BS: THANKS YANKS

05 Jun 04 - 10:45 PM (#1201139)
Subject: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: harpmaker

THIS IS el ted using my dad's computer:
    this is an open message to all you yanks out there : THANKS if it wasn't for you lot, i would not have been born, my grandad drove a very poor english tank through france and lived. Thank you for caring about the mother country, empire etc etc

treat this thread how you want. But I wish you well, all of you. Stiff upper lip, God Bless America!!

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06 Jun 04 - 12:10 AM (#1201162)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Ebbie

It's strange to realize how close to disappearing that generation is. I met a man the other day who is one of those who stormed the beaches on that long ago day. He is now 84, and he's one of the *young* ones.

To me, it seems that that war was one of the few in recent generations where they knew in their bones what they were fighting for.

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06 Jun 04 - 01:16 AM (#1201175)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: GUEST,An English Patriot

While I realsied that America was fighting to protect its markets, the actual GI Joes that fought actually believed that they were fighting for civilization, and so to them, I say thank you. However, I have always believed that the Soviet Union would have defeated Germany by herself and that Britain got nothing out of the war except the death of thousands of its young men, the bombing of its cities, the collapse of both its economy and its Empire, and a reduction to 2nd rate status in its place in the world. We could have stayed out of it and we should.

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06 Jun 04 - 01:30 AM (#1201177)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Blackcatter

On behalf of my dad Harry Cook (he died in 1990 - served in WWII on a US patrol ship looking to capture u-boats along the Caribbean and South American coasts). And my uncle, Earl "Beef" Moench, (died in 1995 - served in WWII in the Pacific on a Destroyer - both Coral Sea and Midway Battles) I thank you.

I just wish that our countries were closer today. The insulting crap that went on in the U.S. because of the Iraqi occupation was terrible.

All that I ask if that you vote for people who will fight for what is right and not listen to idiots like George Bush.

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06 Jun 04 - 01:42 AM (#1201178)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: The Fooles Troupe

Aussies have a love/hate relationship with the USA - at the least that generation before the massive influx of migrants from the 1950's on, especially the more recent Asian migrants.

We love the people, hate the (often seen as highly selfish) political and economic agendas.

My mother's sister was a 'war bride' - married a US Airman - went there to live.

Robin

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06 Jun 04 - 02:48 AM (#1201189)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: GUEST,An English Patriot

Aussies have a love/hate relaitionship with everyone.

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06 Jun 04 - 04:29 AM (#1201205)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Shanghaiceltic

We could not have relied on Russia to prevent an invasion of the UK, Stalin formed a pact with Hitler to divide Poland between themselves. Hitler wanted access to the Polish Corridor so he could unite East Prussia with Germany. There after Stalin also took the Baltic Nations and Romania. This is what prompted Hitler to attack Russia.

Had Chamberlain not made a pact to act against Hitler if he invaded Poland we would have been quickly overrun by Germany. We were still in a weak position as we had not built up sufficient arms (unlie Germany) in order to fully resist. Hence the blitzkrieg and the evacuation of our troops from Dunkirk.

The US supported us by providing arms (lend lease)and later by joining in the war against Japan and Germany. If they had not we would be a different country today.

If the UK ,US and our Commonwealth and European Allies had not fought then we would still maybe be under a totalitarian regime.

English Patriot, I think you must be trolling.

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06 Jun 04 - 05:48 AM (#1201231)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: The Shambles

Thanks to all those who risked and sacrificed so much to enable that day. And to those who fought on that day and in the many days that followed - wherever they came from and whatever the motivations of their Governments may have been.

Thanks must be also due to those on the Eastern Front, without those sacrifices the massed invasion of Europe, would not have been even conceivable.

All these deserve far more credit from us all, than we generally give them.

Thanks.

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06 Jun 04 - 05:54 AM (#1201232)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull

Harpmaker is el teds dad?

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06 Jun 04 - 08:44 AM (#1201264)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: GUEST

WAR...The ultimate failure.

