HBG

I’ve got to write as fast as I can because the two-minutes silence is only minutes away. The Chinese don’t know what to make of it and the Germans have never cottoned on to the habit.

My local ‘English’ Church will have the banners flying and old men with medals will be standing to attention.

I think it’s worth remembering.

steviedeluxe

I trust it was a suitably moving ceremony. We still have (futile?) wars today, but it's hard to understand how thousands of lives were sent to their doom daily in WW1. May their souls rest in peace.

HBG

I read about the riots in London yesterday and some disturbances during Poppy day itself. Nothing appears sacred and Cameron shouldn’t be surprised that the police allowed demonstrators to smash up the Tory headquarters, having cut their bill by 25%.

People power, good or bad, is firmly established in our democracy, and so it should be. My 11.11.11 post doesn’t appear to have raised much interest, that’s democracy too.

The 10.10.10 one did much better, response wise. It’s a funny world.

Trixie_b

I didn't see it - I also did an 11am - 11/11 post.

I took myself off somewhere private to remember like I do every year.

Dick Dasterdly

HBG, because ppl.don't all choose to post their thoughts on a public forum, does not necessarily mean that they don't care.
From what I have personally seen, the vast majority of decent ppl. do still care,... and care very much.

agoreira

Agree, certainly everything stops here, there's still a great deal of respect shown. Apart from the Muslim fanatics, are we too tolerant in UK?

AlanGNW

I think there's an historical reason for that...

HBG

I stand corrected, Dick. I wasn’t looking for an argument on the topic and if you’re looking for total agreement, what’s the point of posting on a discussion forum?

One small point, my local paper, the Costa Blanca News, had an appropriate story along with a photograph of the parade at the local Church. It’s in the paper edition, but not in the digital one, unfortunately, I was going to post the link here.

I attended as a visitor because I’ve only got one medal, and the good old boys there have several, rows of them. I was privileged to be in their company, nevertheless.

Dick Dasterdly

Fair enough,I just got the impression you were a little disappointed with the lack of response to your first post, which is quite understandable.
As someone who spends quite a bit of time back in the UK, I can only say from what I have seen, that the respect,sympathy and understanding with regard to Remembrance day etc. seems to me to be as strong as ever, despite the fact that so much time has passed since the two big wars, and not everyone has been in agreement with involvement in some of the more recent conflicts.

johnnyone

I agree. However I think the amount of casualties resulting from the Afghan war is beginning to hit home in the Uk and whether we agree with the war or not people generally support their injured troops who are carrying out orders from the Government unconditionally.

Dick Dasterdly

Since most of our lads were pulled out of Helmand province, it's not been quite as bad.
It used to be about one loss each day, now it's more like one each week, but even that is still too many, and I have my doubts whether the whole thing is justified.
I see that one of the top army commanders said yesterday that it was a war that couldn't be won.
No great surprise to see history repeating itself I suppose.

bil

Me, I look at it all with horror. No-one, but no-one has ever conquered Afghanistan, so the disgusting, cocky boasting of the Yanks, about how they were going to turn it into 'Trashcanistan' always got my goat. Stupid people who were never quite bright enough to even glance at the lesson of history, much less learn from it. Then, without bothering to consolidate their fast gains in Afghanistan, they rush off into Iraq.

I thought everyone knew that the standard way to victory when faced with superior firepower was to fall back, and harry, harry harry till the enemy bleeds from a thousand small cuts.

The Normans used it to beat the French, and the Vietcong did the same in Vietnam. Had Harold done it to William, the norman conquest would have been a failure, with William having to slink back to France with his tail between his legs.

Now the Taliban are using it on the Yanks, and we all know that barring a 'Deus ex Machina' moment, we are doomed to see a semipermanent stalemate, or in the end as in Saigon, the Yanks will run home with their asses whipped, and their tails between their legs.

Worst of all, the great and the good, (as well as the vomitously stupid and dishonest ie Duh-bya and Bliar) hide behind the injured troops and accuse those of us that decry the war as being disloyal to the troops. In reality, the troops are being treated like trash by our leaders, and are being thrown on the bonfire that is Afghanistan.

Going back to 11.11.11. Another view of the conflict has been that just looking at UK society, WW1 did a damn good job in weeding out enough of the upper levels of a society that was becoming fossilised, allowing the lower sections of society to become more socially moblie.

Rather like the Black Death, which in shattering British social structure freed the working man from the slavery of the existing system.

HBG

I think most people, including out top military leaders, believe that the ‘war’ in Afghanistan in unwinnable. To win, you would have to kill the entire population and start again with imported people of your choice, as we tried in Ulster and that didn’t work either.

Unfortunately we are now stuck with a ‘war’ against Islam, whether we like to admit it or not. What do we (the West) do next? Bomb Iran? Invade Yemen? Completely close our borders? It’s too late for that, the Muslims are here in great numbers and produce more babies than we do.

The military leader whose account I read earlier admitted that the best we can achieve is an environment for our children that is as safe as possible, but it will never be completely safe for our successors.

Maybe banning religion will one day become a reality, and if there are no places of worship left then the terrorists will have nowhere to become radicalised.

Realistically, when we wear our poppies in years to come, the number of our soldiers who died for us will continue to increase.

bil

Tom Paine wrote so long ago, “He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.”

Had the west treated the middle eastern countries thus and not abused them and inteferred in their business as we did, today we might not have these problems.

HBG

I hope it’s not too late to post this link, but I just came across it by chance.

http://www.torrevieja.com/eng/torrev...orrevieja.html