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Britain could not pursue Germany’s economic policy of autarchy. As exports declined with the switch to war-production (taking 1938 as 100, British exports had fallen to 29 per cent by 1943, imports only to 77 per cent), gold and dollar reserves disappeared. The Roosevelt administration was verbally sympathetic to the Allies but in practice unhelpful. Pitiful French calls for help in early June 1940 were coldly dismissed by Cordell Hull as ‘a series of extraordinary, almost hysterical appeals’. For some time Britain fared no better. Ambassador Joseph Kennedy, another Roosevelt campaign contributor, did not even provide verbal support: ‘From the start I told them they could expect zero help. We had none to offer and I know we could not give it and, in the way of any material, we could not spare it.’107 By the end of 1940 Britain had run out of convertible currency: she had only $12 million in her reserves, the lowest ever, and was obliged to suspend dollar
Modern Times
Paul Johnson
In tennis and in life when you do something you love, appreciate it and respect it by giving it all you can. Never take it for granted because soon enough it will be taken away. Time is tough. Every time you go out on the court be thankful. Be grateful. Believe me, I am. If you are lucky enough to be a tennis player you should recognize that it’s a privilege to be able to walk out on that court and play the game.
Winning Ugly
Brad Gilbert, Steve Jamison
Among other assassinations which Serebryansky was ordered to organize was that of the leading Nazi Hermann Goering, who was reported to be planning a visit to Paris. The Administration for Special Tasks ordered its Paris residency to recruit a sniper and find a way of infiltrating him into the airport, probably Le Bourget, at which Goering was expected to land.11 Goering, however, failed to visit France and the sniper was stood down. The files seen by Mitrokhin give no indication of the Centre’s motive in ordering an assassination which was undoubtedly authorized by Stalin himself. The probability is, however, that the main objective was to damage relations between France and Germany rather than to strike a blow against Nazism. The assassination on French soil in 1934 of the President of the Republic and the King of Yugoslavia by a non-Communist assassin doubtless encouraged the Centre to believe that it could avoid responsibility for the killing of Goering if an opportunity arose.
The Sword and the Shield
Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin
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