El Alamein: The end of the beginning

World War Two remains a significant story within Britain’s history. To this day, the war is imbued in our political ideologue, our history curriculum, as well the many statues and monuments commemorating the fallen.

Yet, within the patriotism and remembrance, the story of significant battles is often lost. The Battle of Britain and D-Day are far more prominent and visceral in our imagination because they represent what we see on our screens on bank holidays and at Christmas. No one ever remembers the Eastern campaign in India and Burma. No one ever remembers El-Alamein.

Yet history dictates that among Agincourt, Blenheim and Waterloo, a battle that took place in the parched and desolate desert of Egypt remains one of Britain’s finest military moments. So what makes it so important and does it occurrence really deserve to be elevated among Britain’s most celebrated military victories?

November 1942, like any month since September 1939, had not been a particularly good for the allies. For Britain, the hurried retreat from the beaches of Dunkirk, as well as the capture of Singapore by the Japanese meant morale was deflated. Despite the American entry into the war in December 1941, the burden on British and Commonwealth troops was immense. In the East, the German army was advancing towards the oil fields of the Caucasus’s and Rommel’s Fifth Panzer division was heading towards Cairo and more lucratively, the oil fields of the Middle East.

It was by no means certain, but for Hitler to obtain a constant supply of fuel for the Wehrmacht then the war in Europe was consequentially over. The fate of British India would almost certainly be decided too. At the time, it was not only the British command in Cairo’s biggest concern, it was Churchill’s.

Only a couple years before, British troops based in Africa were successful in maintaining their ground and in fact conquering further. In 1941 they had driven a weak Italian army out of Abyssinia (modern day Ethiopia) as well as driving Mussolini’s forces back from Italian-occupied Libya. Yet, just as the Germans had conquered most of Europe, Hitler sent one of his most trusted and celebrated Field Marshals to resolve the problem, The Desert Fox, Erwin Rommel.

The introduction of Rommel made a huge difference to the Axis’s fortunes and gave a huge awakening to the British troops. Rommel drove the German army through British lines and within 150 miles of Cairo. Churchill saw how his commanders were being easily out-manoeuvred and losing ground quickly and at a heavy cost to the imperious Germans. The fall and subsequent retreat from the important port of Tobruk saw Churchill place Cairo, the Middle East and consequently Britain’s future war in the hands of one Bernard ‘Monty’ Montgomery.

Monty is now often recited for his tactical marvel in Egypt as well as his miscalculation at Operation Market Garden and the so-called bridge too far at Arnhem. Yet, his military career had begun as a humble junior officer in the trenches of World War One. He had seen the devastation to life and the ill-thought out planning of generals to gain or lose needless ground. Perceived as arrogant as well as a maverick, his clubbability found himself fans within the troops, yet unpopularity among fellow officers. Yet, for his dislike, Monty was an astute and forward thinking battlefield commander.

His plans at El-Alamein were by no means revolutionary, but he prepared well, he knew the lie of the land and more importantly he was able to convey this message to the troops. The subsequent victory as Churchill exquisitely told the House of Commons went down as history as the start of the fight back:

“This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning”.

However, for all its significance, El-Alamein is presented as one of Britain’s greatest military battles because it was probably the last time British victory when British commanders were fully in control (this includes the Falklands’ War). Military historians correctly point out that Montgomery’s fortune was to some extent secured because German lines had become too extended. The British Eighth Army had been preparing for the advance for almost three weeks. Not only were they well dug-in but had the higher ground. Even taking into consideration the events of the previous few months, this battle was not as significant as it was made out to be. The importance was not the battle, but the fact that the British had shown the Germans could be beaten.

Monty’s success should be recognised, but certainly not in Egypt and certainly not more than the British and Commonwealth troops that collectively became known as the Desert Rats. Monty’s significance as a commander must be for recognising that Britain’s role had been surpassed by the Americans. He recognised that Britain could no longer take the lead and as consequence must take some of the pain when leading British troops after the D-Day landings. The loss of almost 4,000 men at Caen during Operation Goodwood, though painful, reflected Montgomery’s foresight. It is to some extent unfortunate that the failure of Market Garden saw his reputation somewhat malaise. For others, his forthright and somewhat arrogant memoirs saw him try inflating his own significance to Britain’s war victory.

