When Britain declared war on Nazi Germany in 1939, it did not come as a surprise. Hitler's remilitarisation and repudiation of the Treaty of Versailles sounded a warning bell for what was to follow. Philip MacDougall in this talk examines what steps the British government took to prepare the country for the war they knew was coming. Focusing on the front-line counties of Hampshire, Sussex and Kent but the talk can be tailored to meet a particular geographic location in the South-East. In this talk Philip reveals a shocking story of lost opportunity and incompetence. How was it possible that in a decade or so of preparation, important and vulnerable military targets such as Chatham, Portsmouth and Southampton were left virtually unprotected? Why, in a failed evacuation scheme, were thousands of children taken from the larger towns of the south coast and placed in areas of even greater danger?