Are We *ever* Going To Get Over Wwii ?

[jake-the-peg]

Yet another commemoration - this time 70 years of the Atlantic campaign

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22434753

Given that WWII lasted about 5 years by the time you've commemorated a VE day anniversary it seems time to start celebrating anothe anniversary of the start of the War!

I hear the cries of 'ingrate' already and patriotic chests puffing up like pidgeons - but WWI was just as formative to those who fought in it and I don't recall continual commemorations of that from my childhood.

Why are we so obsessed with WWII and are we ever going to get over it?

[FredPuli43]

aog, I think history is against you. Like me, you lived through times when everyone was encouraged to believe that we, Britain, defeated Hitler and that the Americans only turned up for the glory. The reality is that Hitler's great defeats and his great losses, were at the hands of the Russians who, not content with defending their borders, turned the tide. When I was young, the Russians were never mentioned, except that we were told of their non-aggression pact with Hitler! So far as I could make out then, the way I was told it, Dunkirk was a great victory and a fine example of British military planning!

[anotheoldgit]

jno

/// aog, an estimated 20 million Soviet citizens died in WW2, half of them civilians. Against 388,000 British military and civilians. (More Americans than British died, too, just in case their contribution should be forgotten.) ///

/// More than 40 Russians for every Briton. ///

/// I don't think the claim that the British did more than the Soviets to defeat Hitler holds water. ///

So you balance the numbers killed as proof of a successful victory on that sides part do you? How morbidly strange.

[jackthehat]

//I am sure that even in death some who suffered in the hands of the Germans and the Japanese would turn in their graves at that very thought.
Should the the Lawrence family also join the killers of Stephen Lawrence in their forgiveness of each other?///

I had the pleasure of knowing this gentleman; Billy Griffiths [*link at bottom of page] had long since forgiven the Japanese. He was most anxious that the current generation should not have to live under the shadow of what happened during the war years and he wished that all sides could learn lessons from the dreadful events and atrocities carried out during WW2.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/billy-griffiths-how-st-dunstans-gave-me-back-my-independence-1817209.html

[ludwig]

I wonder what the Russian perspective is on it. I doubt the history books of the Soviet era devote too many pages discussing the American/British contributions to the defeat of Hitler.

[Zeuhl]

/I think he's likening the British Armed forces to the Lawrence family/

ludwig

That just makes aog's analogy even more bizarre! LOL

[ludwig]

I think you need to read a few objective history books AOG. You're in cloud cuckoo land if you think the British won the war with a little bit of help from the Americans and the Russians.

[Zeuhl]

/So you balance the numbers killed as proof of a successful victory on that sides part do you? How morbidly strange. /

It's one factor

But the fact that the Soviets killed, wounded, destroyed and captured a lot more German troops and equipment than we did might be even more compelling evidence of the Soviet's greater achievements

[Sir Alec]

My uncle Arnold was at Dunkirk. He was sent home with shell-shock and, like Spike Milligan suffered from appalling bouts of depression for the rest of his life. He was only 68 when he died. Should we not commemorate his bravery? Of course we should. I for one will never forget him.

[anotheoldgit]

This has been an enjoyable debate, but it never ceases to amaze me how some consider themselves knowledgeable enough to argue on a subject that they have never taken part in, had no personal experience of, and hopefully never will have to.

'KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON'

[Kromovaracun]

AOG

I cannot think of a credible military historian who believes that the British contribution to WW2 outweighed that of the Soviet Union. The numbers just aren't even comparable.

"So you balance the numbers killed as proof of a successful victory on that sides part do you?"

Not exclusively. We also know how much of the Wehrmacht the respective sides were taking up. Plus the Western Front was not opened proper until 1944 - when the Germans had been substantially rolled back already.

(Of course prior to this, as you mentioned earlier, there were the African/Italian campaigns, which did take up around 100,000 -120,000 Germans in Italy - I can't find a figure for N. Africa. This is of course by no means insignificant but I think it's a little hard to pose their absence as decisive to a campaign with numbers running into multiple millions of combatants).

