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[Chococat]

Whoa, don't turn "feelings" around on me, that was all your doing.

Let me quote you again:

Odd to include colonies like British Honduras in the British count, and something tells me that doesn't even include Hong Kong, which was devastated by the Japanese in a way similar to Poland but on a smaller scale. I also suspect that totab[/B doesn't include Canada, Australia, South Africa, or New Zealand, being independent dominions.


You are clear suggesting that I am fudging some numbers to strengthen my argument. That is you using your feelings. You still have not proved any fact other than you think I am wrong.

I'm not denying that those are the figures for war dead, but I'm not sure why you're equating civilian deaths to contributing to the Allies success.

Because for me, human life is an appropriate metric to measure one's contribution to the war. Russia and Germany clear spent more lives. If you want economics, that was clearly USA through it Lend lease programs that stock France, Britain, Russia, and China.

Those are just tragic non-combatant deaths, so your figures for Poland are irrelevant for the topic.

The source I quoted had those are combat death. Those don't include civilian. I quoted them cause you were so sure that the British and USA losses were greater than those of Russia or Germany. I added Poland cause that number shocked me. I knew Poland was bad, but not that bad. I learned something new double checking my sources.

Ill-equipped Soviet soldiers also died in higher quantities than members of other militaries, and the Soviet people in Europe also suffered enormous civilian casualties that are included in that figure.

Post your sources. Again, mine listed those as military only. It had separate casualty rate for civilians.

You're bringing up irrelevant data and becoming belligerent when you're called out on it.

You've been belligerent for the get go tell me I don't know what I am talking about from your first post. Claiming I live in a fantasy land was the very first thing you said. When you open with insults, you don't get to claim you're being civil.

As for India, I'm merely stating that India was an enormous contributor to the British war effort in World War II. The British Raj in India certainly isn't something to be proud of on principle or in the way it operated, but let's not disparage India's achievements.

I'm not disparaging India. You have to dig for proper history source that gives them any credit in western histories for the contribution in the Great War. What I am mocking is claim Britain have the moral high ground over communism when they controlled India at gunpoint under colonialism. And then claiming the achievement due to the British.

Yes, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India all made great contributions towards the war. But stuff like that is only coming to light in modern histories. Before, all of their sacrifices was just lumped under what the people of the UK did. That is wrong.

 

[Pancake Mix]

True but demographics are trending the other way. A untied Ireland isn't going to happen any time soon but in the next 15-20 years this might change.

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/demographic-shifts-force-change-on-ni-politicians-1.2190041

The polls indicate otherwise. Things have changed dramatically since 1998 and the status quo is increasingly popular among Catholics.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-37307783

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2011/jun/17/life-and-times-survey-united-ireland

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/over-half-catholics-surveyed-want-north-to-stay-in-uk-1.601126

I suspect the power sharing, single transferable vote, and increased transfer of funds to Northern Ireland are behind that. Northern Ireland was once quite poor, and the segregation ran deeper than the "peace walls". Things have greatly improved.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

It wasn't until 1945 when the GDP of the SU exceeded that one of Germany.

And except of crude oil Germany's output on war relevant ressources was so much higher than the SU it wasn't funny.
Your listed points about more tanks and stuff is rather pointless because it wouldn't have been possible without the Lend Lease Act.

The Soviet Union produced over 6,000 tanks in 1941, which was before any meaningful quantity of lend lease help arrived. In 1941 the Germans produced ~3,600 tanks. Mostly Panzer IIIs.

Counting only medium and heavy tanks, it's 3,921 (Soviet) vs 2,680 (German). The Soviet tanks produced in 1941 were T34s and KV1s, while the Germans were Panzer IIIs and short-barrelled early model Panzer IVs, both of which are significantly outclassed by these Soviet tanks.

Soviet production skyrocketed in 1942, and this was in part due to Lend Lease, but still would have climbed significantly without it. The Soviet state was simply geared towards heavy industry more than anybody imagined before the war broke out. The true impact of Lend Lease on the Soviet war effort wasn't really felt in a big way until the start of 1943, by which time the Soviets had already broken the Wehrmacht's offensive capabilities.

The only real exception early on is that the Battle of Moscow might have been notably impacted by British war aid, quite a few of the tanks in that battle were sent by the UK. I don't personally believe that this turned the tide, although some have made arguments to that effect.

 

[Ordinaryundone]

Personally I think the British museum is probably one of the biggest standing examples of how unapologetic Britain is about its history tbh.

If all the stuff they returned could be guaranteed to end up in museums as well curated and publicly available as the British Museum then that would be fine. But you just know most of it would end up lost, broken, or sold to private collectors which would be a much bigger tragedy than an bunch of ancient stuff not being in their country of origin.

 

[Spuck-uk]

I've felt it getting worse for a while, romanticising the war and wanking over anything related to it.

Attempting to romanticise WW1 was particularly grotesque.

