Dunkirk

[Jeremy]

Yes I know, this has nothing to do with football but I just watched the excellent movie "Dunkirk".

Made me realise just how much the English did to win the war - in the beginning it was the UK (not Ireland) and some Commonwealth help against nutcase Germans.

I think the Dunkirk evacuation was possibly the greatest moment in English history.

 

 

[Micky]

4 minutes ago, Jeremy said:

Yes I know, this has nothing to do with football but I just watched the excellent movie "Dunkirk".

Made me realise just how much the English did to win the war - in the beginning it was the UK (not Ireland) and some Commonwealth help against nutcase Germans.

I think the Dunkirk evacuation was possibly the greatest moment in English history.

 

 

Couldn't agree more,  closely followed by 1st May 1976. (that's got it back to saints related business..!)

[spyinthesky]

I went to Wembley in 1976 with Duncan Kirk!!

[badgerx16]

11 hours ago, Jeremy said:

Made me realise just how much the English did to win the war - in the beginning it was the UK (not Ireland) and some Commonwealth help against nutcase Germans.

I think the Dunkirk evacuation was possibly the greatest moment in English history.

 

 

( I think you mean British rather than English. )

Also, ( switch to MLG mode ); in the beginning it was the UK, ( plus the empire ), France, ( plus her empire ), and the Polish, ( plus the odd Czech ), versus the Germans. As the Germans advanced in 1940, Norway, Holland, and Belgium were added to the Allied side, although in small numbers. The Dunkirk evacuation pulled out not only Brietish troops, ( minus almost all of their equipment ), but also many thousands of French troops who carried on fighting alongside us after their home territories were overrun.

 

How typically British to evangelise a disatrous strategic defeat as something to be celebrated. After all, didn't Winston Churchill call the Battle of Britain our 'Finest Hour' ?

 

Edited 30 September, 2020 by badgerx16

[skintsaint]

3 hours ago, badgerx16 said:

How typically British to evangelise a disatrous strategic defeat as something to be celebrated

Well it kept the Allies in the war at the time so probably something to cheer. If the UK fell (losing all those troops would have made the Krauts push on harder to land on the home beaches I'm sure), then the Yanks wouldn't have been able to land in Europe or N.Africa. Who knows what would have happened then although someone will probably correct me......anyway why is this on the main page and not the lounge! 😆

[Jeremy]

2 hours ago, skintsaint said:

Well it kept the Allies in the war at the time so probably something to cheer. If the UK fell (losing all those troops would have made the Krauts push on harder to land on the home beaches I'm sure), then the Yanks wouldn't have been able to land in Europe or N.Africa. Who knows what would have happened then although someone will probably correct me......anyway why is this on the main page and not the lounge! 😆

Sorry, my bad. I was bored.

Just impressed by the incredible bravery of those people in the small unarmed boats who sailed over (didn't realise until the movie). 

Back to the footy?

 

 

[Hatch]

1 hour ago, Jeremy said:

Sorry, my bad. I was bored.

Just impressed by the incredible bravery of those people in the small unarmed boats who sailed over (didn't realise until the movie). 

Back to the footy?

 

 

can i ask what age ( more or less ) you are ?

[skintsaint]

What do they teach in schools these days? :/

[Toussaint]

1 hour ago, skintsaint said:

What do they teach in schools these days? 😕

Wokeism 

[Whitey Grandad]

5 hours ago, Jeremy said:

Sorry, my bad. I was bored.

Just impressed by the incredible bravery of those people in the small unarmed boats who sailed over (didn't realise until the movie). 

Back to the footy?

 

 

Many will be familiar with the story of the Titanic and of the most senior surviving officer Charles Lightoller. He served with distinction in the First World War and later in World War 2 took his own motor yacht ‘Sundowner’ to Dunkirk and brought back 127 service em. He lived at Netley Abbey. His yacht Sundowner is preserved in Ramsgate Maritime Museum.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Lightoller

Edited 30 September, 2020 by Whitey Grandad

[aintforever]

14 hours ago, Jeremy said:

Yes I know, this has nothing to do with football but I just watched the excellent movie "Dunkirk".

Made me realise just how much the English did to win the war - in the beginning it was the UK (not Ireland) and some Commonwealth help against nutcase Germans.

I think the Dunkirk evacuation was possibly the greatest moment in English history.

 

 

Think the Battle of Britain tops it. Dunkirk was an amazing achievement but we were just running away from the Krauts and the fact that so many made it home was partly due to the German's making mistakes. Think they halted their advance for just long enough for us to make the rescue. My great Uncle was rescued from the beach at Dunkirk and later got a 'Blighty' just after D-Day in Normandy - legend!

