Lest we forget.

[Butch 3,456]

Apologies if this is in the wrong section, but it affects all of us.

 

None of us would enjoy the freedoms we have today without the sacrifice of those who have served and fallen, and continue to serve.

 

God Bless.

 

 

When You Go Home, Tell Them Of Us And Say, For Your Tomorrow, We Gave Our Today.

 

 

Lest we forget.

[LocalYokul 217]

hmm, I thought Veteran's Day was next week.

[jacko 8,822]

hmm, I thought Veteran's Day was next week.

Well it is on Sunday, whether that is next week or the end of this week I can never quite figure out.

[atlas2 4,329]

11th hr.....11th day..........11th month.

 

God what a waste.............. I don't blame Chamberlain trying to avoid another war.

[tomcat76 327]

NObody but a moron or a psychopath would blame ANYbody for "trying to avoid another war". What he's blamed for is his naivete in making such a stupid deal with Hitler, and trusting Hitler to honor it, after all Hitler had already done and said. THAT arguably increased the ultimate body count enormously. Equally moronic to not learn anything from that debacle.

[atlas2 4,329]

Chamberlain wanted so much to believe Hitler was a gentleman like himself......it blinded him..... I agree.

 

The cuts that Chamberlain as Chancellor was forced to introduce to pay back America for the debts incurred by WW1, left Britain in no shape for another war and he knew that. However, his one saving grace was that despite our relative poverty, as Chancellor in '35 he increased the budget for the RAF. Before the US came in and while we faced Germany alone it was possibly that decision that saved us.

[tomcat76 327]

Chamberlain wanted so much to believe Hitler was a gentleman like himself......it blinded him..... I agree.

 

The cuts that Chamberlain as Chancellor was forced to introduce to pay back America for the debts incurred by WW1, left Britain in no shape for another war and he knew that. However, his one saving grace was that despite our relative poverty, as Chancellor in '35 he increased the budget for the RAF. Before the US came in and while we faced Germany alone it was possibly that decision that saved us.

 

Change of topic really, since you were talking specifically about his visit to Munich. I don't think anybody has held Chamberlain to have been completely & consistently incompetent. His record is forever tarnished however by the Munich Accord disaster. Again, nobody blames him for the part about wanting to avert war; what he's blamed for instead is the manner in which he was played by Hitler. (Hitler to Ribbentrop immediately after Chamberlain's departure re "the desire of our two people to never go to war again." --- "Oh, don't take it so seriously!") What a relief that must've been to Hitler; how much easier it must've made what came after.

[atlas2 4,329]

What part of 'I agree' don't you understand?

 

 

[Butch 3,456]

It is this coming Sunday , I saw no harm in posting early.

[CheshireTom 1,377]

It is this coming Sunday , I saw no harm in posting early.

 

No harm with a timely reminder IMHO.

 

For those guys that are interested, Bert and the Legion folk on Soi 6/1 always have something organised on 11/11. As an alternative, Services of Remembrance are scheduled at the UK Embassy in BKK and at the main Cemetery in Kanchanaburi.

 

From the British Chamber of Commerce website ...

 

 

 

[jacko 8,822]

My mind wandered last night.

I thought how different life was for my old mother growing up during the war, a child of 9-15, to a modern day kid who can't get their face out of their mobile phone and most important thing is having the latest model. And young men of that time having little choice but to get involved and face the ultimate sacrifice.... could those who rioted in London recently summon up that character. I remember seeing men with missing limbs when I was a kid, somewhat fascinated, morbidly, likely the result of WW2. I took a walk through the graveyard at Kanchanaburi some years back, a sobering experience, men dying at an age when I was really enjoying my life.

 

We know nothing.

