BS: Armistice Day (debate)

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Jim McLean
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 06:53 AM

The role played by armament manufacturers in war has been missing from this debate .... sorry if I've missed any reference. A book, The Merchants of Death by Engelbrecht and Hanighen, 1934, deals extensively with this subject from the Middle Ages to the present (1934), covering events leading up to the 1914 war and after.
While agreeing that they (armament manufacturers) are not the sole cause of war, this quote by the biographer of Sir William Henry White who was a prolific British warship designer and Chief Constructor at the Admiralty is included:

Great armament firms have no national or political prejudices; they are concerned not with the ulterior objects of war, but with the immediate means by which victory may be secured; and the value of such abstract ideas as justice and Liberty they leave to the discussion of idle and metaphysical minds, or employ the terms as convenient euphemisms by which the real objects of statesmen may be cloaked and the energies of a people directed.

By the way, I read this book in gaol while servicing time as a consciensous objector.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 06:54 AM

""This thread is proof positive that war will always be with us.""

Indeed! As long as we have the kind of jingoistic xenophobes who believe that, of all countries, theirs is the one innocent participant in conflict.

_______________________________________________________________

""we all have the mental capacity to reject jingoistic or racist justifications for conflict""

I'm afraid that statement doesn't stand up to examination Achmelvich, and you need go no further than this thread to see that.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (moderated)
From: Jim McLean
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 06:54 AM

The role played by armament manufacturers in war has been missing from this debate .... sorry if I've missed any reference. A book, The Merchants of Death by Engelbrecht and Hanighen, 1934, deals extensively with this subject from the Middle Ages to the present (1934), covering events leading up to the 1914 war and after.
While agreeing that they (armament manufacturers) are not the sole cause of war, this quote by the biographer of Sir William Henry White who was a prolific British warship designer and Chief Constructor at the Admiralty is included:

Great armament firms have no national or political prejudices; they are concerned not with the ulterior objects of war, but with the immediate means by which victory may be secured; and the value of such abstract ideas as justice and Liberty they leave to the discussion of idle and metaphysical minds, or employ the terms as convenient euphemisms by which the real objects of statesmen may be cloaked and the energies of a people directed.

By the way, I read this book in gaol while servicing time as a consciensous objector.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 07:00 AM

""we all have the mental capacity to reject jingoistic or racist justifications for conflict""

I'm afraid that statement doesn't stand up to examination Achmelvich, and you need go no further than this thread to see that.

I defy you to produce any Don.
Why must you two make up so much shit?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket gettin.. can't be arsed
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 09:05 AM

Anything else you defy people to produce? Might as well get it off your chest now whilst people are still doing you a favour and humouring you.

An Uncle of mine was a conscientious objector. Ended up becoming a Jehovas Witness to convince the authorities. Snag is, religious mumbo jumbo can be addictive and that branch were and still are of that persuasion. I applaud anyone with courage of their conviction. The soldiers who were convinced they had purpose and those who saw the purpose and didn't agree. All caught up one way or another. All hoping others since don't have to go through what they did.

I can't begin to understand my father's generation yet I think I understand the generation of my sons.   Funny old world.

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

Anything else you defy people to produce?

Yes.
Any post where I link myself to UKIP.
My Daily Mail quotes of past "few days"

And, top favourite for today, a quote where "Dr Sheffield makes a case in one of them that runs fully contrary to your general thrust."

If you people could stop lying I would stop defying you to produce.
Why do you do it?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Branno
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 09:46 AM

Bless all here at sandpit mudcattus...!

More on the Australians in the Great War.
Perhaps the "disproportionate' reference has been misunderstood : in the census of 1911 there were 1,497,456 males aged 15-64 in Australia; the AIF embarked 330,770 men to fight in the ill-conceived and badly executed Dardanelles campaign and thereafter in Flanders and Palestine.

