D-Day + 70 Years ...

Blimey! Just calling in, and notice this hasn't come up at all here. The place must indeed be dyin'!


Today is the 70th Anniversary of D Day. I'd like to pay my humble respects and express gratitude to all those who gave their lives, and to those still living who served or helped in the largest amphibious landing in history.

And one of the few military acts very few around the world would dispute was 'a good thing'.


From all I've heard of and from those who were there, "heroism didn't enter into it".(Ah heroism, that grand example people (especially politicians) often seem to crave .... and always from others.)

If "heroism didn't enter into it", that is partly old-fashioned modesty. But such words also convey strong feelings that this is not what they relished doing, not what they wanted to do, but were trained to do: they simply did what they had to do, as best they could, in shocking conditions.

Not superhuman valour - they were scared, even terrified - but the best human courage. That sort of flesh-and-blood heroism, then. Not "pedestal heroism". Not ra-ra-ra, our glorious past, marble statue worship.

Many who experienced those bloody awful events have said the best way to commemorate D-Day is to do all we can to ensure it's never necessary again.

Which is exactly the same long-term message of many who survived the bloody awful morass of the trenches ... a century ago.

Damn straight. It's completely unimaginable to someone of my age. Such bravery and composure. Most likely our finest hour. Especially considering the last 20 years.

Not fundamentally disagreeing with that!

But actually Dan, one point I was trying to imply was that the circumstances (partly) mekketh the man. And woman. And human.

If anything cataclysmic like that should happen again - God forbid - of course you would get a lot running like hell not to be called up. (More than was the case in those days.) Conscription and national service are decades gone. And with the high (lifestyle) expectations of a different generation, you wouldn't easily get a genie back in an armed forces bottle. Etcetera.

However, the War generation were not born heroes, in any grandiose or otherworldly sense. They became heroes through necessity and some sense of having to do their best. Which they did, to a remarkable degree.

I mean no disservice to our parents' and grandparents' generation to say that they were human beings, acting extraordinarily.

And I'm not sure our present citizens wouldn't rise to a horrendous challenge and have their days enlivened - and lives blighted and terminated - in a similar way.

That's part of what I was trying to get at. I concede I may be in a very small minority in this view.


But I'm surprised - not in a po-faced, high-ground way, just literally surprised - nobody else here commented on D-Day. And I don't mean on this thread. I mean at all.

I was out buying oranges and bananas so I couldn't mention d day until now

PeterCS wrote:Not fundamentally disagreeing with that!

But actually Dan, one point I was trying to imply was that the circumstances (partly) mekketh the man. And woman. And human.

If anything cataclysmic like that should happen again - God forbid - of course you would get a lot running like hell not to be called up. (More than was the case in those days.) Conscription and national service are decades gone. And with the high (lifestyle) expectations of a different generation, you wouldn't easily get a genie back in an armed forces bottle. Etcetera.

However, the War generation were not born heroes, in any grandiose or otherworldly sense. They became heroes through necessity and some sense of having to do their best. Which they did, to a remarkable degree.

I mean no disservice to our parents' and grandparents' generation to say that they were human beings, acting extraordinarily.

And I'm not sure our present citizens wouldn't rise to a horrendous challenge and have their days enlivened - and lives blighted and terminated - in a similar way.

That's part of what I was trying to get at. I concede I may be in a very small minority in this view.


But I'm surprised - not in a po-faced, high-ground way, just literally surprised - nobody else here commented on D-Day. And I don't mean on this thread. I mean at all.

You must have missed my (earlier) post on the CDL, then.

Ah, apologies. I missed that.

A bad miss, you might think - where else to find a commemoration of the dead?

But ... as you know, I don't wander on to that thread much. And not only does it seem a bit too much like a mass grave, when I hope for something a bit better if the deceased is of any note. (It is not as if this Forum is awash with many dozens of new threads a day, that anything would slide off into Page 6 before seen.)

It's also I was wrongfooted by the "Celebrity ....". It often seems a serial marking of the popping of clogs by those in the media limelight, or who once were. Which is not quite the point or "spirit" of D-Day, I think.

Finally, I wanted also to celebrate the living, and the living legacy of the killed, such as (I hope) it is. Which doesn't fit on the CDL very well.

But anyway, I am sad I missed your (last) post. And FWIW, glad you made it.

lardbucket wrote:

PeterCS wrote:Not fundamentally disagreeing with that!

But actually Dan, one point I was trying to imply was that the circumstances (partly) mekketh the man. And woman. And human.

If anything cataclysmic like that should happen again - God forbid - of course you would get a lot running like hell not to be called up. (More than was the case in those days.) Conscription and national service are decades gone. And with the high (lifestyle) expectations of a different generation, you wouldn't easily get a genie back in an armed forces bottle. Etcetera.

However, the War generation were not born heroes, in any grandiose or otherworldly sense. They became heroes through necessity and some sense of having to do their best. Which they did, to a remarkable degree.

I mean no disservice to our parents' and grandparents' generation to say that they were human beings, acting extraordinarily.

And I'm not sure our present citizens wouldn't rise to a horrendous challenge and have their days enlivened - and lives blighted and terminated - in a similar way.

That's part of what I was trying to get at. I concede I may be in a very small minority in this view.


But I'm surprised - not in a po-faced, high-ground way, just literally surprised - nobody else here commented on D-Day. And I don't mean on this thread. I mean at all.

You must have missed my (earlier) post on the CDL, then.

Yep, I think a few of us were discussing the bravery of ordinary folk on there. Not necessarily D Day as such.

PeterCS wrote:Ah, apologies. I missed that.

A bad miss, you might think - where else to find a commemoration of the dead?

But ... as you know, I don't wander on to that thread much. And not only does it seem a bit too much like a mass grave, when I hope for something a bit better if the deceased is of any note. (It is not as if this Forum is awash with many dozens of new threads a day, that anything would slide off into Page 6 before seen.)

It's also I was wrongfooted by the "Celebrity ....". It often seems a serial marking of the popping of clogs by those in the media limelight, or who once were. Which is not quite the point or "spirit" of D-Day, I think.

Finally, I wanted also to celebrate the living, and the living legacy of the killed, such as (I hope) it is. Which doesn't fit on the CDL very well.

But anyway, I am sad I missed your (last) post. And FWIW, glad you made it.

No need to apologise. I will continue to wander off topic in virtually every thread ...

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On a less contemplative note, but a related theme ....

Did anyone else see the programme on Eric 'Winkle' Brown recently? Of the Fleet Air Arm, and suggested as Britain's finest ever pilot. Including being a test pilot who pulled off feats no one else could.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b045pbq2 < iPlayer running out, sadly. And probs available only in the UK, more's the pity.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/10868101/The-Extraordinary-Story-of-Captain-Winkle-Brown-BBC-Two-review.html < a review. (Why only 3 stars??)


I found it, and him, staggering. The newsreel was amazing, the guy an astounding one-man history tour who had taken on a whole range of key roles of the 1930s onwards. And not just the flying!

They should bottle the programme and sell it. (Well, I suppose that's what DVDs and downloads do.) I'd watch it again.

Just one of the many astounding things: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_flown_by_Eric_%22Winkle%22_Brown < bloody hell! :o