DYNAMO’S TUNNEL-VISION SECRET OF DUNKIRK

WHEN Britain was faced with the urgency of rescuing nearly 340,000 allied forces trapped by the Germans at Dunkirk in 1940, it hastily called on one of its greatest strategists, Vice-Admiral Bertram Ramsay to plan the remarkable evacuation of Dunkirk.

It was brilliantly successful, yet ironically just before War’s end Ramsay died when his plane crashed – not from enemy fire, but because it ran out of fuel.

Vice-Admiral Ramsay set up a command post for the evacuation of Dunkirk in a complex of ancient tunnels in the chalky White Cliffs of Dover, whose merits he’d long sung for both watching out over the English Channel and for mounting guns to repel attackers.

And while they may have been the closest point on the English coast to France just 30km away, and in the front-line of possible enemy attack, he reasoned that it would take a lucky hit directly into a tunnel mouth to do any damage.

As far back as 1216 troops of the invading Prince Louis of France dug small tunnels into the cliffs to set up a base from which to attack the formidable Dover Castle, directly above and with walls 6m thick. And in 1797 when the Brits feared Napoleon was going to come sailing across the Channel, they carved themselves into the cliffs with guns that could hurl 15kg cannon balls.

Napoleon never turned up and the tunnels lay idle for 143 years.

Vice-Admiral Ramsay had precious little time to plan and implement the evacuation of Dunkirk. He set up an operations room within a casemate (a tunnel in which guns had once been mounted,) and called the evacuation Operation Dynamo – his school-day’s nickname.

In just nine days, from a cramped 6m by 6m room, Operation Dynamo oversaw the evacuation of 338,000 allied troops from Dunkirk by an armada of naval and civilian ships. But it was not completely without cost: 63,800 vehicles, 2500 field guns and half-a-million tonnes of stores were abandoned to the enemy.

Ramsay was subsequently appointed to head a Combined Services Communications Headquarters within the revitalised tunnels of the White Cliffs, that had been dubbed Hellfire Corner. This was to ultimately become one of Britain’s greatest military secrets, and was re-activated during the 1960s Cold War, finally being taken off the Top Secret list only in 1986.

Ramsay’s complex contained a massive communications centre for Britain’s Navy, Army and Air Force. So secret was it that each tunnel complex was sealed off from the others, and staff were escorted in through different entrances on different days so they could not draw up a working plan of the tunnels, or calculate how many people worked there.

At its peak, Hellfire Corner had six separate telephone exchanges linking it with the War Office, Cabinet Office, Prime Minister Churchill’s office and the various theatres of war. And over 650 lines snaked out from these exchanges to strategists and military chiefs based within the 5km of tunnels.

It also had its own hospital, accommodation, and mess rooms on three levels 15 to 30 metres directly below Dover Castle – and despite regular shellings from across the Channel, as Ramsay predicted, it was never severely damaged.

Today, 45-minute conducted tours take visitors through Hellfire Corner, that’s part of the tourist attractions of Dover Castle above. As well as one of the telephone exchanges that’s been restored to as it was in the 1940s, they can also see several of the tunnels, the wartime hospital, exhibition of the evacuation of Dunkirk, and signs that still warn ‘Careless Talk Costs Lives.‘

Cost of the conducted tours is 7GBP for adults and 3.50GBP for children. Details from Visit Britain on 1300 858 589 or www.visitbritain.com.au