by gerald hall
“Well, I need to return to Canberra to make my report to the Ministry. You are doing a lot of good work out here, Mister Cavill. I am certain that we will need everything that you can produce if we are going to survive this war. I will do my best to convince my superiors to support you in any way that we can.”
“Thank you very much, Captain.” Harold said before the Australian officer began to walk back towards Harold’s truck for the trip back to the airfield.
British Ministry of War
London, England
October 30, 1940
“That was a hell of a thing that the French did in the Med. Their army may have fallen apart, but those French sailors managed to gut much of the Italian fleet before those three French battleships were destroyed.” Admiral of the Fleet Sir Dudley Pound said after coming in to visit his friend, Field Marshall Sir John Greer Dill, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff.
“It is a shame that the French Army didn’t show nearly as much courage and skill as their navy did. Admiral Gensoul succeeded to get at least half of his cruisers and destroyers into Alexandria in spite of the heavy damage many of the surviving ships had suffered.” Sir John bitterly noted.
“I agree. We would have driven the Germans back across the Rhine with such men. It is still unfortunate that the three Littorio’s are still operational or will be soon. Those modern Italian fast battleships remain a force to be reckoned with. But at least they cannot be everywhere at once.
There was also the destruction of several Italian cruisers and destroyers as well during that battle. That will make it harder for the Italian battleships to deploy against our supply convoys, now that the Italian screening forces have been greatly diminished. Those French heroes have certainly made our task in North Africa far less difficult now.”
“We need all of the help that we can get in that arena. The Germans and Italians still have our forces significantly outnumbered in North Africa. We are also extremely short of tanks, artillery and other heavy weapons as well. Our factories are producing equipment as quickly as possible. We are being forced to purchase or barter for additional hardware from the Americans, but it comes at a steep price, you know.”
“We are short of critical materiel everywhere, I’m afraid, Sir John. I have a document here that must reach Commander in Chief Far East, Air Marshall Sir Robert Brooke Popham. He has to be informed of the Chief of Staff’s current assessment of the situation in the Far East.”
“He is not going to like it.” The Field Marshal grimly admitted. “The report paints a very gloomy picture on the situation. We can’t even be sure that the French garrison out there will choose to continue to fight against the Japanese in the event that France falls to the Nazis in the next few days, in spite of the heroic actions of Admiral Gensoul’s force in the Med.
In any event, how were you planning on sending this document to Air Marshall Brooke, Admiral?”
“Our normal procedure would be to send it via commercial ship. That way, the document doesn’t draw unnecessary attention. In the event the ship is attacked, the captain is instructed to dump the document overboard in the weighted bag that the document is in.”
“What about sending it by air this time? Obviously, time is important here as well as security. That Australian industrialist Harold Cavill has set up a flying boat service that travels between London and Australia. I know that Mister Cavill has also informed your people in the Admiralty that he was more than willing to provide free space for the Navy to send couriers to the Far East if necessary. Since his aircraft normally make a stop at Singapore en route to Australia, it would be easy for him to take this report to Sir Robert with far less risk of capture.”
“That sounds like a splendid idea. This Mister Cavill is a close friend of Prime Minister Churchill. I’m sure that if asked, the Prime Minister could quietly make the arrangements.”
“Excellent. I will go ahead and contact the Minister. Maybe he will finally stop thinking of me as some sort of unimaginative dinosaur now.”
Of course, neither officer knew that Harold Cavill had set up this flying boat service expressly for this purpose. While Harold primarily saw the flying boats as a means of profitably moving people and materiel back and forth from England to his headquarters in Derby, he also had another purpose for it as well.
Harold had located a key piece of historical information on his computer years earlier about what happened to this particular document in his own past. When the merchant ship Automedon, carrying this report to Singapore, was captured by the German disguised raider Atlantis, the Germans were able to capture the document before it could be tossed overboard.
Atlantis’ captain Bernhard Rogge immediately arranged for this precious document to be sent to Japan. The document led the Japanese to make the decision to attack Pearl Harbor. The Japanese also exploited the weaknesses detailed in the report regarding Singapore’s defenses. This led to the disastrous fall of Singapore and capture of over eighty-five thousand British, Australian and other Commonwealth troops. Counting personnel captured or killed in Malaya, the total losses were over one hundred and forty thousand.
By ensuring that this document made it to its destination safely on board one of his flying boats, Harold knew that many of these soldiers, mostly Australian, would be saved from a terrible fate in Japanese captivity. It would also ensure that they would be available later on in the war to take the place of American troops in the fight against the Japanese.
But things were not quite as gloomy as the Ministry of War had portrayed the situation in the Southwest Pacific. Some of Harold’s efforts had already borne fruit with the warships and weapons that were already beginning to come out of his factories. This alone would significantly improve the situation, even without any American involvement.
