Army Rumour Service

Register a free account today to join our community
Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site, connect with other members through your own private inbox and will receive smaller adverts!

German President invited to Cenotaph.

I have a new rule. Anything that Richard 'did I mention that I was supreme intergalactic space commander in Afghanistan' Kemp thinks is a bad idea is probably a bloody good thing to support.
I see the headline in that paper that cannot be named describes Richard Kemp as "ex Army chief". Bloody good going for a full Col.
 
Over a year ago I raised this as a question of when and if it would ever be suitable to invite our former enemies. I was assured by the posters responding that it was a bad idea and should never happen. Thinking on now, should we invite the Japanese as our WW1 Allies and the Italians too?


The Japanese were very good allies in WWI, and, their treatment of POWs was regarded as exemplary and cited as an example of how it should be done.
 
They don't do Armistice Day there, they have if I recall right a national day of mourning later in the month which is similar instead.

I know, but I was thinking that they could do something for the 100th anniversary at which the president's attendance would be appropriate.
 
Is that your response?.. 'that I'm arguing with myself' then add a load of old half truths and immature rhetoric that a silly 14 year old would come out with?.

Stick to the subject and the time scale of thread you prick ..... before i'll rip any argument you got to pieces..

.......and before you go , I suggest that you read up about how tribal law was enford in Kurdistan and the surrounding region at that time, without a Brit to be seen, and also the British casuality figures though disease during the Boer campaign and also the life expectancy and causes of death in British cities at the same time.

At a guess, I bet that you're also a Holocaust Denier and Nazi revisionist........same mindset , see.

You think that you've learned something but you're not clever enough to question it or see it objectively. You just stick with what you suits your own limited mentall needs.

Here's one for your Mum to read to you

Amazon product ASIN 057123142X


Helgas_166215_Traditional-White-Thick-Cut_750g.png

For clarity, does this mean you do not want to see former enemy at the remembrance service and only former allies?
 
Dresden memorial perhaps?
I'm sure the RAF could muster a Squadron or two for a flypast to mark the occasion

In 1988, the Berlin Infantry Brigade Queen’s Birthday Parade was held in the presence of HMTQ. The RAF contribution was planned to be the BBMF up until quite a late stage in the planning, until the diplomatic sensitivity of flying a Lanc back over Berlin was pointed out. Shame really.
 
It is however about dead soldiers, a 100 years later I don't see the harm. The German blokes are just as dead as our blokes.

****. Another Helm post I'm compelled to give a like to.

Probably the wisest thing I've ever read.

"The German blokes are just as dead as our blokes"
 
Go a bit deeper and you will realise it was also an overgrown family argument between cousins. Do you want to look at the British Empire and it's air policing of the Kurdsin the Middle East in the 1920's? How about the Boer War and Kitchener's scorched earth policy?

We can go on - you should know that there are rules of engagement and there are ways of achieving the objective. War now is different to war 100 years ago which was different to war 100 years before that.

You are arguing with yourself.

Having been taught about both the examples you mention, plus having read about them in history books I wasn't aware they were suspposed to be little known parts of our history!
 
Go a bit deeper and you will realise it was also an overgrown family argument between cousins. Do you want to look at the British Empire and it's air policing of the Kurdsin the Middle East in the 1920's? How about the Boer War and Kitchener's scorched earth policy?

We can go on - you should know that there are rules of engagement and there are ways of achieving the objective. War now is different to war 100 years ago which was different to war 100 years before that.

You are arguing with yourself.

Go a bit deeper, as Sean McMeekin did in July 1914: Countdown to War, which included a detailed examination of the diplomatic traffic of the Great Powers involved, and you actually discover it was a tremendous conspiracy/cock-up by the respective players, with Russia the prime conspiring villain of the piece and the British Foreign Office not far behind holding the flag for cock-up. The consistent theme is that of the respective monarchs either being out-manoeuvred or discovering what their politicians and civil servants were up to too late to do anything about it.

A bit like the Titanic story, one of the saddest aspects of the whole affair is how close the cousins came to stopping the war on multiple occasions and just how easily it could have been avoided. From that perspective, it's a very difficult read, particularly the bit where the Foreign Office's man, Sir George Buchanan, couldn't be arrsed to discover for himself whether the Russian Army was mobilising, as the Germans claimed, and simply took what he was told by the Russians at face value and submitted reports to say they weren't. The British Government acted on the basis of these reports and dismissed German claims, which in turn convinced the Germans, who could see the Russian build-up in front of them, that whatever was going on, the British must be in on it. That took Britain out of the game as an honest broker and pretty much removed the last chance of peace.

