VE Day celebrations.

[TheScarf]

Wear my Rangers top and go and abuse the Latvian couple at the end of the street.

[Granny Danger]

8 minutes ago, TheScarf said:

Wear my Rangers top and go and abuse the Latvian couple at the end of the street.

Just another Friday night then?

[GordonS]

That's easy.  Defeating Germany meant no more bombs or rockets landing on British soil. 

The last V-2 to hit Britain was fired on 27 March 1945, so that was already over.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

Saw an advert for this yesterday. I’ll be ploughing all my hard earned British pounds into it.

 

[Fullerene]

Just now, GordonS said:

1 hour ago, Fullerene said:

That's easy.  Defeating Germany meant no more bombs or rockets landing on British soil. 

The last V-2 to hit Britain was fired on 27 March 1945, so that was already over.

Maybe so but did it come with a note to say no more were on the way?  The war against Germany came to home for lots of people in the UK.

After that it was back to wars in faraway places.

[Billy Jean King]

I’m going to wear my Union Jack bowler hat and sing rule Britannia while masturbating to pictures of landgirls and spitfires.  

Isn't that the Orange Order alternative to the cancelled marching season ?

[GordonS]

Aye, I don't know why we bothered tbh, should just have left the Russians to it. And as for invading Italy, what a waste of time that was...

To an extent, yeah. Even without the Western and Italian Fronts, the Soviet Union would have defeated Germany. After Kursk the Germans were never able to launch a strategic offensive on the Eastern Front. It was just a matter of time.

Obviously the other fronts significantly hastened Germany's demise, but they weren't the cause. The Axis could have held the Gustav Line a lot longer, possibly permanently, if they didn't have to deal with the Eastern Front. The German defenders at Operation Overlord were disproportionately old men and young boys, lacking in armour, because the best troops and tanks were still in the East.

Once the Western Allies were past the Ruhr they didn't head for Berlin, they swept down into Bavaria and Austria. The primary objective by this point was to avoid the Red Army going beyond the territory they were to administer under the Yalta agreement.

The fact this isn't common knowledge in the UK speaks volumes about the myths we tell ourselves.

[GordonS]

Maybe so but did it come with a note to say no more were on the way?  The war against Germany came to home for lots of people in the UK.
After that it was back to wars in faraway places.

After then Germany didn't hold territory within the V-2's range of London, so yes, they knew that threat had gone.

My grampa was preparing to head off to Japan when news came through about the atomic bomb. They all knew that the war in the Pacific had been much more ugly and deadly than Africa and Italy had been, so needless to say they were delighted. VE Day was far from the end of the war for Britain - they thought it would be a horrible, protracted battle to take Japan on their own soil.

[Detournement]

I think my Grandpa was conscripted into the Navy in 1944 and spent the rest of the war and a couple of years afterwards playing football in Portsmouth then Ceylon going by his stories. He seemed to have enjoyed it but he ended up with Malaria during the 50s. On the downside his cousin who he was close to drowned at Dunkirk.

Three cheers for Uncle Joe on Friday. Ending private property and killing everyone who might have considered surrendering to the Nazis meant the Soviet Union didn't go the same way as the bourgeoisie nations. Hip hip hooray!

 

 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Detournement

[Fullerene]

15 minutes ago, GordonS said:

After then Germany didn't hold territory within the V-2's range of London, so yes, they knew that threat had gone.

My grampa was preparing to head off to Japan when news came through about the atomic bomb. They all knew that the war in the Pacific had been much more ugly and deadly than Africa and Italy had been, so needless to say they were delighted. VE Day was far from the end of the war for Britain - they thought it would be a horrible, protracted battle to take Japan on their own soil.

My point is that the war with Germany was up close and personal in a way that no other recent war had been.

[Fullerene]

9 minutes ago, Detournement said:

Three cheers for Uncle Joe on Friday. Ending private property and killing everyone who might have considered surrendering to the Nazis meant the Soviet Union didn't go the same way as the bourgeoisie nations. Hip hip hooray!

He also got rid of a lot of the troops who made it to Germany and won the war for him.  Unfortunately they had seen the west and been contaminated by the experience and so they had to go.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

Not that give a shite about VE pish, but when I was clearing out my old mans house in Elgin a couple of years back I found this photo.  Did a bit of looking online and found out it was a relation of my mum (possibly uncle) who was killed in WW2. Anyway, more interestingly for me, his record popped up in Dundee as apparently he moved to Dundee, married some Dundonian bint and lived about 10 mins walk from where I live now.   Also, he was 46 when he died. Imagine having to put and trudge through France shooting c***s at the age of 46. f**k that.

