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Sunday, April 26, 2009
Honouring Anzac Day
Anzac Day, today, commemorates Australian and New Zealand servicemen who sacrificed their lives for their countries and ours. Let's remember them and what they did in the cause of freedom.
Well said Iain. I visited Western Australia on holiday in 2005 and was very impressed by the number of War Memorials and commemorative gardens dedicated to the ANZACS. I stayed in Rockingham about 30 miles south of Perth and was amazed at the size of the memorial area in what was a fairly small town. All appeared to be kept in excellent condition, with no vandalism or grafitti. I am old enough to remember when those comments applied to this country.
We should remember all those service people who died for us, fighting tyranny and for our freedoms. We should remember all of them; those who still die and suffer fighting to stop terror and intolerance from coming to our shores.
Just seen your tasteless attack on Jack Jones - you are totally free to point out your views about the influence of Trade Union leaders during the 1970s but using the death of one of them as an opportunity to do so is little more than dancing on his grave. You have had plenty of opportunity to express your views about Jack Jones in recent years (when at least he could answer back) and you can do so in the future after a decent interval - but of course you get far more cheap publicity if you do so now.
And yes if anyone wants to do the same with Margaret Thatcher they will be equally tasteless.
Perhaps one thing that you missed out about Jack Jones was that he was fighting fascism in Spain while the Party to which you belong was appeasing it. Perhaps one way to honour the Anzacs is not to be selective in retelling history.
I hope that if ever we are in combat on the scale of WW2 again, Churchill's hope that the New World would help the Old World would come true. The Aussies and the Kiwis need to be kept as close to our hearts as any nation: they are our cousins, not only in culture but in blood and in heritage.
RIP all who died for us in the world wars, their sacrifice made a difference - they helped liberate the free world.
tory boys never grow up. Jack Jones was the worst kind of Union Leader you could ever meet. Iain's article was, in my opinion, absolutely spot on.
You may not remember when Maggie came to power but we had suffered years of Union domination. They controlled Wilson and Heath and the country was sick up to the eye balls with ever yone of them.
Jack Jones and his ilk ensured that Unions lost the mass membership they had in those days, when Maggie and the Tories rid this country of their undemocratic and communistic rituals -especially the utterly despised 'flying pickets'
But is it not typical of a latter day, johnny come lately,class war warrior such as 'tory boys never grow up' to use a blog which is honouring those thousands of Australian and New Zealand Boys and Men who volunteered, in two world wars, to fight alongside us!
I, like Sunray, was so impressed at the number of excellent War memorials throughout Australia. Bt especially the National one in Canberra, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne.
Let's not forget also that after the (2nd) war Australia/NZ were well and truly shafted by the British when Heath, Jenkins, etc decided we must join the wretched 'Common Market' which as we all know morphed into the vile 'EU'. In doing this we stuffed one of their main export markets, causing significant economic pain for them. I believe some ministerial numpty even said something to the effect that it will be easier for ex German soldiers to work in the UK than Australians/Kiwis. That went down like a lead balloon and quite rightly. Also the use of the soil of Australia to test British nuclear weapons, incredibly Australian PM Robert Menzies allowed the British to detonate atom weapons in the outback AND ordered that Australian troops be involved - as with fellow British soldiers, many have experienced appalling cancers etc since. While the ANZACS are rightly remembered in their own country our lousy governments over the years have betrayed the loyalty of the ANZACS, so no surprise when Australia finally becomes a republic that the treatment handed out by Britain will be cited as one of the reasons. The fact that nobody cares about Australia moving away from Britain in Britain itself, is probably even more hurtful - insult added to injury.
As a Scote emigrant to Queensland I'll just say thanks on behalf of my Australian associates.
So what if you were off by a day - the time zone difference is enough to do your nut in anyway. You thought about it. You published it and your contribution did not go un-noticed.
Lets not forget WW1 where the Australian divisions were among the best in the 'British' Army. New Zealanders and Canadians likewise.
