As the UK celebrates the 80th anniversary of the great Dunkirk withdrawal of remnants of the defeated British forces in Europe to German forces during the beginnings of the war in 1940, there is renewed controversy over the historical event that turned into movies and literary works into something like a "miracle".
The "Dynamo" operation, as it was called, involved the evacuation of more than 338,000 British and French soldiers from the French port of Dunkirk between May 26 and June 4, 1940, and these withdrawn remnants formed the core of the fighting on various fronts of the Allied war against the Nazis.
Prior to the massive withdrawal, then British Prime Minister Winston Churchill described the situation as a "massive military catastrophe", and there was much controversy among military historians over the mysterious reasons that prevented German Chancellor Adolf Hitler from launching a sweeping attack on the remnants of the withdrawing forces, a position that was described as a mistake. Great German is on the front, and one of the turning points in the World War.
Churchill, who has vowed to fight the Germans on the beaches, had stated in a speech to the British House of Commons prior to the withdrawal that "wars cannot be won with evictions" before he described the major withdrawal as "a miracle of salvation."
The University of Durham's academic and academic historian Tim Lakhurst, who studies Britain's contemporary history by following the development of journalism, says that the British public's consideration of the "Dunkirk" process is a victory thanks to the work of British newspaper journalists and Royal Navy press officers who provided them with specific details.
How did the "miracle" happen?
The press did not cover the "Dunkirk" process through eyewitness accounts from the scene as usual, and the few war correspondents who returned with the withdrawing armies had no means of communication, while reports such as Evelyn Montague's coverage of the Manchester Guardian were written on Saturday 1 June 1940 "a miracle The British Forces Return "by the invited journalists to watch the arrival and takeover of the Royal Navy of the evacuated soldiers to the ports of southeast England, and there they were exposed to a scene of national enthusiasm and maritime pride along with some facts.
The first sentence of Montage's report includes this enthusiastic flavor, as he opens his report saying, "With the gray chills of today in the southeastern port of Britain, war correspondents saw with incredible joy a miracle."
The reporter - the grandson of the famous Guardian editor and former owner CP Scott - did not forget to give the Royal Navy the credit for what happened, describing a hotel on the waterfront where "every chair was carrying a soldier or a sleeping sailor, crammed under a coat or ground cover," and Montage turned to the scene in The port said, "As the sun rose, the gray clouds turned into polished brass, the first destroyer quickly slipped into the harbor, and it was erect and filled with men who lined side by side on its roof."
In 1940, the ancient British Times newspaper did not give its journalists a place to write their names on the front of articles and coverage as usual, and its report on the return of British forces from Dunkirk was written by "our special correspondent", who also followed the scenes in the southeastern port of Britain.
He added, "Security censors prohibited any more precise identification," and wrote that the men were "tired but were not afraid." Under the protection of "the ongoing patrols of British warships and aircraft in the English Channel ... the men who demonstrated" great stability in a severe test ... were flocking to the sidewalks. "
Bernard Gray, editor of the Daily Mirror newspaper, wrote a cover for June 2 entitled "The Wonderful Full Story," and added, "There have been many glorious episodes in British history ... but, if the great English historian Lord McCauley (1800-1859)) Able to choose the greatest week of the 2000 years from the annals (event logs) of the British Empire, these last seven days have certainly been the week that would have been chosen. "
Gray did not hesitate to provide detailed comparisons saying, "In addition to defeating the Spanish Armada (in which the British navy swept the Spanish fleet in 1588), we forget even the Battle of Waterloo (in which the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was defeated by an alliance of European countries including Britain in 1815 AD), the saga of Trafalgar Old, this week saw the British Empire at its strongest .. in defeat. "
"This is a stunning heroic image, fighting spirit and determination that has never weakened in the face of the overwhelming imbalance in men and equipment," described G. Price of the British Daily Mail newspaper in an article on the newspaper's front page.
"Glorious" defeat
It took Heller Belloche, the Anglo-French author of the children's stories, a while to realize in his column for the Sunday Times (the time of the evacuation and after 2 June) that the withdrawal from Belgium and the collapse of Britain's main ally (France) constituted a disaster.
In his study of the elements that shaped the "Britain's Story" of 1940, the Scottish historian and poet Angus Calder - who chronicled the history of World War II in his book "The People's War" and won the John Loylin Reyes Literary Prize - indicated that the way the story was covered was misleading. "Dunkirk was actually a great escape," Calder said.
Author Lakhurst says in his article on the website Confidence that he appreciates the work that British newspapers have done to support morale and maintain resolve in a time of danger, but added, "In a democracy that fights totalitarianism, newspapers must balance their commitment to holding power and their duty to the national cause," noting To the complicity of the newspapers on presenting myths about Dunkirk.
On Gray's coverage of the Sunday Mirror, he said that Dunkirk was glorious despite the fact that "the British army did not win a battle ... the British army retreated. The British army was forced to leave the battlefield."
In the end, the great withdrawal was very beneficial to the Allied forces in the Second World War both militarily and morally, and the German Reich leader Hitler paid a great price for missing the opportunity thinking that the withdrawn remnants will never return to Europe, but realizing the reality of what took time and press coverage does not avoid the facts, They are lessons that can be useful at a time when many countries face a major global pandemic threat.