I notice you're quite happy with your disgraceful implication that I'm some kind of closet Stalinist (do you even understand what an awful thing that is?) simply for adhering to the consensus view among military historians. I can't say I'm surprised.

[Svejk]

Britain stood alone against Hitler at a time the US was neutral and your beloved uncle Joe was busy sharing the spoils of war with him.

[Barmaid]

I have no personal experience of that conflict (heck, my mother wasn't even born when the war ended). I have personal knowledge of how it has affected my grandfather though.

That is why I shall be honoured to accompany him back to Anzio (his battalion was the first british battalion to enter Anzio) later this year in order for him to be able to remember ALL the men that died.

[jim360]

Of course, we can always read history books. I appreciate that I didn't live through WWII and hopefully never will again. On the other hand it's clear that for a good three years most of the major fighting in WWII was on the Eastern front. At one point the German forces, not including tanks, numbered well into seven figures towards the beginning of the 1941 and 1942 Russian offensives. By contrast at the Battle of El Alamein Rommel was in command of just over a hundred thousand troops.

Each victory was important and vital, but can you imagine what would have happened had Hitler been more sensible and turned all his military might on us first before even bothering with the Russians? We'd have been crushed, no D-Day landing would have been possible, und wir würden Deutsch sprechen.

[vulcan42]

since when did commemorating something become an obsession?

[anotheoldgit]

FredPuli43

/// aog, I think history is against you. Like me, you lived through times when everyone was encouraged to believe that we, Britain, defeated Hitler and that the Americans only turned up for the glory. ///

I don't know how old you are Fred, but I think I am much older than yourself.

If you read my post I did not think "the Americans only turned up for the glory", i gave credit to all the Western Allies, and I am not stupid enough to believe that we took on Hitler single handed, I was there, and we owe much to 'Uncle Sam' earlier for food and weapons and later for men and planes.

/// The reality is that Hitler's great defeats and his great losses, were at the hands of the Russians who, not content with defending their borders, ///

Neither were we content on defending our borders, we along with others fought tooth and nail over vast areas of land, on two Continents and still they came at us, ever heard of the 'Battle of the Bulge', and I am not referring to one's waist line?

[Zeuhl]

/it never ceases to amaze me how some consider themselves knowledgeable enough to argue on a subject that they have never taken part in, had no personal experience of, and hopefully never will have to. /

aog

it's called learning

something that is often done best from an objective distance

[nungate]

Shall we start by stating that there was no real peace after WW1? In fact there was a 20 year truce, and during that truce owing to the punitive terms of the Treaty of Versailles, the German economy collapsed, there were no jobs inflation was rampant, people were searching for an answer and along comes Hitler promising them the answer to all their problems. They bought into it as it were and elected him into power (he was democratically elected). It can also be argued that WW2 began in the Far East when Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931. We are not obsessed with WW2 we should remember, as it is only by remembering the past that we can (I hope) learn from it and hope not to do it again. Small point. Can Angela Merkel have succeeded where both the Kaiser and Hitler failed?

[ChillDoubt]

You're honoured to be travelling with such a brave man on such a humbling and emotional trip Barmaid, but you already know that.

A work colleague of mine made a similar trip with his grandfather to Monte Cassino a year or two back and he said he wouldn't have missed it for the world.

[Kromovaracun]

Where did you fight, AOG?

[DTCwordfan]

Oh how I love AOG's attempts at proselytising and self-moralisation - "if you haven't lived through it, you aren't able to make a comment or have an opinion."

Good grief man, that's like saying that a saint to you, no doubt, one David Starkey (UKIP member) can't make comments about the Tudors as he wasn't alive back then - or maybe he was and you were too.

And how facetious was your comment on the TV control.....pathetic. This clutter of programmes blocks the opportunity to show more meaningful stuff and I don't mean garbage like the Apprentice or even UKIP adverts.