Kōrero: Second World War

These headlines from the Evening Post on 1 June 1940 attempt to paint a positive picture of the evacuation of British forces from Dunkirk, a French channel port close to Belgium. Expecting a long, drawn-out trench war like that on the Western Front in the previous war, the Allies were stunned by the speed and effectiveness of the German advance, which used tanks and dive bombers from the air. In the end over 330,000 Allied troops were rescued, euphemistically described here as a 'gallant rearguard action'.