Today, tourist trips to the battlefield at El-Alamein are not overly subscribed to. The area remains just as isolated as it was 70 years before. Yet it should not undermine the importance of what occurred in those late months of 1942. Blenheim and Waterloo were more significant for Britain’s political standing and strength in the decades to come. El-Alamein lacked the grace and military nous of these victories, but certainly, this was a great moment and it was significant to how the war was won.

A Greek tragedy via Moscow - Operation Barbarossa

As politicians from around Europe try to work out how to sort out the Greek financial crisis and the potential domino-effect across Southern European nations, the prospects for a generation of young Europeans does not look prosperous in terms of employment or financial stability. One of the main issues that economists and political commentators have pointed out was the fact that the creation of the Euro was built on a premise of political union and advancement, without the framework of a single European economic policy. However, politicians and people from across mainland Europe, despite the uncertainty, have been pursuing such a goal for the past 60 years. The rebuilding of Europe after World War 2 was both cosmetic and political. It provided a framework to pursue peace and a bulwark against Soviet Russia in the East. Even after the Berlin Wall came down twenty years ago, politicians including British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and the French President Francois Mitterrand believed a reunited Germany could spell danger for the future of Europe. The whole purpose of European unity was to keep Germany down and central to its future, something it was battling against seventy years ago to this day.

If one battle is to define World War Two then it must be Operation Barbarossa. Launched with five of Hitler’s armies across the Eastern European frontier it set out to destroy Bolshevik Russia and to expand Germany into the distant East. Eventually five million German soldiers would die to fighting, the cruel Russian winter or disappear in to the work camps in the Arctic North. Russia’s gamble saw it lose over 27 million of its population, two thirds of them being civilians. Yet, despite the tremendous human loss, it is defined by historians as a battle won and lost through the eyes of Hitler and Stalin. These men were caustic and murderously driven to victory, yet they saw the battle as a chance to amend the wrongs of history and to place themselves within the annals of military legend.

Hitler’s hate and scorn for communists and the Slavic race is well documented yet during the infamous pact signed by von Ribbentrop and Molotov that sliced up the Poland and Lithuania between Russia and Germany, Stalin believed Hitler would keep his word and refrain from invasion. Yet Operation Barbarossa, named after King Frederick I of the Holy Roman Empire who set out to conquer the Holy Land in the twelfth century was deemed by Hitler to be a befitting name. On 22 June 1941 when Hitler’s tanks and troops crossed the Russian border, Stalin could not believe it. Despite intelligence from Soviet spies within Germany and on the border he chose to ignore it. Stalin was more sceptical of the British, who were relaying the same information, than his German counterparts (Britain had been Russia’s long term rival in the nineteenth century and had intervened against the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War). In the first day two thirds of the Russian air force was destroyed.

Hitler’s Blitzkrieg, the lightning war that walked over Western Europe, captured Minsk, Kiev, encircled Leningrad and came within 18 miles of Moscow was flawed from the start and any essence of military history could have told Hitler this. Napoleon’s epic battles against the Russia in 1812 are best captured in Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’ where the French are eventually pushed out by a disorganised Russian force. Hitler was obsessed with postcard captures rather than strategic victories. He was blinded by the fog of war and the abstractions of history that had eluded German and Prussians in the past. Like Napoleon, Hitler’s lines were stretched to the limit across a continental front. He ignored the cries from his Generals and believed he knew best. Blitzkrieg had worked but the front line still needed to be supplied.

Stalin too was also blinded by foolishness. His ignorance over intelligence and disastrous attempts to advance was an opportunity to replicate the successes of the 1812 General Kutuzov. At one stage, Stalin believed that his costly decisions would see him ousted, yet the reality as Professor Robert Service points out; he had imprisoned and killed all potential rivals – he was the only one left. He was asked to take the battle to the Nazis

While Hitler continuously gambled, Stalin used history to prevail. Like 1812, he saw this as the ‘Great Patriotic War’. He stayed in Moscow, unlike in 1812 and coordinated the battle from the Politburo in the Kremlin. He allowed generals to make decisions and employed effective propaganda to cede attempts to capture Stalingrad. Leningrad survived the Nazi siege for over 900 days. Armed by the allies, Russia was able to push back the Nazis, war weary and frozen (like Napoleon’s men) to his new prize, Berlin. After years of struggle, this was an opportunity to recapture and to take revenge, through any circumstance necessary.

During those three and half years, Eastern Europe became the blood lands of a violent and ideological war. It was rape, genocide and conflagration on an enormous scale, destroying and poisoning Europe for the following fifty years. Over 2.5 million people died in Stalingrad alone. It is easy to say that times are tough, but Europe has seen much worse.

