News of the Week in Review
Twenty News Questions – 9
Can Germany Be Stopped? Lessons of the War – 10-11
What Germany Gained From Norwegian Conquest (map) – 12
Reich Raises Prestige by Triumph in Norway – 13-14
Chamberlain’s Power is Likely to Continue * - 15-16
Answers to Twenty News Questions – 17
* Subtitle: Britain Faces Cabinet Crisis Over Reverses in Norway but With No Sharp Change Projected
Good call, Ray. If there is any change in that forecast I hope you give us an update. (Isn’t hindsight fun?)
The attack on France is just a few weeks away.
The change from Chamberlain to Churchill was not a sure thing.
Many Brits did not trust Churchill -- too eratic, too, well, imaginative.
And now Norway is added to Galipoli in his list of "accomplishments." Oh dear.
So Chamberlain's first choice as successor was his Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax. But for reasons an American might never understand, that was impossible.
The selection then fell reluctantly to Churchill.
Among Churchill's many assets was an ever deepening friendship with Franklin Roosevelt. In the end, this would make all the difference.
Whether he knew it then or not, Chamberlain was, or would soon be, mortally ill with bowel cancer and die almost six months to the day later, age 71.
So, do I have to pay a penalty for jumping the gun? ;-)
Homer:
This is one of the rare instances I’m disappointed in your selections from the Times. I’d liked to have seen the full article on isolation of the U-235 isotope. It seems that such a powerful naturally occurring substance will have some ramifications in the current war, especially since it is being sought by Germany.
I’ll have to go dig through my copy of Rhodes’ “The Making of the Atomic Bomb” for more on this.
There will be a steady stream of such articles in the coming year, until all news of research into nuclear physics “goes dark.” The astute reader of the New York Times science articles will deduce that construction of atomic weapons is possible. One such reader was a crew member of the Enola Gay. The crew was never told what they were training for, and even on the bomb run to Hiroshima, they were only told it was a very powerful weapon of a new type. When pressed what it was, the crewman asked if it were a “chemist’s nightmare” and told “no.” The astute crewman then asked if it were a “physicist’s nightmare” and told “something like that.” He then put two and two together and asked “Sir, are we splitting atoms today?”