BS: Armistice Day (debate)

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket evolving slowly
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 01:09 PM

According to me and I keep telling you, if paid Fleet St hacks can call themselves historians and fool gullible idiots, so can I.

I'm a historian dontcha know?




When 20, 000 men die on one day in a field you could fit on our village green, it makes you wonder how it happened.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 01:05 PM

We are to assume that you have made up everything you have claimed about the reason the 'ordinary soldiers enlisted then - nothing new there!!
"have provided material from 4 historians already to support my views and can produce more."
Once again you certainly can't produce anybody who agrees with yo here
Just like those 6 phantom politicians who claimed your "cultural implant" theory -never to emerge in the public eye
YOU'RE MAKING IT ALL UP AGAIN.
A bit of a mess really - why do you contribute to a debating forum if you are going to invent things?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 12:37 PM

Surely things are far from black and white?

Not if you're a fundamentalist "Christian"[sic] with the name of Keith they ain't.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 12:36 PM

Jim, I had already given links to those extracts.
I was repeating them for you.

I have provided material from 4 historians already to support my views and can produce more.
My views derive from the historians.
Yours are just your made up ramblings.

Most men died through outrageously callous and ill conceived decisions by their own ignorant senior officers.
Not according to the historians.
Just made up shit.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 12:28 PM

What does one mean though when one talks about Sassoon's views? Is that his later poems or his initial reaction to the war? Sassoon went into the war head first and was reckoned to be far too brave and basically far too wreckless for his own good taking actions with apparent indifference to his own safety. His poems took a turn and he started to think about the war in a different light because of the experiences he had and the losses that he suffered. What do we mean by the views of the ordinary soldier? Do we mean the views they had when they all marched off happily in the first place arms in arms - or do we mean the views they had when many returned partially broken men often refusing to even discuss their experiences? Surely things are far from black and white?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket curious
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 11:34 AM

I love that bit.

I am free to have my views thanks to the armed forces. ....

I actually am free to have my views in spite of the armed forces.

My view by the way is based on a search for the truth, not the easy revisionist propaganda you are wedded to.

Most men died through outrageously callous and ill conceived decisions by their own ignorant senior officers. Even your buddy Hastings concedes thats one factor of the second world war was the senior officers had been junior officers in the first war and learned from the incompetence and wholesale slaughter.

I recall the old man next door when I was a child selling his medals, Boer and WW1. He said there was no glory in keeping them, no difference to the mates he lost. Once people showed interest in buying them, it was nice to see them having some use at last.   Paid for having the house decorated. He died in 1972 at a ripe old age, and you know what? The most heroic thing he did was see the futility of having pride in medals. Mind you, dodging bullets is hard too, but seeing jingoism for what it is? Priceless.

(George Cooper of Worksop. Served in Sherwood Foresters.)

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 11:04 AM

"We are not historians Jim."
Only a matter of time before you claimed this
We read everything we can on the subject rather than do what you do - make your stupid and reactionary statements then go and scramble for a cut 'n paste - then grab the first one that (sort of) backs you up.
Nowhere has Hastings contradicted in any way the account than has been accepted - high pressure recruiting based on lies, 'white feather' blackmail, ill treatment by officers, summary executions, total disillusionment.... nothing of this - all these are established facts of history and all these you have denied with your jingoistic claims
Your (once again) unlinked quote from Max Hastings refers in its entirety to his attempts to blame the Germans for the war -it nowhere backs your claim that British soldiers went to war because the believed in the cause - nor does it back up your equally false claim that they maintained that belief when the came home.
You are using your 'historian' to prove something which he has not referred to.
Are we to assume that your total failure to provide a single shred of evidence for these claims is proof positive that you made up these facts and that they are part of your jingoistic, flag-wagging agenda?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 10:20 AM

but you have demonstrated that you are incapable of reading and understanding the tables.

Really Greg.
Oh dear.
Please educate me and everyone on how you read them Greg.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 10:07 AM

You provided those stats. Greg.

Not quite: I provided references to the tables, yes, but you have demonstrated that you are incapable of reading and understanding the tables.

> 100% subsequently died.

