the past. This also applies in a small
way to our own affairs at home. There are many who would hold an
inquest in the House of Commons on the conduct of the Governments-and
of Parliaments, for they are in it, too-during the years which led up
to this catastrophe. They seek to indict those who were responsible for
the guidance of our affairs. This also would be a foolish and
pernicious process. There are too many in it. Let each man search his
conscience and search his speeches. I frequently search mine.
Of this I am quite sure, that if we open a quarrel between the past and
the present, we shall find that we have lost the future. Therefore, I
cannot accept the drawing of any distinctions between Members of the
present Government. It was formed at a moment of crisis in order to
unite all the Parties and all sections of opinion. It has received the
almost unanimous support of both Houses of Parliament. Its Members are
going to stand together, and, subject to the authority of the House of
Commons, we are going to govern the country and fight the war. It is
absolutely necessary at a time like this that every Minister who tries
each day to do his duty shall be respected; and their subordinates must
know that their chiefs are not threatened men, men who are here today
and gone tomorrow, but that their directions must be punctually and
faithfully obeyed. Without this concentrated power we cannot face what
lies before us. I should not think it would be very advantageous for
the House to prolong this Debate this afternoon under conditions of
public stress. Many facts are not clear that will be clear in a short
time. We are to have a secret Session on Thursday, and I should think
that would be a better opportunity for the many earnest expressions of
opinion which Members will desire to make and for the House to
discuss vital matters without having everything read the next morning
by our dangerous foes.
The disastrous military events which have happened during the past
fortnight have not come to me with any sense of surprise. Indeed, I
indicated a fortnight ago as clearly as I could to the House that the
worst possibilities were open; and I made it perfectly clear then that
whatever happened in France would make no difference to the resolve of
Britain and the British Empire to fight on, '~f necessary for years, if
necessary alone." During the last few days we have successfully brought
off the great majority of the troops we had on the line of
communication in France; and seven-eighths of the troops we have sent
to France since the beginning of the war-that is to say, about 350,000
out of 400,000 men-are safely back in this country. Others are still
fighting with the French, and fighting with considerable success in
their local encounters against the enemy. We have also brought back a
great mass of stores, rifles and munitions of all kinds which had been
accumulated in France during the last nine months.
We have, therefore, in this Island today a very large and powerful
military force. This force comprises all our best-trained and our
finest troops, including scores of thousands of those who have already
measured their quality against the Germans and found themselves at no
disadvantage. We have under arms at the present time in this Island
over a million and a quarter men. Behind these we have the Local
Defense Volunteers, numbering half a million, only a portion of whom,
however, are yet armed with rifles or other firearms. We have
incorporated into our Defense Forces every man for whom we have a
weapon. We expect very large additions to our weapons in the near
future, and in preparation for this we intend forthwith to call up,
drill and train further large numbers. Those who are not called up, or
else are employed during the vast business of munitions production in
all its branches-and their ramifications are innumerable-will serve
their country best by remaining at their ordinary work until they
receive their summons. We have also over here Dominions armies. The
Canadians had actually landed in France, but have now been safely
withdrawn, much disappointed, but in perfect order, with all their
artillery and equipment. And these very high-class forces from the
Dominions will now take part in the defense of the Mother Country.
Lest the account which I have given of these large forces should raise
the question: Why did they not take part in the great battle in France?
I must make it clear that, apart from the divisions training and
organizing at home, only 12 divisions were equipped to fight upon a
scale which justified their being sent abroad. And this was fully up to
the number which the French had been led to expect would be available
in France at the ninth month of the war. The rest of our forces at home
have a fighting value for home defense which will, of course, steadily
increase every week that passes. Thus, the invasion of Great Britain
would at this time require the transportation across the sea of hostile
armies on a very large scale, and after they had been so transported
they would have to be continually maintained with all the masses of
munitions and supplies which are required for continuous battle-as
continuous battle it will surely be.