I've always thought Alan Turing's achievements as the greatest TBH.

[jawillwill]

1 hour ago, aintforever said:

Think the Battle of Britain tops it. Dunkirk was an amazing achievement but we were just running away from the Krauts and the fact that so many made it home was partly due to the German's making mistakes. Think they halted their advance for just long enough for us to make the rescue. My great Uncle was rescued from the beach at Dunkirk and later got a 'Blighty' just after D-Day in Normandy - legend!

I've always thought Alan Turing's achievements as the greatest TBH.

Speaking of which, the Imitation Game is a good movie too.

[badgerx16]

2 hours ago, aintforever said:

I've always thought Alan Turing's achievements as the greatest TBH.

The combination of Turing's mathematical genius with the oft-overlooked electromechanical work of Tommy Flowers that produced Colossus.

[trousers]

 

 

[badgerx16]

18 minutes ago, trousers said:

 

 

Tommy Flowers is the epitome of the 'unsung hero'.

[Jeremy]

Read about this woman a couple of weeks' ago that may interest some of you: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300102722/trailblazer-lady-ellen-elizabeth-reed-part-of-ww2-codebreaking-unit-dies-in-paihia-aged-104

I've got previous generations who went over and fought in WW1 (Gallipoli and the Somme I think it was). Thought it would be fun apparently, One of them was a nervous wreck for the rest of his life when he came back from the Somme. 

[Hockey_saint]

Been to paihia.

 

Anyhow.....Did you know Charles Lightholler (officer on the Titanic) is in that movie under another name? He owned a sailboat and used it. I obviously disagree with your points though as Germany was taking a massive gamble right up until and during the invasion of France helped only by the complete ineptitude of the French and British command. We were boxed in mostly by our own lack of strategic where with all and arrogance.

 

We were then assisted by whatever it was that told Hitler to stop outside Dunkirk...it could have been to save the tanks, to force a peace deal or whatever but be in no doubt, Hitler could have crushed the entire BEF right there and then. Churchill came in and just before that Lord Halifax was making overtures to Italy. We were in SERIOUS, SERIOUS trouble. Whilst it is true Hitler probably couldn't have stopped the Navy crushing whatever operation sealion had in store but even then it was only thanks to his foolish directive to target civillians and stop targeting air bases that let us off the hook but even then Russia was slowly but surely at the cost of millions of it's own citizens pushing the Nazis back. 

 

We got the US involved sure but apart from that, I'm afraid your British.....English....nationalism is a bit misplaced. World war two, for the British, whilst we celebrate winning, was one cock up after another....and let's not even go into our absolute humiliations in Asia before the battle of Imphal..

Edited 30 September, 2020 by Hockey_saint

[Hockey_saint]

9 hours ago, badgerx16 said:

Tommy Flowers is the epitome of the 'unsung hero'.

I thought you wrote Timmy for a minute there. But so was Alan Turing and the Polish who'd already cracked the code.

[Jeremy]

@ H-S: I'm a fifth generation NZer with Southern Irish ancestry from way back (19th century diaspora). BTW, a surprising lot of Scots emigrated to NZ also.

Just thought the people on those small boats who crossed the Channel were outstanding.

I would imagine there are plenty of examples of military disasters caused by useless generals and politicians (WW1 in particular) but that doesn't detract from some of the heroism of the poor buggers who did what they were ordered despite being FUBAR.

I'm keen on trying to write a novel about the First World War (reading around the subject) so anything war-related from the first part of the C20th is really interesting.

Cheers.

[gandalf]

22 hours ago, skintsaint said:

What do they teach in schools these days? 😕

One of my daughters is a teacher. Recently I mentioned Oliver Cromwell and she genuinely didn't know who he was. So I'm not sure what history she was taught! And no, she doesn't teach history. 

[OldNick]

7 hours ago, Jeremy said:

@ H-S: I'm a fifth generation NZer with Southern Irish ancestry from way back (19th century diaspora). BTW, a surprising lot of Scots emigrated to NZ also.

Just thought the people on those small boats who crossed the Channel were outstanding.

I would imagine there are plenty of examples of military disasters caused by useless generals and politicians (WW1 in particular) but that doesn't detract from some of the heroism of the poor buggers who did what they were ordered despite being FUBAR.

I'm keen on trying to write a novel about the First World War (reading around the subject) so anything war-related from the first part of the C20th is really interesting.

Cheers.

