Chapter 16

JULY 1940 VICHY GOVERNMENT BREAKS RELATIONS WITH BRITAIN

“Fuehrer’s Headquarters August 1, 1940
TOP SECRET
Directive No. 17 for the Conduct of Air and Navel
Warfare against England
In order to establish the conditions necessary for the final conquest of England, I intend to continue the air and naval war against the English homeland more intensively than heretofore.
To this end I issue the following orders:
1. The German Air Force is to overcome the British Air Force with all means at its disposal and as soon as possible...
2. After gaining temporary or local air superiority the air war is to be carried out against harbors, especially against establishments connected with food supply ... Attacks on the harbors of the south coast are to be undertaken on the smallest scale possible, in view of our intended operations...
3. Preparation of the Luftwaffe
4. The Luftwaffe is to stand by in force for Operation Sea Lion.
5. I reserve for myself the decision on terror attacks as a means of reprisal.
6. The intensified air war may commence on or after August 6 ... The Navy is authorized to begin the projected intensified naval warfare at the same time.

Adolf Hitler”

(This is the origination order for Operation Sea Lion by Adolf Hitler. It was followed by the delaying directive signed by Keitel on behalf of Hitler shortly after to change the preparation end date to September 15, 1940.) Author’s note: It should be added that there was a bitter difference of opinion between the German Army Higher Staff and the German Navy with Admiral Raeder as the chief spokesman. Raeder wanted the invasion to be on a “narrow front” citing lack of logistical support to accomplish the mission on the “broad front” desired by the Army. The Admiral was adamant that the operation should not commence before the summer of 1941 at the earliest because of other commitments in Northern Europe and Africa.

Hitler did not want to wait that long before he sensed that Britain would be able to bolster its defenses and he did not want to risk losing the window of opportunity with the British Army in disarray after Dunkirk.

I had studied this question in my alternative life span and I tended to agree with Hitler that time was of the essence and he should close and lock the back door before he went off on a long hard road east to Operation Barbarossa. I felt certain he had the American challenge on his mind and he knew that his impatient Asian partner was eager to push the upstart Americans out of the Pacific once and for all. Timewise, he must have been aware the importance of closing the deal with the British island fortress quickly and then negating the threat from the east before confronting the unknown potential sleeping tiger that was the United States of America.

Unfortunately for the Fuhrer, he was unable to shut down the fighting spirit of the British Empire as easily as he had conquered the remainder of Europe with little difficulty. His head told him to not head east until he had bolstered his forces with new weapons and Waffen SS units drawn from newly acquired countries. He knew he needed those new weapons in top production and the human military forces to fuel his desire to rule the entire world. His gut was sending the right message that time was of the essence and he could not delay without the risk of losing it all because he waited too long.

With his Armies stretched thin across so many newly acquired countries, Hitler needed some time to digest what he had already eaten, but he knew his only chance was to keep moving or lose the initiative in his game of world domination.

The diversion of men and equipment to the “final solution” of the Jewish problem was severely detrimental to the war effort and created problems for his internal transportation and logistical systems that sapped the keen edge of his supply lines at a time when everything needed to function with only the purpose of winning a war on multiple fronts as the sole mission of every unit.

I was in a smaller and not quite as clean hotel room down near the docks of the old town when the radio blasted out the news in slangy French that the glorious Marshall Petain had broken off all diplomatic relations with Britain and ordered the French government workers home to Vichy France. Of course, none of the French diplomats followed those instructions because it would akin to political suicide as Vichy France was a puppet of the Nazi Third Reich in Berlin. With almost two million French soldiers in German POW camps in Germany, it was in poor taste to follow the traitor Petain’s instructions.

The frizzy haired mixed blood female in the bed beside me was a funny girl called Natasha. She was naked except for a pair of outrageously sheer panties that revealed her dark bush like it was the deepest darkest part of the African wasteland. She had told me that she arrived in Marseilles almost a year ago with only the clothes on her back. A contact of mine in the underworld had advised me to steer clear of her because she belonged to a Gypsy gang that specialized in pickpocketing and petty crime in the small shops lifting merchandise right out from under the noses of the owners or their employees.