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3.6.41 [George Orwell]

June 3, 2011 in aeroplanes, Australia, Crete, Cyprus, Germans, Greece, Latakia, newspapers, Political, press, ships, Syria, War-time by orwelldiaries

Now that the evacuation of Crete is completed, there is talk of 20,000 men having been removed. Obviously, therefore, they must have begun clearing out long before this was admitted in the press, and the ships sunk were probably lost in that operation. Total losses will presumably be about 10,000 men, 7 warships (3 cruisers, 4 destroyers), [1] probably some merchant ships as well, a good many AA guns, and a few tanks and aeroplanes. And all this for absolutely nothing…The newspapers criticise more boldly than they have ever done hitherto. One of the Australian papers says openly that it is no use trying to defend Cyprus unless we are taking action against Syria. No sign of this, apparently. Reports this morning that the Germans have already landed armoured units at Latakia.[2] Together with this, vague hints that the British “may” invade Syria. Within a few days it may be too late, if it is not six months too late already.

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24.3.41 [George Orwell]

March 24, 2011 in Atlantic, cruisers, Germany, Hitler, Home Guard, invasion, Political, ships, shortage, War-time, weapons by orwelldiaries

The reports of German heavy cruisers in the Atlantic somehow have the appearance of being a false rumour to draw British capital ships away. [1] That might conceivably be a prelude to invasion. Expectation of invasion has much faded away, because it is generally felt that Hitler could not now conquer England with any force he would be able to bring here, unless British sea and air power had been greatly worn down beforehand. I think this is probably so and that Hitler will not attempt invasion until he has had a spectacular success elsewhere, because the invasion itself would appear as a failure and would need something to offset it. But I think that an unsuccessful invasion meaning the loss of, say, 100,000 or even 500,000 men, might well do his job for him, because of the utter paralysis of industry and internal food-supply it might cause. If a few hundred thousand men could be landed and could hold out for even three weeks they would have done more damage than thousands of air-raids could do. But the effects of this would not be apparent immediately, and therefore Hitler is only likely to try it when things are going conspicuously well for him.

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