I really do not care much for Antipodean attitudes, the usual anti American crowd usually care to forget inherent Aussie racism. Culturally they leave me a bit cold and their sporting 'prowess' irritates the hell out of me.
But I would be the first to want them on my side in a fight.
No perhaps the best way to honour the ANZACs is to take your socialst comments and put them in a place more appropriate.
This thread was created as a small remembrance of those who died alongside our families, who fought and won two World Wars alongside us, not a place to champion a misguided communist who fought - and lost - in a forgotten war in Spain.
Fighting fascism was mentioned in the original thread, it's just that the consensus amongst the conservative posters seemed to be that that was a bad thing. The late Generalissimo still has quite the fan club.
I'm surprised no one here has written anything about Gallipoli. The myth that this was exclusively an ANZAC disaster has become established as fact.
It was Rupert Murdoch's father Keith who propagated the Gallipoli 'story' in Australia, accusing British leadership of sending heroic Aussie troops to a pointless death. In fact far more Brits died at Gallipoli than Aussies.
Murdoch was spinning against Prime Minister Asquith, whose government was not serving his business interests.
Afterwards Murdoch lionised Australian troops fighting and dying on the western front in far greater numbers, once Lloyd George became PM.
The Murdochs are still in the business of manufacturing war myth.
Without Murdoch compliance, New Labour would not have been able to back Bush into Iraq and get away with WMD.
I saw an Anzac Day march in 1972 in Adelaide. It was extremely moving watching the mostly WW2 veterans' faces. Few would be left now. But Murdoch's war myths have lived on, as has government control and manipulation of media remained unchallenged....until the blogs arrived!
Australians along with Brits and othger allies made the ultimate sacrifice in WWI and WWII. Unlike us, the Australian govts Labour and Liberal, Rudd's govt for example, unlike Brown et al.remember the sacrifice of their soldiers. Brown was so mean that he did not want to finance the probably the last trip of a few living WWII veterans to Normandy. Only when he learnt about Obama's participation there did he relent to release funds. He had the funds to send a private plane to bring back a Somali terrorist interned at Guantanamo Bay who is not even a British citizen. This Somali says he went to Afghanistan to cure his drug addiction. He faked British passport and he is welcome to enjoy the benefits we tax payers fund. Our soldiers coming from Iraq are spat at and they are asked to join the NHS queue if they need medical treatement. Brown the idiot and his govt has a lot to learn from Rudd and his govt in honouring those who fought for us to enjoy the freedom which this Somali and like him are misusing. Get rid of this filthy Labour.
If there is a political link, the British Commander at Gallipoli was General Sir Ian Hamilton (it should have been Sir Horace Smith-Dorrian but he was taken ill- had he done so, the result would have been much different- Smith-Dorrian was one of the best British Commanders in the war)
Hamilton was a humane thoroughly decent, charming and witty man who happened to be a totally incompetant general.Indeed after the war he endorsed Ramsay MacDonald's Labour Government and was seriously considered by MacDonald as Secretary of State for War in 1924.
Britain lost 21,255 dead in the campaign, Australia lost 8,709, New Zealand lost 2,701 and France also had 10,000 killed. The Turks, who proved formidable opponents lost 86,692 dead. Even so, one should not begrudge the Aussies and Kiwis taking over Gallipoli as their defeat though we should always remember men of regiments such as the Lancashire Fusiliers, The Norfolks, the Dubliners, the South Wales Borderers and the many other battalions who fought and died there.
Four future Field Marshalls, one future Prime Minister and one future President fought at Gallipoli: Bird, Blamey, Harding and Bill Slim who was probably the best British Commander of the 2nd World War, Attlee an Honourable and honest but misguided man who must be turning in his grave at the behaviour of the present Labour Party Leadership and Kemal Ataturk who brought Turkey into the 20th Century
One assumes Jamieson that you are referring to Birdwood (not Bird). Another officer who fought there and later received his baton was Julian Byng, who as commander of IX corps was one of many who advised Kitchener to withdraw and then supervised the withdrawal. He then went on to fame at Vimy Ridge in command of Canadians, oversaw Cambrai and then commanded Britain's largest army during 1918. Byng will go down in history as the man who got screwed over by Mackenzie-King in the "King-Byng affair" when he refused to grant Mackenzie-King a dissolution of Parliament.