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06 Jun 04 - 09:02 AM (#1201271)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: McGrath of Harlow

Somehow I'd always assumed that the American troops were the majority of those landing on D-Day. I suppose it's the movies. In fact I gather that they were well outnumbered by the British and Candadians, who totalled 76,000 to the Americans 58,000.

What's clear is that none of them could have done it in their own - still less without the Soviet troops at the other end of Europe. Or the "D-Day Dodgers", like my father down in Italy.

I wrote this on the 50th anniversary. I posted it before, but here it is anyway:

The cold grey channel and the cold grey sand
And the old men singing to a marching band,
The old men singing as they pass on by,
And the bright flags fly against the cold grey sky
And then the beach is empty
as the tide comes back
And the water covers up
the old men's tracks
The cold grey water washes all away,
the cold grey water, on the longest day.

Well it's been fifty years now
since that cold grey day,
when the young men landed
and were blown away.
And the shells rained down
as they came in to land,
and their blood was mingled with the cold grey sand.
and now the beach is empty
as the tide comes back
and the water covers up
the young men's tracks.
The cold grey water washes all away,
the cold grey water, on the longest day.

But we were all together then, or so they say.
Well, it sure as hell is not like that today.
You see the young ones begging.
Aren't they paying the cost
for that land of heroes, which we somehow lost.
Well, in the fields of Normandy,
they're sleeping still,
and in the streets of London,
where the bombs once fell.
And now you call them eyesores,
to be washed away.
Maybe they're only heroes
on the longest day.

And now the streets are empty,
and the stones are swept,
and the water covers
where those young men slept.
And the cold grey water washes all away.
The cold grey water of the longest day.

But in the fields of Normandy,
they're sleeping still,
and in the streets of London,
where the bombs once fell.
And now they call them eyesores,
to be washed away.
But they could all be heroes
on the longest day.

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06 Jun 04 - 09:22 AM (#1201280)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: *daylia*

Thank you, McGrath.

I'm sure thousands of Canadians remember Juno Beach today as well. The young Canadian regiments (from Saskatchewan, I believe) were the first "guinea pigs" to be sacrificed at sunrise as the Allies attempted their first beach landing on the shores of France. There are graveyards full of Canadian soldiers there. And the locals have never forgotten their gratitude and loyalty to the Canadians and the rest of Allies.

daylia

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06 Jun 04 - 10:20 AM (#1201295)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: The Fooles Troupe

As far as I am concerned, anyone who posts under the anonymous name of GUEST-'anything' is trolling.

Robin

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06 Jun 04 - 10:21 AM (#1201297)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Blackcatter

A great deal of the Americans involved in D-Day were Air Corps and Navy ass well as thousands who landed behind the front at paratroupers/glider Corps.

But all nations played a role - Free-French as well.

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06 Jun 04 - 02:03 PM (#1201402)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Keith A of Hertford

Blackcatter, I am sure the numbers include airborne troops. We used them too.
McGrath, the Red Army faced the main German strength. Had they not been so successful, D Day could have waited until we were ready and it would not have been such a gamble or so close run. Europe could not be abandoned to Stalin's version of 'liberation'
I attended a commemoration sevice this morning in Hertford. Very few turned up.
Thanks indeed Yanks, but next time please do not leave us to struggle on alone for so long.
Also, your people did so many brave deeds. Please don't make films that portray our people's deeds as carried out by Americans too.
Keith.

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06 Jun 04 - 03:24 PM (#1201427)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Peace

The first casualties of the Normandy landings were killed on the beach at Dieppe in 1942. Bless you, boys.

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06 Jun 04 - 03:53 PM (#1201438)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Liz the Squeak

I hate to say this, but the USA Normandy landing casualties would have been considerably less if they had listened to the British intelligence.

A large number of US troops were lost before they ever got to land, because the US generals refused to believe the UK intelligencers that the beach was much farther inland than the US intelligencers stated. Many were lost getting out of the amphibious craft, still in 20ft of water.   

I was lucky - my great uncle was one of those back on the British shore, waiting. If the landings had been a failure, he would have been in the next wave. They weren't and he - and we - lived.

