The memoir opens this account with a telegram dispute in which Churchill is portrayed as underestimating how hard pressed the Mediterranean Fleet was. The fleet had to supply Malta and Greece and support desert operations with limited fighter cover, while submarines and heavily mined waters added further threats. The British plan disguised the movement behind an ordinary Malta convoy operation before the force turned toward Tripoli after dark. Destroyers were to sweep ahead through the mined approaches, while Formidable dealt with shadowing aircraft and covered the retirement. The memoirist was disappointed to be detached to screen the carrier rather than join the exposed sweep, a reminder that essential protective duties could feel less attractive than direct action. He heard the bombardment's spectacular gunfire but doubted that it greatly disrupted Rommel's supplies. The passage sets command pressure, operational deception, logistics, air cover, and minesweeping within one Mediterranean fleet operation.
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A destroyer screen in the 1941 Tripoli operation
A wartime memoir frames destroyer work around the April 1941 Tripoli operation: sustaining Malta and Greece while facing air attack, submarines, and mines.