Done elsewhere Christmas but in brief:

1: "Wrong sized shells" v "Wrong Type" British Army 1914/1915 trained to fight a war of fire and manouevre as such their "field artillery" was too light and the supply of shells they had were predominantly shrapnel not high explosive - both killed the enemy by shrapnel was no good at demolishing barbed wire.

2: At no time at all was Kitchener EVER forced to tender his resignation. Appointed as Secretary of State for War on the 5th August 1914 the day after war was declared and he remained in that post until the 5th June 1916 the day he died - So tell us again Christmas when was he forced to resign?

3: "What thuggery did the clown who made the cock-up bring in - the conscientious objectors who were shipped off to Europe (as you gloatingly pointed out) would have all been executed had Kitchener remained in office - Ehmmm hate to point this out to you Jim but Kitchener died just around the time that the conscientious objectors you refer to arrived in France were they were sentenced to hard labour - not death.

4: "The fact that Britain should not only honour a treaty with such genocidal thugs and stay silent, then persuade British youth to give their lives in support of such a regime,"

Who was supporting any regime?? In 1941 should Churchill have refused to provide assistance and support Soviet Russia - by that time Stalin had murdered more of his own people than any Belgian had Congolese.

As Churchill said at the time - "War makes strange bedfellows"

5: "Belgian atrocities in the Congo took place five years before the war broke out - ample time for Britain to condemn them and review its treaty."

So we are now debating on the basis of what you in 2014 think should have happened as opposed to what actually did happen. Care to tell us how Great Britain could have "reviewed" this treaty - wouldn't that have required the agreement of all the other signatories and IIRC there were quite an number of them. The treaty of London 1839 is still in force today and was last invoked on the 24th May 2005 in an EU dispute between Belgium and the Netherlands.

6: The British Army fought to protect the national interests of Great Britain.

7: "Not legally obligated to object to genocide - for fuck's sake, what kind of a defence is that - do you really live in a world that does not intervene in the slaughter of ten million people - or nor even comment on it unless legally obliged to do so?

Totally irrelevant Christmas because you see us people as you go on to describe us live in the present day in 2014 not back over 100 years ago in 1914. If you wish to judge people on the moral mores and memes of today then fill your boots - all it does is make you look an idiot - back to the American tourists at Windsor Castle again - "Hey honey why do you think the King and Queen of England built this place so close to the Airport?"