even today little is really known.33
The French naval attaché at Madrid sent in reports giving in detail the identifying numbers of German submarines supposed to have been supplied from merchant ships anchored in Spanish ports. German records examined after the war proved, however, that none of these particular submarines had been within hundreds of miles of Spain at the times cited. On the other hand a German submarine commander made an official report, as evidenced by the German archives, that he had had to forego seeking the shelter of the Spanish coast in order to recharge his batteries, because the sector was too closely patrolled by the French for safety.
In addition to all the areas mentioned thus far, the French Navy was also responsible for patrolling the regions of the Azores and of the Canary, Madeira, and Cape Verde Islands, where some German freighters and tankers had taken refuge. On several occasions our own submarines or auxiliary cruisers would investigate these suspected areas, and on September 23, 1939, the French submarine Poncelet captured the German freighter Chemnitz, which had slipped out of Las Palmas and was attempting to get back to Germany. In October a joint Franco-British “killer group” intercepted the German freighter Halle, which scuttled itself, and captured the German Santa Fe. In the middle of the following month the German freighter Trifels was captured by the French auxiliary cruiser Koutoubia, while trying to get away with 21,000 cases of gasoline. On February 14, 1940, a prize crew from the small sloop Elan sailed into Brest with the German Rostock, captured off the Spanish coast three days earlier.
But the most extraordinary episode was that of the German freighter Corrientes, which on the night of May 9 suddenly blew up with a mysterious explosion while trying to get under way in the Las Palmas roadstead. Now it can be revealed that the explosion was caused by two audacious officers from the French freighter, Rhin, cruising off the port, who swam in and placed limpet mines against the underwater hull of the German ship.
But convoy escorting, blockade duty, and vain “killer” patrols were not enough to fill a need for activity which the Italian status of nonbelligerency left unsatisfied in the Mediterranean. At the suggestion of the French Navy, the Royal Navy accepted the offer of a few French submarines to assist in keeping the watch in the North Sea against a possible sortie by the German forces.
The French submarine tender Jules Verne, with a division of 600-ton submarines, arrived at Harwich on March 23, 1940. A month later another division of 600-ton submarines as well as a division of 1,500-ton boats reported at Harwich, bringing the total to 12 submarines thus placed at the disposal of the British Command. The force was further increased by the submarine minelayer Rubis, since the services of such a vessel had also been requested by the British.
But the hazardous operations of this flotilla in German waters more properly belongs to the account of the Norwegian expedition and therefore will be told in that chapter, along with the equally fascinating story of the super-destroyers of our Fantasque-class in the grim battles of the North Sea.
1 Taken over by the American Maritime Commission shortly after Pearl Harbor, the Normandie was rechristened the USS Lafayette (AP 52). While undergoing conversion to a troop transport, she took fire from a workman’s blowtorch, and, after burning for hours, capsized. A total loss, she was raised, only to be scrapped.
2 If Dunkirk was little plagued with magnetic mines during the evacuations of May-June, 1940, Le Havre on the other hand was the target of a very heavy mine drop during which several of our minesweepers destroyed as many as eight mines each in a single day.
3 The French naval attaché at Madrid sent in reports giving in detail the identifying numbers of German submarines supposed to have been supplied from merchant ships anchored in Spanish ports. German records examined after the war proved, however, that none of these particular submarines had been within hundreds of miles of Spain at the times cited. On the other hand a German submarine commander made an official report, as evidenced by the German archives, that he had had to forego seeking the shelter of the Spanish coast in order to recharge his batteries, because the sector was too closely patrolled by the French for safety.
In modern democracies, the national leaders who direct a war are the statesmen—the political men in power. But they are not capable of conducting war alone; they need the assistance of technicians whose business this is; that is to say, the strategists. Thus at the highest echelons of national defense, the general staffs of the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force have a double function: on one hand, they conduct the actual military operations in accordance with the decisions of the government; on the other, they assist by information and suggestions in the making of those decisions.
In 1939 Admiral Darlan and his immediate colleagues in the French Admiralty were not unaware of their responsibilities. If, up to the time of the formal declaration of hostilities—a purely political action—their role had been limited to completing the Navy’s preparations, now the moment had come for them to show how the war could be won.
Truthfully speaking, France entered the war without any definite, actual plan. She had promised to come to Poland’s assistance, and she was committed to that action. But within days, within hours, almost, Poland was crushed, occupied, and partitioned without the French Army being able to do one thing to prevent it. What must France do now?
For a long time after the First World War the French were assured that there would be no more wars, and that in any event the fortified Maginot line, facing Germany, guaranteed them security from any invasion. These assurances engendered a defensive psychology which spread throughout the country and pervaded the governing circles and, in 1939, influenced even the military staffs. The sea was forgotten, and the nation’s entire attention was given to the land. When the complicated movement of millions of men on innumerable trains was completed without disruption from German air bombardments, every one breathed more easily. The entire French Army was now drawn up at attention back of the Maginot line and the Belgian frontier, which extended beyond it. But that only brought up the question once more: What should be done now?
Whether stated or not, one postulate was universally admitted both in France and in England: the Maginot line was impregnable, and the German Army would shatter itself in attacking it. But by the same token the French Army would shatter itself if it attempted to pierce Hitler’s equivalent, the Siegfried line—though the degree of completion of this latter fortification was perhaps overestimated. So it was a standoff, a checkmate for both sides. This opinion was so universal that at the first meeting of the Interallied Supreme Council, held at Abbeville on September 12, 1939, the British Premier, Sir Neville Chamberlain, asked the French as a favor not to risk smashing their army against the Siegfried line for, at best, an uncertain gain. When the French Premier later asked the Chamber of Deputies, assembled as a secret committee on April 19, 1940, whether the French forces should throw themselves against it headlong, the unanimous shout was, “No! No!”
At the worst it was believed that even if the German Army attacked and made some penetration, the frontlines could be consolidated again just as they had been in 1918. The front, everyone believed, was frozen in place, and no decision could be expected for the time being in that quarter.
There was of course the possibility of a flanking movement by one side or the other through Belgium. But Belgium was neutral, and intended to remain so. As to a thrust through Belgium, France gave that country complete assurance that the French Army would enter its territory only if Germany violated it first—and
