16. The fall of France at once threatened the whole British strategic structure all over the world. The quick victory to which German strategy, economy and organization had all been directed seemed to be within sight. The whole Atlantic and North Sea coastline from the Arctic to the Pyrenees was now in German hands. Italy had entered the war at the side of Germany and the apparently impregnable Allied position in the Mediterranean was changed almost overnight by this fact and by the collapse of France into a barely tenable one. The defence of the British Far Eastern positions was equally menaced by the entirely new situation in Indo-China, now open to Japanese pressure. The German Luftwaffe could operate against Britain itself from bases disposed in a wide semi-circle south and east of the British Isles, and could reasonably hope to dominate the narrow waters of the English Channel. The British naval control of the North Atlantic could be threatened by surface, submarine or air attack from bases as far apart as the Norwegian coast and the Bay of Biscay. There was nothing unreasonable in the German belief that they would soon hold the last area of enemy territory in Europe and make the course of world events conform to the pattern of the Führer’s will.
