HISTORIANS
Sir Martin Gilbert, Winston Churchill’s official biographer
Sir Martin Gilbert is a leading historian and the author of 81 books, among them Churchill: A Life, and the multiple volumes of The Churchill War Papers. In 1995 he was knighted “for services to British history and international relations” and probably knows more about Churchill than anyone else alive.
Andrew Lambert, Professor of Naval History at King’s College, London
Andrew Lambert has been described as “the outstanding British naval historian of his generation.” His books include Trincomalee: The Last of Nelson’s Frigates, The Foundations of Naval History and Nelson: Britannia’s God of War. His highly successful history of the British Navy, War at Sea, was broadcast on BBC2.
Galen Perras, Associate Professor, Department of History, University of Ottawa
Galen Perras is a military historian and expert on Canadian-American relations. He wrote his PhD in American and Canadian History and is the author of Franklin Roosevelt and the Origins of the Canadian-American Security Alliance, which included an examination of the secret Canadian/American diplomatic meetings included in the film.
Warren F. Kimball, Robert Treat Professor of History at Rutgers University
Warren F. Kimball has written and edited numerous books including The Juggler: Franklin Roosevelt as Wartime Statesman; the acclaimed three-volume collection Churchill & Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence (3 vols); Forged in War: Roosevelt, Churchill and the Second World War; Allies at War: The American, British, and Soviet Experience in the Second World War; America Unbound: World War II and the Making of a Super-Power; and FDR’s World: War, Peace and Legacies.
SURVIVORS
André Jaffre, French Navy veteran
André Jaffre was born in 1922. After joining the French Navy in 1938 he was assigned to the battleship Bretagne and was one of the few survivors when she sank at Mers el Kebir on 3rd July 1940. In 1942 André took part in the sabotage of the French Fleet at Toulon to prevent it falling into the hands of the Nazis. Although taken prisoner by the Germans, he managed to escape and rejoined the French Marines who took part in the Liberation of France at the end of the war, fighting all the way into Germany in 1945. He received the Military Cross for his valour. André formed part of a delegation of former sailors present at Mers el Kebir in July 1940 who every year attend the reunion of the HMS Hood Association at the invitation of the late Ted Briggs the Associations’ president.
Léon Le Roux, French Navy veteran
Léon Le Roux was born in Brest in 1920. After joining the French Navy in 1938 he was assigned to the battleship Dunkirk where he served as part of Admiral Gensoul’s executive. Injured in the attack at Mers el Kebir in July 1940 he returned to Toulon where he served as part of the Naval Ministry for the remainder of the war. After the war he returned to active service on the cruiserGlory and finished his career on the battleship Richelieu. He was awarded the Military Cross for his services to the French Navy.
Robert Philpott, Royal Navy veteran
Born in 1919, Robert Philpott was the last remaining survivor of HMS Hood when we filmed him earlier in the year. He died of cancer in April 2009.
PRODUCTION
Jared Lipworth, executive producer
As director of science programs, Jared Lipworth is responsible for commissioning and executive producing all science programs produced by THIRTEEN’s Science, Natural History and Features department. Current projects in production or development include Secrets of the Dead IX, Ground War, Curious II and The Human Spark, which is currently a finalist at the Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival for Presenter-Led programming. Recently completed projects include Curious, Warplane, Secrets of the Dead VII-VIII (with one program, Doping for Gold, up for a 2009 Emmy) and The Mysterious Human Heart, which won the 2008 Emmy for Science, Technology, and Nature programming.
Prior to becoming executive producer and then director of science programs, Lipworth was the series producer for the department’s technology series, Innovation. He also served as series producer for the Emmy-nominated Secrets of the Dead III and coordinating producer for many of the department’s projects, including Warrior Challenge, Secrets of the Pharaohs, the Emmy Award-winning Frontier House and The Secret Life of the Brain, Warship, Taxi Dreams, Echoes From the White House and Savage Planet. In 2003, Lipworth was nominated for a writing Emmy for Secrets of the Dead: Mystery of the Black Death. Additional credits at THIRTEEN include post-production producer for The American President and 1900 House and production assistant for Savage Seas, On The Trail of Mark Twain, The Great Balloon Race and Stories of Lupus.