There was also the issue of the French military force in Indochina. Harold already had it on good authority that the French commander in Indochina had no intention of surrendering his territory to the Japanese, unlike what had happened in the history of the original timeline. Harold’s efforts in supplying armored vehicles and other weapons to the French there had also developed several reliable sources of information about the French military leadership there. Things in Indochina would be far different now than what had been the case with the Vichy in charge.
French Military Headquarters
Haiphong, French Indochina
November 21, 1940
Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival, commander of the garrison at Singapore had flown aboard a RAF transport aircraft to Haiphong to meet with the commander of forces in French Indochina, Vice Admiral Emile Henry Muselier.
A French military honor guard stood at the ready at the airfield when General Percival’s aircraft arrived. A French major was standing at the door of the aircraft when the British general stepped down to the ground. The major smartly saluted before speaking in accented English.
“Monsieur General. I am here to take you to see the Admiral. I will be serving as a translator as well since the Admiral’s English is not very good.” Major Francois Mercador said.
“Thank you, Major. I am eager to speak to Admiral Muselier on a matter of great importance to both our forces.”
General Percival, his aide and Major Mercador then all got into a sedan and rode to the French military headquarters building. The three men were quickly ushered into Admiral Muselier’s office.
“Good afternoon, Sir. Air Marshall Popham sent me to speak to you about what has happened in France. We are very concerned about what your forces will do now that France has signed an armistice with Germany? You currently occupy a very critical area between British forces and the Japanese in China. ” General Percival said with Major Mercado quickly translating.
“Yes, General. We are aware of this. The Japanese have already been probing our defenses. While our troops are eager to prove themselves, we do have considerable shortages in modern equipment.”
“I am aware of this already. If you w
ere to allow the Japanese to come in, it would cause my forces and those of our allies considerable difficulty. Therefore, I have a very important question. Admiral, are you Vichy or are you French?”
“I am French, of course. That is why I denied the request by the Vichy government for me to send back to France my two battle cruisers, Dunkerque and Strasbourg. They cannot be of any use sitting tied to the pier at Toulon.” Admiral Muselier replied, standing proudly upright as he spoke.
“Then continue the fight and resist the Japanese alongside us. Fight for your freedom, Admiral. By doing so, you help us in the fight against the Germans who have occupied your homeland and eventually for their freedom as well.”
“What will you do to help us, Monsieur General? For many of our men, their families remain in France and are vulnerable to retribution by the Boche and their Vichy puppets. There is also the issue of providing supplies like fuel, food and spare parts for our equipment.”
“I can promise you that we will do everything that we can to protect your families in France, including evacuating them to England if necessary. As far as your materiel needs are concerned, we will provide you with oil and food, even weapons if necessary, as long as you are committed to continuing the fight on our side against Hitler and his allies.”
“Please understand, Monsieur General. This is a very difficult decision for us to defy our own government back home in Paris. The Vichy government in Paris had sent us instructions to cooperate with the Japanese who were just north of our border with China.
On the other hand, we also received a second set of secret instructions from French Navy headquarters in Toulon a few days ago. We will continue the fight as your allies per those particular instructions. I pray that our families will not pay the price for my decision here. But at least Dunkerque and Strasbourg are both here, safe from being taken over and used by the dirty Boche.”
“Thank you, Monsieur General. I am sure that your families will be very proud of you and all of your men here, Admiral. We are also trying to get more of your nation’s fleet to safe havens, away from German hands. I believe that we will be able to save Richelieu and possibly also even the carrier Bearn. But your force is very important for us out here.”
“Vive la France! For we will fight and if necessary, die for her. I hope that together, we can make a difference against the Fascists.” Admiral Muselier finally said.
“Thank you, Admiral. We will have our staffs coordinate with yours about how we can best integrate our forces. Now, we not only have our Commonwealth forces as well as the Dutch units in the area, but we now have yours to work with. We will have to work quickly because the Japanese will surely be on the move against all of our forces.”
“I have work as well to do. I am sure that we will have some French here whose loyalties are with the Vichy. They will have to be contained and dealt with as necessary. It will not be pretty, I fear.”
“Conflicts among countrymen never are.” General Percival sadly noted.
“I know. But I feel a lot more comfortable fighting the Japanese, even if we are not able to fight the Boche at the moment.”
“If you will give my aide a list of materiel that you feel that you need to help fend off the Japanese, I will immediately forward it to Air Marshall Popham. We will do our utmost to support you and your brave forces.”
“Now, what can we do for you, Monsieur General?”
“At this time, our total strength in capital ships consists of Force Z with the battleship Prince of Wales and the battle cruiser Repulse. If you would combine your naval forces with ours, we would immediately double our available strength in modern capital ships. That will be a powerful deterrent to the Japanese attempting to strike against us.”
“This is a good idea, although we would like to conduct independent operations as well. Our ships are accustomed to operating with each other, Monsieur General. There is also the language barrier with so few of our people able to speak English. I am not certain that you have enough people who speak French adequately as well.
There is also the issue of how we are to defend the skies over Indochina. We have very few military aircraft here. From what we have already seen, they will not be able to defend us against the more modern Japanese fighters and bombers.”
