Wars and ConflictsΒ permalink
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Message 1.Β
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Message 2
Posted by FormerlyOldHermit (U3291242) on Friday, 2nd May 2008
Cynically speaking, Chamberlain couldn't afford to lose anymore political capital by backing down over Poland.
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Message 3
Posted by dmatt44 (U11812615) on Friday, 2nd May 2008
Chamberlain believed that war could be averted with Germany and he was of the generation that had lost so many men in the First World War. In 1940 we did have an inadequate air defence and we were probably saved by radar and luck. Hitler' rockets and missiles only came in from the mid-1940s so they really don't come into play at the start.
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Message 4
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
That conflict with the third Reich was probably unavoidable, had been clear for a while. In the pre-war years France and Britain did try to avoid conflict, but they also calculated the timing of a possible war: Too early, and Germany would benefit greatly from having started it re-armament first. Too late, and the 3rd Reich might be able to consolidate its territorial gains and make its position unassailable. Thus the second half of the 1930s saw an arms race, with Germany in the lead but Britain and to a lesser extent France gradually catching up.
In late 1939, British rearmament had at least brought the RAF and Navy back to a reasonable strength, but the Army was still very small. The position of the French was worse, with an almost completely outdated air force and new equipment just starting to leave the factories. For the allies it was probably still too early. On the other hand, Germany's re-armament had been based on financial black magic and drawing off resources from the civilian economy, at a rate that could not be sustained, and the entente powers (and even the USSR) were catching up. For Germany, the timing was probably about right.
So it was Hitler who provoked the war, in the belief that the timing was right for him. He really wanted war, but he hoped that he would be able to destroy his enemies one by one. Chamberlain decided to go to war with a British-French-Polish coalition instead; it was better than the alternative. The timing was not great, but sacrificing Poland would have been dangerous as well as politically unacceptable.
Hitler's rockets and jet fighters would not have made much difference to the outcome: While the V-2 was a formidable technical achievement, it was a nearly useless weapon of war, being disproportionally expensive in relation to the damage it could do. The V-1 was more efficient because it was much cheaper and easier to produce, but effective defences against it could be and were created. Germany's jet fighters had a modest technological lead over their Allied equivalents, but the combination of British jet engine technology and US aerodynamics was close to producing a fighter that was a match for the Me 262. German guided missiles were advanced but not that much ahead of American missiles. And in the end, numbers to matter, and there was no conceivable way in which the Axis powers could match the manpower and industrial capacity of the Allied powers.
To counter it, the Allied had a considerable superiority in other technologies, but above all they had the nuclear bomb -- which wartime Germany did not have, and was incapable of producing, because it lacked both the scientific basis and the massive industrial resources required by such a programme. -
Message 5
Posted by caveman1944 (U11305692) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
Had Hitler been left to conquour Europe he woulds hve had the overseas posessions of the Netherlands, Belgium, France, a ready made empire.
That would not do. Building a fleet with the Channel ports at his disposal, a very uncomfortable neighbour indeed .I do not believe for one moment that he wanted to attack Britain.
I believe that the Americans also saw the undesirability of a powerful dictator on the high seas, given their hate of dictatorships.
Why else should they interfere in Europe first in spite of Japan ? No argument about it for me, that was the behind closed doors reason.
John -
Message 6
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
Whole lotta of rubbish. The politics of Britain were much deeper than English today (and then) want to admit.
The bitter truth is that England wanted and to a large extend controlled this war. Not as a country but financial circles that had no diffculty to jump from one place to the other, Zurich, Paris, London or New York.
You are not able to understand this but then accept it as it is.
The bitter truth is that England did everything possible to spread the war as much to all over Europe and then when the Germans had gotten the largest part of it they did everything possible to make the life of German easier there by making the life of resistance groups in the conquered countries difficult.