Before arriving at THIRTEEN, Lipworth produced, directed and edited In the Footsteps of the Black Rhino for the BBC’s Animal Zone. He received his master’s degree in broadcast journalism from New York University, where he won the award for academic excellence, and he received his bachelor’s degree in business management from Cornell University.
Phil Craig, executive producer
Prior to setting up Furnace, Phil Craig was Joint Head of Programmes at Brook Lapping Productions, where he was responsible for a range of programming including Hostage, Finest Hour, Live Aid Remembered, Storyville: Blog Wars, Ocean of Fear, The Flight that Fought Back, Surviving Katrina, Attack on the Pentagon, Geldof in Africa and Secrets of the Dead: Doping for Gold.
Richard Bond, writer & director
Richard Bond has been directing prime time television documentaries for over 10 years. He specializes in documentary, history and drama-documentaries and his films have been broadcast by many major broadcasters around the world including the BBC, Channel 4, Channel 5, MSNBC and the Discovery Channel. His awards include a Cine Golden Eagle and a Royal Television Society Award.
The French proved they were honorable allies in WW2. Churchill in his desperation and haste screwed up, and created a tragedy/war crime no matter how much secrets of the dead tries to spin it. It is unconscionable and still displays enormous disrespect in trying to spin this that the French navy needed to become some sort of sacrificial lamb so America would “see” British resolve, what a CROCK! America’s dithering didn’t help for sure. And then the French still kept their word and scuttled their ships even after this betrayal by the British! Amazing! Respect is due to the French Navy.
Considering the French government had promised to never negotiate a separate peace without British approval, how much faith would you put into any promise by any Frenchman when your survival depended upon it. What recourse would the British have had if the French fleet fell into German control, “Darlan promised! Put the war on hold. We need a judgement from the referee. He promised this would not happen”. It’s easy after the fact to say the British did not have to do what they had done, but history cannot be judged by whatifs and could haves. The only question to ask is, “Did the French fleet fall into German hands?” The answer is no and regardless of whether the British action was necessary or not to bring about this end, the fact remains that the French fleet did not and so the British action cannot judged as anything other than right however wrong you think it might have been.
The premise was Churchill needed to keep these ships out of German hands, makes sense if the Germans were that hard up for naval vessels and absolutely needed them to finish off Britain. This was a senseless attack and would not have staved off the Nazi advance… the Americans did that. So keep trying to spin it you “pre-emptive” war mongers.
The French navy is reported (in this presentation) as being “the largest European navy after the British”. Perhaps in numbers, but not in strength. In point of fact, the vast majority of the French fleet was small fry, and the few large modern surface combatants (Dunquerque, Strausboug, Jean Bart, Reicheleu) were only newly commissioned and thus untrained for service or incomplete. And thus inconsequential.
The real threat to Britain was the U-Boat. Churchill himself said a bit later “the only thing I really feared was the U-Boat threat”. This is born out by the fact that what he wanted from America was the 50 ** DESTROYERS **, not capital ships — as was amply documented in the presentation.
Besides all this, Britain had an entire worldwide EMPIRE. It is ludicrous to assert that the Royal Navy, the world’s largest, could not have recalled its vast fleet from worldwide service to defend its very homeland.
All these prestigious historians that have been called upon in this presentation to defend Churchill’s “Deadly Decision” only serve to justify a ridiculous historical claim — that Churchill needed to shell the French in order to sufficiently impress the Americans to join them in their struggle against Hitler. Total folderol.
Though I must congratulate the producers of Secrets of the Dead for their balance in presenting the Toulon incident.
Yet, why, in the memory of this, Churchill’s “Deadly Betrayal”, should we wonder why the French to this day [and in days recent past ] are so reluctant to join us in our current international conflicts ???
Bad scholarship by a bunch of British historians. What French “aircraft carriers”? They had one, the Bearn, a converted cruiser with a deck placed on top for biplane tests. What German “armada”? Two battleships and no modern destroyers is not an “armada”. Without air superiority Britain could not and was not invaded. Any school boy should know as much. Churchill’s delusions about battleships was pure nuts.
The French Navy (Dnquerque, Strausboug, Jean Bart, Reicheleu) though newly commisioned, would not have been inconsequential against Britain if they were in German hands.
I disagree, as the film states, Churchill needed to shell the French in order to impress the Americans. Instead I believe the Brittish, (after giving the French an ultimatum, and intercepting messages that French reinforcements were on the way), had one choice, to attack and be decisive.