“We will have to find a way to work together and effectively communicate in whatever language is necessary, Admiral. The situation with aircraft is already being addressed. We have one aircraft carrier, HMS Hermes, already en route to Singapore. A second aircraft carrier, HMS Indomitable, will be joining Hermes as soon as some repairs are made. It is also my understanding that the Australians have recently surprised us with a new fleet aircraft carrier of their own that will also be entering service soon.
These ships will be able to provide mobile air cover for all of our naval forces against the Japanese. In addition, the RAF will have well over one hundred land-based fighters and bombers available to defend Malaya and Singapore. I have also been promised that Australia will be producing a significant number of additional aircraft for their aircraft carrier as well as for land-based operations.”
“This sounds all very good. Hopefully, it will all be enough to stop the Japanese from advancing any further south into Southeast Asia.”
Royal Navy Base
Port of Alexandria, Egypt
December 1, 1940
Lieutenant-General Archibald Wavell stood outside the British military headquarters building, looking down upon the port of Alexandria and the mass of Royal Navy and commercial ships that filled the port facilities there. Shortly before the beginning of the war, General Wavell had taken command of the new Middle Eastern Command.
For the past three months, General Wavell has had to contend with the Italians’ attempt to invade Egypt. While the Italians stopped after only advancing into Egypt, both sides were accumulating supplies for a continuation of the fight.
A British Army major wearing standard issue khaki uniform and shorts walked up and smartly saluted the general.
“Good Morning, Sir. I’m Major Snipes from Logistics.”
“What do you have for me, Snipes?” General Wavell calmly replied, his gaze hardly wavering from the scene of the busy port.
“A new supply convoy just arrived into port after transiting through the Suez Canal.”
“What did they bring for us? We need all of the help that we can get.”
“We just received nearly ten thousand more personnel reinforcements from the Australians, Sir. They also arrived with some new tanks, artillery and trucks.”
General Wavell sighed in resignation.
“I hope that the bloody Aussies didn’t drag a bunch of obsolete junk with them like before. We are not fighting the last war, you know. As desperate as we are for any sort of armored vehicles and weaponry after Dunkirk, we need equipment that will be able to stand up to what the Germans already have in North Africa. We are only getting a trickle of weapons from the Americans and from our own factories. That just isn’t enough if we are going to hold Egypt. At least the trucks might be of some use to us.”
“Sir, from what I have seen, these new Australian tanks that just came in are not old designs at all. They all look like they had just been manufactured, in fact. The tanks are very unusual looking though, I have been told.”
“What do you mean exactly?”
“The Aussies have a three or four companies’ worth of this new light tank that is a bit bigger than our Vickers Light Mark Six and has an automatic cannon in the turret instead of a heavy machine gun. They also have about two companies’ worth of another tank that is similar in many ways to their light tank but is larger and much more heavily armed. In fact, these larger vehicles that the Aussies call ‘Echidna’s’ are even more powerfully armed than our latest Crusaders.”
“If what is are saying is true, then they are most certainly welcome then. But you did say that they were unusual looking, didn’t you?”
“Yes, Sir. I was told that they
look like someone built them ‘backwards’. I guess that you will have to go see them sometime before the Australian force leaves Alexandria to go to the front lines.”
“Who delivered those vehicles anyway? I never saw anything in our regular message traffic about these vehicles coming in.”
“Most of the vehicles came in a pair of bloody big Australian freighters. They belonged to Cavill Lines, I believe.
“Cavill is that wealthy Australian fellow, isn’t he? I read something about him in the newspaper. He’s turned a little town in Australia into a large business center with a bunch of factories. He also owns a lot of mines in Australia.”
“Yes, I’ve heard about that too. I also heard from some well-connected friends of mine who tell me that he owns factories in England too in addition to others in various locations in Australia and maybe in America too.”
“Mister Cavill sounds almost like that American, Howard Hughes, to me.”
“Maybe, but he doesn’t make motion pictures or date starlets. In fact, you hardly ever see him in public at all, Sir.”
“I know. But I understand that he has some very influential friends, including our new Prime Minister. His factories also have a reputation for producing some very high quality ships and vehicles. So Mister Cavill must be doing something right.”
“I suppose so, Sir. Rumor out there among the Aussies is that Churchill himself asked for these new tanks. I also noticed that Mister Cavill sent a lot of ammunition and spare parts along with the vehicles and artillery. All of these Australian infantrymen that just arrived are armed with this new rifle of theirs too. It uses Japanese ammunition and can fire automatically like a machine gun.”
“Sounds like a bloody waste of ammunition compared to our troops’ bolt-action Lee-Enfield rifles. If the Australians want to use their fancy new toys, they are welcome to do so. In any event, the Australian reinforcements and their new armour are here just in time to participate in Operation Compass. We are going to take the fight to the Italians and not only drive them out of Egypt but also push them all the way out of North Africa.
