Famous sailor in VJ day photo dies

Very nice find, Garg.

@CWO:

@Gargantua:

This was an awesome read - Thanks Marc.

Glad you liked it.  The story reminded me a bit of a 1942 British film I have on DVD: “Went the Day Well?”, a movie about Nazi paratroopers in British uniforms who infiltrate an unsuspecting village in England (with the help of a local traitor) for a secret mission, then put it under military occupation when their cover is blown.  It’s astonishingly frank and uncompromising in depicting the way war inflicts brutalities on innocent civilians and on the way these civilians respond with equal brutality to defend themselves.  The scene that always sticks in my mind is the one in which a sweet little old lady talks pleasantly to a German soldier until he’s lulled into carelessness, then throws a jarful of pepper into his eyes and kills him with a meat cleaver while he’s writing in agony.

It’s a great firm isn’t it Marc … and still very “fresh” fit its age.

@CWO:

A question: if the Allies had concentrated their efforts and resources on conquering the southern part of Europe, and had not invaded France, isn’t it possible that the Russians would have driven westward through Germany in 1945 and would have kept going through France (which Germany would still be occupying in this scenario) until they got to the English Channel?  In other words, doesn’t a scenario in which the Anglo-Americans end up controlling the southern and eastern parts of Europe create a situation in which the Soviets end up controlling the northern and western parts of Europe, with France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark and possibly Norway being switched from Nazi occupation to Soviet occupation?

You’ve raised a very good question.

In the scenario I outlined, one possible Allied objective would have been to reach the Baltic before the Red Army arrived. Had this been achieved, all of Europe west of this Anglo-American line would presumably have been protected from the Red terror. Whether that was achievable goal is difficult to say.

Thank you Worsham. That explains a lot.

@rjpeters70:

Germany got a bastion of anti-communism in Spain who gave 40,000 “volunteers” in Barbarossa.  What more you want?

Taking Gibraltar from the British.

"He wasn’t a complicated philosopher or thinker, but he quite simply said: ‘We’re just not going to make it, and just imagine, people are saying all kind of things, but look, an infantry division has just been deployed and they hardly have artillery support, and for every two kilometers, we have a single battery.’ "

Had Rommel of had the Panzer divisions at the beaches on D-Day would it of actually made any meaningful difference to the outcome of the battle?

This statement said it all so the ansewr is…. no.
Rommel was not a foul…

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2026494/Albert-Brown-Oldest-survivor-Baatan-death-march-died-aged-105.html

I looked through that earlier, it’s not too bad. Still need to find out the ratio of tanks and planes per country, and also how the numbers per nationality altered in the weeks that followed.