Serbs you right?

The capture of the former Bosnian Serb General Ratko Mladic is perhaps more significant than many people estimate. Mladic, who was arrested yesterday in northern Serbia, has been arrested on 15 counts of crimes against humanity and is expected to be extradited to The Hague where he will be tried.

It is only three years since the first Serbian President Radovan Karadzic was arrested. Karadzic by all accounts was charming and garrulous, performing to the world’s media and statesmen when Yugoslavia was being savaged by war. Whilst Mladic (or the ‘Butcher of Bosnia’ as he became ordained) was inflicting the misery of war on millions. Small, yet tough, the indignant and ruthless general, was behind the massacre at Srebrenica where over 8,500 Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks) were killed in mass graves whilst the UN stood by, this was genocide in Europe sixty years after the Holocaust. He also oversaw the bombardment of Sarajevo. A place that became a poetical term for misery, death and destruction. This was a war that spilt blood on a continent that had been ravaged by so many conflicts earlier in the century. It brought us the inaction and inertia of diplomats and introduced the chilling phrase ‘ethnic cleansing’ into the English language.

After twenty years of hostilities, this may finally end a chapter of toil and unrest in the South Eastern corner of Europe. Since the bombing of Belgrade by NATO and the indictment (but later death) of the former Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, the region is transforming economically and politically. Many of the new republics that once formed Yugoslavia like Croatia are now attracting tourists and are close to agreeing European Union membership. Many of the world’s best sportsmen and women also come from the region with footballers like Serbia’s Nemanja Vidic and Croatia’s Luka Modric to the tennis players Novak Djokovic and Anna Ivanovic.

Many commentators have speculated that Mladic’s arrest may have been induced through diplomatic circles that would quicken up Serbia’s membership to the European Union. Yet many Serbs feel aggrieved by their national perception of those around Europe. And do they have a right to be? The Yugoslavian break up and subsequent war did not stem from a couple of years of uncertainty. There have been ethnic tensions between Yugoslavs for many centuries, a country composed of Muslims, Catholics and Orthodox. In World War 2 over 1.2 million Yugoslavs were killed, but not by Hitler’s war machine, but mainly through ethnic violence. The Communist dictatorship of Marshal Tito brought decades of stability; but his death only saw those underlying tensions come to a head at the beginning of the 1990s. The all-out war saw all men conscripted and all families suffer, yet the perception is that it was instigated by Serbs. Despite the bloodshed inflicted by the likes of militant criminals like Arkan and Mladic, it is wrong to simply pigeon hole the entire nation of Serbia as the only aggressors, many were murderous and acted with impunity; but like most wars it was subject to history. The Serb victimhood was used by politicians to fuel Serb nationalism. It ultimately inflamed Milosevic to attack Kosovo at the end of the century, bringing NATO and Russia to the verge of war.

History has unfolded in front of us with new nations with strong cultures, and Europe has yet again learnt to move on from its troubled past. The capture of Mladic may finally end an era of aggression and insularity for Serbia and now allow it to evolve politically, economically and socially.

After war: Post Combat Trauma Stress

I have just started watching Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg’s World War Two miniseries ‘The Pacific’. As a narrative perspective it is easy to conclude that ‘Band of Brothers’, the 2001 series set in the grey clouds of Europe, is better and for many reasons. The war in Europe had its obvious heroes and villains and moral structures of good versus evil. These were typified by acts such as the liberation of Paris to the discovery of the death camps in Hitler’s blood lands. The Pacific war did not breathe the romance of liberating Europe; it was a war of attrition. US Marines launching seaborne assaults on isolated islands in the hope of flushing out a determined and virulent enemy. It was savage and neglected and often distorted by the realms of Hollywood and the denouement in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

We have a Hollywood interpretation of the brutality of war but have time for those who gave their lives for such causes. Yet there appears to be great neglect to those mentally scarred by war. In recent years the National Arboretum was erected in Staffordshire to commemorate the war dead and much publicity and charity has been made of sites like Headley Court, dedicated to help injured soldiers recover after life-threatening injuries. The toils and scars from the death and blasts in World War One are etched in our memories through the poems of Sassoon, Owen and Graves; yet the legacy was vivid in the minds of those who survived the front only to face a hell from within. The British Army identified around 80,000 men suffered from the exposure to such atrocities, many of their wounds would never heal and they ended up in asylums.