In the Balkans it is by now well known that it was the English that caused Mussoloni to attack Greece and it was them that invited with their actions the Germans to invade the country and all that for "inexplicable reasons". Even if that was a tactic on the expense of the cheap lifes of Balcanic people to spread out the army of Germans what can be said about the fact that during the occupation the English tried in every way to divide the resistance groups and make the life of Germans there easier????
England is responsible for that war as much as Germany and USA has to be seen as the cuontry that most benefited from that war and hence one should re-examine more closely the myth that "they only got lately"... to "help"... oh yes, only that by then the Germans were already losing big time as it was obvious they would not last for long that way...
Dirty war, I wish at some point people and especially "specialist" would shut the kcaf up nd think twice the bulls waste they say... -
Message 7
Posted by JB_In_Bournemouth (U11805687) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
Per-leeease let me go first!
Aside from everything else you say Nikolaos, then as now, England had no government, army or assets of any kind to be in a position to do anything.
If you can't get that right, you had better start again. -
Message 8
Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
I know it is whackie all what I am saying and people here that have read one too many texts of mine know that I enjoy "dragging history by the ear",
However apart my extravagant style, you have to stick to some basic stuff such as to forget about states and nations when talking about a global war like the two WWs. European nationalism and bullswaste... nationalism naturally is less of an ideology and more of a generalised "feeling" that normally leads easily to wars of local scale but never of a more extensive scale. WWs are clearly imperial wars and when we talk about war on that scale it is not the nations or even the governments of the participating states that decide to go on or not but the international, densely interelated financial circles. If any you should ask yourself how on earth they found the financing to do all that war investment when at peaceful times they struggle for really ridiculous things... well as I said it is not exactly the governments' inability.
In that sense the behaviour of Britain (like that of others) in both wars is weird, fully responsible for the crimes, but 100% understandable. Once you grasp the reality in that depth, then the reason why a war started and who had the best tanks and airplanes is really of third rate importance.
Just take the example of the 1st WW. Imagine that the 1st WW is believed to had started just because an idiot was murdered by a fanatic student. Or to the more as-if knowledgeable it was that Germany was rising and wanted to antagonise Britain. Well, going a bit more close to the truth it was actually Britain that was more preoccupied with the rise of Germany. But Britain knew very well where they had to look. The bitter truth is that Britain cared less about Germany and more about Russia! Germany was merely the inbetween "conard" as a French would say, the marrionet used to create chaos and thus implicitly reach Russia and thus secure the huge investents in USA*
*Strange? Ha! Who was the owner of the 1/3 of the world? Whose earth circumnavigated the planet? Who was 3rd world producer of oil in the early 1900s? Well it was Russia! Who was just next to the crippling Ottoman Empire? Russia. Who had been 5-6-10 times so close to dissolve the Ottoman Empire and take all the Middle East (where the other third of the then known oil reserves was?) Russia. Not Germany! That was the problem in the 1st WW. The fact that well known American industrialists mentioned to had watched Leo Trotsky... drinking tea in New York in the company of bankers and capitalists and that Lenin a poor Russian had the chance to travel to anywhere in Europe he wished with preference to Switzerland at a time when even well-off people hardly ever had the financial capacity to fund such trips should not escape your attention - communists in Russia were anything but Russians and were certainly not living off the kind donations of the "Russian workers" who of course were a very small part of the Russian society to had been so powerfull to take over in a country that was on the verge of becoming industrial but certainly not industrial yet as a society.
Similarly in the 2nd WW would you ever think a moment that a financially destroyed Germany was able to duoble its industry in 10 years under a mad dictator? Who paid for all that development? They will give you stupid explanations, the bitter truth is that if it was so easy for Germany to do it with internal funding, trust me there would had been other 10-15 countries who wuold had done the very same thing! Unless you really believe that Germans are a superior race. Trust me they are not, it is just that hidden investment always helps! On the other side, was it really Japan that sought war with USA? Why would they do it anyway? USA was supposedly on the other half of the planet! Every piece of document shows that it was USA, an imperialistic country since birth. Leave aside the bullswaste about the neutrality and isolation... these people had already made war with countries as far as Argentina only some 3 decades after the birth of their state. Even the first attack was carried out by the Americans while japanese had indeed warned repeatedly about a strike in Perl Harbor. USA was supposedly unprepared but in fact they well really very well prepared: the next year they were in position to constructing 40 ship carriers and a country that is not prepared, simply is not in position to do so just like that.
