How short is the memory?
 

70 civilians killed on raid of stolen tankers.
The Taliban stole them and the Germans are outraged that they were blown to hell. :confused:
How many children were slaughtered by the Germans for nothing?
How many men, women and children suffered at the hands of the Germans?
What should the Americans have done, send them a message saying 'Come out with your hands up?'
I doubt that the people receiving stolen goods were aware of the danger but that is down to the thieves not the defenders.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

what do ya expect from the krauts? aint forgiven US fer 66.:rolleyes:;)

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Read this Cashy:

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Merkel urges Afghan raid inquiry

How can someone in my lifetime convince me that the death of my Dad was down to the Japs and the death of his brother to the Germans never happened.
I am no lover of either of these peoples and perhaps never will be.
The Japanese hopefully have been held in check but the Germans are as arrogant as always. We are still committed to the EU with Germany.
I hope the outcome is favourable when Brown stops his creeping but I doubt it. :mad:

Re: How short is the memory?
 

cheeky bitch, if the krauts n some of the other so- called NATO allies were pulling their weight in afghanistan, perhaps we would be a damn site nearer handing over.:rolleyes:

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Come on guys , for the past fifty odd years the Brits and the US have been having temper tantrums anytime there was a mention of the German Nato forces having decent weapons going into action , (dreams of the Wehrmacht (sp?) marching down Pall Mall to Admiralty Arch ). So now they are being allowed a limited role in Afghanistan (Because the Brits and Yanks need help) and they screw up , the German forces are on a leaning curve , not being allowed to fight in combat since 45, mistakes happen , As per usual the politicians jump in (this time Angela Merkal) and make asses of themselves .

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thats true steeljack, still don't detract from the fact shes a silly bitch though.:D

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Definatly agree , they are her troops she should be supporting them right or wrong (in public at least) , also to be remembered the majority of German forces are still young conscripts (they still have National Service).

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See nobody mentioned the French:rolleyes:

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when we need advice on surrendering then naturally they will play their part .

happy now? :D

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And they learned it from the Italians:rolleyes:

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got to pull you up there Accyman..the Frence Ressistance held very brave men and women that gave their lives knowing they would die when found by the Germans.. along with the Dutch.. these people were brave and deserve respect.

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I don't think anybody doubts the great contribution the resistance made during the war, but if the hadn't been hamstrung by he Vichy government of France in that period maybe there efforts would ave been more effective

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The Swiss had the best idea, stay neutral and make money out of both sides.

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You can't blame the German people now for something that happened 70 years ago. That is just ludicrous. Blowing up the oil tanker was a bit extreme in these conditions. It's ridiculous to compare it to the Holocaust though - something that the Germans are very embarrassed about to this day.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

not quite the case, having spent time in germany there is STILL a small percentage that are certainly NOT embarrassed.

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It didn't seem to be the case when I was there last summer, and my brother were there for four years. He never had any problems with people being supportive of the Nazis in the 30's and 40's.

Although, I cannot argue with your experiences. There always is a small proportion of idiots though in all societys - a la BNP members and supporters in this country.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

yer last paragraph was my point, wasn't having a pop or owt.;)

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It's OK, I never felt that you were doing http://www.thefootballforum.net/foru...ault/thumb.gif

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The story now going the rounds in Afgan is that when General McChrystal asked the German commander to accompany him to the incident site the German replied that it was not currently a good idea as ..."we might get shot at."

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C'mon ... there are lots of French doing their part in Afghanistan ... for some strange reason tho', they are wearing the Maple Leaf:confused:

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I think I'll line up with Royboy on this one (the guy who's going to owe me forty bucks at the end of the season) ... seventy years is not nearly long enough for memories to fade. Tens of millions killed because of the Germans; remember, they started two world wars, what the hell, was one not enough? .... and I don't buy into the idea that there were only about a dozen Nazis, but they worked real hard ... they were in it almost to a man, all of them. There was no shortage of volunteers for even the dirtiest jobs, like dragging off children and the elderly to the ovens ... and does no one look at history and notice how weak and pathetic the opposition to the Nazis really was? Kriegslustig .... it's probably still there if you scratch the surface. I remember a comment from de Gaulle: when he heard that the German army had switched to rubber soled boots, he said "Ah, next time, we won't hear them coming."

