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the view that France’s defeat was pure military stupidity and cuts the ground from under all the generals who claimed they were outnumbered, or undermined by their politicians. The most thorough examination of the whole matter is J. Benoist-Mechin’s Sixty Days that Shook the West (London, 1963). The British part in the campaign is covered by L. F. Ellis’ The War in France and Flanders, 1939-1940 (London, 1953), another volume of the U. K. Military Series. Dunkirk has been extensively dealt with. A recent treatment is R. Collier’s The Sands of Dunkirk (London, 1961). Airey Neave in The Flames of Calais (London, 1972) discussed the question of the utility of the heroic defense of the old town by the British. The latest treatment of Mers-el-Kebir is Warren Tute’s The Deadly Stroke (New York, 1973).

The Battle of Britain has received nearly as much attention as the Battle of France. Any of the following are useful: E. Bishop’s The Battle of Britain (London, 1960); Basil Collier’s The Battle of Britain (New York, 1962); A. McKee’s Strike from the Sky: The Story of the Battle of Britain (London, 1960); and Drew Middleton’s The Sky Suspended: The Battle of Britain (London, 1960). A slightly different tack is taken in Constantine Fitzgibbon’s The Blitz (London, 1957). Perhaps the best single short work is Len Deighton’s Fighter: The True Story of the Battle of Britain (London, 1977), written recently enough to dispose of many of the common myths, and also concentrating heavily on the matériel and equipment problems of both sides. Several works have appeared on the question of the German invasion. P. Fleming’s Operation Sea Lion (New York, 1957) is a good general coverage. R. Wheatley’s Operation Sea Lion: German Plans for the Invasion of England, 1939-42 (Oxford, 1958) is the most detailed study.

The Battle of the Atlantic has also received extensive coverage. General works on the naval war are S. W. Roskill’s White Ensign: The British Navy at War, 1939-1945 (Annapolis, 1960); P. K. Kemp’s Key to Victory: The Triumph of British Sea Power in World War II (Boston, 1957); F. Ruge’s Der Seekrieg: The German Navy’s Story, 1939-1945 (Annapolis, 1957); T. V. Tuleja’s Twilight of the Sea Gods (New York, 1958). More specifically there is D. G. F. W. MacIntyre’s The Battle of the Atlantic (London, 1961). One of many books on the U-boats is Heinz Schaeffer’s U-Boat 977 (London, 1952). The classic technical study on the big ships is S. Breyer’s Battleships and Battlecruisers, 1905-1970 (New York, 1973), and the best account of the convoys is in M. Middlebrook’s Convoy (London, 1976). Almost all of the big-ship episodes have received treatment by one or more writers. A. McKee’s Black Saturday (New York, 1959) is about the sinking of Royal Oak; Dudley Pope wrote Graf Spee: Life and Death of a Raider (New York, 1956). On the Bismarck there are R. Grenfell’s The Bismarck Episode (London, 1948), and W. Berthold’s The Sinking of the Bismarck (London, 1958). D. Woodward dealt with The Tirpitz and the Battle for the North Atlantic (New York, 1953), and F.-O. Busch with The Sinking of the Scharnhorst (London, 1974), on which there is also M. Ogden’s The Battle of the North Cape (London, 1962).

THE WAR IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. For the naval aspects of the struggle in the Mediterranean there are the general naval histories referred to above; there is also D. G. F. W. MacIntyre’s The Battle for the Mediterranean (London, 1964). S. W. C. Pack covered The Battle of Matapan (London, 1961). A view from the other side is M. A. Bragadin’s The Italian Navy in World War II (Annapolis, 1957).

On Greece and Crete there is C. Buckley’s Greece and Crete, 1941 (London, 1952); A. Heckstall-Smith and H. T. Baillie-Grohman’s Greek Tragedy, 1941 (New York, 1961); and R. Crisp’s The Gods Were Neutral (London, 1960). More especially on Crete there is A. Clark’s The Fall of Crete (New York, 1962), and J. H. Spencer’s The Battle for Crete (London, 1962).

For the desert campaign in Libya and Egypt there are D. W. Braddock’s The Campaigns in Egypt and Libya, 1940-1942