Pragmatism Or Collaboration?

[Freggyragh]

If you're interested in another view you could try; http://www.irishdemocrat.co.uk/anonn-is-anall/royalty/ (but I doubt you are)

 

Well I was interested enough to have a look. The history is very interesting. The article does not add anything new and is badly written.

 

The Royal Family is a political anachronism. That is more significant than them having German relatives. That website is over - focused on issues about race and nationality.

 

*Godwin's Rule states that: “As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.”

 

It's going to be hard to avoid the Nazis on a thread about how some people reacted to Nazi occupation.

 

Sorry the article didn't anything new for you, but I am therefore surprised you singled out 'Celtic revivalists' to accuse of flirting with Berlin, when you could have picked on the other elements in these isles who are well known to have had more than mere flirtatious connections to the Nazis. Is the website I referred you to over-focused on issues about race and nationality? It is called 'The Irish Democrat', I would have thought the clue as to the contents was in the title, and I thought you had some interest in Celtic revivalism since you brought the topic up. If you mean that you find overt nationalism distasteful then I quite agree.

[pongo]

Sorry the article didn't anything new for you ..

 

Well don't be sorry - unless you are the author. It's more like - just about the only TV I watched for ages was history documentaries. And pre multi channel TV, when I was at University and had no money, I used to spend hours in the college library watching history documentaries. And I've read boxes full of history books. And drawn no definite conclusions. I'm equally skeptical of all movements and causes. I mentioned the celtic revivalists and their flirting with the Nazis in the context of you talking about island folk under occupation and your joke about Tynwald being a display of British militarism. I think I understand the context from which the language of the quip is borrowed.

 

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[manshimajin]

TIMES ARTICLE

 

The question being, of course, whether anyone really believes that the Brits would have behaved differently if they'd been invaded.

 

Well Paris and London are in Western Europe - though I doubt that Brits in 1940 would have understood the meaning of an 'orgy'.

 

Central Europe didn't fare so well - just visit Warsaw. AH himself had to issue orders in 1944 to the German troops in the Wola district to stop killing the civilians as they were wasting ammunition that was supposed to be used to suppress the Warsaw Uprising. A different type of orgy there.

 

One of the questions I cannot find a rational answer to is 'why did the UK and France declare war on Germany for invading Poland and not declare war on the USSR when it followed suit a few weeks later?'

[VinnieK]

One of the questions I cannot find a rational answer to is 'why did the UK and France declare war on Germany for invading Poland and not declare war on the USSR when it followed suit a few weeks later?'

 

For reasons similar to those behind the UK and France's reluctance to declare war over the Sudetenland, or even resist Germany's earlier examples of growing expansionsion and militarism. Both were still trying to avoid another full blown world war, and in any case were in no position to wage a war against both Germany and USSR (they weren't in a terribly good position to fight even Germany alone). Had war been declared on the USSR, then the allies would have been faced with waging war on a front thousands of miles deep against forces that outnumbered and outgunned their own many times over (Also, the USSR was well placed to attack British and French possessions in the Far East which would have stretched already meagre allied resources further).

 

In short, they chose a fight they had some chance of winning, over one they'd almost certainly have lost.

[manshimajin]

One of the questions I cannot find a rational answer to is 'why did the UK and France declare war on Germany for invading Poland and not declare war on the USSR when it followed suit a few weeks later?'

 

For reasons similar to those behind the UK and France's reluctance to declare war over the Sudetenland, or even resist Germany's earlier examples of growing expansionsion and militarism. Both were still trying to avoid another full blown world war, and in any case were in no position to wage a war against both Germany and USSR (they weren't in a terribly good position to fight even Germany alone). Had war been declared on the USSR, then the allies would have been faced with waging war on a front thousands of miles deep against forces that outnumbered and outgunned their own many times over (Also, the USSR was well placed to attack British and French possessions in the Far East which would have stretched already meagre allied resources further).

 

In short, they chose a fight they had some chance of winning, over one they'd almost certainly have lost.

 

Ah, that makes sense. Thank goodness Germany invaded Russia. Things had not exactly been going swimmingly for us prior to that. We should have taken a lesson from the Finns....

 

So in summary we did not give a toss about the Poles? Maybe that is why they were the only country whose troops were forbidden by the British Government from taking part in the Victory Celebration Parade in London - even though until the entry of the Americans they were the second largest allied fighting force.

[VinnieK]

So in summary we did not give a toss about the Poles? Maybe that is why they were the only country whose troops were forbidden by the British Government from taking part in the Victory Celebration Parade in London - even though until the entry of the Americans they were the second largest allied fighting force.

 

I don't know if I'd go as far as to say that we didn't give a toss about the Poles (although it's true that declaring war on Germany at that point was more about stopping the growth of German power than it was defending Poland, and that the Polish, and indeed fighters of so many other nations that fought alongside the allies were poorly treated or forgotten after the war ended). The sad fact of it is that after the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, Poland was in an impossible situation and I don't think much could have prevented her loss of independence to a determined Germany or USSR.

 

Incidently, I agree that Warsaw is an example of how brutal Poland's fate was, but I'd say it's also a glowing testament to the will and ability of the Polish to rebuild their country in the aftermath - the Old Town is a masterpiece of reconstruction (compare it with Coventry!).