See, what is going on today? USA says that Iran and North Korean is the problem despite the fact that these two nations are clearly oriented towards inner development rather than expensive wars that have a detrimental effect on them. And what does it do? It asks Poland and the Check republic to host their star-war bases. Even my dog understands that USA's main problem is Russia and soon will be also China (when China reaches the level of Russia in terms of quality nuclear arsenal - at that time they will call in Korea or Japan).
Anyway I am not in any position to give you clear answers. One thing is for sure:
Today the main threat of world peace is America and not Iraq, Iran or anybody else.
Back 100 years ago it was Britain and not Germany or anybody else. -
Message 9
Posted by Erik Lindsay (U231970) on Saturday, 3rd May 2008
If memory serves, Britain and France had a firm pact with Poland that stated, in essence, that an attack on that latter country would be construed as an attack on all of them. Considering that, and even taking into account all the behind-the-scenes political manoeuvering and empire-building, there was really no way, despite all their efforts to appease Hitler, that Chamberlain or Edouard Daladier, the French PM, could avoid war.
At that stage, belligerence had taken on a life of its own. -
Message 10
Posted by Philip25 (U11566626) on Sunday, 4th May 2008
I think we can safely dismiss the semi-literate and obscene ramblings of Mr E_Nikolaos_who is evidently politically driven in his views.
The position as I see it - and I have worried at this question for many years - is as follows:
Chamberlain had consistently avoided war for several years (as Chancellor and then as PM). This followed on from Baldwin's preference to ignore foreign affairs and focus on domestic issues - but it had a different motivation.
Baldwin had been mainly driven by economic concerns - the depression etc. Chamberlain believed that Appeasement was a rational and civilised way of settling disputes and avoiding the bloodshed and "waste" of WWI. He believed that no one wanted a repeat of that slaughter.
Munich, in which Hitler was given pretty much what he wanted was the logical outcome of the policy of appeasement. But Chamberlain was hard-nosed enough to recognise that Hitler was not to be trusted - hence the "scrap of paper" waved on his return home. In this Hitler (perhaps inadvertently, perhaps uncaring) guaranteed that he had no more territorial concerns and that any problems between Germany and Britain would not be settled by war.
In parallel, Chamberlain had been re-arming. He, like everyone else knew that war was likely, but there was fear that Britain might face aggression from both Germany and japan and could not cope with both. The attitude of the Dominions (especially Australia, NZ and Canada) also had to be taken into account.
The German invasion of the rump of Czechoslovakia in March 39 proved that Hitler could not be trusted. hence a line had to be drawn.
It was recognised even then that a key issue was whether the dictators should be opposed or appeased. The order in which these approaches were employed I'll discuss below.
The guarantee of Poland was the line in the sand - Hitler crossed it and war followed. The date was thus in Hitler's hands. (Interestingly, even at the 12th hour, Chamberlain was still reluctant to go to war, but was forced by his cabinet, including some of the key appeasers such as Hoare and Simon.
The point about oppose or appease is that britain would not hve gone to war united in 1938 - but by and large, after Munich and the events of early 1939, the need to resort to force was accepted however reluctantly.
The issues are much more complicated, of course, than I have been able to summarise here. Theinternational situation viz a viz Russia, France, the US and Japan also needs to be understood and taken into account. Hitler wanted war, but as the Hossbach memorandum illustrates, would have preferred a date a couple of years later when German rearmament would have been completed and its military power at its predicted peak in comparison to the other European powers.
