Did anyone else on here see it on TV recently ? I've only just got round to watching and thoroughly recommend it . Features interviews with men who fought in the First World War and the women they left behind. Very emotional and hard to watch without shedding a few tears. Makes our woes of football seem very trivial indeed. Well worth an hours worth of your time.
I saw it. I went to Auschwitz Birkenau last year too. It was horrific beyond comprehension, something that every person should be forced to see. It shows what racism and intolerance can lead too.
Didn't see the tv show but as a Bomber Command researcher and historian, I can tell you I'm still learning things of what happened in WW2. How anybody can glorify war of any kind is beyond me but you will still get some ratbags who want to wear the Nazi emblems and as such. The young of today need to learn the whole truth of what happened to ensure that it never happens again. Rant over.
Morning Staines R's, I caught up with it last week too having saved it on the planner. I thought it was excellent. I've recently been listening to the BBC History podcasts in the car on the way down and back to W12. About the only time I can dedicate uninterrupted. They have has a series of interviews and presentations that are equally as fascinating, focussing on the first and second world wars. I'm embarrassed to admit that my grasp on history is awful. I put this down to a poor education. My kids seem to learn a whole lot more and they're not yet out of Primary School. My school day memories are punctuated with the endless strikes in the 80s. So I'm making up for lost time.
Oddly, it is not so much the actions of the guards that horrifies, it is the sheer scale and precision of the organisation. The planners, architects, builders, scientists, funders, logistics etc. A vast number of highly educated monsters, discussing, arranging and building such an incredibly efficient mass killing device. I too, tend to agree that people should never be forced to do things. In this particular respect, for the better good and humanity, I believe it appropriate.
What channel was this on? I'd like to see it. There is a very good series of books, "Voices" of oral history from the Great War. I'm enjoying the coverage on the TV about the war in the most part, though I wish they had someone other than Paxman (an historian for example) fronting it up. I quite like Paxo, but not for this gig. I'd recommend a visit to Ypres, the Somme, Vimy Ridge etc, but preferably in the company of someone who really knows their stuff. As for the Nazi death camps, I think the impact depends on the individual - I, like most I think and hope, found it both horrifying and incomprehensible, for the reasons Another spells out. But there are plenty of twats dropping litter, giggling and occasionally giving the Nazi salute or quenelle. Don't beat yourself up Sku, what you get from education is a lottery. History was my thing at school, but I didn't get on with English Literature and am entirely self taught on that from age 19 onwards (when I developed an interest - read widely and am now at the stage of knowing that I have read certain books but not being able to remember anything at all about them) and science apart from biology is still a massive hole. If your kids are doing well I reckon its because they have a good teacher rather than education overall being better or worse than it was in the past. Have been in a protracted debate with my daughter about her choices for GCSE, which were originally based entirely on which teachers she liked. She won, rightly I think.
Think it was on bbc4 Stan, and what a great channel that is for informing and educating. So pleased they kept that and got rid of bbc3.
Thanks lads. I'm taking it easy at home with the charming novo virus today (yesterday I didn't have the energy to even read on here, let alone post) and had at look on the BBC4 iPlayer. They have put 20 minute chunks of individual interviews on there, quite a few of them. I've looked at 3 or 4 and they are all remarkable for the sheer eloquence of the interviewees. There has obviously been a little editing, but I am certain these men were talking about things which had a massive impact on them with no script, universally clearly, with a fantastic vocabulary and sense of drama, with no hesitations, 'umm''you know' 'innits' and the like. One, a Naval NCO called Tobin, is almost poetic in his description of the defence of Antwerp.. I'm sure very clever people prepared them for the interviews (and what a joy to have no interviewers voice spoiling them) but deeply impressive as well as fascinating and moving.
Watching the programme reminded me of a story I heard from an old fella at work, talking about his dad and WW1. His dad was desperate to go and do his bit for king and country, but at only 16, his chances of joining up were non existent. Deciding to try anyway he turned up at a recruitment push, and when asked by the Seargent his age, he truthfully replied 'sixteen sir'. The Seargent looked at him and said that obviously he was too young, but with a wink, told him that of course he (The Seargent) wasn't very good at remembering faces and that if he was to turn up in an hours time and say he was 18, then of course he would be welcomed. So that's what he did and he went on to serve at the front. An amazing story, that I have no reason to doubt, and makes me feel very humble when thinking of young lads like that.
My Grandad, a very quiet and dignified man, signed up on his 17th birthday. Never got to the frontline as a Lewis gun blew up in his face in training, and he spent months in hospital having his jaw reconstructed. They did a good job though, I never noticed any scars. There's another programme on BBC4 now. An interesting fact, despite our image of the leaders sitting in chateaux sending men to their deaths, 71 German, 55 French and 78 British generals were killed in action. Also that by 1916 for a British soldier you would spend an average of 100 days in the frontline, with the rest of the year in reserve or on leave. Those hundred days must have felt like several lifetimes though, if you survived them. There were apparently very many 'quiet sectors' where little happened - we knew that if we shelled their supply lines, they would simply shell us back. The carnage was often around the 'battles' like the Somme, Ypres, Verdun where one side or the other tried to make a breakthrough. These took an immense amount of men and artillery and simply could not be kept up along the whole frontline.
No need to doubt it mate, it seemed to be a common occurrence ................. they made em' tough back in them days. I have spoken to a number of ex RAF crews who commented on a number of air crew who enlisted at 16 .............. forged their documents etc just to join up. Keep in mind, these young lads spent approximately 18 months being trained before being posted to a operational squadron. Many didn't make it past HCU's & OTC's before losing their lives in aircrashes. My fathers Flight Engineer was into his second tour when war ended, only 20 years of age but had flown 36 ops with my fathers crew, then went onto instructing new crews, was badly injured in an air crash with a new crew, said it would be safer going back to being aircrew and demanded to go back on ops, for which he started a second tour to take his tally up to 45 operations .......... by the age of twenty !
Great program as im always intrested in war history. I was always keen to watch and read everything about WWII but until few years ago i didnt take WWI as such a big and horrendous war it was.One reason for that might be that Finland didnt take part of it (we were part of russia back then)but then russian emperior collapsed and we came as a indepented country in 1917. We did have our own awful civil war 1918 but the history of WWI was not so familiar for me until i was older. For example more british soldiers were killed in the WWI than in the WWII....Horrible but very intresting war and now im watching every document about it and read books.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Civil_War "Reds" against "Whites" and brothers against brothers......The war left deep scars between finnish peoples for decades after that. It was a miracle that we did fight so united and bravely against Russia during WWII......
That looked like a bitter one alright Igor. One percent of the population killed? In UK terms that would equate to around 600 thousand dead. But Russia was in that war?
Yep, technically we take part as a russia. Then again we never want to be a part of russia and didnt actually take part of the real war. However in the civil war there were quite few germans fighting for the "whites" and russians for the "reds" so...IMO these concentration camps were the most awful things in that war.
Big miscalculation by Lenin, who felt that 'self determination' would result in a Bolshevik Finland, in line with the then guiding philosophy of international socialism. I suppose he knew that Russia was in such chaos they couldn't do much to influence the outcome anyway. It could be argued (and if I was writing an A level essay I probably would, for fun) that the Finnish Civil War changed the world, by nipping international socialism in the bud, sending the Bolsheviks down the 'socialism in one country' route (which directly contradicted Marxist philosophy which holds that socialism has to be international to the extent that national boundaries break down) and building a traditional type Empire, which then was liable to internal division because it was ruled by force, and eventual break up, 70 years later. So thank you Finland, though who is to know whether or not true International Socialism may have worked?
