Destroyer actions. September 1939 - June 1940. Боевые дйствия эсминца. Сентябрь 1939 - июнь 1940

Utilising eye-witness accounts of those who patricipated in them, Destroyer Actions focuses on the human side of naval operations during die first eight months of the Second World War. Harry Plevy draws upon primary sources of both naval and civilian provenance, many of which are previously unpublished and therefore have never before been available to the general reader.
Lucid treatment of the political, strategic and tactical background to naval operations allows the reader to understand the pivotal role played by the destroyer during the so called ‘Phoney War’ period of the Second World War. Although the heroic dnd successful actions of the RAF in the Battle of Britain are rightly celebrated, it is Sometimes forgotten that the efforts of the Royal Navy were equally vital in the defence of Britain. At this time the British Army and RAF were in desperate need of time to prepare for their imminent engagement with the advancing German armed forces - the destroyers of the Royal Navy were in a very real sense all that stood between Britain and invasion during the first eight months of the War.
As this book so clearly reveals, the war was anything but ‘phoney’ for the crews of destroyers during this period. They kept shipping routes safe from the threat of German U-Boats and played a central role in such operations as the rescue of British POW sirom the German prison ship Altmark, the First and Second Battles of Narvik, and of course the evacuation of Dunkirk. Destroyer crews of both sides had a life of unremitting hardship. Their service was one of long periods of tedium and tiredness interspersed with intense spells of horror, leavened by very occasional episodes of hum our. Always present was the common enemy - the hostile waters of the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean.
Extensively researched through comparison of British and German operational logs, and including first-hand evidence from Polish, French and Norwegian sources which reveal the true impact of the conflict at sea upon the lives of the people of all nations caught up in it, this book gives a comprehensive picture of destroyer actions at the beginning of the Second World War.

Contents
Acknowledgements List of Maps Introduction
I The Navy Prepares for War
II The Opening Days
III Fleet and Convoy Actions: Duties and Distractions
IV The Menace of the Magnetic Mine
V Collisions and Other Catastrophes
VI 'The Navy's here": The Altmark Affair
VII The Beginning of the Norwegian Campaign.
VIII The First and Second Battles of Narvik
IX The Battle for Central Norway
X The Abandonment of the Norwegian Campaign
XI The Evacuation from France Begins
XII Dunkirk and the Fall of France Appendices
Bibliography
Index