To take a much broader perspective, WWI and WWII can be perceived as one single war, divided by an armed armistice. On that analysis the question was not whether but when the problem of germany would againtake martial form.
There are good books by DC Watt and Richard Overy on all this.
Phil -
Message 11
Posted by FormerlyOldHermit (U3291242) on Sunday, 4th May 2008
E_Nicholaeos (or whatever your name is), you aren't by any chance a marxist in your historical outlook are you? I thought we'd discredited that line of historical thought a while back.
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Message 12
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 5th May 2008
Eric had mentioned about pact of Britain&France with Poland and there really was no way to avoid the war .
Though Hitler to the last
moment had been hoped that other important pact into the context of the events- the Soviet-German one ( which split Poland between Hitler and Stalin - the twins who were in the real alliance to stir up the WWII ) would have plunged Britain into despair. But it just forced Britain to accept the inevitableness of war and accept the war as the given fact which already was impossible to reverse .
As for French.
They were the defeatists from their origins .... their Defeatism reached its apex in the personal popularity of Petain among the Frenchmen ( Petain sincere thought and stated and even himself lived within the conception that sex and grub were the only real things in our world worth having and thus all else just being the rubbish ...) during the Vichy regime.
Thus France simply followed the formal procedure when they were forced to join Britain in declaring war on Germany. It was needed 56 hours of ' thinking and crying ' for France to react on Hitler's invasion Poland ........in spite of the protocol which was signed between the French general Gamelen and the Polish General Kaspzitski in May 1939 , in which it was written that French assaults , on land and from air , against German forces should be launched within the first 16 days of war. Nothing like that was done.
Probably Hitler was right when he tried to prove his doubtful generals those who resisted the Hitler's plan of occupation Czechoslovakia that while such leaders like Chamberlains-Daladirers held onto the power in Britain and France there was no any reason to worry about declaring war on Germany for them ....
But we must take into account the Chamberlain's belief that exactly in the moment when the Nazis would disappear from the German political stage then they should be replaced by commies there ....as an alternative to the Nazi's regime. .
We will never forget about 10,000,000 of votes which went into the lot of German commies during the last German elections in 1933. It was not clear for Chamberlain in 1938 yet -Was Hitler a real threat for the world or not ? But it was clear for him that Stalin and Bolsheviks were.
P.S. The occupation of Czechoslovakia supplied Hitler by the advantage in shape of additional thirty Divisions which he could use in any direction he wanted...as rightly pointed out Sir W.Churchill. -
Message 13
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Monday, 5th May 2008
'Even my dog understands that USA's main problem is Russia and soon will be also China (when China reaches the level of Russia in terms of quality nuclear arsenal - at that time they will call in Korea or Japan). '
- even my cat understands, Nick , that China is the main problem for Russia . And Russians deserve this problem. The time has come for them to learn the Chinese language as the basic language which is spoken as such in the 'russian' Far East already. -
Message 14
Posted by Scarboro (U2806863) on Monday, 5th May 2008
It is an interesting coincidence that this thread appears next to the thread "Britain never got over the Somme" on the messageboard.
The ability to go to war depends on your peoples' willingness to follow their leaders, and this faith was severely shaken in WW1. Much of the traditional respect for authority and sense of duty died, and the survivors were those who hung back and kept their heads down.
Many European states collapsed. France, the UK, and the USA were threatened with socialist revolutions, and had doubts about the army's loyalty in the event of civil unrest. Everything was falling apart.
So whether the British & French leaders saw the threat or were deluded, the old ability to declare war was not there anymore.
The fact that the big powers were still putting their own national interest first did not help. The creation of NATO after WW2 was the final step that should have been taken followwing WW1, and was omitted, to the world's great loss. -
Message 15
Posted by Ghostwinds (U11483909) on Monday, 5th May 2008
Why did Britain declare war on Germany in September 1939? Ostensibly, to save Poland, but what was the real reason?Β
Because they knew what would happen after Poland. They did not exactly go rushing to Poland’s aid, in fact after the war Poland was thrown to the wolves.
