To stop them becoming part of the German navy after the French refused to hand them over.Originally Posted by jeepster
| + Visit Cardiff FC for Latest News, Transfer Gossip, Fixtures and Match Results |
To stop them becoming part of the German navy after the French refused to hand them over.
Phew well done Winnie, it was only 1300 lives!!
They would have been seized by the Germans or Italians. 1300 lives yes but during a world war.
Churchill wasn't all good, no man really is but he made tough decisions. He was the right man for the occasion, in peace time he wouldn't have been and his swift defeat in the polls following the war shows that.
I'd agree with this. It would of course have been better if it hadn't happened, but the allies were not winning the war at that point and the fleet could have done more damage than 1300 lives, it could have kept the Nazis in North Africa and repelled the Italian invasion. No one knows and that's with the benefit of hindsight.
It was those lives or the lives of the British sailors of the Mediterranean and atlantic squadrons that could have been sunk by those ships combined with the modern diesel Italian cruisers which would have led to the starvation of the good people of Malta and it's loss together with probably the loss of Gibraltar and the war in the Med, no invasion of Italy and the extension of the war by god knows how long and all the people that would have killed, not to mention we may have lost.
the officers and crews were given the opportunity to sail out go to UK and join the free french navy but declined, stating they were part of the vichy french state which was a German controlled puppet government set up after the french surrender.
Could have waited until they were in German hand then bomb them
Could we bomb south of France at the time?
They weren't in the south of fFance and they weren't bombed. They were in the french Algerian port of Oran and Admiral Cunningham sent a destroyer into the harbour to ask them to join him. They refused not realising the whole British Med fleet was sitting outside with all its guns (Including 3 battle ships) trained on them. Or perhaps they did know but thought that the British wouldn't fire. Wrong!!!
Yes youre right that it was in Algeria, I was confused with another scuttling. But I was replying to someone saying that we could have destroyed them after the Germans took them. I know they weren't bombed at that time, but if we were going to wait for the Germans then I assume that's the only way to do it, which seems a very difficult mission to me.
If we'd done that, wouldnt they have fired back?
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote