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shafique wrote:David Cameron.


We now have a new PM (apologies for bringing the topic back to the question in the thread header! )

Cheers,
Shafique

To quote The Who (aptly named!)

"Here comes the new boss....same as the old boss!"



Knight

Dubai Knight wrote:There were a lot of men lost who put boot to *ss for the sake not just of our country, but a lot of others as well. Which is the reason this forum is in English...and not German. Or did you forget that?



Knight

Yes, you were "keeping" only YOUR arses. I did not see such people like you who did almost nothing for defeating Germans but teach everybody that saved the World. The war would have been won with or without you.

This forum is in English... not Russian probably is merit of Americans, but definitely not Brits.

Red Chief wrote:

Dubai Knight wrote:There were a lot of men lost who put boot to *ss for the sake not just of our country, but a lot of others as well. Which is the reason this forum is in English...and not German. Or did you forget that?



Knight

Yes, you were "keeping" only YOUR arses. I did not see such people like you who did almost nothing for defeating Germans but teach everybody that saved the World. The war would have been won with or without you.

This forum is in English... not Russian probably is merit of Americans, but definitely not Brits.

Dream on!

The North Atlantic convoys of aid from the UK into Russia kept your parents alive.

As for doing nothing for defeating the Germans, I really, really suggest you go and do some history.

1940: Netherlands, Belgium and France occupied. The Battle of Britain (as it is commonly referred to) was a 4 month campaign of attrition between the RAF and the Luftwaffe. The losses were appalling, with the average life expectancy of a fresh fighter pilot being just 7 days. There were pilots of all nations taking part, including Poles, Czechs, Americans, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Free french, Belgians, Irish and even one Sikh, one Jamaican and one Palestinian! I am looking down the list...I don't see any Russians named.

"'The Few' were 2353 young men from Great Britain and 574 from overseas, pilots and other aircrew, who are officially recognised as having taken part in the Battle of Britain. Each flew at least one authorised operational sortie with an eligible unit of the Royal Air Force or Fleet Air Arm during the period 10 July to 31 October 1940. 544 lost their lives during the period of the Battle. A further 791 were killed in action or died in the course of their duties before the wars end."

Maybe you will now blame us because we defeated Goering's airforce and thus caused Hitler to concentrate all his efforts on the Eastern front and the push to Leningrad?

Wake up!



Knight

Dubai Knight wrote:
Dream on!

The North Atlantic convoys of aid from the UK into Russia kept your parents alive.

Wow. Should I also have thanked Brits for saving Russia and that luxuary to speak English insted of German? With all respect to thoes heroes (not very numerous) of convoys (we remember and evaluate their activity even more than in their homeland) I cannot say that they changed the direction of war.

Dubai Knight wrote:As for doing nothing for defeating the Germans, I really, really suggest you go and do some history.

1940: Netherlands, Belgium and France occupied. The Battle of Britain (as it is commonly referred to) was a 4 month campaign of attrition between the RAF and the Luftwaffe. The losses were appalling, with the average life expectancy of a fresh fighter pilot being just 7 days. There were pilots of all nations taking part, including Poles, Czechs, Americans, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Free french, Belgians, Irish and even one Sikh, one Jamaican and one Palestinian! I am looking down the list...I don't see any Russians named.
"'The Few' were 2353 young men from Great Britain and 574 from overseas, pilots and other aircrew, who are officially recognised as having taken part in the Battle of Britain. Each flew at least one authorised operational sortie with an eligible unit of the Royal Air Force or Fleet Air Arm during the period 10 July to 31 October 1940. 544 lost their lives during the period of the Battle. A further 791 were killed in action or died in the course of their duties before the wars end."

I did not see any contradiction. You sat in the island and fought in the air, in other words saved your arses, but nobody could have defeated the most skilled land army in the world fighting only in the air.
2353 young man is a drop, almost nothing, among real troops that partisipated or victims in the war.
The military dead in the war shows real participation of Brits:

Soviet Union 8,700,000
Germany 3,250,000
Britain 240,000
(stat from the book "WORLD WAR II", H.P. Willmott, 2004)

According to those facts I cannot thank Brits for saving word from invasion of German language, people from South East Asia and Far East think the same but this myth is very viable in heads of heirs of the Great Empire, which disappered 50 years ago.

