Word: commandant
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...training stations can turn them out. Although officers say that new Navy men learn in three months what took oldtimers three years, the Fleet needs more training-for its gun crews, its engineering forces, even for the hard-eyed, diligent young officers that Navy expansion promoted to the command of battleship and cruiser gun turrets long before their time. With an expansion of 70% ahead of it for the two-ocean Navy, it will need intensive training for a long time to come...
Unlike changes in government personnel, which almost always come for reasons which are obvious to everyone, changes in military command are not always so clear. For every new general is always officially an erudite bear cat until he is succeeded. Then he becomes an ignoramus and a scared...
Last week Britain's R. A. F. announced an important change. Sir Cyril Louis Norton Newall was replaced as Chief of Air Staff by Sir Charles Frederick Algernon Portal, formerly head of the bomber command. Sir Cyril was immediately branded by unofficial gossip as a defeatist, a Chamberlain appointee whom soft-hearted colleagues did not wish to bounce until Chamberlain was bounced, a hard worker but a man in whom the offensive spirit burned somewhat low. It was said that because he is a social butterfly and his wife an American climber, he should be a great success...
...this point, Commodore Tattnall in command of the American Asiatic squadron came to the assistance of the hard-pressed British in violation of his neutrality. Said Tattnall, "Blood is thicker than water." This breach of neutrality by Commodore Tattnall was later sustained by public opinion and by the U. S. Government...
Three days later two large British battleships, four cruisers, "several" destroyers and four troop transports under the command of General de Gaulle appeared off Dakar. General de Gaulle sent a message to Governor General Pierre Boisson demanding the surrender of the colony. M. Boisson refused. At 2 p.m. the British and French force opened fire. The bombardment proceeded far into the night, and Vichy sources indicated that General de Gaulle would attempt a landing. Foreign Minister Paul Baudoin declared: "This is not a question simply of ships which might be taken by the Germans or Italians, but a British desire...