GW. -
Message 16
Posted by FormerlyOldHermit (U3291242) on Monday, 5th May 2008
It wasn't thrown to the wolves. It was a useless situation to demand a democratic Poland while it was under the control of the Soviet Union's forces.
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Message 17
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Monday, 5th May 2008
They were the defeatists from their origins...Β
Vichy propaganda. Petain's Vichy regime considered it to be in its best interest to blame the defeat of 1940 on the 'divided' and 'defeatist' French society, and propagate their own disciplined, conservative, somewhat militarist regime an the antidote. The reality was very different: The defeat of 1940 was first and foremost a shattering military defeat, with as its main cause the inability of the French generals to keep up with the evolutions in modern warfare. The Wehrmacht ran rings around the slow French army and its ponderous command structure. Petain was one of the people who had to carry the largest burden of responsibility for this, as one of the most important advocates of military conservatism, and it suited him and his colleagues very much to point in a different direction. They conveniently forgot that before May 1940, they had confidently boasted that a German attack could not succeed.
That is not to say that French society was not divided in 1940. It was; the extreme right always favoured accommodation with (and imitation of) Hitler and Mussolini's regimes, and the extreme left converted to this view after the Hitler-Stalin pact of 1939. But this wasn't that different in Britain. However, thanks to the barrier of the Channel, Britain was able to military resist and survive, and rediscover its unity. France was crushed on the battlefield in a few weeks.
But the French soldiers of 1940 were not, before the German attack, defeatist or rebellious. They were, if anything, extremely bored, because of the long months of 'drole de guerre' in which generals did far too little to train and prepare their troops. They lost confidence when confronted with the violence of the initial assault, but later many recovered and (too late to make a difference) fought stubbornly.
in spite of the protocol which was signed between the French general Gamelen and the Polish General Kaspzitski in May 1939 , in which it was written that French assaults , on land and from air , against German forces should be launched within the first 16 days of war. Nothing like that was done.Β
That agreement was not binding, because it was never ratified -- the political agreement on which it was conditional was never completed. However, the main failing of that agreement was that it was hopelessly unrealistic. It specified that the French would start offensives with limited goals four days after mobilisation (as they did, more or less) and a major offensive on day 15 after mobilisation. But in reality, M+15 Poland was already defeated and the offensive pointless.
To be fair to the French, Poland was prepared even worse than France, and its military planning was based on illusions. Nationalism overruled reason; an understandable desire to protect the whole national territory (and even to take the offensive) put the army in the worst possible position. Modern equipment was desperately scarce and command structures were poor. The French and British were only dimly aware of this; they expected that Poland would be able to defend itself for much longer than it did. They were never prepared to expect that organized resistance in Poland would collapse after a week of war.
But even if it had continued, France simply did not have an army capable of the kind of offensive operations that were needed to give effective support. The majority of the French military leadership had drawn the conclusion from 1914-1918, that in modern warfare the defensive position was superior. Gamelin wanted to be attacked, not to attack, and his army was equipped and trained mainly for that purpose. As for air attacks, in 1939-1940 every single bomber in the French air force was obsolete. New aircraft were emerging from the production lines, but desperately slowly.
So the French-Polish agreement of May 1939 was based on mutual illusions. If the war of 1939 had developed at the speed of 1914, then maybe -- maybe! -- there would have been hope. Or perhaps in 1941, with a better trained military and more equipment, France would have been a real threat to the southern borders of Germany. In the reality of September 1939, the plan was completely useless. -
Message 18
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Monday, 5th May 2008
Re: Message 17.
Mutatis Mutandis,
I thank you very much for this excellent survey of what I always tried to summarize on these boards. It is the best and most complete survey I saw until now. I completely agree with it and wanted that I could have said it that coherently and eloquently as you said it overhere. With great esteem.
