Читать книгу Saviour of the Nation - Brian Hodgkinson - Страница 13

Most urgent of the many weighty tasks

That bore upon him now, on his return,

Was how to meet the ever present threat

Of German U-boats. British merchant ships,

On which the life of every islander

Depended now, as always, were at risk.

Harsh memories returned of countless ships

Torpedoed in the former German war.

But counter-measures swiftly were in place.

Churchill had learnt that convoys greatly eased

The passage of the mercantile marine.

Now captains were instructed to obey

The common rules of safety, zig-zag routes

And arming of their vessels. Orders rose

For more destroyers and for trawlers, too,

Which fitted with new Asdics could detect

The prowling U-boats deep within the sea.

In vain, however, did the new First Lord

Demand control of vital Irish ports,

For Eamon de Valera still recalled

The hated Black and Tans Churchill had sent

Against the Irish rebels of Sinn Fein.

Dramatic proof was given of the skill

Of German sailors, when at Scapa Flow,

The inland harbour sheltered by the hills

Of Orkneys’ islands, one bold U-boat sank

The Royal Oak at her moorings, with the loss

Of hundreds of her officers and men.

And German science offered further threats:

Magnetic mines below the waterline

Sank many vessels, till a way was found

To neutralise the mines’ magnetic force

By means of cables girdling every ship.

Churchill was no scientist, yet he knew

How best to manage others’ expertise.

He had recourse most often to his friend,

Professor Frederick Lindemann, by whom

He was informed of scientific news

That bore upon the war. Much use was made

Of figures showing trends: in shipping lost,

New output and the turnover in ports.

Demands were made by Churchill for such facts

With brusque impatience. Any brief delay

Might jeopardise some action or command.

At sea he scorned to rest upon defence.

How could he use the power of Britain’s fleet

To bring to German hearts the dread of war,

And make the aggressor fear he had aroused,

From careless sleep, a new Leviathan?

His fertile mind conceived a strategy

Of startling boldness. By his naval staff

He ordered that a study should be made

Of how to send a force of battleships

Within the Baltic Sea, and threaten there

To bombard German coastlands, stop her trade,

Especially of the vital Swedish ore,

And even make a landing near Berlin.

In Baltic States the sight of British ships

Would hearten those now cowered by Germany.

Would such a stroke make Stalin hesitate

To strengthen his alliance with the Reich?

But naval experts were more sceptical:

They feared the U-boats, and lacked faith in plans

To strengthen ships against the threat of mines.

The Skagerrak might be the Dardanelles.

A second project then attracted him:

To wreck the Germans’ trade upon the Rhine

With floating mines. The French objected,

Fearful lest their factories would be bombed

In swift revenge. Nor would the Cabinet

Give their full assent. Though mines were made,

They were not used before it was too late.

The members of the House were ill at ease

With Chamberlain’s pursuance of the war,

And when he spoke there was but scant applause;

Whilst Churchill sat beside him on the bench,

A Chinese god of plenty, someone wrote,

With indigestion, circular and hunched.

His words were warmly greeted. With a grin,

He turned to the Prime Minister, and said:

‘I have at present no conception how

This odd change in my fortunes has occurred.’

As he went on, he sounded every note

From deep concern to carefree flippancy,

From resolution to sheer boyishness,

And word by word the members’ spirits rose.

For few had seen the temper of the House

So changed abruptly by a single speech.

Later they talked together in the bars:

‘We have now found our leader’, many said.

Meanwhile from Poland came the darkest news.

Stukas and tanks had overcome the Poles,

Whom gallantry alone could not defend

Against the Wehrmacht’s mechanised assault.

Churchill’s broadcast strove to offer hope:

‘The heroes of Warsaw are not destroyed.

The soul of Poland lives. The rock remains;

Submerged by tidal waves, it still endures.

Though Russia has pursued its interests there,

Her armies make a strong defensive front,

Which Hitler, though her ally, must deplore.

For Russia would not welcome German moves

Towards the Baltic States, nor further east.’

It fell to Churchill, once again, to rid

The sea lanes of the world of German ships.

Concealed in ocean wastes, like beasts of prey,

They struck the slow and ill-armed merchantmen.

New groups were formed to hunt the Germans down.

Into the port of Montevideo

They drove the pocket-battleship, Graf Spee,

Whose captain, under orders from Berlin,

Soon scuttled her, and shot himself forthwith.

Amidst the gloom of Winter, Churchill’s speech,

Describing how the Graf Spee met her end,

Warmed British hearts with hopes of victory.

On radio his now familiar voice,

With lisping sibilants, and mocking style –

Pronouncing ‘Nazi’ as in ‘marzipan’ –

Endeared him to the people. Few could doubt

The ruthless will his irony concealed.

Royal Navy sailors, victims of Graf Spee,

Were held aboard the prison ship Altmark.

Evading all pursuers, she had reached

The fjord coast of Norway, on her way

To land the captives in a German port.

British destroyers intercepted her.

