Sarah Paine

So the Germans attacked the fallback position because they're trying to bail out the Italians and fighting in North Africa.

And so they're trying to take Malta because whoever's got planes there

can cause convoys all kinds of problems or they can protect their own things.

And so Malta is blockaded by the Germans.

It's not relieved until the end of 1942.

So that is not great for Britain.

It's threatening, well, its access to the empire.

And the problem for Britain is

is Italian belligerency.

Italians had been part of the Entente in World War I. Well, they're part of the Axis in World War II.

And three of these keys, Malta, Crete, and the Suez Canal, lie in the center of Italian admissions because they want an empire where they go down the Balkan coast and then they're going to go deep into Libya and Ethiopia to unify their empire around the Red Sea.

And so Mussolini kicks this thing off, except then he gets stuck in Greece.

And so the Germans have to come and bail them out.

They chase the British out of Greece.

The Britons are then on Crete, and then that falls to the Germans.

So the Britons are in a world of hurt.

The Suez Canal is under threat.

Think about it.

Fall of Norway, fall of France, blockade of Malta, fall of Crete.

It is really bad news.