2014 & the UK Commonwealth.

2014 will be a year of commemoration. A militaristic nation with a massive army and the worlds second largest navy invaded Belgium our coastal neighbour. Don't cheapen the sacrifice made for all the right reasons by spouting the trendy meme that it was all for nothing.

The UK and Commonwealth armed forces went to war over Germany's invasion of Poland which was not a threat to us and entered The Napoleonic wars because France invaded Switzerland. Ask the people of Belgium or Alsace Lorraine if they think The Great War (World War 1) was all for nothing.

Before any one chimes in that The US only entered both global conflicts when it was all over, the real fighting was done, and it was clear which way things were going to go, I urge you to bear in mind that ordinary people made huge sacrifices because they were raised to tell the difference between right and wrong and are deserving of our respect and gratitude.

reply to post by hotel1

Belgium was definitely the emotional trigger for the populace at large.
Some years ago I was preparing a dissertation by reading through a small denominational newspaper of the time (the Primitive Methodist Leader).
One week an editorial by a church leader was pouring scorn on the idea of going to war over Austrian threats or attacks against Serbia. Who would think of fighting for Serbia, that bandit nation?
In the following week's edition, though, the invasion of Belgium had already taken place and his whole attitude was turned by 180 degrees. The fight was on.

reply to post by DISRAELI


Grateful for your reply. What bothers me is that in our modern comfortable life we scoff at the people of the past and smugly feel superior by erroneously believing that they were naive and not as switched on as we today are. The people who made those sacrifices considered themselves as alive and as with it as we do today, and to glibly say that what they did was all in vain is a distasteful slur on their memory and all that they stood for.

Kind regards.
h1

reply to post by hotel1

The main problem with the Great War is that things were often handled badly, and historic resentment of this gets confused with the issue of whether it should have been happening at all.
But what was the alternative? Letting the Germans have their way?

At the end of the war the House of Commons officially thanked God for "deliverance from the threat of German domination", which Churchill deliberately repeated at the end of the next war. As far as he was concerned, it was the same issue both times.

reply to post by DISRAELI

You clearly have a firm understanding of the political situation and the human perspective that leads to the views often voiced today. One example that I think helps to explain the ambiguity is understanding how a British mother that lost her three sons in the war would feel about Belgian sovereignty, and a government minister forced to look at the wider picture of a huge and very real threat to the future of this country by a dominant Germany.