Honour in Combat, Mk IIa

[John Kettler]

JonS,

Good catch! I got so wrapped up in trying to capture the main topic that I let that part slip inadvertently. Even so, can you imagine what it must've been like hauling badly wounded men out of the basement with fires burning furiously and the shell shattered building ready to go at any time?

Not my idea of fun!

As for the truce, I know the parties involved agreed to a ceasefire, but unless specifically agreed to, does that automatically include a positional freeze as well? I don't know.

Regards,

John Kettler

[JonS]

Originally posted by John Kettler:

I got so wrapped up in trying to capture the main topic that I let that part slip inadvertently.

Really? It struck me as an entirely standard part of your usual program of mis-representation, selective quoting, and distortion. I still don't know whether it's through general ignorance or deliberate deception, but as I said before: a post from you is like a perverse gold standard.

JonS

[John Kettler]

Mr. Jingles and JonS,

Same source as before.

Page 380.

Commander of SS Panzer Division Hohenstauffen does a Saddam (uses a human shield) by putting a British POW enclosure on the grounds of his HQ, specifically to keep his HQ safe from air attack.

Pages 465, 466.

German defenders, mostly teens and seniors, gleefully shred the American airborne making the terrible Waal River assault crossing, then try to surrender when stormed by the enraged survivors of said crossing with SMGs and grenades. Many defenders are simply shot on the spot.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by John D Salt:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Dave Stockhoff:

In the previous thread, I just noticed the following statement made, I believe, by John D Salt.

"A classic example is Herr Doktor Goebbels' assertion that it was the British who first invented the concentration camp in the Boer War; not true, but so widely repeated by now that it may as well be."

If this is false, then why?

Because Kitchener copied the technique from the system of quadrillage used on Cuba during the Spanish-American war.</font>

[Michael Emrys]

Mike,

This subject has come up for recent discussion in soc.history.war.world-war-ii. You might try googling Cuba 1870 and seeing what you come up with.

Michael

[John Kettler]

Mr. Jingles,

Was researching General Khudyakov as part of a Kursk discussion, when up popped this provocative and deeply disturbing dissection of Allied late war bombing practices in Europe.

http://www.shunpiking.com/ol0207/0207-SW-rd2berlin.htm

Looks like a must read for you.

Regards,

John Kettler

[David I]

John,

I don't know, this guy sounds like a hack. Drawing unrelated events into some kind of consperacy theory, combined with total Allied incompetence/murderous intent/overwelming superiority/etc smells like an axe to grind to me. Both the Russians and the Western Allies fought this war with no hindsight. Both of them suffered at the hands of the German Military Machine. What is the best strategy? What are the best tactics? What is an adequate reserve? Can Airpower win it alone? What are the Strategic and Political ramifications? All unknown at the time. But I know the same thing most of the German General Staff knew by 1943 - the Nazi's got Germany into a war it could not win.

DavidI

[John Kettler]

David I,

I grant that some of it seems more than a bit out there, but consider a) how "Bomber" Harris was treated after the War, being blamed for the slaughter caused by policies dictated by Churchill,

Churchill's previously described direct involvement as First Sea Lord of the Admiralty in engineering the armed merchant cruiser, ammo laden Lusitania's sinking (see Griffin's THE CREATURE FROM JEKYLL ISLAND and Simpson's LUSITANIA), helping drag the U.S. into World War I. Concerning this event he wrote, "Supreme excellence in strategy lies in the sudden introduction of a powerful ally." It was the British who provided the incendiary Zimmerman telegram, too, in which Germany offered Mexico California and other parts of the nation if it would enter the war against the U.S. Recall, too, that it was Churchill who essentially announced the Cold War, with his Iron Curtain speech.

History shows Churchill was prepared to go to any lengths if he thought he needed to, which included

authorizing the dropping of anthrax bombs on Germany if Germany used chemical weapons (tests of such a bomb contaminated Gruinard Island for many decades, and it probably still is "hot" despite contradicting statements) and mining neutral Swedish waters. Churchill also figures heavily in the destroyers for bases and U.S. convoy escorts to Britain, even though we weren't at war. That led to the torpedoing of the the U.S. destroyer Reuben James. He wanted the U.S. in the war. Nor are U.S. hands clean, for Roosevelt wanted a war against Germany and went along with Churchill, while creating a backdoor war approach via Japan.

The link provides a summary of many of the key aspects of this.

http://whatreallyhappened.com/pearl/www.geocities.com/Pentagon/6315/pearl.html

Further, the CFR's own records (quoted in Sklar, Ed., TRILATERALISM) clearly show that the American entry into the War was deliberately delayed until its commercial rivals were so spent that the U.S. would be able to dominate the global marketplace after the War. Moreover, so clearly did the CFR recognize how unpalatable politically and propagandistically disastrous it would be were this information to get out that it called for a high sounding statement of principle, the result of which was the famous "Freedoms" speech by Roosevelt.

As for the Russians, Stalin had his eye on the prize in Europe long before the ailing Roosevelt

got it, and deftly maneuvered at the conferences

to facilitate planned post War actions on the Continent, meanwhile, he had agents on the ground quietly laying the groundwork for a whole series of swift moves which installed a whole string of Communist governments seemingly overnight once the Red Army arrived on the scene.

Regards,

John Kettler