Quite right- I should have written "Birdwood" and indeed forgotten Byng.
Hamilton cabled Kitchener asking for younger generals to replace Stopford, Mahon and Hammersley and although Kitchener had previously told Hamilton he could not have Byng to take over IX Corps to take over from the useless Stopford he had to reverse his decision
Overall the Aussies and the Kiwis proportionally suffered more fatalities than Britain. Attlee thought the strategy was right but the tactics wrong.
Owing to intiial resitance from Kitchener who did not ensure there were sufficient forces with the proper equipment to fight a long campaign (this of course is what is happening today) and for modern-day Britain, Australia, New Zealand, France, Ireland and Turkey this is an anniversary that should not be forgotten.
My hero of Gallipoli by the way is an Australian/Englishman born a Geordie with a Scots name. He was Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick V.C.of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance Company.
An amendment to my previous posting. I said that John Simpson Kirkpatrick had been awarded a VC. Not so-there have been petitions but he was certainly Mentioned in Despatches.
1. More British soldiers died at Gallipoli than ANZACS.
2. It was the birth of two nations.
3. Ant fair observer, who has visited Gallipoli, must accept and honor that Turkey is among the most generous of nations in allowing Aussies and Kiwis full honour at the site.
4. The Foriegn Office made one of it's worse errors in underestimating Kemal Ataturk, truly one of the Great Men of the 20th century.
27 comments:
Iain, No doubt others will also point this out. Anzac Day is 25th April.
Well said Iain. I visited Western Australia on holiday in 2005 and was very impressed by the number of War Memorials and commemorative gardens dedicated to the ANZACS. I stayed in Rockingham about 30 miles south of Perth and was amazed at the size of the memorial area in what was a fairly small town.
All appeared to be kept in excellent condition, with no vandalism or grafitti. I am old enough to remember when those comments applied to this country.
Iain, I'm pretty sure you're wrong.
I think Anzac day was yesterday - my birthday.
The sentiments are appropriate though and better late than never.
Eternal rest give unto them
and let perpetual light shine upon them for ever and ever
Isn't Anzac day the 25th?
We should remember all those service people who died for us, fighting tyranny and for our freedoms. We should remember all of them; those who still die and suffer fighting to stop terror and intolerance from coming to our shores.
Just seen your tasteless attack on Jack Jones - you are totally free to point out your views about the influence of Trade Union leaders during the 1970s but using the death of one of them as an opportunity to do so is little more than dancing on his grave. You have had plenty of opportunity to express your views about Jack Jones in recent years (when at least he could answer back) and you can do so in the future after a decent interval - but of course you get far more cheap publicity if you do so now.
And yes if anyone wants to do the same with Margaret Thatcher they will be equally tasteless.
Perhaps one thing that you missed out about Jack Jones was that he was fighting fascism in Spain while the Party to which you belong was appeasing it. Perhaps one way to honour the Anzacs is not to be selective in retelling history.
OK, yes I know it was yesterday, but all the services are being held today, I believe.
I hope that if ever we are in combat on the scale of WW2 again, Churchill's hope that the New World would help the Old World would come true. The Aussies and the Kiwis need to be kept as close to our hearts as any nation: they are our cousins, not only in culture but in blood and in heritage.
RIP all who died for us in the world wars, their sacrifice made a difference - they helped liberate the free world.
tory boys never grow up. Jack Jones was the worst kind of Union Leader you could ever meet. Iain's article was, in my opinion, absolutely spot on.
You may not remember when Maggie came to power but we had suffered years of Union domination. They controlled Wilson and Heath and the country was sick up to the eye balls with ever yone of them.
Jack Jones and his ilk ensured that Unions lost the mass membership they had in those days, when Maggie and the Tories rid this country of their undemocratic and communistic rituals -especially the utterly despised 'flying pickets'
But is it not typical of a latter day, johnny come lately,class war warrior such as 'tory boys never grow up' to use a blog which is honouring those thousands of Australian and New Zealand Boys and Men who volunteered, in two world wars, to fight alongside us!