You really ARE an idiot.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:54 AM

Any moment you are going to claim "I am no historian - don't blame me, I am only the messenger"

We are not historians Jim.
If I want to know about the past, I do go to the works of historians.
What do you do?
Close your eyes and make it up as it should have been!

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:38 AM

You provided those stats. Greg.
If you can do sums with them better, do it.

Do add in those wounded and SUBSEQUENTLY died
Good point Greg.
100% subsequently died.
A very helpful statistic.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:33 AM

"Far from dying in vain, those who perished in the King's uniform between 1914 and 1918 made as important a contribution to our privileged, peaceful lives today as did their sons in World War II."

"Because I have myself been writing a book about 1914, I have spent many hours reading the timelessly moving correspondence and diaries of men who fought. I came across one letter penned in November from an officer serving at Ypres, speaking about a close friend's death there.
He wrote: 'When I think of poor Bernard's utter weariness (I left him in his trench in the early morning, and wished I could take his place, he was so done) . . ."

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:31 AM

Do the sums Greg dear.

Good ol' keith - lying with statistics, yet again.
Do add in those wounded and SUBSEQUENTLY died (not just the KIA) and the MIA's, and those that "survived" as vegetables, sunshine, and then YOU do the sums.

Idiot.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:27 AM

It's the eye of the tiger, it's the thrill of the fight
Risin' up to the challenge of our rival
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night
And he's watchin' us all with the eye of the tiger

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:23 AM

a pissing contest between cousins with empires as gambling tokens. ..... weak politicians caused that war. Stumbled into it.
Futile.
Unnecessary.

You are free to think what you like (thanks to the armed forces), but I will reject your view based as it is on profound ignorance, and accept the views of historians based as it is on years of research.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:19 AM

Sassoon and Owen were too posh to comment!

No-one said that Musket.
Made up shit again.
What the historians did say was that their views were not representative.

I choose to believe the historians.
I think it more likely that you two are talking bollocks than that all of them are.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket being patriotic
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 09:07 AM

Not a lot to disagree with there Grishka. Where you say we should not judge their morality, I see no disagreement in this thread. There are those however who see cold reflection and judging of the situation by today's standards as judging the prevailing morality of those who fought. If you read some posts, and in particular those of Keith A of Hertford, questioning the cause or questioning the methods of war is pounced upon as being disrespectful.

And that is sad.

The war memorials are a mixture of commemoration of those who fell, especially when people reading the names could still put faces to them, and reminding us of sacrifice in order to have the peace afterwards.

Nowadays they also serve as sentinels to the worst methods of resolving political failures. War occurs when humanity fails. Every death is ultimately futile on the basis that they shouldn't have been in that situation in the first place.

The first world war especially. Im not anti monarchist as such, but a pissing contest between cousins with empires as gambling tokens. ..... weak politicians caused that war. Stumbled into it.

Futile.

Unnecessary.

A stain on what we were calling civilisation.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 08:36 AM

In times of insecurity, it does not take much to make young men "believe in the cause" of their leaders. As we found on the threads about religion, the word "believe" has many shades, and must not be reduced to the meaning "conclude by sober analysis". Also, there are various forms of "coercion", the most efficient one being haranguing by propaganda and peer pressure. If we could ask young men in Taliban controlled areas anonymously and secretly, most would still claim to be voluntary fighters.

So did young men in WWI, on both sides. Few, if any, really understood what was going on. Those who came to curse their leaders often did so only because the promised quick victory did not occur, and the losses were larger than anticipated. Others, who were originally critical of their governments' causes, resolved to fight bravely to help their comrades.

As usually, only few people felt they had to change their minds when the war was over and new evidence was available.

Therefore, if we now mourn those who died young in WWI and other wars, we should not judge about their morality at all. Praising anyone as a hero requires an analysis of the individual person's motives and of the cause.

At a given point in time, the leaders of a country may only have the choice to send their soldiers to war or to surrender at unacceptable conditions. Often enough, however, they failed to prevent that situations when there was still time. Most governments, definitely including all protagonists of the WWs, play with their military power to gain influence on other countries, in other words to bully them, and thus consciously take the risk of "unprovoked" war. Praising soldiers' heroism amounts to supporting that power play and encouraging governments to continue it. Not my idea of modern politics.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket giggling
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 08:21 AM

Fook me!   Sassoon and Owen were too posh to comment!