Here is where we come to the Navy-and after all, we have a Navy. Some
people seem to forget that we have a Navy. We must remind them. For the
last thirty years I have been concerned in discussions about the
possibilities of oversea invasion, and I took the responsibility on
behalf of the Admiralty, at the beginning of the last war, of allowing
all regular troops to be sent out of the country. That was a very
serious step to take, because our Territorials had only just been
called up and were quite untrained. Therefore, this Island was for
several months particularly denuded of fighting troops. The Admiralty
had confidence at that time in their ability to prevent a mass invasion
even though at that time the Germans had a magnificent battle fleet in
the proportion of 10 to 16, even though they were capable of fighting a
general engagement every day and any day, whereas now they have only a
couple of heavy ships worth speaking of-the Scharnhorst and the
Gneisenau. We are also told that the Italian Navy is to come out and
gain sea superiority in these waters. If they seriously intend it, I
shall only say that we shall be delighted to offer Signor Mussolini a
free and safeguarded passage through the Strait of Gibraltar in order
that he may play the part to which he aspires. There is a general
curiosity in the British Fleet to find out whether the Italians are up
to the level they were at in the last war or whether they have fallen
off at all.
Therefore, it seems to me that as far as sea-borne invasion on a great
scale is concerned, we are far more capable of meeting it today than we
were at many periods in the last war and during the early months of
this war, before our other troops were trained, and while the B.E.F.
had proceeded abroad. Now, the Navy have never pretended to be able to
prevent raids by bodies of 5,000 or 10,000 men flung suddenly across
and thrown ashore at several points on the coast some dark night or
foggy morning. The efficacy of sea power, especially under modern
conditions, depends upon the invading force being of large size; It has
to be of large size, in view of our military strength, to be of any
use. If it is of large size, then the Navy have something they can find
and meet and, as it were, bite on. Now, we must remember that even five
divisions, however lightly equipped, would require 200 to 250 ships,
and with modern air reconnaissance and photography it would not be easy
to collect such an armada, marshal it, and conduct it across the sea
without any powerful naval forces to escort it; and there would be very
great possibilities, to put it mildly, that this armada would be
intercepted long before it reached the coast, and all the men drowned
in the sea or, at the worst blown to pieces with their equipment while
they were trying to land. We also have a great system of minefields,
recently strongly reinforced, through which we alone know the channels.
If the enemy tries to sweep passages through these minefields, it will
be the task of the Navy to destroy the mine-sweepers and any other
forces employed to protect them. There should be no difficulty in this,
owing to our great superiority at sea.
Those are the regular, well-tested, well-proved arguments on which we
have relied during many years in peace and war. But the question is
whether there are any new methods by which those solid assurances can
be circumvented. Odd as it may seem, some attention has been given to
this by the Admiralty, whose prime duty and responsibility is to
destroy any large sea-borne expedition before it reaches, or at the
moment when it reaches, these shores. It would not be a good thing for
me to go into details of this. It might suggest ideas to other people
which they have not thought of, and they would not be likely to give us
any of their ideas in exchange. All I will say is that untiring
vigilance and mind-searching must be devoted to the subject, because
the enemy is crafty and cunning and full of novel treacheries and
stratagems. The House may be assured that the utmost ingenuity is being
displayed and imagination is being evoked from large numbers of
competent officers, well-trained in tactics and thoroughly up to date,
to measure and counterwork novel possibilities. Untiring vigilance and
untiring searching of the mind is being, and must be, devoted to the
subject, because, remember, the enemy is crafty and there is no dirty
trick he will not do.
Some people will ask why, then, was it that the British Navy was not
able to prevent the movement of a large army from Germany into Norway
across the Skagerrak? But the conditions in the Channel and in the
North Sea are in no way like those which prevail in the Skagerrak. In
the Skagerrak, because of the distance, we could give no air support to
our surface ships, and consequently, lying as we did close to the
enemy's main air power, we were compelled to use only our submarines.
We could not enforce the decisive blockade or interruption which is
possible from surface vessels. Our submarines took a heavy toll but
could not, by themselves, prevent the invasion of Norway. In the
Channel and in the North Sea, on the other hand, our superior naval
surface forces, aided by our submarines, will operate with close and
effective air assistance.