As for Russian pilots in 1940, Soviet Union was not ally of yours and didn't partisipate in the war at that time, but between 1941 and 1944 the UK was but did almost nothing in fighting against GERMAN troops or MOST time of the war as I said.

Shut up about Lenigrad - a million people had been dead during 1000 days siedge. Your mosquito bites had nothing in common with this.


Did you defeat Gering Airforces? You should stop walking with Jonny so long.

What those gosts had done during next 4 years in the Eastern Front? We was able to make parity with them only in 1944.

I have never quoted any total casualty figures as this was just a 4 month period of a 6 year war. But it was a pivotal part and stopped Hitler from rolling up the whole of Europe. Who would have stopped him then? Russia? As you said, Russia was not even in the war at this point and we and all the other European nations had been fighting for a year already. The US only entered the war because of Pearl Harbour and the German/Japanese axis.

The British and many other nations fought in all theatres of war from the South Pacific to Europe to Asia to North Africa in an attempt to stop German expansionism. You were only defending your homeland, same as us in 1940.

The only difference was that, after the war, we gave it back to the people who really owned it. Or were you 'Liberating' Eastern Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania etc?



Knight

Dubai Knight wrote:I have never quoted any total casualty figures as this was just a 4 month period of a 6 year war. But it was a pivotal part and stopped Hitler from rolling up the whole of Europe. Who would have stopped him then?

How did you stop him? Crossing English Channel swimming back to the green island from Dunkirk and dropping all haevy weapon and hardware.

Which country of Continental Europe did you prevent from occupation? All Europe worked and fought against Russia, but German and axis were defeated.

You asked me about the difference. We defended our homeland and defeated Germany, but you TRIED without any success and was so afraid of the kick in Dunkirk as sit in the island the rest of the war. The fat boy tried to minimise British casualties and entered into the war only to divide the pie. I don't see any problem with that but just wonder why neigther Russians nor Americans insist that they saved the World as Brits do.

Red Chief wrote:
How did you stop him? Crossing English Channel swimming back to the green island from Dunkirk and dropping all haevy weapon and hardware.

Please see above reference to The Battle of Britain: An aerial battle as we, like all the other occupied countries, were unable to stop his Blitzkreig and were forced to fight from a distance. That fact that the BEF were there fighting in Europe and left all their hardware on the beach in Dunkirk should indicate that we were actually fighting to prevent the occupation of Belgium and France don't you think? Or were the French and Belgian armies able to do that themselves? Obviously not

Which country of Continental Europe did you prevent from occupation? All Europe worked and fought against Russia, but German and axis were defeated.

Which countries were fighting against Russia before WW2? After the war they were fighting against it because they were occupied in exactly the same way as Germany did.

You asked me about the difference. We defended our homeland and defeated Germany, but you TRIED without any success and was so afraid of the kick in Dunkirk as sit in the island the rest of the war. The fat boy tried to minimise British casualties and entered into the war only to divide the pie. I don't see any problem with that but just wonder why neigther Russians nor Americans insist that they saved the World as Brits do.

Really? The Americans seem to think they won the war single handed (see any number of Hollywood movies) and forget that they were just bystanders for the first part of it. We went to war with Germany because they invaded Poland (hardly on our little island is it). Russia did not join until Germany invaded. Which European countries were you preventing from German invasion?

We lacked the resource, being a small island, to self provide for the entire material to defeat the Nazi's but we managed to pull all the other nations together (including yours) to stop them. We never claim to have won it single handed, but we do claim to have done more than our part.



Knight

C'mon RC - you've got to give us the credit for standing up to tyranny and not rolling over like some others did on the continent. I agree that the Russians' contribution is often underplayed - I mean you lost 20m people, didn't you? - but that's largely 'Hollywood' for you!


WWII was the last 'hurrah' for the British though - we were effectively bankrupt and had to be bailed out by the Yanks. They quite generously treated it as a loan and as a condition the UK had to hand over all its state secrets. There's a story of a diplomat/civil servant carrying a box full of state secrets and delivering to the US.

JM Keynes was part of the team who had to negotiate the bailout of the UK - and the loan that ensued was only repaid in full in 2007. We were shafted and we had to smile and say 'thank you sir'. But such is the way of Empires - it is not too long before the US will be forced to bend over and take it like a man, the only problem though is they are actually more like petulant teenagers than mature adults (to stretch the analogy).