I've raised a glass for them, and will be in Ypres later this year to remember them properly. 60 years is too far away to remember but too recent to forget.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning.... we will remember them.

LTS

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06 Jun 04 - 04:40 PM (#1201456)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: GUEST,Art Thieme

My father passed away when I was five. In World War 2 his being a metallurgist made his profession quite essential and he fought that war in Chicago producing alloys to get the job done better. As the war ended, he and several other representatives of the various smelting industries were put on the The Overseas Scrap Advisory Board and sent to Europe to evaluate what to do with ALL the scrap metal---bring it home, destroy it, bury it at sea, salvage it from the sea---and a few other options as well. He arrived back in the USA with a film of it all---and then he sat down and wrote his report on the brass and bronze aspects of what he found on the other side. That book is entitled A Metalurgist Views Europe by Carl Otto Thieme.

Now, the reason for this thread!! Someone borrowed my only copy of that book. I have no idea who it might've been, but I would very much like to have it back. It was/is the only remaining insight I've ever had into the heart of that man---my father.

It wasn't a great book---and it was never sold in stores; just was given to industry peers of his. It was a travelogue through a shattered Europe at a time when mines were being exploded on the beaches almost every fifteen mintes. It was written by a man who drank too much scotch, smoked too much, and ate only cholesterol---as did many others then. For me, it raised more questions than it answered----questions my brother and I will never be able to answer because we are the only ones left standing here in 2004. (Well, my brother is standing. I'm sitting and rolling more often than not ;-)In the 1960s I was very critical of what I found there in that book -- between the lines---I thought. Now, pushing 63 with more wisdom I do hope, I would like to look at the world through his eyes once more.-----He came home from that trip to Europe, my mother typed his manuscript for him--and a while later he passed away in December of 1947.

Again, the book is called:

A METALLURGIST VIEWS EUROPE--From The Beaches To Berlin
by Carl Otto Thieme

Thanks for indulging this thread creep.

(Art Thieme)

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06 Jun 04 - 07:20 PM (#1201534)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Leadfingers

D Day is well worth remembering - I had ONE song at The Tap tonight and was going to do The second Front song , but time was short so I just did Bogles 'All The Fine young Men' and had an old guy who served in WW II practically in tears 'cos no one else mentioned the Anniversary. Cynicism seems a bit out of place at a time like this.

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07 Jun 04 - 03:51 AM (#1201741)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Tracey Dragonsfriend

Thanks to all who served to keep us free. We will not forget you.

Tracey Dragonsfriend
Scorch's Pyrography

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07 Jun 04 - 08:38 AM (#1201895)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: McGrath of Harlow

Cynicism seems a bit out of place at a time like this.

I haven't seen any so far on this thread.

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07 Jun 04 - 08:49 AM (#1201901)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: el ted

Steady as she goes lads! At last we have one irony/cynicism free thread. And I haven't mentioned flamenco once......... doh!....

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07 Jun 04 - 09:33 AM (#1201934)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Sttaw Legend

God bless them all.

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07 Jun 04 - 10:05 AM (#1201957)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Bill D

None of the success of that DAY would have been possible without the help of all who worked on it...from the soldiers of ALL participating nations who didn't know as they jumped into the water who would get the most serious fire, to the French resistance, to the British planners and citizens who decieved the Germans with false intelligence, and so on....even to the dumb mistakes of German defenses and command who 'might' have foiled the whole thing if the right guys had been allowed to make decisions.

It was a scary enterprise, in bad weather, with flawed intelligence, limited technology, and ONE chance....
   Whatever the motives of politicians, the guys who jumped in those waters and struggled up that beach are ALL heros, and I am proud that some of them were Americans. By the time the day was over, soldiers of all groups were helping each other, and leaving blood on the sand that had no distinguishing makings of origin.

It is just sad that the whole thing was made necessary by the rise of an evil set of megalomanics that sometimes arise in history....lets not dwell too much on who were the smartest, bravest, earliest, cleverest in the Allies circle....it worked.

