Word: hitlered
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Guderian's tanks raced up the coast, seized Boulogne, seized Calais, neared Dunkirk, then were ordered to halt. Guderian protested but was told that it was Hitler's personal order, an important miscalculation that has never been fully explained. "The Fuhrer is terribly nervous," Chief of Staff Franz Halder wrote in his diary. "Frightened by his own success, he is afraid to take any chance and so would rather pull the reins...
...into deserted Paris on June 14. Reynaud fled to England, leaving the government in the hands of Marshal Henri Petain, 84, who was still revered as the man who had defended Verdun during World War I under the watchword, "They shall not pass." But on June 17 he asked Hitler for an armistice. Hardly noticed in the debacle was an appeal from London one day later by an obscure French general named Charles de Gaulle, who, in a speech that was to become the rallying cry for the Resistance, asked all Frenchmen to fight on under his leadership: "France...
...Hitler's terms seemed mild: Germany would occupy and rule the northern half of France and its Atlantic coast; the southern half could remain an autonomous state under Petain, with its capital in the sleepy resort town of Vichy. But he insisted that the armistice be signed in Compiegne, just outside Paris, in the same railroad car where Marshal Foch had made the Germans sign the armistice in 1918, the site marked by a stone tablet placing blame for the war on "the criminal pride of the German empire." CBS correspondent William Shirer, who was standing nearby, reported that Hitler...
...Hitler could not believe it. The French had been defeated, the war won, and the British must see reason. In a speech to the Reichstag, he jeered at the idea of Churchill's fighting on in Canada, but he offered to make peace. "I can see no reason why this war must go on," he said. Churchill decided not even to answer, leaving it to Lord Halifax to declare, "We shall not stop fighting until freedom is secure." Hitler was again lying. Just three days before his "peace speech" on July 19, he had officially told his commanders, "I have...
...have enough ships for such a broad front, and those it did have would be overwhelmed by the stronger British fleet. And who had control of the skies? If there was any doubt, said Goring, his Luftwaffe could smash the Royal Air Force within a few weeks. Hitler thereupon ordered the Luftwaffe "to overcome the British air force with all means at its disposal," so that the invasion could begin Sept...