Free Republic

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz formally announced Wednesday that after weeks of stalling and frustrating negotiations Berlin has agreed to send two battalions of Leopard 2 A6 tanks to Ukraine. In a statement the government said it would initially send one company of 14 tanks to Kyiv, though its aim is to send up to 88 tanks from its own stockpiles. Scholz said, "This decision follows our well-known line of supporting Ukraine to the best of our ability. We are acting in a closely coordinated manner internationally." Some 15 other EU nations that possess the German-made tanks in their own stocks...

By day they were ordinary civilians — from dentists and clergymen to gamekeepers and roadmenders – in a Britain gripped by fear of imminent invasion by Hitler’s blitzkreig troops. The only clue to their alter egos might have been the pieces of paper in their pockets – informing any police officer suspicious of their behaviour “to ask no questions of the bearer but phone this number”. But new details have now emerged of the highly secretive role played by a “resistance” army of fit young men and women chosen as would-be saboteurs and spies in the event of a German...

"If I have to choose between Europe and the open sea, between you and Roosevelt, I will always choose America," Churchill told de Gaulle in 1944. British prime ministers, Tony Blair the crowning example, have followed Churchill; French leaders have held to de Gaulle's suspicion of Britain as an American Trojan horse in Europe. France, like Germany, was shaped by defeat in the second world war; undefeated Britain continues to look to its war-time saviour America. The route from France 1940 to divisions over Baghdad 2003 is clear. The fall of France was a heart-churning event that signified the end...