AVOIDING BLOODSHED.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 256, 26 September 1940, Page 7

AVOIDING BLOODSHED.

OBJECT OF WITHDRAWAL

EVENTS DESCRIBED

Tho events leading np to the withdrawal of General de Gaulle’s forces from Dakar are described in a statement by the British Ministry of Information and'a 8.8. C. comniif.-entary. In a statement, the Ministry pf Information says that on the morning of .September 23 General de Gaulle attempted to land at Dakar and met with a hostile reception, being fired on by the shore batteries. Before returning the fire the British admiral stated in a clear signal that he would be compelled to return the French fire unless it ceased. Fire was then exchanged between the British warships and the shore batteries and there were casualties on both sides. The battleship Richelieu opened fire and this also had to be returned. Three submarines in the harbour made attacks on the British warships and had to be engaged. Two of the submarines were sunk, but the crew of one were saved and will he repatriated. Tlie 8.8. C. commentator said that when it was realised that General de Gaulle could no longer take Dakar without a major operation he decided to retire. It was recognised that the free French forces could only be recruited by goodwill and not compulsion. If some of the Frenchmen at Dakar still believed that Marshal Petain, General Weygand and M. Laval were right it was clear that they could not have their opinions changed by artillery and machine-guns. The resistance at Dakar did not represent the general feeling in French Senegal, and General de Gaulle’s attempt might prove decisive in the long run.

BRITAIN’S PART IN ACTION

The 8.8. C. commentator also emphasised that the Dakar affair was not a British attempt to make contact with tho French there. It had been a French attempt to persuade the residents there to choose, between Vichy or freedom. The British Government had approved the suggestion, made by General de Gaulle, to make contact with Dakar, firstly because it wished to help the free French movement, and, secondly, because German influence had been spreading south towards Dakar with the object of seizing this key point on the Atlantic coast. AVhen the Vichy officials at Dakar, presumably strengthened by German elements, fired on General de Gaulle’s flag of truce, the ships of the Royal Navy had no option but to open fire. AVhen the three French cruisers which had come from Toulon put to sea again, steaming south, the situation again changed. The cruisers could only be going to French Equatorial Africa, which had already declared for General cle Gaulle, and with the object of upsetting the situation there. The British force thereupon intercepted the ships and ordered them back to Dakar. Two returned, but the third, with engine trouble, was escorted by the Royal Navy to Casablanca.