I, like Sunray, was so impressed at the number of excellent War memorials throughout Australia. Bt especially the National one in Canberra, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne.
May they never grow old!
Thank you.
Let's not forget also that after the (2nd) war Australia/NZ were well and truly shafted by the British when Heath, Jenkins, etc decided we must join the wretched 'Common Market' which as we all know morphed into the vile 'EU'. In doing this we stuffed one of their main export markets, causing significant economic pain for them. I believe some ministerial numpty even said something to the effect that it will be easier for ex German soldiers to work in the UK than Australians/Kiwis. That went down like a lead balloon and quite rightly. Also the use of the soil of Australia to test British nuclear weapons, incredibly Australian PM Robert Menzies allowed the British to detonate atom weapons in the outback AND ordered that Australian troops be involved - as with fellow British soldiers, many have experienced appalling cancers etc since.
While the ANZACS are rightly remembered in their own country our lousy governments over the years have betrayed the loyalty of the ANZACS, so no surprise when Australia finally becomes a republic that the treatment handed out by Britain will be cited as one of the reasons. The fact that nobody cares about Australia moving away from Britain in Britain itself, is probably even more hurtful - insult added to injury.
As a Scote emigrant to Queensland I'll just say thanks on behalf of my Australian associates.
So what if you were off by a day - the time zone difference is enough to do your nut in anyway. You thought about it. You published it and your contribution did not go un-noticed.
Lets not forget WW1 where the Australian divisions were among the best in the 'British' Army. New Zealanders and Canadians likewise.
I really do not care much for Antipodean attitudes, the usual anti American crowd usually care to forget inherent Aussie racism. Culturally they leave me a bit cold and their sporting 'prowess' irritates the hell out of me.
But I would be the first to want them on my side in a fight.
To: tory boys never grow up
No perhaps the best way to honour the ANZACs is to take your socialst comments and put them in a place more appropriate.
This thread was created as a small remembrance of those who died alongside our families, who fought and won two World Wars alongside us, not a place to champion a misguided communist who fought - and lost - in a forgotten war in Spain.
Shame on you.
And on a slightly lighter note always remember that Australia and Britain share a common bond. We are both decended from the same criminals.
What about a day for Gurkha's?
TBNGU,
Fighting fascism was mentioned in the original thread, it's just that the consensus amongst the conservative posters seemed to be that that was a bad thing. The late Generalissimo still has quite the fan club.
I'm surprised no one here has written anything about Gallipoli. The myth that this was exclusively an ANZAC disaster has become established as fact.
It was Rupert Murdoch's father Keith who propagated the Gallipoli 'story' in Australia, accusing British leadership of sending heroic Aussie troops to a pointless death. In fact far more Brits died at Gallipoli than Aussies.
Murdoch was spinning against Prime Minister Asquith, whose government was not serving his business interests.
Afterwards Murdoch lionised Australian troops fighting and dying on the western front in far greater numbers, once Lloyd George became PM.
The Murdochs are still in the business of manufacturing war myth.
Without Murdoch compliance, New Labour would not have been able to back Bush into Iraq and get away with WMD.
I saw an Anzac Day march in 1972 in Adelaide. It was extremely moving watching the mostly WW2 veterans' faces. Few would be left now. But Murdoch's war myths have lived on, as has government control and manipulation of media remained unchallenged....until the blogs arrived!
