Operation Mercury Read Online Free
Author: John Sadler
an accord with Hitler and the Nazis. Joseph Kennedy and the Irish lobby within Rooseveltâs own party were rabid Anglophobes.
As ambassador to St. James, Kennedy was less than a popular success, seeking to gain personal business advantage as a condition precedent to continued aid and openly touting for an armistice. The president was considerably embarrassed and recalled Kennedy. Repellent as his attitude and conduct were, he was not, by any means, in a minority; many US industrialists shared his leanings.
Gerhard Westrick, a German agent with a trade attaché cover, liaised with numerous leading figures from the sphere of business and commerce, offering significant trading opportunities for US businesses with the Greater German Reich. A number of key industrial figures appeared convinced by his blandishments. 13
By the close of 1940, a year of serial disasters for England, livened only by the twin deliverance of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain, the war cabinet was desperate for US support, the continuance of which was beyond the beleaguered and depleted capital of the state and its Empire. Churchill penned an eloquent and detailed essay to Roosevelt, stressing the need for unencumbered aid:
I believe you will agree that it would be wrong in principle and mutually disadvantageous in effect, if at the height of this struggle Great Britain were to be divested of all saleable assets, so that after the victory is won with our blood, civilisation saved, and the time gained for the United States to be armed against all eventualities, we should stand stripped to the bone. 14
This passionate plea touched a continuing chord in the president and became the inspiration for the subsequent Lease-Lend scheme. More immediately, and within a couple of days, Roosevelt had dispatched his personal representative, Colonel William Donovan, to liaise directly with Churchill.
âBig Billâ was a larger than life character; latterly a successful Wall Street lawyer, he had abandoned the brief for the sword at his presidentâs request even though their politics were, in many areas, incompatible. A much decorated veteran of the Western Front, Donovan had maintained a finger in the counterintelligence pie and was a firm advocate of the Allied cause. He would go on to found the US equivalent to Special Operations Executive (SOE), the Office of Strategic Studies (OSS) which would, in due course during the emergence of the Cold War, grow into the omnipotent Central Intelligence Agency.
Having met and conferred with Churchill in London, Donovan proceeded on a grand tour of Eastern Europe, including the Bulgarian capital of Sofia, Belgrade, where he spoke with Prince Paul and then to North Africa for discussions with the representatives of Vichy.
His message to the War Cabinet was a simple one and typically forthright. If Britain wished to restore and maintain its foundering credibility with the Americans then some form of successful military venture had to be undertaken on the European mainland. Clearly France, the Low Countries and Scandinavia were beyond the Empireâs much depleted resources; this left the Balkans, the deadly melting pot and graveyard of spent alliances.
It was this need, coupled with the spectre of an Italian offensive, that triggered Churchillâs interest in Greece. If Britain, for a limited military commitment, could facilitate the defeat of Il Duceâs strutting legions then this might achieve the necessary resonance across the Atlantic.
Mussoliniâs designs were scarcely secret. Since the annexation of Albania in 1939, the Italians shared a common border with the Greeks and there had been an escalating tide of provocation since. In addition to a series of stage-managed border âincidentsâ, the Greek cruiser Helle had been brazenly torpedoed in an utterly unprovoked attack.
Hitler had met his Italian counterpart in October 1940 at the Brenner Pass in the wake of the German defeat
As ambassador to St. James, Kennedy was less than a popular success, seeking to gain personal business advantage as a condition precedent to continued aid and openly touting for an armistice. The president was considerably embarrassed and recalled Kennedy. Repellent as his attitude and conduct were, he was not, by any means, in a minority; many US industrialists shared his leanings.
Gerhard Westrick, a German agent with a trade attaché cover, liaised with numerous leading figures from the sphere of business and commerce, offering significant trading opportunities for US businesses with the Greater German Reich. A number of key industrial figures appeared convinced by his blandishments. 13
By the close of 1940, a year of serial disasters for England, livened only by the twin deliverance of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain, the war cabinet was desperate for US support, the continuance of which was beyond the beleaguered and depleted capital of the state and its Empire. Churchill penned an eloquent and detailed essay to Roosevelt, stressing the need for unencumbered aid:
I believe you will agree that it would be wrong in principle and mutually disadvantageous in effect, if at the height of this struggle Great Britain were to be divested of all saleable assets, so that after the victory is won with our blood, civilisation saved, and the time gained for the United States to be armed against all eventualities, we should stand stripped to the bone. 14
This passionate plea touched a continuing chord in the president and became the inspiration for the subsequent Lease-Lend scheme. More immediately, and within a couple of days, Roosevelt had dispatched his personal representative, Colonel William Donovan, to liaise directly with Churchill.
âBig Billâ was a larger than life character; latterly a successful Wall Street lawyer, he had abandoned the brief for the sword at his presidentâs request even though their politics were, in many areas, incompatible. A much decorated veteran of the Western Front, Donovan had maintained a finger in the counterintelligence pie and was a firm advocate of the Allied cause. He would go on to found the US equivalent to Special Operations Executive (SOE), the Office of Strategic Studies (OSS) which would, in due course during the emergence of the Cold War, grow into the omnipotent Central Intelligence Agency.
Having met and conferred with Churchill in London, Donovan proceeded on a grand tour of Eastern Europe, including the Bulgarian capital of Sofia, Belgrade, where he spoke with Prince Paul and then to North Africa for discussions with the representatives of Vichy.
His message to the War Cabinet was a simple one and typically forthright. If Britain wished to restore and maintain its foundering credibility with the Americans then some form of successful military venture had to be undertaken on the European mainland. Clearly France, the Low Countries and Scandinavia were beyond the Empireâs much depleted resources; this left the Balkans, the deadly melting pot and graveyard of spent alliances.
It was this need, coupled with the spectre of an Italian offensive, that triggered Churchillâs interest in Greece. If Britain, for a limited military commitment, could facilitate the defeat of Il Duceâs strutting legions then this might achieve the necessary resonance across the Atlantic.
Mussoliniâs designs were scarcely secret. Since the annexation of Albania in 1939, the Italians shared a common border with the Greeks and there had been an escalating tide of provocation since. In addition to a series of stage-managed border âincidentsâ, the Greek cruiser Helle had been brazenly torpedoed in an utterly unprovoked attack.
Hitler had met his Italian counterpart in October 1940 at the Brenner Pass in the wake of the German defeat
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