Great Britain had a population of around 40 million (?)and a far larger pool of manhood to draw on. I don't have the total casualty figures to hand, but around 23,000 Aussies died at Pozieres alone.
Eric's "whole generation" has particular resonance in Australia, where the adventurous spirited egalitarianism met the imperial loyalty, propoganda did its appointed task,
and they all joined up (and voted in two referenda AGAINST conscription!)

For the more serious historian, George Trevelyan, grandson of Lord Macaulay and a very English man is a prime source for detailed explanation of the root causes of the conflagration.
And the aftermath: "Lloyd George had the majority, and the majority had Lloyd George." I have his 'History of England' right here. There's far too much to selectively quote!

'The Broken Years' by contemporary Australian historian Bill Gammage I have here also, presented as "A horrifying yet moving portrayal of men at war, based on their own accounts". The selected bibliography runs for several pages.

"I have seen things here that will make the bloody aristocrats' name stink forever. The soldiers I pity as they have been ruled into this farce...God, it is cruel. What humans will stand is astounding... I have seen the most gruesome sights the most awful tragic scenes it has been my cruel lot to witness, however, take it from me none of mine will ever tackle this job again... if men refuse to fight all the world over war will cease."
Corporal A.G. Thomas 6 Bn 27/7/16 after Pozieres. KIA 8/6/18

Adieu, the years are a broken song
And the right grows weak in the strife with wrong.
The lilies of love have a crimson stain
And the old days will never come again.   

September 1917

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Lighter
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 10:47 AM

Facts:

Had the nations attacked without provocation by Austria and Germany in 1914 not resisted, there'd have been no war.

Had the nations attacked without provocation by Japan and Germany in the '30s and '40s not resisted, there'd have been no war.

And the lesson we should learn from these indisputable facts is what?


More facts:

If armies unanimously refused to fight, there'd never be another war.

If no one ever joined an armed force, there'd never be another war.

If a rabble never took up arms, organized and waged war for a cause, there'd never be another war.

If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.

Hats off to Rap and Jim for their insight and personal courage.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 12:03 PM

" I don't have the total casualty figures to hand, but around 23,000 Aussies died at Pozieres alone."

I've given the figures as quoted by the Australian Anzac day website ( and I checked from other sources and they all tie up) on the other thread. Whether talking about total casulaties or actual dead the Anzac losses were just under the UK losses per head of population though as someone else pointed out it is so close as to be meaningless. There is no point in breaking it down further by certain events or certain regions. The whole picture is when you look at the total losses in the entire conflict. Your point about every little village having its war memorial etc will be right enough but of course that is mirrored across the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Allan Conn
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 12:39 PM

"I don't have the total casualty figures to hand, but around 23,000 Aussies died at Pozieres alone"

Again terrible though they were you are greatly exaggerating the losses through misundestanding what casualty means in this context. The Australians had 23,000 casualties at that said battle but that was wounded and killed. 6,800 were killed which is bad enough. In the entire conflict the Australians lost between 60,000 and 70,000 dead(exact figure on other thread) whilst the UK lost just over 700,000.


http://www.awm.gov.au/ww1/1916/essay.asp

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 02:11 PM

And don't forget the railway timetables, once mobilised a country needs one to get its troops to the front!!! AJP Taylor has all the answers.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Lighter
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 02:35 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 02:55 PM

That is the historians' view.

No, Keith, that is SOME "historians'"[sic] view, and they are definately in the minority, not to say the fringe.

Very much like your beloved "creationists".

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 03:21 PM

No they are not Greg.
They are mainstream.
How many can you find with any significantly different view?
Give it your best shot Greg.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket evolving slowly
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 03:45 PM

Mainstream = fits Keith's prejudice.

The common link with mudcat.org members is music. I don't hear many folk songs aping Hastings but there are thousands and thousands questioning glorifying war. Most point out that people die unnecessarily. Shouldn't have died. Died through the incompetence of their leaders.

Glory pomp and circumstance of glorious war.

Pass me a bucket.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 05:09 PM

Refer to reality, Keith. Then you won't need my "best shot".

You are obvioussy not conversant with the whole body of historical work on WW 1 - which, considering the abysmal ignorance you have demonstrated regarding a host of other topics - should come as no surprise.

