Are We *ever* Going To Get Over Wwii ?

[jake-the-peg]

Yet another commemoration - this time 70 years of the Atlantic campaign

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22434753

Given that WWII lasted about 5 years by the time you've commemorated a VE day anniversary it seems time to start celebrating anothe anniversary of the start of the War!

I hear the cries of 'ingrate' already and patriotic chests puffing up like pidgeons - but WWI was just as formative to those who fought in it and I don't recall continual commemorations of that from my childhood.

Why are we so obsessed with WWII and are we ever going to get over it?

[sp1814]

I'm still lost. How on earth did the Lawrences get into this one?

AOG - did someone bring them into the discussion previously? I literally can't work out how they could be connected to a discussion about WWII?

Oh, and my two penn'orth...I don't think we'll get over WWII for some time yet, and leaving aside the historical importance (why does Europe look the way it does - socially, economically etc), I personally find stories about the war quite interesting.

[DTCwordfan]

Thanks CD for that info. I am glad it isn't a war grave. Actually, I am in favour of recovering and restoring it, though we could approach "Jerry" Merkel for a contribution.

I'm in favour of ceremonies etc that honour the soldiers and others, - also poignant moments like the reburial in Flanders last week, the Duck of Kent attending that one. What gets me is the repetition and banging on in the media (mainly TV)......and the imbalance of the teaching of history in schools, too much WW2 on and not enough on the rich heritage that this country has in its passage through the centuries. I guess the Dark Ages could be extended to include 1066 to 1939, for that it seems to be to many school children and indeed adults..

[whiskeryron]

VHG Very interesting photograph, but do my eyes deceive me ? It is dated 1901 & yet I swear there are modern aircraft in the sky can anyone else see them ?

WR.

[FredPuli43]

PS aog, I trust you don't accuse me of being a Stalinist either. It does not follow that we have to like Stalin, or communism, to form an objective view of history. Unfortunately, Stalin's forces did do far more to defeat Hitler than we did.

[jno]

WR, I think they're lightbulbs suspended across the middle of the street by wires

[sp1814]

Ha ha ha...

Ironically, AOG is now fighting on several fronts.

[Zeuhl]

^

and losing on all of them!

PMSL

[ChillDoubt]

Furthermore, just to answer the very first reply in the thread, where the question was posed: Who commemorates Trafalgar?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trafalgar_Day

Besides the Senior Service, it still obviously holds great significance for some.

[jno]

Sea Cadets, then. Interesting that your link makes the same point as elsewhere in this thread: as commemoration of WW1 fell away after WW2, so commemoration of Trafalgar fell away after WW1 (more than a century later, in the latter case).

The only one that's really lasted is Guy Fawkes' Day.

[emmie]

1939 to 1945 doesn't make just about five years, nor will many forget because it's part of our history, and if any wants to commemorate it then good for them, it could have been a very different Britain had Hitler won, indeed a very different Europe, many British wouldn't have survived i am pretty sure, seeing how many Jews lived in UK, not to mention all the other so called misfits, those who didn't fit in with Hitler's plan.

I visited the Bomber Command memorial in Hyde Park erected fairly recently. Over 55,000 of these men gave their lives for our freedom, and i for one won't be forgetting that visit any day soon. And no one is puffing out their chests, that is totally the wrong approach, anywhere between 60 to 90 million dead so it's nothing to be glad about. I only feel sadness come November 11th and will continue to either visit the Cenotaph or watch the ceremony on the day on the television.

[ChillDoubt]

Those currently serving and former officers and ratings of the Royal Navy would be upset to here you refer to them as Sea Cadets jno.

[Svejk]

Take cover AOG. General Jake & Corporal Gromit are leading their heroic key-board warrior battalion in your direction.

[Svejk]

Take cover AOG. General Jake & Corporal Gromit are leading their heroic key-board warrior battalion in your direction.

[shaneystar2]

Trafalgar Day is always celebrated in my neck of the woods because Nelson is our famous son .We have a monument .Top brass turn up too ,not just Sea Cadets .

[jno]

none the less a naval (+Brummie) rather than a national event. That's as it should be.

Curious that the most significant battle of the lot, Hastings, isn't really celebrated at all.

[DTCwordfan]

"I shall go on to the end of Answerbank. I shall fight in News, I shall fight these leftwingers and pathetic Cameron-wringers on History and CB, I and Nigel shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength on the airwaves, we shall defend our AB rights, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the threads, we shall fight on the intenet, we shall fight in the pubs and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills if Gromit lets us have any; we shall never surrender, and if, which I do not for a moment believe, my place in Answerbank or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our sister sites beyond the seas, armed and guarded by Bill Gates, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of Nige Ferret and me."

[shaneystar2]

I think they have sort of reenactmant every year at Hastings Jno .
A type of commemoration I suppose .

[Sqad]

D-T LOL

[ChillDoubt]

Curious that the most significant battle of the lot, Hastings, isn't really celebrated at all.
--------------------------------
Do we celebrate many battles that we (when I say we, I mean the indigenous Brits at the time, obviously) lost? Not sure we do!

[Zeuhl]

svejk

wasn't it Corporal Jones who always said everything twice?