Posh people not allowed views then? That Farage bloke, he's a bit posh. Mind you, I dismiss his views on Europe I suppose, but based on his naive philosophy rather than his logic.

Let's get this right. If you were capable, as the poets of the trenches appeared, of articulating the awful situation, you are irrelevant because you contradict the view that the Generals wrote from their hq bases a few miles back? As The Imperial War Museum, The British Museum and other establishment bodies were concerned with the official account of the war, dissenting views are immaterial?

I'll give you this much Keith, you write as if you are keeping a straight face.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 08:10 AM

Sassoon and Owen were there - they had no political axe to grind
Your 'historians' were not - and have
Your 'historians' conclusions contradict long standing accounts, including the eye-witness ones you have neither responded to nor provided examples of ones you claim to support your views.
Once again you are dominating someones thread with your own twisted distortions and selectively part-quoting 'historians' to back your distortions - your 'Irish famine' technique all over again.
Any moment you are going to claim "I am no historian - don't blame me, I am only the messenger", as you have in the past.
The fact that millions died over a squabble between family members as to who should rule the world make W.W.1 made it 'one vast, useless, futile tragedy, worthy to be remembered only as a pitiable mistake' - no matter who claimed otherwise.
That is an inescapable fact - not an opinion.
Now - your "soldiers' diary" quotes rather than desperately searched for cut-'n-pastes - all unlinked - as is your wont.
Him Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 07:16 AM

Sassoon and Wilfred Owen could be used to evoke an emotional reaction against war which engaged students and satisfied teachers, but which utterly misrepresented the feelings of most Britons who lived through the war years.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 07:11 AM

Most veterans rejected the 'poets' view'. One old soldier, named Henry Mellersh, declared in 1978 that he wholeheartedly rejected the notion that the war was 'one vast, useless, futile tragedy, worthy to be remembered only as a pitiable mistake'.
Instead, wrote Mellersh: 'I and my like entered the war expecting an heroic adventure and believing implicitly in the rightness of our cause; we ended greatly disillusioned as to the nature of the adventure, but still believing that our cause was right and we had not fought in vain.'
The fact that Britain sacrificed so many lives to prevent the triumph of Germany's militarists should be a matter of pride to those men's modern descendants, not grounds for ministers to take refuge in empty platitudes.

That view was far more widely held by Mellersh's contemporaries than the 'futility' vision of Owen, Sassoon and their kin.


"Notwithstanding the enormous casualty lists, in 1918 many Britons thought they had achieved a miraculous deliverance from an evil enemy. They celebrated a remarkable military victory and national survival. For those who had served in the trenches, and for those left at home, the war experience encompassed not only horror, frustration and sorrow, but also triumph, pride, camaraderie and even enjoyment, as well as boredom and apathy."


Dr. Gary Sheffield.
" popular opinion: that the issues were not worth the ensuing bloodbath. Most modern scholars would not agree

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 07:05 AM

No diaries - no eye witness accounts, no opinions of why people enlisted

Those would be some of the sources used by the historians to make their conclusions.
Why should I reject the historians and take notice of you Jim?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 06:31 AM

My mother in law was going through old boxes and came upon various things which included her father's (last name Kirby from Norfolk) little diary from when he was in the first war. In truth there wasn't much of note written in it, mostly mundane stuff, though there was a poem which I took a copy of and put a tune to. I'll look it out over the weekend and post the lyrics. Not pro or anti war. He was a signalman so it basically just describes how he feels about his duties and comrades.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 06:21 AM

NO KEITH They ARE NOT THERE
No diaries - no eye witness accounts, no opinions of why people enlisted
Just arguments for who was to blame
Where is the evidence of your claims that soldiers who joined did so because they believed in the cause?
Where is your evidence that returning soldiers said they believed such nonsense?
Where is your response to the actual eye-witness accounts claiming the contrary?
here is your evidence that they weren't coerced and forced?
Nowhere-nowhere-nowhere-nowhere
Yoe have lied openly again
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 06:04 AM

You will find those things in those sources.
They are produced by eminent historians of the conflict.