[tomcat76 327]

I had the privilege of knowing as a child a Polish RAF veteran (Spits) - flew for Poland and then begged to fly with the RAF - a veteran of the Battle of Britain - who had immigrated to the US after the war. How he and my dad became acquainted I don't exactly know. I was too young at the time to really appreciate his background, and to have witnessed his jovial and utterly self-effacing personality, you'd have never guessed it. He'd suffered some kind of injury while flying to one leg that left him with a bad limp - shrapnel or gunshot I guess - but it was totally insignificant to him. He just limped around and got where he was going twice as fast as everyone else. You had to ask him to get him to say anything about his experiences, but doing so he'd refer to "Nazis" with some obvious lasting bitterness. He was the friendliest guy you could ever be around - loved us kids - but oh how he LOVED American freedom and HATED communists! I remember wondering at the vigor of his attitude toward communism, and not even knowing what it was! An interesting guy. Full of good humor. Even more full of humility. I only wish I could've known him later after I'd become old enough to understand all the significance of the things he'd done and ask him more about his experiences. To have known him, you kind of know what the war was about for many people I think...

[atlas2 4,329]

I was 8....Mr Cook or 'Cookie' was the only male teacher in my primary school on the Lisson Grove. He was ex army and for us boys he was a 'rite of passage'. He turned PE lessons, (which all the female teachers clearly hated) into army obstacle courses with us all forming human pyramids to get over the 'walls' he created out of stage blocks. He also ran the school football team so was practically a God!

 

It was 1960........I know this because every morning he would bring in a newspaper in which it had printed the Longitude and Latitude of the individual competitors in the first ever Single Handed Atlantic yacht race. We'd all made 2D model yachts and would rush to plot our 'horses' position on the enormous 'Map of the World' on the back wall of our classroom. My 'horse had taken the Rhumb Line and was out of it. We were eight but we'd all put bets on. If Cookie knew he didn't mind. This race took up more than a month and was a great way to get us lazy working class boys into 'working'

 

One morning our Headmistress came into class and, looking at Mr Cook, told us, 'tomorrow we would be having, some very important guests and that we should be on our best behaviour'

 

The next morning after assembly there was an edge in the room. Cookie was sharp and snappy towards us while we waited for these guest to arrive. The perfect silence in our class meant that we all heard the door of the classroom next to us close and the footsteps getting closer.

 

Our Head came through the door smiling and ushered in and introduced our guests...... from Japan!

 

.....In trouped five small men, all dressed in the same grey suits.......Smiling at us, and bowing towards Mr Cook. Our Head said something and we waited for Cookie to reply........ or 'do'....something to welcome our important guests.....We waited .......The silence was like a dagger at our throats. Cookie walked passed the Head and the 'important guests' as though they weren't there and opened the door wide for them to leave!

 

The Head mumbled something and thanked us and they all trouped meekly back out bowing and smiling.

 

As the last one passed by Cookie he slammed the door behind them so hard we jumped out of our skins..And then he kicked it and one of the glass panes cracked.

 

"Those bastards killed your fathers" He shouted, for half the school to hear.

 

None of us had ever seen or heard anything like it, we were stunned and just looked down at our desks.

 

It was the talk of the playground. I told my parents, they didn't show any disapproval of Cookie's 'madness'......Just said, 'a lot of bad things were done by the Japanese in the war'.

 

Years later I saw the emaciated scarecrows that the Japs had put to work on a railway close to where I'm typing this. Over the years the appalling, vicious cruelty of the Japanese in WW2 has come to light and I've come to understand old 'Cookie.'

 

I Bet he never bought a Toyota.

 

"Lest we forget"

Edited November 8, 2012 by atlas2

[tomcat76 327]

I just can't imagine what it must've been like on the Bataan death march, or to have been a Japanese POW or internee, or one of their medical or weapon experiment victims, or an innocent civilian in Nanking, Manila, or any one of a list of other occupied asian cities, or otherwise mass-brutalized or murdered at the hands of the Japanese. Their atrocities compared to those of the Germans are definitely under-reported. But having a knowledge of those things, I can almost approach an understanding of what must've been going through your Mr. Cook's mind... I'll bet the list of friends he lost at the hands of the Japanese was a long one.