Figures show that more American soldiers have committed suicide in the past decade than have been killed in combat in Afghanistan. Post-traumatic combat stress (PTCS), as it has now been identified, has caused countless dedicated men to turn their lives to drugs, alcohol and crime.

It is estimated that around 20,000 veterans are within the criminal justice system and that 10% of the prison population is filled with former soldiers. There is an argument that many members of the armed forces came from the fringes of society and that enlisting, cruelly, was the best way to steer clear from crime, but that would be an indictment on the reputations of many these honourable men.

In the last twenty years, the British Army was involved in Iraq twice, Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone; all for varying durations with incalculable risks. Young and inexperienced men are entering situations that are abnormal to society, and expect the things they saw, did and became as normal. Perhaps it is understandable that drugs and crime have become their tonic.

It is now normal procedure for decommissioned battalions, who have just seen combat, to spend a fortnight or so unwinding in places like Cyprus, away from the enemy’s bullet and the banalities of family life. After the Falklands War it was noticed that members of the Parachute Regiment, who flew back home, were more likely to suffer PTCS or commit suicide, than members of the Royal Navy who had a two-week journey back to the UK. It is deemed that this decompression is a vital starting step to let soldiers unwind from months of combat.

War is never glamorous and even the bright lights of Hollywood are reflecting on the trials of soldiers in modern-day warfare. We know the sacrifices made in such theatres are heavy on families and communities, but perhaps it is changing our relationship with mental illness as well. We live in a country where the public no longer accepts or understands the need for long drawn-out wars. Most soldiers would acknowledge and fear the ideas of sacrifice but I daresay many would disregard the scars that come with it.

Sportsmen at war: The Killing Fields.

2010 will be the first time that all 20 Barclay’s Premiership clubs will bestow a place on their shirts for the British Legion’s poppy of remembrance. In the past few years, football crowds have become used to minutes of applause in respect to their fellow professionals and for other celebrated figures of the game that have died; though admittedly, applause appears to hide the otherwise boisterous minority observed during a minute’s silence. The Poppy Appeal has become more visible with Britain’s involvement in recent international conflicts and certainly sportsmen and women have contributed a great deal to help those affected by war injuries. Twickenham has held many events to raise money and create awareness for injured servicemen and women. Sport has a great history in war and in previous generations it was common to see sporting heroes of the day to enlist for frontline service, something unimaginable by today’s professionals.

World War One was the first time that British men enlisted en masse to fight for their country; something common on the continent but new to Britain, but this was a desperate occasion. One of the most popular ways of drumming up support was through the ‘pal’s battalion’. This simply was creating platoons of men from local industries or communities; it was literally fighting at the front with your next door neighbour and best school friend. As we know, the war wasn’t over before Christmas and many battalions were massacred. 584 out of the 720 men of the Accrington Pal’s were killed, missing or injured on the first day of the Battle of the Somme. Rows upon rows of houses, in the small Lancashire town, had their curtains drawn in their early days of July 1916. Communities were destroyed by the futile clamour over the top, over and over again.

Perhaps one of the most moving stories is that of the Hearts team. The squad of the 1914/15 side had won their first title since 1897 and had won eight games on the trot, including a game against the Danish national side. It was during this season that amateur sports like rugby, golf and hockey had stopped, as more men signed up to go to the front. In fact, the Glasgow Herald questioned after the November 1914 Old Firm clash how much the fates of Rangers and Celtic mattered when the ‘greatest of all internationals’ was being played in Europe. It was not until late November when the Royal Scots was formed and all of Hearts’ first XI and five reserves enlisted. Many of their fates were sealed along with many others on the first day of the Somme. Inside forward Henry Wattie and Duncan Currie both fell on the first day. Paddy Crossan was wounded by a shell and his lungs ruined by gas. He was so badly injured that his right leg was labelled for amputation, he begged the German surgeon not to amputate saying, ‘I need my legs, I’m a footballer.’ His leg was saved and he survived the war but died in 1933.

It wasn’t just football that suffered. World number one and New Zealand tennis player Tony Wilding was killed by shell fire. England’s rugby captain Ronnie Poulton-Palmer was killed at Ploegstreert Wood. Around 34 county cricketers were killed in combat, including the Warwickshire all-rounder Percy Jeeves. It is said that P.G. Wodehouse’s character Jeeves was named after him. Wodehouse had been a great fan.