Read them first, then post.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 06:00 AM

Where do any of these quote the diaries you claim show soldiers fighting the war for for other reasons than having been coerced or forced to join.
Where is your evidence that they came back from the trenches and made such claims
Where is the evidence for any of your jingoistic claims
We recorded someone who fought in the war and says anybody who makes such claims is a fucking liar
Are we to dismiss his statement as lies and believe you, who has proved himself a habitual liar over and over again
His testimony is accessible in the British library - where is yours?
Diary quotes please
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 05:48 AM

No.
That is just where the historian published.
The source is the historian not the publisher.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket curious
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 05:40 AM

Sorry.   Still giggling over the sources of what Keith refers to as objective truth.

Daily Telegraph
Daily Ma*l.

Why not add The Daily Sport and have done with it?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 05:28 AM

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/britain-at-war/10110657/Germany-and-Austria-started-WWI-seeking-European-domination-historian-says.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2339189/MAX-HASTINGS-Sucking-Germans-way-remember-Great-War-heroes-Mr-Cameron.html#ixzz2kLdoRTh5


http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/perceptions_01.shtml

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/origins_01.shtml

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/lions_donkeys_01.shtml#one

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/248f6960-29d3-11e3-bbb8-00144feab7de.html#ixzz2kbqMXxnU

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 05:14 AM

I you bothered to check, I already have provided links to various historians' findings.
You have jumped in to an ongoing discussion without reading anything!

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 05:08 AM

Where - what are their findings?
Sources and links only accepted - not bullshit jingoistic claims by you
You have made claims on the vabasis of these diaries - where did you get your information - sorry a rhetorical question - you made them up as you make all your 'information" up.
"Over 80% of soldiers made it home, so we can be sure what they thought"
What did they think?
Stop lying
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 04:11 AM

Historians have access.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 03:58 AM

"comprising unpublished diaries,."
Unpublished and unavailable
As far as we are concerned - almost non-existent
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 03:54 AM

You will almost certainly ignore all the facts you have been presented with - a few more for you to ignore
Jim Carroll

The traditional image of recruitment in 1914 is of an initial wave of enthusiasm and volunteering greeting the outbreak of war. At the beginning of August 1914, Parliament issued a call for an extra 100,000 soldiers. Recruitment in the first few weeks of war was high, but the real 'recruiting boom' began in the last week of August, when news of the British retreat following the Battle of Mons reached Britain. Recruiting peaked in the first week of September.[2]
By the end of September, over 750,000 men had enlisted; by January 1915, a million. The reasons for their enlistment cannot be pinned down to a single factor; enthusiasm and a war spirit certainly drove some, while for others unemployment prompted enlistment. Some employers forced men to join up, while occasionally Poor Law Guardians would also refuse to pay support for fit military-aged men. The timing of the recruiting boom in the wake of the news from Mons, though, suggests that men joined knowing that the war was dangerous and indeed many joined precisely because it seemed to be a threat to their home, district and country.[3]
One early peculiarity was the formation of "Pals battalions": groups of men from the same factory, football team, bank or similar, joining and fighting together. The idea was first suggested at a public meeting by Lord Derby. Within three days, he oversaw enough volunteers sufficient for three battalions. Lord Kitchener gave official approval for the measure almost instantly and the response was impressive. Manchester raised fifteen specific 'Pals' battalions; one of the smallest was Accrington, in Lancashire, which raised one. The drawback of 'Pals' battalions was that a whole town could lose its military-aged menfolk in a single day.
The government demand for men continued unabated, and after the first call in August for 500,000 men; a further 3.5 million were called-for before the year ended. The pre-war calculations had supposed that the British Expeditionary Force would lose around 40% of its manpower in the first six months of fighting. Kitchener's predictions of three years fighting and a million men needed was regarded as incredible. The seven divisions of the BEF, totalling 85,000 men, had been landed in France at the outbreak of war; casualties in the first three months totalled almost 90,000. By mid-1915, this total had risen to around 375,000 even before the autumn offensives and the rate of recruitment was falling off, for a number of reasons.


