Dunkirk - the last town before the Low Countries, the last town in France to be liberated in 1945 and, above all, the last chance of rescue for the British Expeditionary Force in 1940. From the unreal days of the phoney war, when there didn't seem to be a war on - even the distribution of civilian gasmasks was months late - to the sudden andshocking arrival of the Blitzkreig, with its attendant miseries for the civilians. This is the story of Operation Dynamo, told from the French viewpoint. While the town and people of Dunkirk suffered their martyrdom by bombing, more than 300,000 troups - the greater part of the BEF, together with 100,000 French - were plucked from the port and beaches and conveyed to England, ready to fight again. By that time, both town and port lay in ruins but, by its sacrifice, Dunkirk had made its own contribution to the final victory of 1945, for which the immediate and essential requirement was the survival of Great Britain as the last opponent of Nazi domination.--Back cover