The twentieth century was a bloodstained time. And it is the fault of the Germans.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

how much time is needed? its the same for many memories.. We english should be hated all over if memories never fade... being one of the most barbaric countries throughout history

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Twice, in one generation, the Germans dragged the world into the bloodiest wars in history ... England doesn't even come close to this .... and when you are bitching about your economic woes, remember that England spent its national treasure, and the best and bravest of its citizens to hold the Germans at bay.

Len Deighton put it well in "Blood, Tears, and Folly": "Half a century has passed, and the time has come to sweep away the myths and reveal the no less inspiring gleam of that complex and frightening time in which evil was in the ascendant, goodness diffident, and the British - impetuous, foolish and brave beyond measure - the world's only hope." This is your legacy, one to be proud of. The German legacy is, I believe, summed up in "evil was in the ascendant."

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Hating a nation of people for something that happened 70 years a go is just narrow minded. The people in the German army now certainly were not involved in the henious crimes of Nazi Germany.

The Nazis were a vile set of people, and no one is disputing that - but, for us to move on from it, we have to move on from something that involves people that are mainly dead now.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

I guess we will agree to differ. But to say the "Nazis were a vile set of people" is to set the Nazis apart from the rest of the Germans, who were, no doubt, misled and coerced. Unfortunately, that is not how it was. A good read on this subject is "Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust" by Daniel Goldhagen. And it is worthwhile to remember that millions who are "mainly dead now" were killed by the Germans.

Rather than forgive and forget, I prefer the attitude of Charles Hazlitt Upham, VC & Bar, 2nd. New Zealand Expeditionary Force, who, until his death in 1994 would not even allow a VW to drive on his land.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

I was on this earth seventy years ago as a baby in arms and am not dead yet.
Many of the extended families of the Brave Souls who perished in WWII are still alive and may think your post an insult.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

I've got family who fought in both wars - one member of my family recieved a VC in WWI.

Laurence Calvert - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Even speaking to my grandma I learnt much about how war life was. She doesn't hate all Germans.

When I said who are mainly dead now - I meant the perpetrators of the crimes. I just can't see what having lots of pent up anger and hate against people which is not their doing is going to achieve?

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Seems to me that all the forgiving and forgetting and appeasement in the thirties didn't get you all that far either. For me, it's the immensity of the German crimes against humanity that dominates .... and it's still with us .... the wars were so disruptive that we are still experiencing the aftershocks; the Middle East comes quickly to mind.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

When my Mom and Dad (Royal Navy 39-45) used to go on holiday to Spain in the 70s and 80s they much preferred staying at a place with older,similar in age to them Germans, they said it was a better holiday being away from the Bingo and Chips crowd ,When I asked him about how they got along , said no problem they are great folks and they were young lads just like him and his shipmates doing what they were told to do , no animosity on either side , both sides happy they had managed to survive .

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i feel and partly agree with comments above but as part of the human race you got to agree that you cannot type cast any person. To hate germans is like somebody said...its like voting BNP and hating in general. I dont know i find it hard....these subjects to speak my mind and not either offend or sound like a fool... but **** it i have traded live concerts with A GERMAN FRIEND and he studies nazi past struggling to to understand why a family member fought in the war... and i know he has a passion for peace far beyond anybody i know... this is mostly why i commented in the thread

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Read in the Guardian today that Angela Merkel put pressure on the US and GM to support Magna's (a Canadian auto parts manufacturer) bid to take over GM's European operations, Vauxhall and Opel. She did this to protect the jobs of 20 thousand German workers .... so, it seems that most of the upcoming job cuts will be in, you guessed it, the UK.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Don't you just love them Germans:rolleyes:

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So, where was the gurning, grimacing incompetent who supposedly runs this country while all this was going on? Elsewhere, like he always is! :mad:

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You're being far too generous, there, Wynonnie.