 

[Spuck-uk]

The British have never truly atoned for the horrible, vile nature of its empire across the globe. As an Irishman I shake my head at the jingoistic shite being peddled across the sea by British ultra-nationalists who now believe a Brexit means a return to Rule Britannia. If anything it will lead to the UK's demise and, likely, a united Ireland.

As a someone who grew up in Ireland.. yeah there's plenty of ultra nationalist shite there as well.

United Ireland isn't happening any time soon because politically there's very little interest in it IN IRELAND ITSELF.

 

[Spuck-uk]

The main lesson here, really, is that Nationalism in any form is cancerous.

 

[Crema]

This is a great point and not at all unique to the UK. I remember clearly being taught in a 1ere French history class that the French resistance defeated the Germans.

 

[Vivalaraza]

If all the stuff they returned could be guaranteed to end up in museums as well curated and publicly available as the British Museum then that would be fine. But you just know most of it would end up lost, broken, or sold to private collectors which would be a much bigger tragedy than an bunch of ancient stuff not being in their country of origin.

It’s a very complicated issue.

I used to work at a London museum where this kept coming up and its very difficult to unpick the past and come to a ‘fair’ resolution.

There is of course the issue of maintaining the artefacts and this has been a strong ‘defence’. But it is becoming increasingly difficult to make this claim as more and more museums around the world develop their facilities. Especially in India/China and there is the recent example of the Elgin marbles going on loan to the Hermitage when there is now a state of the art facility in Athens.

But the question goes far deeper than being able to look after stuff. The BM frequently argues that it is a ‘universal’ or ‘world’ museum where visitors are exposed to a breadth of history. Which is true. But there is also the argument that you can better understand and appreciate artefacts when they are presented in their original context or setting. I really don’t know where I come down on that.

Of course there is also a very complex question around ownership. Many items were procured in underhand ways or via third parties and many were removed for safekeeping during wartime. Then They have been looked after and maintained by museums for hundreds of years in some cases. And now the claim for repatriation often comes from private investor groups or from people who may be geographical heirs but nothing more than that. So who really owns these artefacts?

At the very least I think museums like the BM can do more in terms of presenting the history of their collection and how it has ended up where it is…which is very interesting in and of itself.

International loans and tours have been a positive step in this space. Another question for museums is how technology will transform people’s experiences and expectations. There are opportunities there.

 

[BGBW]

Apparently the Museum of London Docklands is rather good for showing the darker side of British history. It's in one of the last warehouses on the Thames and it doesn't hide the fact that it was hand dug by slaves.

 

[Theonik]

If all the stuff they returned could be guaranteed to end up in museums as well curated and publicly available as the British Museum then that would be fine. But you just know most of it would end up lost, broken, or sold to private collectors which would be a much bigger tragedy than an bunch of ancient stuff not being in their country of origin.

So you are fine with looting because other countries cannot be trusted with their own heritage. This idea doesn't even make sense because many of the countries asking for their antiquities back have built well curated purpose built museums for them. Take the parthenon marbles for instance.

The most damning aspect of this whole affair is that the ones in the British museum are the worst preserved due to being displayed and restored inappropriately.

 

[SomTervo]

Really great read.

 

[Bold One]

The UK and the US both suffer from the same over-developed sense of self. Typically means, most people are unable to separate patriotism from jingoistic nationalism. The slope is slippery and never ends well.

 

[Charles Brandon]

I don't think I learned a single thing about Waterloo at school and I have a degree in history. In any case I think that is a poor example. Slavery I remember but always taught alongside Wilberforce and the banning of the slave trade, which I suppose is fair enough although the emphasis might be a bit out of wack. WW1 was always the "lions lead by donkeys" position.

What we didn't touch on really was the empire and the colonies and all the bad things associated with that.

There was healthy debate at degree level though.

as for the assertion that WW2 was a war between Russia and Germany based on percentages of population killed...seems a bit asinine to me. The western front was several orders of magnitude less brutal than the eastern front, but that doesn't make it any less of a war nor any less an important part of the war than the east. Strange. And strange to use %'s instead of absolute numbers.

 

[Noirulus]

No it wasn't. The richest place in the world around Plassey, let alone when the EIC took control of most of the country, was clearly Britain by a large margin with the United Provinces as its only real competition.

I think it's really interesting how whenever British history comes up on GAF people trot out these really odd external narratives for industrialization and British economic achievement. Britain's imperial adventurism is clearly the result of its economic strength and centralization, not the other way around.

I'm speaking of the numerous natural resources (India had some of the biggest natural diamond/gem stone resources in the world). The british came under the pretense of "civilising" India (By what, taxing everyone to famine and death?) but really they came to plunder India of everything it had. These aren't "odd narratives" they're actual, factual events that took place.

Britain had a long history of imperial adventurism, yes, but that's because they were obsessed with power and they had a veteran, established hierarchy of conducting their business. And yeah, they took advantage of the industrial revolution to further these goals.