As Christopher Nolan’s new film epic, Dunkirk, goes on general release, historian Joshua Levine gives Britain at War an exclusive insight into his work as the film’s historical consultant.
WORLD WAR II | DUNKIRK
Operation Dynamo – the evacuation of Dunkirk – is not very well known outside of Britain. To most Americans who have heard of it, it represents a dismal defeat that took place before they entered the war. To a class of Russian students it was a mystery. As I spoke to them on Skype, they were far more interested in posing a question that has long vexed Eastern Europeans – why was there no second front until 1944?
All of this is a huge shame. The Dunkirk evacuation was not just a parochial little British story, the bit that happened before the United States arrived to save the day. On the contrary, it has huge international significance. If the British Expeditionary Force had been destroyed or captured at Dunkirk, Britain would almost certainly have been forced to seek terms with Hitler. She would then have become, as Churchill warned his Cabinet, a slave state. German efforts would have focused exclusively on the Soviet Union. And without Britain as a partner, it is difficult to see how the Uni…