I think we should also remember the 40000 UK soldiers who died there in addition to the 11000 ANZACs - they are often forgotten
Australians along with Brits and othger allies made the ultimate sacrifice in WWI and WWII. Unlike us, the Australian govts Labour and Liberal, Rudd's govt for example, unlike Brown et al.remember the sacrifice of their soldiers. Brown was so mean that he did not want to finance the probably the last trip of a few living WWII veterans to Normandy. Only when he learnt about Obama's participation there did he relent to release funds. He had the funds to send a private plane to bring back a Somali terrorist interned at Guantanamo Bay who is not even a British citizen. This Somali says he went to Afghanistan to cure his drug addiction. He faked British passport and he is welcome to enjoy the benefits we tax payers fund. Our soldiers coming from Iraq are spat at and they are asked to join the NHS queue if they need medical treatement. Brown the idiot and his govt has a lot to learn from Rudd and his govt in honouring those who fought for us to enjoy the freedom which this Somali and like him are misusing. Get rid of this filthy Labour.
Tapestry: Spot On mate.
Like you I've just discovered the power of the BLOG. Here's my attempt.
http://plonquer.blogspot.com
Tell me what you think. Think I might be the next Rupert?
My only probl;em with blogging is that its a penny for your thoughts but you put your two cents in. Somebody's making a penny.
Major Plonquer
If there is a political link, the British Commander at Gallipoli was General Sir Ian Hamilton (it should have been Sir Horace Smith-Dorrian but he was taken ill- had he done so, the result would have been much different- Smith-Dorrian was one of the best British Commanders in the war)
Hamilton was a humane thoroughly decent, charming and witty man who happened to be a totally incompetant general.Indeed after the war he endorsed Ramsay MacDonald's Labour Government and was seriously considered by MacDonald as Secretary of State for War in 1924.
Britain lost 21,255 dead in the campaign, Australia lost 8,709, New Zealand lost 2,701 and France also had 10,000 killed. The Turks, who proved formidable opponents lost 86,692 dead. Even so, one should not begrudge the Aussies and Kiwis taking over Gallipoli as their defeat though we should always remember men of regiments such as the Lancashire Fusiliers, The Norfolks, the Dubliners, the South Wales Borderers and the many other battalions who fought and died there.
Four future Field Marshalls, one future Prime Minister and one future President fought at Gallipoli: Bird, Blamey, Harding and Bill Slim who was probably the best British Commander of the 2nd World War, Attlee an Honourable and honest but misguided man who must be turning in his grave at the behaviour of the present Labour Party Leadership and Kemal Ataturk who brought Turkey into the 20th Century
One assumes Jamieson that you are referring to Birdwood (not Bird). Another officer who fought there and later received his baton was Julian Byng, who as commander of IX corps was one of many who advised Kitchener to withdraw and then supervised the withdrawal. He then went on to fame at Vimy Ridge in command of Canadians, oversaw Cambrai and then commanded Britain's largest army during 1918. Byng will go down in history as the man who got screwed over by Mackenzie-King in the "King-Byng affair" when he refused to grant Mackenzie-King a dissolution of Parliament.
Quite right- I should have written "Birdwood" and indeed forgotten Byng.
Hamilton cabled Kitchener asking for younger generals to replace Stopford, Mahon and Hammersley and although Kitchener had previously told Hamilton he could not have Byng to take over IX Corps to take over from the useless Stopford he had to reverse his decision
Overall the Aussies and the Kiwis proportionally suffered more fatalities than Britain. Attlee thought the strategy was right but the tactics wrong.
Owing to intiial resitance from Kitchener who did not ensure there were sufficient forces with the proper equipment to fight a long campaign (this of course is what is happening today) and for modern-day Britain, Australia, New Zealand, France, Ireland and Turkey this is an anniversary that should not be forgotten.
My hero of Gallipoli by the way is an Australian/Englishman born a Geordie with a Scots name. He was Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick V.C.of the 3rd Australian Field Ambulance Company.
An amendment to my previous posting. I said that John Simpson Kirkpatrick had been awarded a VC. Not so-there have been petitions but he was certainly Mentioned in Despatches.
1. More British soldiers died at Gallipoli than ANZACS.
2. It was the birth of two nations.
3. Ant fair observer, who has visited Gallipoli, must accept and honor that Turkey is among the most generous of nations in allowing Aussies and Kiwis full honour at the site.
4. The Foriegn Office made one of it's worse errors in underestimating Kemal Ataturk, truly one of the Great Men of the 20th century.
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