Word: dakar
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Battle of the Oceans. The great battle had already begun. Pundit Walter Lippmann called it the Battle of the Oceans. The day before the pact was signed he wrote: "The battles over England and northern Europe and in the English Channel, at Gibraltar, toward Egypt and Suez, at Dakar in Africa and in French Indo-China are the opening battles of a great campaign in which there is at stake . . . the mastery of the oceans of the world...
...weakness for lost causes like that of Quiberon. There have been others-Barcelona in 1705, Toulon in 1793, Norway in 1940. But the worst of them all, because the job looked so easy and the repercussions of failure were so drastic, was last week's fiasco at Dakar...
...France, had not. He had good reason to believe that the Germans were much interested in West Africa, had indeed sent more than 300 technicians and advisers into the area to develop pro-Axis airfields, garrisons, sentiment. Therefore he proposed that he personally lead a French force to Dakar, the capital, and subdue it by persuasion. He was sure that overwhelming opinion favored him rather than the Germans. General Spears took the idea to the Prime Minister; and Winston Churchill, the author of Gallipoli, approved-even ordered a supporting British force. If De Gaulle succeeded, the adventure would...
...sending them to join forces with Britain again. Just as slyly the British pretended to believe the trick, but made sure the squadron would never reach the rebellious colonies in French Equatorial Africa. Off the coast of West Africa British warships intercepted the French flotilla, drove it back to Dakar, in Senegal, which was still subservient to Vichy, and the westernmost tip of Africa...
Three days later two large British battleships, four cruisers, "several" destroyers and four troop transports under the command of General de Gaulle appeared off Dakar. General de Gaulle sent a message to Governor General Pierre Boisson demanding the surrender of the colony. M. Boisson refused. At 2 p.m. the British and French force opened fire. The bombardment proceeded far into the night, and Vichy sources indicated that General de Gaulle would attempt a landing. Foreign Minister Paul Baudoin declared: "This is not a question simply of ships which might be taken by the Germans or Italians, but a British desire...