The same thing happened during World War Two, though many sportsmen were not posted to frontline positions like their previous generation. High-profile footballers like Tom Finney served in Monty’s Eighth Army in North Africa and Stan Matthews served his time in the RAF. Not all were fortunate, Hedley Verity, the Yorkshire and English spin-bowler was killed in action at Monte Cassino and the Ajax footballer Eddy Hamel was murdered in Auschwitz in 1943.

War is no longer fought on such grand theatres and mass enlistment/national service no longer exists. It is no use to ask hypothetical questions of whether today’s professionals would do the same, it is best to reflect that these men represented their countries at the highest level in sport and delayed their careers for more purposeful causes, often with their lives’. Their stories paint ones of humility and heroism, Premiership footballers may play in hostile arenas in Europe; but ultimately it was nothing like Ypres, Passchendaele or the Somme.

The Cossacks: To Russia with love?

There is something warm about watching the reaction of soldiers returning from war. The lucid smiles and cries of happiness when families reunite after months of absence and separation. It is not cold turkey, besides the post, there is the internet to keep them updated with news from back home. It was not the same for the men of World War Two. The policy of enlistment meant that men could be called away for years and often leave was something of a dream, especially at the front. Those men interned in Prisoner of War (PoW) camps fared worse, despite the depictions of Hollywood, successful escapes rarely occurred and incarceration for some men lasted the whole duration of the war. The only lifeline was from mail back home to keep their morale high and mind occupied.

Towards the end of the war, when the future of the world was being decided, the Allies signed agreements that all liberated soldiers of PoW camps would be returned to their native armies and homeward bound. This  was a relief for men longing for ‘Blighty’ as they were returning to a Britain forged with the new welfare state. The Soviets believed they would return to the Mother Russia as heroes and be repaid after much bloodshed. How they were wrong.

Around two million men and women were sent back to Russia by the British and Americans. They were coaxed with propaganda like ‘The Motherland has forgiven you! The Motherland calls you!’ Many had fought to the brink and seen their comrades die surrounding them. Many had been forced to work under German supervision (The Germans of course saw the Bolsheviks/Slavs as a sub-race). However, Stalin saw this as treachery, surrendering or corroborating with the sworn enemy as a crime. To many, these Russians had been forsaken three times: being ill-equipped to fight initially, receiving no support once captured and then finally the contempt of arriving home and accused of being a traitor. Much is depicted of German soldiers being sent to the notorious Gulags, but many Russians faced a death sentence in the Siberian tundra.

As one prisoner put it:

“For not wanting to die from a German bullet, the prisoner had to die from a Soviet bullet for having been a prisoner of war! Some get theirs from the enemy; we get ours from our own! ... In general, this war revealed to us that the worse thing to be was to be a Russian.”

One aspect that is lamentable from a British aspect was the fate of the Cossacks. They had actively fought against Stalin and supported the Nazis throughout the war. Towards the end of the conflict, Cossack units surrendered to the British hoping for leniency, but this was not to happen. As part of the Allied agreement, the British sent back around 23,000 Cossack men, women and children to a bleak and hopeless future. Upon learning their fate many Cossack soldiers committed suicide and further resistance was restrained by force. The inevitable doom had arisen.

Russia’s legacy of World War 2 paints the brave mass of men and women, who fought and snared the beast of Nazism. It was bloody and probably the most nihilistic war we have ever seen. Figures estimate that 23 to 27 million Soviets died in their attempt to liberate the Motherland. The famous matchsticks that divided the continent for another 40 years, shackled another generation and killed the hope and efforts of the many millions who had fought for liberation.

Bomber Command: Flying without fear.

Admiration and courage is what defined the men that flew in the Battle of Britain. ‘The Few' who seventy years ago fought off the German Luftwaffe and prevented a land invasion are still held in high esteem as part of the national identity and within popular culture. The depiction of Hurricane and Spitfires planes flying across the skies of southern Britain and the young, charismatic pilots who gave their lives speaks volumes of the magnanimity and congenial spirit of this special group. We correctly lionise the efforts of those young fighter pilots; yet so much recognition is neglected to those of Bomber Command. The toils and struggles of those in Lancaster bombers appear convoluted and depicted in fewer stories. The men of Bomber Command had the unenviable task of hitting German cities and military targets. The pilots, navigators, gunners became known as the ‘Men of Air’, not because of their long and perilous taxis, but because of the likelihood of dying in flight.

‘When we first arrived on 101 Sqn the intelligence officer told us: “You’re now on an operational squadron, your expectation of life is six weeks. Go back to your huts and make out your wills.” It was simply accepted that two out of three of us would be killed.’ Sgt Dennis Goodliffe.

