Whirlwind said:First of all Wulfhund welcome to the RO forums.
Secondly, yes I agree that many view the Italians as cowards such as the French army. However these are sterotypes just like French men dont have strings of onions round thier knecks and British men dont all wear Bowler hats and drink tea.
I would not let statements like this aggrevate you. With any luck the mod will ignite some interest in this theatre of war and people will go and do some casual resarch and learn that not everything you are told is true.
Sam
paulus1975 said:(perhaps like the 80,000 British in Singapore?)
I think it's "than anyone else"...but I suppose it depends on one's pronunciation.King Ragnar said:Yeh but we owned more of the world then anyone else so
paulus1975 said:I think it's "than anyone else"...but I suppose it depends on one's pronunciation.
One can't sit in the capital cities of conquered colonies and call that "ownership" (as the Italians found out in Abyssinia), especially when 95%+ of the governed populace is rural.
This is by no means a personal attack or a flaming of Britain, but it's worth stating that the British very soon came face to face with this issue of "ownership," most importantly in Egypt and India, both of whose various nationalist movements (while supplying troops for the British cause) were galvanised by Britain's inability to defend her far-flung empire in the face of such predictable aggression from the Axis, especially in Asia. The Japanese are also said to have sat up and taken notice at South Africa's success in shaking off British colonial rule and saw how, especially after WW1, Britain would have problems mustering the manpower to meet insurgent threats or invasions. Britain's technological advantage in sea and firepower was negated in an increasingly rapid fashion in the 20th century, and that would only leave manpower as a lever by which to control the colonies. Sadly WW1 saw the near-wholesale destruction of "the flower of British male youth" and WW2 only ensured that Britain would have even fewer men capable of manning an empire, leaving the way open to the US to complete is supplanting of Britain as the world's great western power. Surrendering 80,000 of those men to the Japanese without so much as a fight was a grave indication of Britain's loss of supremacy in the world, and it is no coincidence that this, its greatest military disaster, occurred at the height of its territorial overextension and precariousness.
I would therefore strongly question the notion of "ownership" of most of Britain's 20th century empire. "Varying degrees of administration" may be a more correct term to describe a situation which has been likened to a chef attempting to keep the lids on 20 different pots all boiling over, while his arm is in a sling with "The Great War" written on it.
Yep but at least we didn't keep on changing to the winning side during the second world war.paulus1975 said:I think it's "than anyone else"...but I suppose it depends on one's pronunciation.
One can't sit in the capital cities of conquered colonies and call that "ownership" (as the Italians found out in Abyssinia), especially when 95%+ of the governed populace is rural.
This is by no means a personal attack or a flaming of Britain, but it's worth stating that the British very soon came face to face with this issue of "ownership," most importantly in Egypt and India, both of whose various nationalist movements (while supplying troops for the British cause) were galvanised by Britain's inability to defend her far-flung empire in the face of such predictable aggression from the Axis, especially in Asia. The Japanese are also said to have sat up and taken notice at South Africa's success in shaking off British colonial rule and saw how, especially after WW1, Britain would have problems mustering the manpower to meet insurgent threats or invasions. Britain's technological advantage in sea and firepower was negated in an increasingly rapid fashion in the 20th century, and that would only leave manpower as a lever by which to control the colonies. Sadly WW1 saw the near-wholesale destruction of "the flower of British male youth" and WW2 only ensured that Britain would have even fewer men capable of manning an empire, leaving the way open to the US to complete is supplanting of Britain as the world's great western power. Surrendering 80,000 of those men to the Japanese without so much as a fight was a grave indication of Britain's loss of supremacy in the world, and it is no coincidence that this, its greatest military disaster, occurred at the height of its territorial overextension and precariousness.
I would therefore strongly question the notion of "ownership" of most of Britain's 20th century empire. "Varying degrees of administration" may be a more correct term to describe a situation which has been likened to a chef attempting to keep the lids on 20 different pots all boiling over, while his arm is in a sling with "The Great War" written on it.