One last sally...
If you have anything positive to add please do,/>
I have neither the wish nor the energy to waste going back over this thread, but you will find that most academic historians writing since 1970 will largely agree with what Keith has said.
I could provide you with a bibliography but that would be a pointless exercise, and I sincerely doubt you would ever read any of the works cited, and would simply prolong this pointless exercise for another 600 odd posts. But, if you actually did want to learn some history, why not expend a little bit of effort in actually reading it, rather than ranting. It's out there and remarkably easy to find. And most of it's free.
Yeah, we all love the poignant, shroud waving stuff and to get maudlin over a jar or two. It's all happened again and again and again and again, an' all that. But reality - well, dammit - reality has a nasty habit of being slightly more complicated than sentiment or received opinion would have it. Ain't that a bugger?
And it's Max Hastings, by the way, not Hasting. But it doesn't appear that accuracy matters much in this current scrap.
Nighty night.