The heroics in the Summer of 1940 lasted simply for several months, but the sorties of bombers hitting enemy targets continued throughout the war. The memorable story is of ‘The Dambusters’, hailed as a triumph by the ingenious Barnes Wallace and the daring Guy Gibson, yet much is neglected to the great loss of life in carrying out the raid. The bombing raids of the Second World War became notoriously horrific. The policy of ‘strategic bombing’ was in effect the targeting of major cities and civilians as well as war industries. The destruction in places like Rotterdam and Coventry by the Luftwaffe, and then Hamburg and Dresden by the Allies epitomise the death and colour of war. Air Chief Arthur ‘Bomber’ Harris told Churchill that to destroy Hitler it may cost between 400-500 Lancasters. The consequences of WW1 ultimately meant that this time that Nazi Germany would be brought to its knees.

In total, Bomber Command lost 55,000 men during the war and a further 10,000 were taken prisoner. These men, at an average of 22, brought needed retribution within the borders of Germany, and hope to those incarcerated within it. Their bodies’ were scattered across Europe and yet they have no memorial or lasting tribute. In rural Holland, I remember seeing on the grave of a British Airman:

‘A good life often too short, but a good name endureth forever.’

There was ‘The Few’ but of course there were many more.

War in Poland and Czechoslaovakia: the legacy.

Consider a statistic from history. 1938 saw the annex of Czechoslovakia by Nazi Germany, Britain and France left its Czech allies to the perils of Hitler and the SS.

In 1939, German tanks roll into the city of Danzig, Poland: France and Britain declare war on Germany.

World War Two death toll: Czechoslovakians: around 40 000. Polish around 5.7 million deaths.

Seems crazy on the balance of things.

The Norwegian resistance of World War Two

It is interesting to read and hear how different nationalities coped during times of occupation and essentially how they dealt with it at the end. The Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008 and the subsequent squabbling over South Ossetia has blazed a fever of patriotism in the small Caucus state. Compare that to the recent publications in France naming those who collaborated with the Nazis during the Second World War, some families are still burdened with belated guilt of what their families did in historical conflicts.

We need to identify that war is not black and white; there are a few heroes and villains. War forces ordinary people into impossible positions not of their making, forcing upon them choices or compromises they could never have anticipated. Generations in the future now venerate the work of resistance fighters in France and Holland but we cannot ultimately conceive an idea that if you weren’t part of the network you were on the other side. The German policy of ‘Schrecklichkeit’ which literally translates to ‘terror’ was a policy adopted in both WW1 and WW2 that was designed to inflict horrific repression on the civilian population so it would never resist. This is why we can never simply judge ‘sympathisers’ or people who told of where Jews lived because life in war goes day by day.

The silent resistance of the Norwegians is particularly notable in its stiff heroism and determination. Germany invaded Norway in 1940, despite its declaration of neutrality. There were acts of armed resistance, many people will have heard of the ‘Heroes of Telemark’ where trained Norwegian commandoes destroyed Hitler’s attempted to create an atomic bomb. Most Norwegians, aware of potential reprisals, resisted in an unorthodox, psychological way. They attached paperclips to their collars as an act of defiance; they crossed the road when a German approached, they only spoke Norwegian in public and would leave a bus if a German sat next to them. This approach eventually led German administrators forcing natives to stay in their seats.

War is callous and bloody, but it reflects well that countries with proud heritages like Norway acted with civilitly but with ultimate defiance.

The Battle of Britain: The Few

I have so much admiration for any man or woman who decides to fight for their country. It is particularly relevant with the seventieth anniversary of The Battle of Britain. If one ignores the limits of Hitler's Blitzkreig tactics and the might of the Royal Navy, Britain was on its own against a well-oiled fighting machine that had flattened Europe in months. 'The Few' as they have become, with an average age of 22, were fighting not only for their lives but for the future of freedom in Europe.

The one legacy that is less forgettable I think is the procurement to the RAF in the seventy years since. Many expensive and generally superfluous contracts have been given for fighter jets, most notably the Tornado and Eurofighter jets, all on the historical premise that we may one day engage in a 'Battle of Britain II'. A regrettable waste of money when one thinks of a lack of logistical support in Afghanistan.

On September 15th, Battle of Britain day, I think it will be pertinent to look up into the skies and think back to what those men did and what it means for us today.