
Chicago Tribune
In 1940, a ragtag flotilla of tug boats, fishing vessels, barges, lifeboats and pleasure craft responded to an urgent call to save a British Army trapped by Nazi forces on the beaches of France. Those 700 “Little Ships,” as they were dubbed, helped the British Navy evacuate more than 380,000 soldiers in 10 days from the port of Dunkirk. I’m preoccupied with split-screen visions of the “Little Ships” and contemporary images of chaos at Kabul’s airport. As I write, there has been an explosion at the Kabul airport shortly after the U.S Embassy warned Americans lined up at the gates to move away i…