I have 4 military cross groups from WWI, the latest one I bought has loads of history including letters from his officer colleagues in the trenches bemoaning the sad loss of his life, pictures and an album of related bits about him. The one i have added images of has other pieces as well.Notice the blood stained wallet from where he was badly wounded

 

[Hockey_saint]

18 hours ago, Jeremy said:

@ H-S: I'm a fifth generation NZer with Southern Irish ancestry from way back (19th century diaspora). BTW, a surprising lot of Scots emigrated to NZ also.

Just thought the people on those small boats who crossed the Channel were outstanding.

I would imagine there are plenty of examples of military disasters caused by useless generals and politicians (WW1 in particular) but that doesn't detract from some of the heroism of the poor buggers who did what they were ordered despite being FUBAR.

I'm keen on trying to write a novel about the First World War (reading around the subject) so anything war-related from the first part of the C20th is really interesting.

Cheers.

That's why their Lamb is so good! All those Scottish sheep farmers!

 

Yeah, I've been to NZ a few times (initially, it was just a short stop between the US and Oz on my RTW trip but I found I actually preferred the usually wet islands and did a month long tour using their version of National Express from Queenstown....which made me feel quite old....to the North Island and that was pretty awesome. I planned to return at the end of the year but....covid obviously).

 

My grandad served in Burma just after the battle of Imphal and his dad....who, thanks to him sadly passing of COVID (I found out his dad's age).....was a world war one veteran (I used to talk to him about it a lot)....and a 2nd Boer war one....that always facinated me until I found out his dad was 50 when he was born (he died at 52 probably from injuries sustained at the battle of Mons.....he spent most of the war as a POW). Obviously NZ wasn't in much trouble during world war one or two (unless the battle of the coral sea went the wrong way) but I always found the gun implacements on Mount Victoria in Devonport near Auckland very interesting. The main problem I have with celebrating a lot of world war two is a lot of people make up their own ideas of what happened to promote their nationalistic views over here....Farage being a good example but yep, I find that bit of time really interesting too. (btw here's a photo of my great-grandad, the Boer war veteran in a POW camp in world war one and here's his son, my grandad in Tokyo after the war.)

Edited 1 October, 2020 by Hockey_saint

[Jeremy]

This discussion is far more preferable to what's going on in the Trump thread!!

@ Old Nick:  Very interesting and also a bit moving - the blood stain. I'm trying to find books about soldiers writing home from the front (there are quite a few actually) so I can try and understand how they felt and, also, how they said what they thought so I can try and reproduce it in authentic dialogue. 

@ H S: very interesting response also. I joined the NZ Military Historical Association (or whatever it's called) last year to find out more about NZ's involvement in WW1. I know the casualty rate was very, very high per capita at the time (probably reflecting the fact that at the time England was still considered "home" to many people). I think the Prime Minister famously said at the time of declaring war something like "where she [England] goes we go" (something like that). In the beginning the really young soldiers from the NZ Expeditionary Force thought it would be all over in months ...

I want to try and write a story about an underage Maori volunteer from rural NZ wanting to escape for a big adventure and his grandfather, a fierce warrior during the Maori Land Wars with new settlers, trying to stop him. I think that raises some  potentially interesting underlying issues within the narrative of a novel.  I may then try and fictionalise NZ's capture of Le Quesnoy using the kid who also dies there. Something like that anyway. I did a couple of papers in creative writing a couple of  years' ago and loved it.

Jeremy

 

[Hockey_saint]

4 hours ago, Jeremy said:

This discussion is far more preferable to what's going on in the Trump thread!!

@ Old Nick:  Very interesting and also a bit moving - the blood stain. I'm trying to find books about soldiers writing home from the front (there are quite a few actually) so I can try and understand how they felt and, also, how they said what they thought so I can try and reproduce it in authentic dialogue. 

@ H S: very interesting response also. I joined the NZ Military Historical Association (or whatever it's called) last year to find out more about NZ's involvement in WW1. I know the casualty rate was very, very high per capita at the time (probably reflecting the fact that at the time England was still considered "home" to many people). I think the Prime Minister famously said at the time of declaring war something like "where she [England] goes we go" (something like that). In the beginning the really young soldiers from the NZ Expeditionary Force thought it would be all over in months ...

I want to try and write a story about an underage Maori volunteer from rural NZ wanting to escape for a big adventure and his grandfather, a fierce warrior during the Maori Land Wars with new settlers, trying to stop him. I think that raises some  potentially interesting underlying issues within the narrative of a novel.  I may then try and fictionalise NZ's capture of Le Quesnoy using the kid who also dies there. Something like that anyway. I did a couple of papers in creative writing a couple of  years' ago and loved it.

Jeremy

 

Yeah, when I visited Te Papa in Wellington I was amazed by some of the military exhibits there.