She fled to Josing fjord, seeking there,

Amidst the snow-bound slopes of vacant hills,

The safety of a neutral waterway.

But Churchill ordered Altmark to be searched.

A boarding party overcame the crew.

‘The Navy’s here!’ resounded through the ship,

As British sailors clambered onto deck,

Freed from the holds of dark imprisonment.

This incident sent ripples far afield.

In England it enhanced the First Lord’s claim

To prosecute the war aggressively.

In Germany it weighed on Hitler’s mind.

Though pressed by Admiral Raeder, he’d preferred

That Norway should remain a neutral power.

Now Churchill’s action led him to believe

That now she might submit to British plans

To occupy her ports, and interrupt

The flow of iron ore from the Swedish fields,

Upon which German armaments relied.

This latter scheme, indeed, had long appealed

To Churchill’s judgment. When the war began

He had considered how the Swedish ore

Could be denied to German industry.

In Winter, when the northern Baltic froze,

It was supplied from Narvik, down the coast,

Through neutral waters, safely to the Reich.

If these were mined, the ore-ships would be forced

To enter seas patrolled by British ships.

Persistently had Churchill made the case

That rights of smaller countries should not count

Against those measures from which all would gain.

Without the iron their armaments required,

The Germans could not much prolong the war.

Should moral scruples jeopardise those lives

Which would be lost on future battlefields?

But, in the British Cabinet, Churchill’s voice,

Demanding action, eager to engage,

Had failed to move the scruples and the doubts

Of those same men, who not so long before,

Had hailed, in vain, the Munich settlement.

The Russians meanwhile had attacked the Finns

To gain more ground for Leningrad’s defence.

Though Finnish bravery was much admired,

And many people favoured Allied moves

To go to their assistance, Churchill said

The main objective should be Swedish ore.

In London and in Paris long debates

Took place upon this issue. Plans were made

For Allied landings at Norwegian ports,

Anticipating Germany’s response.

Yet nothing was decided. Churchill watched,

Frustrated at the lack of leadership.

In France Edouard Daladier resigned;

To be replaced by Reynaud, one inclined

To fight the war with more audacity.

But still, in England, Chamberlain remained;

Although, when people talked about the war

In offices and factories, shops or streets,

The name of Churchill was upon their lips.

Affronted by the Altmark incident,

The Führer now accepted Raeder’s view

That holding Norway furthered German aims.

By sea and air the Wehrmacht would descend

Upon Norwegian ports and aerodromes.

The basic aim, his War Directive said,

Was that the Wehrmacht should appear to come

As mere protectors of Norwegian rights.

And yet surprise was vital. Any means

To break down all resistance would be used.

This Operation Weser would precede

The opening of offensives in the west.

Both surface ships and submarines could hide

Along the fjord coast. British blockade

Would be no more a threat; and Swedish ore

Would be secured throughout the Winter months.

So when at last the Cabinet gave assent

To mining the Norwegian waterways

And landings to begin at Narvik port,

They found the Germans had forestalled them there,

At Oslo and at other major ports.

This was a bitter blow to Churchill’s pride.

How had the German navy carried there,

To Norway’s western coast, those Wehrmacht troops,

Without alerting Britain’s northern fleet?

The Narvik force had briefly been observed

By air reconnaissance. The Admiralty,

Not realising how bold the Führer was,

Did not believe that Narvik was their goal.

Belatedly the British navy fought

To compensate, by courage, for its lack

Of necessary vigilance and speed.

Along the fjord coast fierce actions flamed

Between the British and the Kriegsmarine.

The German losses so reduced their fleet

That when, weeks later, Britain faced the threat

Of mass invasion from the Channel ports,

The German generals feared to cross the sea.

When, in the Commons, Churchill rose to speak,

He looked quite tired, and hesitated much

In fumbling with his notes and spectacles.

He could not really say how it occurred

That German ships arrived at Narvik first.

But later, in the Cabinet, he urged

That Narvik, first of all, must be regained.

The prime objective still remained the same:

To halt the flow of ore to German ports.

Yet other views prevailed. The case was made

For taking Trondheim, further to the south.

So Allied forces sailed to Namsos, too,

And Aandalsnes, to make a pincer move

From north and south on Trondheim’s garrison.

Disaster followed. Under air attack

And ill-equipped to move in heavy snow,

They gave some help to Norway’s patriots,

But then returned to havens on the coast.

Theirs was the first of many such retreats.

Whilst long delay ensued at Narvik port,

Despite the First Lord’s plea of urgency,

On mainland Europe mightier events

Cast Norway’s tragic battle into shade,

And left its sturdy people and its land

To traitors and the will of Germany.

Deficient in equipment, poorly led,

And hamstrung by political neglect,

The Allied forces soon withdrew by sea.

This was a bitter foretaste of defeat

In other theatres at the Wehrmacht’s hands.

Though Narvik had been stormed belatedly,

It could not now be held. The German grip

On Norway’s vital coastline was complete.