The Story Behind the Dunkirk Miracle
The biggest military evacuation in WW2
Maybe one of the most devastating conflicts in human history, World War II (1939–1945) left approximately 60–80 million dead victims behind, its shadows following us even to this day. Swiftly rising to power, Germany lead by the Nazi leader party Adolf Hitler, and together with its Axis allies sought after world domination. Their opposition, the Allied forces, faced many setbacks before Germany’s eventual surrender on May 8, 1945. At the beginning of WW2, when everything seemed lost, only a miracle could have saved the British Expeditionary Forces (BEF) and its French and Belgian counterparts. Today, we remember it as the Dunkirk miracle — an unparalleled military evacuation for its urgency and dimensions — but why was it so important for the Allies?
It was named Operation Dynamo — a rather courageous endeavor initiated by the British Cabinet to use naval vessels and hundreds of civilian boats to rescue the troops of British and Allied forces circled on the coast of France and Belgium by the German army. Despite the approaching German threat, the Dunkirk evacuation will remain one of the biggest and successful military evacuations in history with about 198,000 British and 140,000 French and Belgian troops saved.
On May the 10th, 1940, at the beginning of World War II, the Germans started the invasions of Belgium and the Netherlands. All the same, German tanks marched gloriously through Luxembourg whilst their other armies aimed to weaken the French defense lines at Sedan. After a few days, they successfully managed to gain control of the region and swept across northern France, trapping the remaining Allied forces closer to the coastline near Dunkirk. On May 21, at the Battle of Arras, the British led an attack with two divisions consisting of a brigade of infantry tanks — their only armored troops still left — that proved surprisingly effective which truly alarmed the Germans.
However, on May 24, Hitler and his high command issued a halt order which gave the Allies three days to retreat at Dunkirk. No one knows for sure why the Germans postponed the operation. There exists speculation about them being worried about logistical deficiencies or a potential counterattack. Some even go as far as to suggest that Hitler became superstitious and feared that his spectacular luck from before would not last for much longer.
Regardless, the Allied forces did not have any other attempts to break the trap, and shortly after their enemies took Boulogne on the 25th and Calais on the 26th of May. Just two days later, Belgium was forced to surrender. This meant that if the BEF and the remaining French and Belgian armies wished to escape, their only hope lied at the port in Dunkirk placed between Calais and the Belgian frontier.
The Dunkirk Evacuation
Co-ordinated from Dover Castle by Vice-Admiral Bertram Ramsay and his team, the rescue operation began as early as May the 19th to plan the famous evacuation which was later implemented by the Royal Navy on the 26th of May.
Communication was scarce, resources were low and the process was slow because the troops had to be rescued from the shoreline. They were circled and under continuous attack and exposed to German airstrike attacks. The problem was that the beaches at Dunkirk proved unsuitable for this task and destroyers could not approach within a mile of the shore so the troops had to use small craft such as wooden boats. The most favorable place to evacuate the soldiers was the main dock at Dunkirk which the Germans destroyed. In fact, a wooden boardwalk played the role of an ersatz dock to board the rescue ships. Neither of the options was close to ideal, to say the least.
The Royal Air Force was responsible for protecting the area from above. Truthfully, the air cover provided by fighter aircraft from the English coastline which fought against enemy aircraft was one of the main reasons the evacuation succeeded besides the high discipline of the troops, and the Royal Navy’s tremendous efforts to bring its men back.
Operation Dynamo
The brilliance of Operation Dynamo lied in the hundreds of civilian vessels (i.e. fishing smacks and cockle boats, lifeboats, sailing barge, etc.) crewed by volunteers consisting largely of amateur seamen who answered promptly to the help call and marched across the Channel to Dunkirk. A truly noble act — they risked their lives for the trapped soldiers under German attack. The small boats were able to get closer to the beaches and pick up soldiers to transport them back home. Finally, after days of patiently waiting to be rescued, it all came to an end on June 4; and so the Dunkirk Spirit was born.
Some say that “Dynamo”, the code word used during the Dunkirk evacuation, has its origins in the Castle Dover tunnels which once held an electrical generator.
Although the evacuation boosted the British morale and saved the Allied troops from the merciless hands of the Germans, it is rather difficult whether it was a complete success: many of the British heavy equipment was left behind or destroyed and more than 50,000 troops were unable to flee from the Continent (11,000 of theme were killed and the rest turned into war prisoners). Even Germany declared it at the time as a victory for them. There exists the common misconception that most of the soldiers were rescued by the little ships, but that is far from the truth. Unsurprisingly, the troops were evacuated mainly with the help of destroyers of the Royal Navy which suffered regrettable losses.
Dunkirk, or Dunkerque, was later liberated at the end of WW2 after the surrender of Nazi Germany. The town was badly damaged during WW2 in the attacks with over three-quarters of its buildings destroyed.
The events at Dunkirk will stand for a long time to come as a sterling example of British diligence. The miracle gave soldiers and civilians hope that the war can be won; that their cause is not a lost cause. Undoubtedly, a lot of mistakes were made — on both sides — but none as big as Hitler’s decision to halt. Luckily, the British turned that to their advantage and began the evacuation process accordingly. Regardless of the questionable “successful” nature of Operation Dynamo, when the urgency of rescuing human lives is involved, we should admire the courage of the tireless volunteers who managed to bring their boys back home alive — a noteworthy achievement.