May 1915 poster by E. V. Kealey, from the Parliamentary Recruiting Committee
In 1915 the total available number of men of military age was 5.5 million, with around 500,000 more reaching the age each year. By late September, 2.25 million men had been enlisted and 1.5 million were in reserved occupations. Of the rest, the recruiters had uncovered a dismaying fact — almost two in every five volunteers were entirely unsuitable for military service on the grounds of health. When volunteer numbers fell to around 70,000 a month after the Dardanelles Expedition, the government felt forced to intervene, although they initially avoided conscription. A National Registration Act in 1915 created a register that revealed the number of men still available and they were targeted in a number of ways. The skills of advertising were brought to bear with posters, public meetings, tales of German atrocities, and the threat of shame. The 'Derby Scheme' used door-to-door visits to gather men to 'attest' to serve if needed, with a promise that bachelors would be called up before married men.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recruitment_to_the_British_Army_during_the_First_World_War

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 03:45 AM

"Documents
Our documents cover a wealth of personal experience and testimony, both British and foreign, as well official records. Private Papers IWM holds almost 18,000 individual collections of important private papers, principally comprising unpublished diaries,..."http://www.iwm.org.uk/global-tags/diaries


18000 Jim.
Not that rare then.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 03:40 AM

"I do not make stuff up."
You do nothing else Keith
"The Imperial War museum has thousands."
As the Daily Mail pointed out - soldiers diaries were illegal, they are extremely rare and they were never published - the first one only came to public notice this month.
We have no idea how many there are - I tried to access information to annotate our recordings of the Liverpool soldier we recorded - there was none available, so your jingoistic claims of flag waving soldiers marching into Europe is crap made up entirely by yourself by yourself.
From the official records, 5.4m Britons served in WW1; 996,000 died - somewhat astray from your own figures
http://www.1914-1918.net/faq.htm
"Over 80% of soldiers made it home, so we can be sure what they thought."
Serving ranking soldiers accounts of their war experiences are extremely rare and I have never come across any that fit your descriptions that describe flag-waving zealots fighting the good fight.
Rather, the realities of fighting came from poets like Sassoon, Owen and Brook, or vivid descriptions of the horror of it all by Robert Graves, Patrick McGill or The Dillen - no flag-waving there.   
We recorded the reality from Tommy Kenny the docker:
As little more than a child, he was conned into joining up with promises of glory and adventure - and most important, regular work.
Many of his mates were forced to join up by their employers who had done a deal with the local military not to touch their best workers.
Others had been refused entitled benefits if they didn't 'GO'
Somme were shamed by fur-coated women carrying white feathers.
The realities of what they had done sank in almost (but not quite) before the door had had time to close behind them.
We recorded vivid descriptions of the brutality, deliberately degrading ill-treatment and viciousness of army life even before they left Britain
And when they got there - the months of end of walking on duck-boards so they didn't drown in the mud (many of them did)
Being prodded by sticks to climb ladders to face the enemy by officer who never left the trenches - and being court martialed if they didn't go quick enough.
The summary executions for supposed desertion, sharing their beds with thousands of rats, rancid food , dirty water, constant beatings....
The deafness caused by the constant noise and the semi-blindness from the fog and gas - even if you didn't receive a direct hit.
My mother's father died in France and her stepfather was gassed - I still remember from a child, being terrified by the old man with the horrific scars on his neck.
That was the reality of fighting in Flanders and France - not the jingoistic shite you have dreamed up.
And when those who managed to survive returned home from "The War to end all Wars"
The unemployment, leaving returning to the forces to fight in Ireland, or become part of one of the 14 armies that went to Russia to attempt to return the Tzar to power in the Civil war there one of the few alternatives.
Then the Hungry thirties; Jarrow, Salford, Liverpool - the mass Hunger Marches, the crippling and degrading poverty.... a true "Home fit for heroes to live in".
The German workers returned home and tried to overthrow the bastards who had sent them to fight - they nearly won, but their failure led to Hitler's rise to power.
The British Government sat on its hands and did nothing, and punished those who tried by fighting the fascists in Spain or by opposing the British Knight, Sir Oswald Mosely on the streets of Liverpool, Manchester and East London.
They appeased Hitler to the point of waving a "Peace in our time" treaty - the British monarch and his American friend became his close friend and supporter, as did many businessmen, Newspaper owners, Members of Parliament and the House of Lords.
And then - as Bogle's song says
"We started all over again".
W.W.1. was an Imperial war, a falling out between two members of the same family – our and their monarchs - over who should rule the world.
Two and a half percent of the British population perished - it is deeply insulting to them and to the British population as a whole to suggest that they did so willingly or with any degree of enthusiasm for the cause of that war.
You appear to get off on supporting these establishment thugs in their monstrosities.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 15 Nov 13 - 02:46 AM

