Hitler Stopped 16 km From Dunkirk. Why?

On the 24th of May 1940, German tanks were sixteen kilometres from Dunkirk — the last port left to a third of a million trapped Allied soldiers. Almost nothing stood in the way. Then an order arrived: halt. The tanks stood still for three days. In this animated documentary we follow all three sides through the nine days that followed: Berlin, where a general, an air force chief and a dictator each had a reason to stop; London, which planned to save forty-five thousand men and did not tell its ally it was leaving; and the French rearguard at Lille and on the canal line, who held the wall while the ships loaded — and stayed behind. Every mistake gets a number and a price tag. At the end we add up the bill. ⏱ Chapters 0:00 The Door 1:37 The Trap 2:57 The Order 5:35 The Myth 6:35 The One Right Answer 8:03 The Tunnel 9:21 The Mole 10:44 The Third Side 12:49 The Sky 14:18 The Wall Comes Down 15:57 The Bill Who really left the door open — Rundstedt, Göring, or the man who wanted to show his generals who was boss? Tell us in the comments. The best argument gets pinned. Subscribe for more of history's most expensive mistakes. Sources include Hugh Sebag-Montefiore (Dunkirk: Fight to the Last Man), Karl-Heinz Frieser (The Blitzkrieg Legend), Walter Lord (The Miracle of Dunkirk), Julian Jackson (The Fall of France), L. F. Ellis (The War in France and Flanders), Heinz Guderian (Panzer Leader) and the war diary of Franz Halder. #history #ww2 #dunkirk