This brings me, naturally, to the great question of invasion from the
air, and of the impending struggle between the British and German Air
Forces. It seems quite clear that no invasion on a scale beyond the
capacity of our land forces to crush speedily is likely to take place
from the air until our Air Force has been definitely overpowered. In
the meantime, there may be raids by parachute troops and attempted
descents of airborne soldiers. We should be able to give those gentry a
warm reception both in the air and on the ground, if they reach it in
any condition to continue the dispute. But the great question is: Can
we break Hitler's air weapon? Now, of course, it is a very great pity
that we have not got an Air Force at least equal to that of the most
powerful enemy within striking distance of these shores. But we have a
very powerful Air Force which has proved itself far superior in
quality, both in men and in many types of machine, to what we have met
so far in the numerous and fierce air battles which have been fought
with the Germans. In France, where we were at a considerable
disadvantage and lost many machines on the ground when they were
standing round the aerodromes, we were accustomed to inflict in the air
losses of as much as two and two-and-a-half to one. In the fighting
over Dunkirk, which was a sort of no-man's-land, we undoubtedly beat
the German Air Force, and gained the mastery of the local air,
inflicting here a loss of three or four to one day after day. Anyone
who looks at the photographs which were published a week or so ago of
the re-embarkation, showing the masses of troops assembled on the beach
and forming an ideal target for hours at a time, must realize that this
re-embarkation would not have been possible unless the enemy had
resigned all hope of recovering air superiority at that time and at
that place.
In the defense of this Island the advantages to the defenders will be
much greater than they were in the fighting around Dunkirk. We hope to
improve on the rate of three or four to one which was realized at
Dunkirk; and in addition all our injured machines and their crews which
get down safely-and, surprisingly, a very great many injured machines
and men do get down safely in modern air fighting-all of these will
fall, in an attack upon these Islands, on friendly. soil and live to
fight another day; whereas all the injured enemy machines and their
complements will be total losses as far as the war is concerned.
During the great battle in France, we gave very powerful and continuous
aid to. the French Army, both by fighters and bombers; but in spite of
every kind of pressure we never would allow the entire metropolitan
fighter strength of the Air Force to be consumed. This decision was
painful, but it was also right, because the fortunes of the battle in
France could not have been decisively affected even if we had thrown in
our entire fighter force. That battle was lost by the unfortunate
strategical opening, by the extraordinary and unforseen power of the
armored columns, and by the great preponderance of the German Army in
numbers. Our fighter Air Force might easily have been exhausted as a
mere accident in that great struggle, and then we should have found
ourselves at the present time in a very serious plight. But as it is, I
am happy to inform the House that our fighter strength is stronger at
the present time relatively to the Germans, who have suffered terrible
losses, than it has ever been; and consequently we believe ourselves
possessed of the capacity to continue the war in the air under better
conditions than we have ever experienced before. I look forward
confidently to the exploits of our fighter pilots-these splendid men,
this brilliant youth-who will have the glory of saving their native
land, their island home, and all they love, from the most deadly of all
attacks.
There remains, of course, the danger of bombing attacks, which will
certainly be made very soon upon us by the bomber forces of the enemy.
It is true that the German bomber force is superior in numbers to ours;
but we have a very large bomber force also, which we shall use to
strike at military targets in Germany without intermission. I do not at
all underrate the severity of the ordeal which lies before us; but I
believe our countrymen will show themselves capable of standing up to
it, like the brave men of Barcelona, and will be able to stand up to
it, and carry on in spite of it, at least as well as any other people
in the world. Much will depend upon this; every man and every woman
will have the chance to show the finest qualities of their race, and
render the highest service to their cause. For all of us, at this time,
whatever our sphere, our station, our occupation or our duties, it will
be a help to remember the famous lines:
He nothing common did or mean, Upon that memorable scene.
I have thought it right upon this occasion to give the House and the
country some indication of the solid, practical grounds upon which we
base our inflexible resolve to continue the war. There are a good many
people who say, "Never mind. Win or lose, sink or swim, better die than
submit to tyranny-and such a tyranny." And I do not dissociate myself
from them. But I can assure them that our professional advisers of the
three Services unitedly advise that we should carry on the war, and
that there are good and reasonable hopes of final victory. We have
fully informed and consulted all the self-governing Dominions, these
great communities far beyond the oceans who have been built up on our
laws and on our civilization, and who are absolutely free to choose
their course, but are absolutely devoted to the ancient Motherland, and
who feel themselves inspired by the same emotions which lead me to
stake our all upon duty and honor. We have fully consulted them, and I
have received from their Prime Ministers, Mr. Mackenzie King of Canada,
Mr. Menzies of Australia, Mr. Fraser of New Zealand, and General Smuts
of South Africa-that wonderful man, with his immense profound mind, and
his eye watching from a distance the whole panorama of European
affairs-I have received from all these eminent men, who all have
Governments behind them elected on wide franchises, who are all there
because they represent the will of their people, messages couched in
the most moving terms in which they endorse our decision to fight on,
and declare themselves ready to share our fortunes and to persevere to
the end. That is what we are going to do.