 

Edited May 6, 2020 by Melanius Mullarkey

[Sergeant Wilson]

2 minutes ago, Melanius Mullarkey said:

Not that give a shite about VE shite, but I when I was clearing out my old mans house in Elgin a couple of years back I found this photo.  Did a bit of looking online and found out it was a relation of my mum (possibly uncle) who was killed in WW2. Anyway, more interestingly for me, his record popped up in Dundee as apparently he moved to Dundee, married some Dundonian bint and lived about 10 mins walk from where I live now.   Also, he was 46 when he died. Imagine having to put and trudge through France shooting c***s at the age of 46. f**k that.

 

I thought it was Windsor Davies.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

24 minutes ago, Sergeant Wilson said:

I thought it was Windsor Davies.

I don’t think that’s the guy in the box tbh.

[Shandon Par]

34 minutes ago, Melanius Mullarkey said:

Not that give a shite about VE pish, but when I was clearing out my old mans house in Elgin a couple of years back I found this photo.  Did a bit of looking online and found out it was a relation of my mum (possibly uncle) who was killed in WW2. Anyway, more interestingly for me, his record popped up in Dundee as apparently he moved to Dundee, married some Dundonian bint and lived about 10 mins walk from where I live now.   Also, he was 46 when he died. Imagine having to put and trudge through France shooting c***s at the age of 46. f**k that.

 

Did he have a habit of shooting folk on his own side?

[D.A.F.C]

To an extent, yeah. Even without the Western and Italian Fronts, the Soviet Union would have defeated Germany. After Kursk the Germans were never able to launch a strategic offensive on the Eastern Front. It was just a matter of time.

Obviously the other fronts significantly hastened Germany's demise, but they weren't the cause. The Axis could have held the Gustav Line a lot longer, possibly permanently, if they didn't have to deal with the Eastern Front. The German defenders at Operation Overlord were disproportionately old men and young boys, lacking in armour, because the best troops and tanks were still in the East.

Once the Western Allies were past the Ruhr they didn't head for Berlin, they swept down into Bavaria and Austria. The primary objective by this point was to avoid the Red Army going beyond the territory they were to administer under the Yalta agreement.

The fact this isn't common knowledge in the UK speaks volumes about the myths we tell ourselves.

Theres myths about the german army as well. Hitler kept going on about how much more hardware they had but in truth France had more of everything and were regarded as the best army in Europe.
Hitler went against his generals advice they reckoned that they couldn't beat france so easily and was then regarded as some sort of tactical genius which ultimately led him to take over and mess up the russian offensive due to being too far away from the action.
If germany didnt invade russia then things would have been very different. The russian offensive ended the war with d-day pretty much a side show.

[BFTD]

3 hours ago, GordonS said:

I don't understand why VE Day is being celebrated more than VJ Day, which was the real end of the war. Allied forces were training and waiting to be sent to the Far East until Japan surrendered, and British forces were still fighting in Burma.

Because an alarming number of people think Britain almost singlehandedly liberated Europe from the Nazis, and it's in nobody's interests to persuade them otherwise. It's a bit trickier to claim the same for Japan, considering the Americans made damn sure the world knew who'd ended that particular chapter.

Also worrying how many people refer to 'we' or 'us' winning World War II; you did f**k all, mate, it was the work of a generation who'll all be dead from old age soon. Stop trying to tag yourself on to other people's achievements and suffering by association.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

53 minutes ago, Shandon Par said:

Did he have a habit of shooting folk on his own side?

Probably shot himself tbf. A preferable option to returning back home to a Dundonian wife I would imagine.

[Fullerene]

42 minutes ago, BigFatTabbyDave said:

Stop trying to tag yourself on to other people's achievements and suffering by association.

Strange remark to make on a Football Forum!

[GordonS]

1 hour ago, Detournement said:

Three cheers for Uncle Joe on Friday. Ending private property and killing everyone who might have considered surrendering to the Nazis meant the Soviet Union didn't go the same way as the bourgeoisie nations. Hip hip hooray!

You can take it that way if you want, but it's possible to know that two things are true at the same time.

1 hour ago, Fullerene said:

He also got rid of a lot of the troops who made it to Germany and won the war for him.  Unfortunately they had seen the west and been contaminated by the experience and so they had to go.

Yup, apparently one of the major reasons the USSR did so badly at the start of WW2 is because Stalin had purged everyone who knew what they were doing, and the rest were so scared of his retribution for retreating that they ended up losing 3 million soldiers as prisoners of war - who the Germans starved to death.