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Your short memories delude you.
If you go back far enough - to the end of the last ice age to be precice - you will observe that we are a mixed population which is predominately Anglo Saxon (german) and Norman (french), with a bit of Viking (Norwegian) to spice up the mix with the Celts

What you are talking about here are recent 'family squabbles':rolleyes:

Re: How short is the memory?
 

WW1 - 6 million dead in Western Europe

WW2 - 40million dead in W.Europe and Russia.

Some family. Some squabble.

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You can't blame wars on the population of a country.
Their governments are the culprits.
The populations can only take the blame by neglecting to rid themselves of such governments.

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Absolute rubbish. The populations of Britain and France in 1914 were itching to get at the Germans and the same with them to us. Their governments were democratically elected and before you say not really, because women didn't have the vote - the women were worse than the men in their lust for war.

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Well if anyone would know that it is you - being 107 as you are:rolleyes:

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Funny you should mention this, but Merkel and the German govt. were prepared to put up loan guarantees for Magna. In return, the Germans keep their jobs (I do believe that Opel workers will own about 10% of the new operation), and those in the English factories are slated for that long, lonely ride down the tubes. Whether you agree with govt. stepping in to help private industry or not, I think you must agree that Merkel and company won this battle.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Is the first line of your arguement a defence of the German people?
There were hundreds of thousands of German soldiers who had families, has had the Nazis, who must have known what was going on.
I dont think your history is up to speed.
In the first and the second world war these people had been taught to kill.
They even had a trial run at Guernica in Spain to try out the mass bombing.
This was directed at civilians, well documented. The Germans were animals who wanted to create a pure race.
They selected that Bar steward who was'nt even German to lead them.
Forgive them.........never

Re: How short is the memory?
 

...and on top of that their women just shafted us 2-6 in the Euro womens' footy final.

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Ok. In terms of the First World War, you may have something of a point. But with the Second World War, no way. We are back to the argument which I mentioned before: There were only a few Nazis (the one's mentioned in that famous song to the tune of Colonel Bogey) ... but they worked real hard. Apart from a few, futile, stuttering attempts at assasinating Hitler, one of which gave rise to a recent crappy movie, the Germans were fully behind the Nazis .... look at how they fought to the very bitter end. If there had been a time to be generous to Germany, it was in 1919 ... but after what they did in the 30s and 40s, no way.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

You should enter that in Less's funny half hour...very amusing. :rolleyes:

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Surprising how no-one has mentioned how much support Oswald Mosley and the British Union had during the 30s , I imagine it would have been much higher , probably enough to form a Govt. if WW1 had gone the other way .

Re: How short is the memory?
 

i never mentioned it deliberatly steeljack, would have been accused of being political by the saddos, especially as they secretly funded Mosley.:rolleyes:

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Don't want to be a "Doubting Thomas/Jerimiah " I wouldn't anyone to lose their job, but I'm a suspicious sod , Manga is listed as being a Canadian company , but all the money to finance this deal is coming from a Russian bank and to me it stinks to high heaven .

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Indeed it does ... and Stronach is the quintessential self-made billionaire pirate, according to some anyway. By the way, his daughter Belinda was linked romantically with William Jefferson Cliton.

Jeez, can't even spell his name right:rolleyes:

But, bottom line is, the Germans were, and are active in preserving 20 thousand German jobs.

Re: How short is the memory?
 

to me it's strange when the whole of what could be deemed as "capitalist" nations..most of Western Europe, the USA, Japan and so on have been crying to high heaven that they are in economic meltdown, the Russians and Chinese have said nowt!... how come Russia and China just carry on business as usuall whe we are told we are bankrupt?

Re: How short is the memory?
 

Ya but have you seen the German team they're all like South African athletes:rolleyes:

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Quite simply, because they are now the models of successful capitalist economies.

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And they firmly control their banks and, particularly with the Chinese, their currency.