PS. There seems to be a book "the French defeat of 1940: Reassessements" by Joel Blatt.
I only found it the day before yesterday and I rather stick to your definition as that it was a military! defeat due to the mentioned flaws of the strategy and preparations rather than to defaitism or politics. From the other side if the French in the eyes of the Germans would have be better prepared they would have changed their strategy too?
Warm regards and with esteem,
Paul. -
Message 19
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
Gamelin wanted to be attacked, not to attack, and his army was equipped and trained mainly for that purpose. '
- the brightest example of the French Defeatism !!!!! ....and the world had its chance to see to which such things that army was trained.
Not me but the French chose the Petain and the 'peace' behind the famous Line.
Brits chose the Churchill-warrior and heroism...
It wasn't me who invented the slogan :
'LA FRANCE , C"EST PETAIN , EL PETAIN C'EST LA FRANCE ! '
It was French.
French 'defensive' tactics onto the French-German border and aimless activities in other places just played on hand of Hitler.
Partly it can be explained the fact that
Britain didn't elect the so- called government of People's Front ( commies and other leftists-defeatists who during Nazi's invasion in 1940 calling upon French soldiers not to fight against Hitler ..they did it from MOSCOW !!!! ) in the latest 30s as it happened in France. And now it has become known for historians that Gamelen was a syphilitic and thus sometimes was keen on taking
the un adequate decisions , suffered from lacking of concentration and was obsessed with a narcissism. Though the un adequate decisions were among the incompetent French generals the common place... Anyone who wants can find these facts into the book of Marc Bloch , Strange Defeat (Oxford , 1949).
P.S
'They were never prepared to expect that organized resistance in Poland would collapse after a week of war.' - Poland was attacked from the both of sides ...from the West and from the East on 17th of September 1939. They were heroes these Polish soldiers. -
Message 20
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
French 'defensive' tactics onto the French-German border and aimless activities in other places just played on hand of Hitler.Β
In 1939 and early 1940 a defensive posture made excellent sense, because time would make France and Britain stronger and Germany weaker. With the declaration of war, German industry would be cut off from imports (this was partially remedied by generous Soviet supplies) and would soon reach its ceiling anyway. Meanwhile France and Britain would gain the advantages of their own rearmament programs and the huge orders they had placed in the USA. Britain would be able to expand its army (although the level of British mobilization in early 1940 was about one fifth of that of France) and France would be able to train its large number of reservists.
The expectation in 39-40 was, quite correctly, that this war would be as long as the previous one, and that a long war was disadvantageous for Germany. This was completely correct. The flaw in the assessment was that France wouldn't be around to profit from it.
Partly it can be explained the fact that
Britain didn't elect the so- called government of People's FrontΒ
Actually it was the Popular Front government that gave the biggest boost to French re-armament, and took harsh but necessary measures such as the reorganization of the French aviation industry. It was this government that at least tried to resist the fascist advance in Spain. And its prime minister, Leon Blum, was one of the few French politicians who refused to transfer power to Petain or to collaborate with the Germans.
It is correct that the communists refused to fight in 1940 -- but then they had been outlawed as a party in 1939, not a gesture that inspired much loyalty.
They were heroes these Polish soldiers.Β
There is no doubt that many Polish soldiers behaved like heroes. Unfortunately, there is also no doubt that the Polish government and military command of the pre-war years behaved like idiots. (Government and military command were much the same, the Sanjaca regime being a virtual military dictatorship.) Despite their vulnerable position, they built neither strong alliances nor a strong army, instead opting for a fatal balancing act between the rival powers --- even to the extent of having itself allocated a part of Czechoslovakia at Munich. -
Message 21
Posted by VF (U5759986) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
Having read this thread late (sorry) I do not understand E Nicholaus's post.My impression was that in the late 1930's the last thing that Britain and the Empire needed was another war.Finacially it was known that it would in all likelyhood be finacial suicide,I can remember reading a book by Paul Kennedy(?) called "The Decline And Fall Of British Seapower".He stated in this book that the Treasury expected to be broke by 1941 with the UK's gold and foreign currency exhausted.In addition you have various parts of the empire pushing for independence or in the very least partial self governance.Given this insurrection and likelyhood of bankrupcy in the case of war,why the hell would the uK wish a large scale conflict in Europe? WW1 cost us our financial clout and the flower of our youth with four long years before Germany realised that they couldnt win and sued for armistice.