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07 Jun 04 - 10:18 AM (#1201967)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Lanfranc

Like Kevin McGrath's, my father was a "D-Day Dodger", but there were two uncles I never knew because they died during the invasion, one in Normandy and the other at Arnhem.

The Normandy landings were the usual wartime combination of courage and cock-up, but succeeded because of the former and despite the latter.

As far as the cinematic recollections of D-Day and the following campaign are concerned, "Saving Private Ryan" and "Band of Brothers" continued the US media's tradition of minimising the contribution of other Allies (not only the British, but also the Canadians, French, etc.) which can still be descried in Iraq today.

Reality was and is different - I have never heard any serviceman of any Allied country who was actually there indulge in such a belittling of the relative contributions, and all the broadcasts of recent days reinforced this.

Britain could not have invaded Europe alone in 1944, we needed you then as never before or since.

So, indeed, thanks, Yanks!

Alan

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07 Jun 04 - 10:54 AM (#1201993)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Metchosin

Thank you to all who served and particularly to those who paid the ultimate price and to those few still remaining, who personally bore witness and carried the burden of the horrific tasks our nations sent them to do on our behalf.

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07 Jun 04 - 11:16 AM (#1202003)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Strick

"As far as the cinematic recollections of D-Day and the following campaign are concerned, "Saving Private Ryan" and "Band of Brothers" continued the US media's tradition of minimising the contribution of other Allies (not only the British, but also the Canadians, French, etc.)..."

That's a little unfair since those two movies were about specific American units and issues rather than the whole invasion. While a movie like The Longest Day could have acknowledged British, Canadian and French contributions more, they were hardly ignored.

Dang, here I am defending Hollywood's interpretation of something! Heaven knows they'd change Henry the VIIIth to an American if they thought it would improve the box office.

For what little it's worth, the Americans provided the largest single portion of the manpower (I think the Canadians deserve to be counted on their own) and most of the material.

That said, I hope you'll all forgive me for commenting on the trivial. The invasion was a risky, magnificant accomplishment that wouldn't have been possible without the contributions of all the allies; everyone involved should be equally proud and we should all be grateful.

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07 Jun 04 - 12:39 PM (#1202081)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: Steve in Idaho

My Dad was a tail gunner in B-17s. Flew 25 missions out of England to help in the air campaign. He's been dead for years - but as his Son -

You are most welcome. He was very proud of his service.

Steve

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07 Jun 04 - 06:12 PM (#1202315)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: jimmyt

Norton1 My dad was also a tailgunner on B17s, stationed near Eye on the NOrfolk Suffolk border. My uncle was shot down and died in a B24 crashed over Denmark in 1944 April. Horrible thing, war. My father flew 32 missions and when he left England to come home he was only 18. He never really liked to talk about it much. He just passed away 2 years ago.

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07 Jun 04 - 06:38 PM (#1202327)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: greg stephens

Thanks Yanks indeed, from the bottom of my heart. And I'm sorry there will always be a few clever dicks who drag their current obsessions into this kind of thread, pleae ignore them.
    I was there, in spirit(well, I was in my mother's womb).My dad, due to an an extremely un-life-threatening injury, D-day dodged quietly in Kent (though there were a few doodle-bugs and such about).. My grandfathers did things (or had things done to them) in the previous unpleasantness that shocked them so much they never talked about it.
    Britain was in deep doo-doo then(as was the world). I thank those Americans deeply who saw what was happening and swung the waverers round, so that you did come and join in. It doesnt bear thinking about, what might have happened if you all had not been overpaid, oversexed and over here. We needed you. Thanks very very much.

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08 Jun 04 - 03:55 AM (#1202509)
Subject: RE: BS: THANKS YANKS
From: GUEST,Keith A working

In need, but not a complete basket case.
perhaps we could never have finished it alone, but in 1940 the RAF defeated the Luftwaffe in The Battle Of Britain, preventing invasion of these islands, and in 43, as the US forces began to arrive, our 8th Army defeated Rommel's proud Afrika Corps. and the battle of the Atlantic was largely won.
Still, again, grateful thanks.
Partners for death in the mad dance of war.
Keith.

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