We may now ask ourselves: In what way has our position worsened since
the beginning of the war? It has worsened by the fact that the Germans
have conquered a large part of the coast line of Western Europe, and
many small countries have been overrun by them. This aggravates the
possibilities of air attack and adds to our naval preoccupations. It in
no way diminishes, but on the contrary definitely increases, the power
of our long-distance blockade. Similarly, the entrance of Italy into
the war increases the power of our long-distance blockade. We have
stopped the worst leak by that. We do not know whether military
resistance will come to an end in France or not, but should it do so,
then of course the Germans will be able to concentrate their forces,
both military and industrial, upon us. But for the reasons I have given
to the House these will not be found so easy to apply. If invasion has
become more imminent, as no doubt it has, we, being relieved from the
task of maintaining a large army in France, have far larger and more
efficient forces to meet it.
If Hitler can bring under his despotic control the industries of the
countries he has conquered, this will add greatly to his already vast
armament output. On the other hand, this will not happen immediately,
and we are now assured of immense, continuous and increasing support in
supplies and munitions of all kinds from the United States; and
especially of aeroplanes and pilots from the Dominions and across the
oceans coming from regions which are beyond the reach of enemy bombers.
I do not see how any of these factors can operate to our detriment on
balance before the winter comes; and the winter will impose a strain
upon the Nazi regime, with almost all Europe writhing and starving
under its cruel heel, which, for all their ruthlessness, will run them
very hard. We must not forget that from the moment when we declared war
on the 3rd September it was always possible for Germany to turn all her
Air Force upon this country, together with any other devices of
invasion she might conceive, and that France could have done little or
nothing to prevent her doing so. We have, therefore, lived under this
danger, in principle and in a slightly modified form, during all these
m6nths. In the meanwhile, however, we have enormously improved our
methods of defense, and we have learned what we had no right to assume
at the beginning, namely, that the individual aircraft and the
individual British pilot have a sure and definite superiority.
Therefore, in casting up this dread balancesheet and contemplating our
dangers with a disillusioned eye, I see great reason for intense
vigilance and exertion, but none whatever for panic or despair.
During the first four years of the last war the Allies experienced
nothing but disaster and disappointment. That was our constant fear:
one blow after another, terrible losses, frightful dangers. Everything
miscarried. And yet at the end of those four years the morale of the
Allies was higher than that of the Germans, who had moved from one
aggressive triumph to another, and who stood everywhere triumphant
invaders of the lands into which they had broken. During that war we
repeatedly asked ourselves the question: How are we going to win? and
no one was able ever to answer it with much precision, until at the
end, quite suddenly, quite unexpectedly, our terrible foe collapsed
before us, and we were so glutted with victory that in our folly we
threw it away.
We do not yet know what will happen in France or whether the French
resistance will be prolonged, both in France and in the French Empire
overseas. The French Government will be throwing away great
opportunities and casting adrift their future if they do not continue
the war in accordance with their Treaty obligations, from which we have
not felt able to release them. The House will have read the historic
declaration in which, at the desire of many Frenchmen-and of our own
hearts-we have proclaimed our willingness at the darkest hour in French
history to conclude a union of common citizenship in this struggle.
However matters may go in France or with the French Government, or
other French Governments, we in this Island and in the British Empire
will never lose our sense of comradeship with the French people. If we
are now called upon to endure what they have been suffering, we shall
emulate their courage, and if final victory rewards our toils they
shall share the gains, aye, and freedom shall be restored to all. We
abate nothing of our just demands; not one jot or tittle do we recede.
Czechs, Poles, Norwegians, Dutch, Belgians have joined their causes to
our own. All these shall be restored.
What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that
the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the
survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British
life, and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The
whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us.
Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the
war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of
the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail,
then the whole world, including the United States, including all that
we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age
made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of
perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and
so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last
for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour."