Aye, the home front played a massive role. Big shout out to the Women who made our bombs and weapons, grew our food and, stitched our clothes and got Britain ticking along nicely while the Nazi's were trying to limit our supply lines. Loved the source work on the home front, all those old posters and songs. Really enjoyed that piece of course work.
Ha ha! Welcome back Com. Any idea what you and billy did yet? I don't even recall an incident. Was it an OT thread by any chance?
Certainly had no intention of forgetting the RAF, Nostalgic. My point was, it's not so easy to run your artillery across 22 miles of water as it had been to run them into Holland, Belgium and northern France. That fact placed more emphasis on the Luftwaffe. And, as you quite rightly say, they failed spectacularly. The sea was our first defence, it defined Hitler's problem, The RAF, and the crazy division of fronts highlighted by Nordic all came later, and all helped do the job. There never is a single factor in winning a five year war. I merely highlighted our first advantage.
got nee idea mate, i vaguely remember a muslim thread, i was ****faced....next day logged on, banned. oh well.
It frightening how many huge & tiny things changed the course of the war. For Germany to take on the British, the Americans, most of mainland Europe, the Soviet block, etc is mind blowing. To take time out to systematically & casually murder 6 million civilians, at the same time, is barely believable. I was in Sicily, last summer, and toured the sites of the resistance ambushes where the 'exiting' German troops were impeded. The locals attacked crack German troops and Panzer tanks, on the roads to Messini, with little more than hunting rifles. At one mountain pass they simply pushed boulders down onto the transport, blew up the bridge and ran away If all those German & Italian troops, and equipment, had reached the Italian mainland that campaign may have been much different. The fact that the Sicilians also attacked Italians helped encourage the 'opposition' to capture and execute Mussolini.
I've been considering re studying the whole subject purely out of recreation. Was my favorite subject at school, there are only so many repeats I can watch on Channel Yesterday. Like I said earlier in the thread, 1941 was a definitive year imo, bet the timeline for that year makes very interesting reading. Might have look, you forget so much growing up. I'll always maintain the Nazi's timing of a Russian invasion to be their biggest shot in their foot, but still, stand alone it wasn't a big enough mistake to lose them the war.
Yep, so many mini-to-large scale events throughout the whole of WWII especially, its crazy. From fascists in Spain to Molotov cocktails in Finland... In case you didn't already know, the name comes from the Finns making up home brew bombs/grenades in response to their distaste for the Russian foreign minister. They managed to beat the bastards back as well. Just another mini-event which shaped the entire war outcome.
You obviously have first hand knowledge and a heightened local interest. I became ashamed of my previous dismissal of the French resistance after living in Provence for a number of years. We like to walk and would invariably come across dozens of rudimentary memorials to 17/18 year old kids who'd been executed. The majority are marked 'summer 1945' ...... the already defeated & retreating Germans shot them out of sheer spite. They constantly ran the risk of betrayal and were hounded by the Milice who were a total ****ing disgrace. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milice The British would train them, arm them & supply them ........ only to abandon them when the focus of the war changed.
Why no mention of the Poles and the major role they played in breaking the enigma codes pre bletchley park
There has been a mention of the Poles, I'm positive ......... but **** all about the Sikhs or Gurkhas
Mad init, there's too many factors to list. I had a similar question to the op for one of my exams, that paper only had two questions, answers in essay form. Great subject.
We might have won the moral high ground but don't forget we also got a song out of it. Two World Wars and One World Cup.....
Long story but I'll keep it as brief as possible. World Cup in Germany with 2 sons. Staying as guests at a sports complex, in a tiny village, near Nuremberg. It had a fantastic subsidised bar with a subsidised restaurant and huge screens for all the games. In the corner of the bar, every night, was a group of 80/90 year old's who drank all night but never ever paid for anything ..... .......... they were openly hostile to our England shirts etc. They made it absolutely Kristallnacht clear that they weren't sorry they started the war .......... just sorry they lost it. The scheme we'd used for accommodation was called 'Staying with Friends'
Iv'e wondered before why Hitler let our forces go at Dunkirk, would have been easy pickings them being pinned against the coast. Seems unlikely to be a tactical error having to wait 3 days for an evacuation which was allowed to go ahead.
Aye, makes sense, must have been a gesture of sorts for an alliance or peace offering. I don't think us or the French were prepared for how fast Germany made there way through France. If nowt else, as we can tell by the football, they've got a lethally efficient side to them.