 

I know of no Japanese equivalent, but watching "Valkyrie" I'm aware of the monument the Germans have erected, and hold a formal memorial observance at every year, to the Valkyrie conspirators who were executed. They do actually & with sincerity honor those conspirators. ...One of the reasons - there are others - that I believe in something I'll refer to as German "national remorse", and can forgive contemporary Germany for the war. I couldn't possibly ever "honor" or respect any German veteran's service in the war, but I can accept that Germany deserves to be allowed to move on without continuing recrimination.

[yogi100 1,925]

The least we can do is to at least buy a poppy and wear it. Tropical Berts has them in Soi 6/1 as does 18 Coins in Soi Bhukaow. I've got mine.

[Lantern 193]

[LocalYokul 217]

I'll be at Applebee's gettin' my free feed on, Woo Hoo !

[papillon 695]

RIP

[flighty 31]

Soldiers who fought in WW2 would've been mostly born just after the end of WW1. Even 30 years ago it was said we were living in the longest period of peacetime in recent history. So I'm sure a lot of us feel extremely lucky and try to live the life they would like to have lived.

[Bushcraft 2,591]

Too true flighty, we of the baby-boomer generation have indeed been lucky not to be embroiled in any wars involuntarily, at least in western Europe. As Prime Minister, one of the few good things that Harold Wilson did was to keep Britain out of the Vietnam War despite American requests. As young men we were very conscious that Americans and Australians etc. of our age were fighting and dying there, not to mention the Vietnamese, and that it could have been us too.

[tomcat76 327]

Here we go. And in a memorial thread to the fallen, too.

[atlas2 4,329]

Too true flighty, we of the baby-boomer generation have indeed been lucky not to be embroiled in any wars involuntarily, at least in western Europe. As Prime Minister, one of the few good things that Harold Wilson did was to keep Britain out of the Vietnam War despite American requests. As young men we were very conscious that Americans and Australians etc. of our age were fighting and dying there, not to mention the Vietnamese, and that it could have been us too.

Here we go. And in a memorial thread to the fallen, too.

 

I don't find anything disrespectful or contentious in Bushcraft's comment. From what I've seen of him on the Board he's not like that.

 

Although it's well known British servicemen did serve and in some cases die alongside our American and Australian cousins in Vietnam..... Britain's youth...previously Involved in Malaysia, Korea, Aden, Palestine, Oman etc were left out of Vietnam, which was, from an admittedly selfish point of view, a mercy. That's all I believe he was expressing in a follow on from another poster.

 

RIP all of them.

 

I simply stood alone in my condo..... not much was it.

[Bushcraft 2,591]

Here we go. And in a memorial thread to the fallen, too.

 

Tomcat, I would be appalled if anybody thought my words were disrespectful of the fallen, if indeed that's what your comment implies (?). On the contrary, we saw this horrible conflict going on for years on our TV sets at home, the first televised war, and were more than saddened because it always seemed unwinnable. The Tommy in his trench, the bomber crews (55,000 British dead) in the 2nd war, POWs in Japanese prison camps, the grunt on the ground in Vietnam, the list is endless, continuing. War is a terrible but sometimes necessary waste owing to human folly, I identify with the terrified individual who meets his violent end and doesn't come home from a faraway place, we must never forget them all. 'Nuff said.

[samfreeland 64]

My mind wandered last night.

I thought how different life was for my old mother growing up during the war,

We know nothing.

Your right there jacko my great grandfather died soon after getting home from WW1. from mustard gas leaving his wife with ten children.

No welfare in those days. my grandfather told me WW2 came along just in time as things where very tough. him and four of his brothers joined up.

Edited November 12, 2012 by samfreeland

[CheshireTom 1,377]

Good to see the Bikers get involved to mark the 70th anniversary of the building of The Death Railway.

 

Some good background info here ...