Under the circumstances, one can see why the Germans baulked at the War Guilt clause in the Versailles Treaty, McMeekin's research showed that the Russians made most of the running. They didn't mobilise faster than expected as the traditional view would have it, they had simply started to mobilise earlier than anyone suspected. One can see why the 'Aggressive Hun' trope became the preferred version but the idea that war was inevitable and that it was in some way driven by family jealousies does not survive detailed scrutiny. It's yet another of those First World War myths we were all brought up with and which are now steadily being debunked by historians mining the source materials in a more objective way than perhaps hitherto.

I would love one of our better historians to write a book about how the narrative of the First World War was hi-jacked in the years that followed by multiple interests pushing their preferred line.

July 1914 is well worth a read and I thoroughly recommend it.
 
The Japanese were very good allies in WWI, and, their treatment of POWs was regarded as exemplary and cited as an example of how it should be done.

As this is ARRSE it's likely many of us will know this, or that the USA was good good friends with Japan in the inter war years, and that US troops trained with and did exercises with Japaneses troops in Japan.

I sometimes wonder if the change you mention from WW1 to WW2 isn't as well known by the wider public as they were never taught much (or anything) about Japan in the WW1 era.
While many younger people I've spoken to can cite the different ethos of Germany in WW1 versus WW2 many of them also think China was our enemy in WW2.
 
Go a bit deeper, as Sean McMeekin did in July 1914: Countdown to War, which included a detailed examination of the diplomatic traffic of the Great Powers involved, and you actually discover it was a tremendous conspiracy/cock-up by the respective players, with Russia the prime conspiring villain of the piece and the British Foreign Office not far behind holding the flag for cock-up. The consistent theme is that of the respective monarchs either being out-manoeuvred or discovering what their politicians and civil servants were up to too late to do anything about it.

A bit like the Titanic story, one of the saddest aspects of the whole affair is how close the cousins came to stopping the war on multiple occasions and just how easily it could have been avoided. From that perspective, it's a very difficult read, particularly the bit where the Foreign Office's man, Sir George Buchanan, couldn't be arrsed to discover for himself whether the Russian Army was mobilising, as the Germans claimed, and simply took what he was told by the Russians at face value and submitted reports to say they weren't. The British Government acted on the basis of these reports and dismissed German claims, which in turn convinced the Germans, who could see the Russian build-up in front of them, that whatever was going on, the British must be in on it. That took Britain out of the game as an honest broker and pretty much removed the last chance of peace.

Under the circumstances, one can see why the Germans baulked at the War Guilt clause in the Versailles Treaty, McMeekin's research showed that the Russians made most of the running. They didn't mobilise faster than expected as the traditional view would have it, they had simply started to mobilise earlier than anyone suspected. One can see why the 'Aggressive Hun' trope became the preferred version but the idea that war was inevitable and that it was in some way driven by family jealousies does not survive detailed scrutiny. It's yet another of those First World War myths we were all brought up with and which are now steadily being debunked by historians mining the source materials in a more objective way than perhaps hitherto.

I would love one of our better historians to write a book about how the narrative of the First World War was hi-jacked in the years that followed by multiple interests pushing their preferred line.

July 1914 is well worth a read and I thoroughly recommend it.

Excellent post, and a can of worms truly opened!
Just looking at a few of the 'sliding door/what if' moments the possibilities for a different word are spectacular if Russia hadn't been bogged down in a war and with poorly supplied troops, if the USA hadn't mobilised and ramped up up their home industries with war work. If Europe hadn't been exposed to the flu epidemic.
 
Having been taught about both the examples you mention, plus having read about them in history books I wasn't aware they were suspposed to be little known parts of our history!

As you mention in a later post, former allies become enemies; former enemies become allies and the members here may be a little more aware and knowledgeable about the past than the general public.

The issue seems to be where to draw the point on the timeline of acceptance.
 
As you mention in a later post, former allies become enemies; former enemies become allies and the members here may be a little more aware and knowledgeable about the past than the general public.

The issue seems to be where to draw the point on the timeline of acceptance.

Very true.
Most of the WW1 combatants are now friends, perhaps an irony is just how much those friendships changed in the years since 1918.

It's a shame that not everyone took the opportunity be part of the group of friend.
 
Top