I cannot see in any circumstance that the UK could see either finacial profit or some kind of industrial resurgance,especially on reflection to the events of WW1.
Or am I missing something!!!???
As for "spreading the load" (bringing in other countries into the conflict,like the Balkans).However "selfish" there was no allied precence on the continent,was it attempt to regain a "foothold" back in Europe? If it was it was flawed as the UK really wasnt in any position to start offensives in Europe.I would argue that up to 1942 most of the UK's actions were defensive battles (with the exeption of Sidi Barrani) and cases of holding onto what we (the UK ) had got. I suppose the one side effect of the Balkans campaign was that it dilluted some of the Axis forces and took their focus off their main objective at the time - Russia.It also took some of the heat off the UK itself because I could imagine, without the benefit of hindsight that Germany still had ambitions on knocking out the UK and a perception (however wrong) that invasion plans were still being drawn up.
Or again have I got the wrong end of the stick???
-
Message 22
Posted by Ghostwinds (U11483909) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
It wasn't thrown to the wolves. It was a useless situation to demand a democratic Poland while it was under the control of the Soviet Union's forces.Β
The time to take control and dictate events is when you are at an overwhelming advantage. Unfortunately Churchill could not see past the end of his English nose. He even refused Australian requests for a return of an Australian division to defend Australia against the Japanese threat.
GW. -
Message 23
Posted by LongWeekend (U3023428) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
GW
No, Churchill didn't. He asked the Curtin government to leave the veteran 6th and 7th Divisions in the Middle East, because the British Chiefs of Staff did not believe there was a direct threat of invasion (and there wasn't, the Japanese leadership didn't even discuss it until Feb '42, and then rejected the idea). Curtin agreed to leave 9th Division, but not the other two.
Churchill then asked that 7th Division be diverted to Rangoon, because it was nearest (having been the first to leave the ME. Given the narrow margin of Japanese superiority in Burma, its presence could have tipped the balance in retaining Rangoon. However, Curtin would not agree, so back to Australia it went.
The British did not want the Australian divisions to leave, but there was no "refusal" - indeed, there could not have been.
Once it became clear there was no threat of invasion/ the invasion threat had passed (depending which side of the "panicking Aussie Prime Minister" argument you are), Curtin agreed that 9th Division could stay until the end of the North African campaign (in fact, it started to pack up to go home after Alamein), and the Australian Armoured Division was even sent to the ME to train, before being disbanded. -
Message 24
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
'Despite their vulnerable position, they built neither strong alliances nor a strong army, instead opting for a fatal balancing act between the rival powers --- even to the extent of having itself allocated a part of Czechoslovakia at Munich.'
- since the Munich all Central European countries (Hungary , Romania , Bulgaria) realized that better to be a 'friend' of Hitler than would become his victim soon as an outcome of the Munich II ....while some powers were 'balancing'.
