Changing times

[Airspeed]

I saw a new Triumph motor bike in the street the other day, and noticed that only decals were used as badges, not the old chrome screw-ons.
Then I thought about how the Germans own Rolls Royce, the Arabs own London, and other stuff.
I got home and heard that Australia is getting some new frigates, and the proposed suppliers are Germany or Japan.
Things have changed alright.

[Tako_Kichi]

My father is probably spinning where he was scattered (he wasn't buried so can't spin in his grave!) I remember the berating I got when I bought a BMW motorcycle! He was not pleased I tell ya!

[Paul K]

Look at the bright side - Rolls Royce is re-engining the B-52. ( Yes, I know it's RR USA, but still...)

[Airspeed]

My father is probably spinning where he was scattered (he wasn't buried so can't spin in his grave!) I remember the berating I got when I bought a BMW motorcycle! He was not pleased I tell ya!

If you have mentioned this before, Larry, I don't recall your father's story.
Do you feel like elaborating?

[Tako_Kichi]

He was a British Royal Marine Commando during WWII. He was called up in 1941 as he was in a 'protected occupation' in the coal mines up to that point. After basic training was shipped out to Ceylon and then India where he was waiting for the Japanese invasion that never materialized (history now tells us that the Japanese never intended to take on India as they knew they would never win).

In 1943 he was shipped back to the UK to retrain for land warfare as a Commando. During his return trip on board a RN destroyer he was acting as an anti-aircraft gunner (his normal naval role when on board ship) when the convoy was attacked by the Luftwaffe off the coast of Malta in the Med. During the attack he was able to down two ME109s that were escorting the bombers.

After retraining he was a qualified bren carrier driver, a 3" mortar team leader (they held the training record for a while of 21 mortar rounds in the air at one time before the first one burst!) and an explosives/demolition specialist. In 1944 he took part in the famous D-Day landings in Normandy. On D-Day itself he was manning an anti-aircraft gun onboard a RN destroyer standing off from Sword Beach and providing cover for the PBI (poor bloody infantry) attacking the beaches. On D-Day +1 he was part of the specialist teams that blew the bottoms out of the concrete block ships that were used to create the temporary harbours that were so successful in the invasion process. On D-Day +2 he actually landed on Sword Beach and then worked his way across Europe to Berlin where he was eventually de-mobbed in 1946. As part of that journey he should have been at the infamous 'Bridge Too Far' during 'Operation Market Garden' but his unit was one of the thousands caught up in the massive traffic jam trying to get up the Arnhem Corridor and he didn't get to the bridge until three days after the fighting was over.

While in Germany in 1945 he was among the group of UK military personnel ordered by the Commanding General to visit the only Nazi concentration camp liberated by the UK Forces so that they could all witness the crimes committed. That camp was Bergen-Belsen and it is where Anne Frank and her sister Margot were executed just before the camp was liberated. He visited the camp about a week or so after it was liberated and he said the stench of the place could be detected about 5 miles away and the sight that greeted him once there was gut wrenching! There were still huge piles or rotting, naked, copses just lying around the edges of the camp and the British had used bulldozers to dig broad trenches to act as mass graves. The former SS guards were being forced to move and bury the decomposing victims bare-handed without any form of protection and were fed the same meager rations that they had fed the inmates while the inmates themselves had been moved to the SS barracks nearby and were getting emergency feeding and medical attention to help them recover. Needless to say many of the SS guards died from typhus (like their victims) as a direct result of their atrocities. Here is some info on Bergen-Belsen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergen-Be ... ation_camp . If anyone tries to tell you the Holocaust did not happen they are bare-faced liars and you can tell them so, my father was there and saw it first hand!

Me buying a German motorcycle did not sit well with him but I had already bought several Japanese motorcycles prior to this so he should have been used to it! There was almost no British motorcycle industry left at that point so the only choice was Japanese or German!

[Airspeed]

That was quite a background, Larry, thank you.
Holocaust deniers need to think again.
They often finish challenging TV programmes with "If this has caused you or anyone you know, distress, call ######"
I often think "If this did not cause you distress, when did you become so inhumane?"

[airboatr]

Holocaust deniers need to think again.

Some choose not to believe, that'll never change, Mike.

[TSR2]

Guys, what started as a genuine interesting post has desended into something that really isn't suitable here. Sorry, but save it for some other forum.

I've also taken the decision to delete several posts on the basis that they aren't helpful and not in the public interest. I know this goes against what we usually do here, but I don't think it's in anyones interest to keep them. My intention isn't to cause offence to anyone.