Greg, from your Spartacus site.
British Empire        8,904,467mobilisesd        908,371killed/died

Do the sums Greg dear.
87% survived.

From your other site.
Great Britain        5,397,000 mobilised        703,000 killed
Do the sums Greg dear.
86% survived.

So after all your abuse and filthy language you have confirmed that I was right all along and you, as usual, were wrong.

What is the point of you Greg.
You contribute nothing to debate, just flinging in abuse and shit.
What a bleak empty world you must inhabit that you are driven to do it.
You sad man.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Ron Davies
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 08:31 PM

"Green Fields of France" is a good song. It is not a documentary.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Ron Davies
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 08:18 PM

I am "Guest" above.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 08:16 PM

It's truly remarkable how many folks feel compelled to sound off on political or military topics without stooping to soil their hands by actually doing research, as for instance reading books about their chosen topics.    There are no doubt rightist know-nothings on other sites, but here we are lopsidedly blessed with those on the left. No wonder folkies' grasp of military and political realities is so universally admired.

It takes just a bare modicum of research to find out that there was considerable enthusiasm for war in 1914 in Paris, London, St. Petersburg and Berlin, among others.   Many in each nation were seemingly convinced that they would win before Christmas 1914. It is simplistic in the extreme--and typical on Mudcat--to claim that this is due solely to jingoistic xenophobia or propaganda.   It is always easy to underestimate your enemy, especially if you have not been in a major war for a while.   (The same thing happened in the US in 1861--in both the North and South.) And there were all sorts of personal reasons to greet war with enthusiasm.

By Christmas 1914 it was apparent the war would not be short and war fever had in large part evaporated--all over. In Germany, for instance, the old particularism was still very much in evidence---many Bavarians and Saxons, some of whom had been employed in the UK, wanted no part of what was seen as a Prussian war.    The "Christmas Truce" for instance was primarily in the sectors manned by Saxons and Bavarians.

But if we hope to have any grasp of history at all, we need to stop looking at it from our own 20/20 hindsight and often pacifist viewpoints.

Face it, in August 1914 the war was very popular in many quarters.    And that was not just due to propaganda.


The flip side is that the allegation that in 1939 mankind had learned nothing is also wrong.   In 1939 Hitler was one of the few in all of Europe who welcomed war.   The start of war was not popular in Germany; it was received somberly.   Indeed Hitler's popularity in Germany was in large part due to the perception that he had achieved many German goals without war. Even so there had been several attempts within Germany to kill him, as well as conspiracies which fizzled. And the primary impetus to asssassinate him was a conviction that he would start a war Germany could not win.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 06:14 PM

Bollocks, Keith.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWdeaths.htm

http://europeanhistory.about.com/cs/worldwar1/a/blww1casualties.htm

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 06:07 PM

Over 80% of soldiers made it home
Source?

Some numbers from Great Britain : "Conscription put into uniform nearly every physically fit man, six million out of ten million eligible in Britain. Of these, about 750,000 lost their lives and 1,700,000 were wounded." Makes about 5,250,000 British survivors.
Source:
"World War I casualties", Wikipedia : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I...
"World War I: Troop Statistics", Digital Survivors : http://www.digitalsurvivors.com/archives...
"Surviving veterans of World War I", Wikipedia : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surviving_v...

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 05:31 PM

I do not make stuff up.
I leave that to Jim and Musket.
The IWM material is available for historical research.
I believe the historians, not the arrogant twats who think they know better.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 04:13 PM

Over 80% of soldiers made it home

Source?