But do keep on with your various delusions.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 05:44 PM

They are mainstream.
BBC history presenter and two used for the BBC history site.
You have become desperate indeed.
Just google them.
You have put up nothing to support your discredited view.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Greg F.
Date: 13 Nov 13 - 06:01 PM

You have put up nothing to support your discredited view.

Nor have you put up anything to support your idiosyncratic distorted view other than the spew of minority, idiosyncratic distorted historians.

The majority view is only considered "discredited" by iconoclasts such as yourself.

But no surprise there.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 03:04 AM

I have put up 3 eminent mainstream historians, and add a fourth, Nigel H Jones.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigel_H._Jones

Todman and Sheffield were the ONLY two historians chosen to write on these events for the BBC history site.
You can not get more mainstream than that.

The Telegraph review of Hastings' book, " his position as Britain's leading military historian is now unassailable."

How are you getting on with your list of dissenting historians Greg?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket curious
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 03:34 AM

Bugger me. The Daily Telegraph is now put forward as the Oracle of opinion. ..

Scraping the barrel a bit aren't we Keith?

How about when having Hastings dismiss his war memoirs, a very old very still with it Spike Milligan noted that the works of the likes of Hastings and Taylor are evidence that history is written by the victors. (Taylor called his books unreliable. Milligan was so happy about this he quoted it on the book jackets. )

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 03:43 AM

No, but they can be trusted not to say that about "the spew of minority, idiosyncratic distorted historians"

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 04:14 AM

Tony Barber writing in Financial Times identifies the German Historian Fritz Fishcher.
. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/248f6960-29d3-11e3-bbb8-00144feab7de.html#ixzz2kbqMXxnU

Everything was turned upside down in 1961 when Fritz Fischer, a German historian, published Griff nach der Weltmacht, known in English as Germany's Aims in the First World War. This book showed that, one month after the war's outbreak, the German government had drawn up a plan for large-scale territorial annexations and economic hegemony in Europe. Fischer earned the opprobrium of many of his peers by blaming the war squarely on a German bid for world power. FL Carsten, a fellow historian, commented drily: "We had really fixed it all so well, and then this stupid ass must come along and spoil it."
Some of Fischer's followers refined his argument by contending that Germany's leaders had provoked a war in an effort to prevent internal political and social tensions from destroying their regime. MacMillan and Hastings mention this line of inquiry and should perhaps have devoted more space to it. "A key factor in Berlin's original decision to fight had been a desire to crush the perceived domestic socialist menace, by achieving a conspicuous triumph over Germany's foreign foes," Hastings writes.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 04:47 AM

And the Kaiser's cousin was with him to a man in that aim.......

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Lighter
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 09:41 AM

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 10:13 AM

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

Unless they were put in the trenches, in the mud, shit and blood.

Then their ideas would mean something.

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: Keith A of Hertford
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 10:19 AM

We know that most who served in the trenches DID think it was worth it.
But what did those oafish dupes know?
Right?

Subject: RE: BS: Armistice Day (debate)
From: GUEST,Musket
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 11:21 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. The age of communication, starting with the telegraph but through satellites and now the internet allow more people to question.

Would the recruiting marches have been so successful if the men had access to facts and the freedom to question the church and establishment ?

Would we have questioned Blair's dossier if this was 1914?

Keith. Despite everything, your unswerving loyalty to what you construe as defending the fallen is commendable. But your evidence base is not only subjective, it is based on 1914 thinking, and those of us who see it differently do so with 20/20 hindsight.

It doesn't make us wrong, and your attempts to put this into a right and wrong rather than opinion versus opinion does you no favours.

It does however vindicate my attitude towards your posts in recent weeks.

Yours aye,

Musket the Historian.

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.

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 - 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 - 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: 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: GUEST,Ron Davies
Date: 14 Nov 13 - 08:18 PM

I am "Guest" above.

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: 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: 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 - 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 - 03:54 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: 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: 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 - 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 - 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: 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: 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 - 05:48 AM

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