Agreed good to hear from someone who knows. My maternal Grandfather was said to have been "sleepwalking" when he was found drowned on the banks of the Clyde. We are as certain as we can be the he committed suicide, but as that was illegal at the time & his widow would have got no pension if it was known, that was the official version the family stuck to. I don't know what he did in WW1 but all my mother ever said was that as he was such I gentle man someone like him should never have been forced to go to war. I am sure there were thousands more like him. I never knew him mores the pity.
Lizzie27, there is no secret in how to keep the peace, the politicians should be forced by law to put going to war to a public vote. It should also be a law that the forces are never sent anywhere without the best and up to date kit. In 1947-8-9 we were using weapons and ammunition marked 1940 many times I would change magazines having used less than half because of stoppage, we got the new SLR rifles and Stirlings in 1957-8. The first SA 80 in use today were useless in Desert conditions yet they sent our forces to war. The people who supply the material and weapons should be made to try it in real conditions. After Both the world wars men took off uniform donned civvy's and tried to pick up their lives as if nothing had happened, now there is some help but why I ask should it be mainly charity? There should be properly funded places to ease the forces back into normal living again, "Whoa up" the politicians would have to give up their perks that would never do. Frank.
Better yet, have the politicians operate alongside front line forces, wearing the same rubbish protection they had in Iraq / Afghanistan. That would concentrate their minds.
It is an amazing film. My grandfather enlisted at 14 and the war shattered him. The ricochet is still cracking though our family four generations down.
What I found most surprising were personal angles I had never thought of. A war where whole companies had no toilet paper and to use their hands instead. No soap. No water. Scooping out water to boil from puddles were dead men lay. That “trench foot” is in fact gangrene and more people had amputations (wet and ice) from that than weapons fire. Sitting on a long plank in the open together to poo into a hole. nothing to sleep on.
It is boggling my brain that anyone could plan a campaign (even a short one) where soldiers don’t have some kind of shelter to sleep in. That a trench is quite literally a trench. That water provision was not organised. All quite mind blowing, after years of studying the war. Obvious, in a way, but new to me.
Fire, exactly and nothing much changes. In 1947-8-9 in Desert conditions water was rationed a gallon a day per man for all purposes. Toilet a spade a short walk into the desert dig a hole or not clean yourself with sand, no toilet paper wash your hands with petrol, we had plenty of that. Germany into the 60's in the field a log over a pit, water from mobile tankers and a strip of canvas stretched from the armoured vehicle, too cramped to sleep inside though we did at times and never sleep under them as they sank in soft ground. Our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan did their business in plastic bags then threw it in a fire pit that was kept burning. The people who lightly send our forces off to Battle think only of weapons and some ammunition, they are tough men and women they will manage somehow and they usually do but boy do they learn to hate politicians. Frank.
“ No toilet paper, no soap, no water! Forget ammunition and boots and uniforms that fit!” It’s not the jingoistic WW1 call to arms the govt issued, but it’s closer to the mark for some companies. Four years of body lice biting you is enough to drive anyone crazy.
AnniD, do not forget the lionesses, many women saw action in both WW1-2 and after though it has just become official they can join the troops at the front. In Germany it was the same log over the same trench only they had a strip of sack cloth round their end.
Fire, I came from abroad and met my wife, I was thinking it is not my Mr Universe looks or the sun blacked skin in a world of white, she said it was your humour? No that came from experience in the forces, if you did not laugh you would be forever crying. We loved the jingoism every song that echoed it had the words changed to more realistic ones. Lilly Marlene was heaven sent for that "D" Day Dodgers being the one most people knew. Smile lads smile you could be dead tomorrow. Being next to the Americans was good they were wide open to the sticky fingered Brits who were ace at making themselves comfortable, a silver lining to each cloud as they say. Frank.
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It should also be a law that the forces are never sent anywhere without the best and up to date kit. In 1947-8-9 we were using weapons and ammunition marked 1940 many times I would change magazines having used less than half because of stoppage, we got the new SLR rifles and Stirlings in 1957-8. The first SA 80 in use today were useless in Desert conditions yet they sent our forces to war. The people who supply the material and weapons should be made to try it in real conditions.
After Both the world wars men took off uniform donned civvy's and tried to pick up their lives as if nothing had happened, now there is some help but why I ask should it be mainly charity? There should be properly funded places to ease the forces back into normal living again, "Whoa up" the politicians would have to give up their perks that would never do.
Frank.
What I found most surprising were personal angles I had never thought of. A war where whole companies had no toilet paper and to use their hands instead. No soap. No water. Scooping out water to boil from puddles were dead men lay. That “trench foot” is in fact gangrene and more people had amputations (wet and ice) from that than weapons fire. Sitting on a long plank in the open together to poo into a hole. nothing to sleep on.
It is boggling my brain that anyone could plan a campaign (even a short one) where soldiers don’t have some kind of shelter to sleep in. That a trench is quite literally a trench. That water provision was not organised. All quite mind blowing, after years of studying the war. Obvious, in a way, but new to me.
Germany into the 60's in the field a log over a pit, water from mobile tankers and a strip of canvas stretched from the armoured vehicle, too cramped to sleep inside though we did at times and never sleep under them as they sank in soft ground.
Our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan did their business in plastic bags then threw it in a fire pit that was kept burning.
The people who lightly send our forces off to Battle think only of weapons and some ammunition, they are tough men and women they will manage somehow and they usually do but boy do they learn to hate politicians.
Frank.
Fire, I came from abroad and met my wife, I was thinking it is not my Mr Universe looks or the sun blacked skin in a world of white, she said it was your humour? No that came from experience in the forces, if you did not laugh you would be forever crying.
We loved the jingoism every song that echoed it had the words changed to more realistic ones. Lilly Marlene was heaven sent for that "D" Day Dodgers being the one most people knew. Smile lads smile you could be dead tomorrow.
Being next to the Americans was good they were wide open to the sticky fingered Brits who were ace at making themselves comfortable, a silver lining to each cloud as they say.
Frank.