The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

that had made him determined to join the Auxiliary Air Force. For some
reason Cocky was never able to fathom, however, he failed his preliminary
medical three times. Only on the fourth time did he pass, and although he
was unable to join John in 609 Squadron as he had hoped, he was happy
enough, in May 1939, to be sent to 616 Auxiliary Squadron at Doncaster as
a pupil pilot.
A year on, he and his brother were fighting over Dunkirk.
Ambassador Joe Kennedy was very much with Halifax in believing that
Britain’s leaders needed to look at the rapidly unfolding events both
rationally and pragmatically, yet he feared they were viewing the situation
far too optimistically. As far as he was concerned, defeat by Germany still
seemed heavily on the cards. Thus, he had spent some energy trying to
encourage the Government to send its gold reserves to safety in Canada and
to make contingency plans for the future, such as sending the Royal Family
there and making preparations for the Government to move there should it
be necessary. This suggestion was sharply rebuffed by Churchill, who said
that even shipping valuables might make the public think the Government
was in a panic. What concerned Kennedy was not only the gold reserves
falling into German hands but particularly the Royal Navy – a worry shared
by the President. Of course, Churchill understood this – he had even
dangled the threat of losing the British fleet before Roosevelt in an effort to
get more help from the United States. Luring America in remained a key
policy for Churchill, yet the Prime Minister knew that Kennedy was not the
man to facilitate this. Kennedy was sensing this too. ‘My contacts with the
Churchill Cabinet were certainly far less friendly than with the old
Government,’ he noted. ‘Yet my first duty was to the United States and I
had to tell them that they could not count on us for anything but supplies.
And the worse the situation became, the harder it was to tell them.’
On the 30th, however, Kennedy visited the Palace to hand-deliver a
letter from Roosevelt to the King. George VI was wearing his army uniform
and looking fitter than Kennedy had seen him for some time. He told
Kennedy that they had now lifted some 80,000 from Dunkirk, almost
double what had originally been hoped. ‘Just think,’ said the King, ‘all this
death and destruction due to the whim of one man.’