Ok - I'll get off my soap box now.

Cheers,
Shafique

How convinient to pretend "small island" and at the same time teach "untermensch" from the former colonies that the Greatest Ever Empire saved their lives.

I doubt that you can say that looking at how little you did to protect them. Massacre in Hong Kong and shameful surrender of Singapore were remarkable examples.

Someone blames Soviet Union in "occupation" of East Europe but how about India and numerous colonies of the "small island". Did you give them to the people who lived there? Certanly not.

So, DK, don't mix up virginity with impotence.

RC - let me give you some more examples - there were Massacres in Kenya and the world's first concentration camps were in South Africa (where Boer women and children died in large numbers) - there was a scandalous famine in Bengal, when rice was horded for troops and yet bodies piled up on the street.

However, it has also been argued that the colonists who broke away from the Brit Empire in America caused more suffering to the Native Americans and prolonged slavery as a result of not being restrained by the British parliament. (Some would argue the Brits developed a sense of guilt a bit late in the day).

This still does not take away the fact that the Brit Empire did win in the language stakes and did actually produce the largest Empire we've seen so far. It's last act of glory was standing up to the Nazis - not least because of the great numbers of overseas fighters that fought for Empire. It is certainly a tragedy that the great numbers of non-white soldiers who fought and died in both world wars is only now getting the recognition it deserves (I use the non-white pointedly - the ANZACs, Poles, South Africans, Canadians etc have all had their participation well represented).


Cheers,
Shafique

shafique wrote: because of the great numbers of overseas fighters that fought for Empire. It is certainly a tragedy that the great numbers of non-white soldiers who fought and died in both world wars is only now getting the recognition it deserves (I use the non-white pointedly - the ANZACs, Poles, South Africans, Canadians etc have all had their participation well represented).

You are absolutely right. The UK used Japanese invasion to the colonies as an excuse to gather soldiers from all parts of its empire to fight in Europe.

Red Chief wrote:

shafique wrote: because of the great numbers of overseas fighters that fought for Empire. It is certainly a tragedy that the great numbers of non-white soldiers who fought and died in both world wars is only now getting the recognition it deserves (I use the non-white pointedly - the ANZACs, Poles, South Africans, Canadians etc have all had their participation well represented).

You are absolutely right. The UK used Japanese invasion to the colonies as an excuse to gather soldiers from all parts of its empire to fight in Europe.

Those soldiers were already fighting in Europe and North Africa before the Japanese were involved. Lets not go down the road of the atrocities carried out by THAT nation to the natives of south east asia and China as well as to the prisoners of war they took from all nations.

And I suppose the thousands of deaths at the hands of Joe Stalin, armed suppression of the uprisings in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, the invasion of Afghanistan, the seizure of the oil wells in Hungary, Romania and Ajerbaijan, the prison camps and salt mines of Siberia, the Gulags and The Road of Bones were not examples of Russian Empire building? At one point, the Communist bloc was almost equal in land area to that of the old British Empire.

The words 'Pot, Kettle and Black' come to mind...



Knight

Dubai Knight wrote:the invasion of Afghanistan,

The words 'Pot, Kettle and Black' come to mind...


Knight

Agree for 100%. Russians came and left after 10 years and had sanctions in between. Nobody remembers them now, but everyone knows the nice English words Tommy and GI.

Have you found WMD or Osama? When are you going to leave? Any horyzon?

Some important facts

1. America only joined the war because the Japs invaded Pearl Harbour.

2. Russia only survived Lenningrad because of a/ the weather and b/ Hitler spead his army too thinly between Russia and Europe.

Another important facts.

Americans defeated Japs, Russians did the same with Germans. Both superpowers did favours each other like land-lease, D-day or defeating Japs Kwantung land army.

Brits kept colonies and saved the World.

As for "the fact about Leningrad", bad weather during 1000 days of the siedge and mythical western front even Erich von Manstein might turn over in his grave listening that crap.

Just for your inf. the war for Russians were started on the 23d of JUNE!!! the season with the best weather. Hitler had no idea that winter is cold in Russia, didn't he? Probably he had dropped the lesson about Napoleon in his grammer school.

All those lame excuses remind me the moving story about a bad dancer and his balls, which prevent his good performance.

I sincerely hope he doesn't devastate us in foreign politics..
http://judicial-inc.org/7_23_WW2.htm