'And its prime minister, Leon Blum, was one of the few French politicians who refused to transfer power to Petain or to collaborate with the Germans. '
-I just heard that he was one of the politicians who was accused and sentenced in France as a man who had been driven France to the defeat. Probably Spanish Civil war and Spanish trozkists& Stalin's 'inter brigaders' were the things in which he interested more than those interests if his France. -
Message 25
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
'In 1939 and early 1940 a defensive posture made excellent sense, because time would make France and Britain stronger and Germany weaker. '
- the history has proved that it made excellent sense only for Hitler who defeated in April 1940 Norway ( according his own plan of operation ).... then having many alternatives available for himself chose the best of them - the tanks' assault through Ardenn against France in May 1940. -
Message 26
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
-I just heard that he was one of the politicians who was accused and sentenced in France as a man who had been driven France to the defeat.Β
Accused, yes: In the Riom show trial, organized by the Vichy regime and the Nazis to shift the blame for the defeat of 1940 on left-wing politicians --- and incidentally to "prove" that Nazi Germany had not been the aggressor.
Sentenced, no: The Riom trial turned out to be such a public embarrassment for the Vichy regime, as more and more information was aired in public that contradicted the accusations, that it was suspended after two months and then quietly cancelled. -
Message 27
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Tuesday, 6th May 2008
Re: Message 24.
Jack,
"and its prime minister leon Blum..."
now you aren't fair against LΓ©on Blum and even seems to haven't read your history in depth.
I read a lot about the man in the research for the French interwar history and he came over to me as one of the most honest men of the French Third Republic. Even my mother, born in 1920, although as a fish merchant hardly a Socialist, recognized as a contamporary his exceeding qualities.
And all what Mutatis Mutandis said is completely right as about the Riom trial and the unbelievable army supply effort by the Front Populaire. Thanks again Mutatis.
there seems not to be much comments neither in English nor in French about the book. If I can catch the book I will translate some comments.
Warm regards,
Paul. -
Message 28
Posted by OUNUPA (U2078829) on Wednesday, 7th May 2008
Paul , sidekick....if Leon Blum was the one who .'gave the biggest boost to French re-armament (???), and took harsh but necessary measures such as the reorganization of the French aviation industry.' ....then I can claim that Petain was the one who created the ' Chantiers de la Jeunesse ' , the youth's football and even the embryo of the ' Commissariat general du Plan' ...Do we doom to be bogged down into the hell knows what....a kind of... the Hitler was a Great Man ...because he used to create things like the German High Way system and job for Germans .... Saying these demagogic things , doing that in the way of Lukashenko , you should agree with me that I am completely right.
And where's it gotten us ? To the conclusion that ' the Polish government and military command of the pre-war years behaved like idiots ' ? To my mind I have explained clearly who were these REAL IDIOTS in those times...and I did it in a single paragraph.
It doesn't matter that the trial in Riom was conducted by the Vichy regime ( which itself was involved into the defeat thus the regime was just forced to suspend the trial ) but to the big account the trial was needed .....
Anyone knows that
during the Nuremberg's Trial many important things were hidden from public ( say...the secret German-Soviet protocols and etc.). But now none dares to claim that because of that fact there was no any need in the Trial over Nazis because the one of Judges itself was a Partner In Nazis' Crimes and the TWIN of Nazis . -
Message 29
Posted by Ghostwinds (U11483909) on Wednesday, 7th May 2008
LostW.
Churchill at no time gave a darn about Empire troops. They were to his mind assets to be used for the defense of the UK. Indeed some Indian troops never had so much as a grave marker. With Darwin under attack by the Japanese from the air and nothing between them and Australia, Churchill had some gall wanting Australian troops diverted to Burma. Burma was a waste of time and nothing but Brits protecting a colony that they were thieving millions from. British troops were no match for the Japanese. At a time when the Chindits started to lose combat effectiveness after 2 weeks in the Burmese jungle, the Japanese could only be beaten by the Brits after 2 years in country and no resupply. The Japanese by this time were eating their fallen comrades. In Burma British troops were very much a minority.
The threat to Australia was over when New Zealand and Australia were reinforced with American Marine divisions. This in fact was Australia’s milestone for turning from the UK to the United States for its military partnership, which of course continues to this day. After the disgrace of Singapore who could blame them. Churchill did everything possible to keep the Australians. I don’t blame him as they were and still are first class troops.
GW.
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