Which/whose soldiers precisely?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 04:01 PM

You [Keith] have invented every single claim you have made here.

Shouldn't come as a surprise, Jim - that's his standard M.O. on each and every topic, innit?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 03:46 PM

"Diaries were forbidden but soldiers kept them anyway"
There is no information from the UNKNOWN AND UNPUBLISHED war diaries held at the IWM - I know that for a fact from my attempts to annotate our recordings of the WW1 soldier I knew
All the 'FACTS' you have claimed here have been made up by by you.
You have invented every single claim you have made here.
You are using the dead just as the people who sent thousands of them to their deaths in an Imperial war use them while they are living
The only 'FACT' here is there are no depths that you are not prepared to sink to to support your scummy little world
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 03:07 PM

Diaries were forbidden but soldiers kept them anyway.
The Imperial War museum has thousands.
Rob Naylor said he has one kept by his Grandad, so that was a silly thing to say Jim.

Letters were censored for locations and activities.
If a soldier was nervous of expressing disillusionment, he would just wait until he got leave.
He would not need to lie in his letters. Just not mention it.

Over 80% of soldiers made it home, so we can be sure what they thought.

So you are talking bollocks again.
All the historians are not fools who need you to explain their job to them.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 12:38 PM

Jingoist and extremely dishonest bullshit – an insult to those who died.
It was strictly against the rules for an ordinary soldier to keep a diary
All correspondence home was strictly censored, dissention in the ranks was severely punished; often those found guilty of such were placed in the most dangerous positions, which virtually amounted to being executed
Desertion, and sometimes, slowness to 'go over the top' was routinely a capital offence
The only reports to come from the front were the official diaries (below), which did not even record the names of the 'ordinary' soldiers.
http://www.greatwar.co.uk/research/military-records/british-army-war-diary.htm
By 1916 Lord Derby's recruitment drive was announced to have failed and was abandoned in favour of compulsory enlistment.
Enthusiasm for the war was a myth circulated by "officers, toffs and their toadies" according to the Liverpudlian docker who had lied about his age to enlist "we usually shouted the toadies down when they were given the job of egging us on".
He said the lies about the army being "a man's life" had been "kicked into touch before we even embarked for Europe".
He and most of his mates had enlisted because "there was no work back home".
He described the experience as "traumatising and brutalising" – he refused to speak about it for years; many of his comrades "couldn't settle back into civilian life and the only work on offer was to re-enlist and go off and fight in Ireland with the 'Tans'.
Desertion, which usually involved "walking away from the noise", was automatically met with the firing squad.
We were told that, if a push was on, "those condemned to death were taken out and put in the front line" – if they survived they were re-imprisoned and later shot"
We were instructed to "tell anybody who said there was any honour or glory in fighting in that filthy war, that they are fucking liars – it amounted to nothing more "
"Don't shoot me, I'm only the messenger" as somebody here is fond of saying.
Jim Carroll

WW1 British Army War Diaries
British Army War Diaries were handwritten or typed documents providing a daily account of the activities of a British, Dominion, Indian and Colonial Army unit on active service. This was a British Army Field Service Regulation dating from 1907. Sometimes the War Diary was designated as an Intelligence Summary.
It was the responsibility of the commander of every military unit – from the level of a battalion to a division – to ensure that the War Diary was kept up to date. It was to be written up each evening by a specific junior officer and usually signed off by a senior officer or the commanding officer.
The War Diary was compiled by month for every month that the unit was on active service.
In addition to the completed official War Diary Army Form, there might also be sketches, messages, maps and Operational Orders included as appendices.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2491760/Harry-Drinkwaters-lost-diary-Great-War.html

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 11:34 AM

They thought the bible was literal for that matter. They thought the smell of rotting seaweed was ozone and therefore good for you. They thought radioactivity had many health promoting properties. They thought cigarettes were benign. They thought blacks were generally inferior. They thought the a Empire was there to wipe our arse.
They thought a lot of things based on what they had been told.

Yes, but in this case they were right.
We have that on the authority of the eminent, leading mainstream historians who do have access to all the information required.