Comments by "Geordiedog" (@geordiedog1749) on "Imperial War Museums" channel.

  1. My grandads mate - a tanker - said to me (many years ago) that they switched to firing HE at range over 400yds as the AP would bounce off the big cats but the HE was create “a bloody mess”. This was in Italy. He’d also mentioned constantly passing burning/burnt out German panthers and sometimes a tiger and when they’d looked to see what killed it they found that it was usually abandoned and set on fire by its crew ie no holes in it or blown tracks.
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  2. What made me rather cross was the end of the film and them not mentioning that most of the men involved lost their lives in the war. Hardly a minor point!
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  3. Roger Hill, Captain if HMS Ledbury - one of the escort destroyers - was so appalled at the Royal Navy abandoning the merchant Navy do PQ-17 that he swore never to do it again, even if it meant breaking orders. It was Hill and Ledbury along with HMS Penn that hauled the crippled Ohio into Valletta a few months later thus saving Malta, the Mediterranean and arguably the whole shebang.
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  4. It’s not complicated. Not at all complicated. Pretty bloody straightforward, I reckon. If those rockets had been coming down on New York or Baltimore then I very much doubt he’d have been recruited and lauded, somehow. It’s an insult to those in Europe who were killed by Brauns work. I’m very much with Tom Lehrer on this one.
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  5. Bit disappointed with the pop history slant this channel is taking. The title is just click bait
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  6. Anyone I follow who has the slightest expertise just laughs at the ‘tank is dead!’ Statement.
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  7. Let’s not forget that hindsight is a wonderful thing. With a few different factors in the allies favour it would be heralded as the best manoeuvre ever.
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  8. “…………..Professionals study logistics”
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  9. Spain wasn’t going to join the axis on the basis of this mission. They had weighed up the pros and cons and decided to stay out of it. Pretty major stab in the back for the axis I think. Huge bribes by the UK had a large effect on the Spanish decision to stay out of it. That said, they did a lot to help and sent many thousands of volunteers (to die horrible on the eastern front…….shame, not).
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  10. Cheers. Was about to say same thing. Saved me the job:)
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  11. Good point. The kaiser was obsessed with defeating the RN.
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  12.  @drinksnapple8997  Yeah, totally agree but ‘Phyllis’ was a bad tempered bugger (active service since the Abyssinian Crisis will do that to you I suppose) and he pissed a few people off. The Waimarrama rescue alone should have got him the VC. Paint bubbling on the walls inside the ship!, jeez.
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  13. Brilliant piece. Thank you.
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  14.  @Boppy-B-B  Well, funny you say that because I was just thinking how sometimes you get that bandwagonesque thinking. Ok, sure, the Russians used their tanks poorly but maybe they would have suffered the same anti armour problems if they had? The argument is that the Ukrainians are using tanks properly and so there! But maybe there’s another factor at work and maybe tanks really re going to have to change or evolve or get massacred. They did say the same about air power and armour tbh.
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  15. Why did he think the US and U.K. alliance fall apart I wonder?
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  16. There are some stories of mid air collisions with Jugs where the German plane fell apart and the forty seven be like ‘what was that bump?”
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  17.  @権兵衛-e8u  I think you need to get your history in chronological order for your argument to make more sense.
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  18. Kill cam is just ghoulish. End of!
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  19. Good point.
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  20. I almost wish the Germans had succeeded given the carnage and suffering that followed.
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  21. Yeah, it’s a good point. After what they did pre and during the war was dreadful. No sympathy. I’m a pretty soppy sort of guy and not vindictive but they asked for what they got and then some!
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  22. So, my theory is this. Germany was dominated by Prussia and Prussia was obsessed with two things (other than war, obviously) hunting and duelling. For hunting and duelling the need for good kit is very important and this is why the Germans were obsessed with things like Tiger and Panther Tanks, MG42s, 262s and V weapons when they really should have been looking at logistics and reliability. As for Von Braun……. We’ll, the Tom Lehrer song says it all!
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  23. Total War.
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  24. I think the U Boat campaign which very nearly took the British out of the war is one that should be mentioned. It was probably the closest the Germans came to taking Britain out of the war. There was also a small battle at the start that bought the British time to fall back in order but I’m buggered if I can remember it’s name. If that had been lost then the British would have had to fight a ‘broken back’ retreat and would have lost most of the BEF.
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  25. Good point but I’d argue that a major European war was inevitable at some point because the German military industrial complex (the worlds first? Rome, maybe?) was always going to go to war at some point as war was it’s reason d’être. The kaiser was utterly obsessed with defeating the RN for one thing.
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  26. Good version on Audible if you’ve a long journey coming up.
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  27. Great story.
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  28. I live just around the corner from the first V2 rocket strike.
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  29. Poor aircraft, poor payload, poor sights, poor defensive armaments and poor tactics and strategy. Poor bastards.
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  30. Good analogy.
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  31. Churchill used British atomic research to barter for the use of the SS Ohio for Operation Pedestal.
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  32. That made me literally LOL.
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  33. Funny how history repeats itself.
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  34. Good question! Germany would have been a Soviet (radioactive?) wasteland. The allied (conventional) bombing would have continued and so would Stalin from the east. The question would have been would uncle Joe have stopped in Germany and just pushed on into, well, everywhere?
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  35.  @dovetonsturdee7033  I’ve seen them given for less.
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  36. There are a lot of conflicting accounts of Soviets shooting their own men. Seems that it was generally hugely exaggerated by western sources. However, I have to agree with a certain somewhat controversial historian that the only way to beat a monster like Hitler was to have a monster like Stalin.
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  37. It’s an absolute disgrace that he ended up where he did. This is such a dark episode of history. I mean, in Japan there wasn’t even a Nuremberg equivalent. It disgusting. Love NASA but this is whitewashing and to try to say any different is disingenuous.
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  38. Not sure how I feel about Monty. Seems more like a clever politician than a brilliant general. A bit like Patton, he was given a rep through propaganda rather than actual achievement. That said, he clearly understood the old adage “amateurs study tactics, professionals study logistics”.
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  39.  @Boppy-B-B  interesting point. I hadn’t considered how they’d treated prisoners in the First World War. I imagine that they were looking to get a place at the wars end table as a result of their collaboration and didn’t want to be seen negatively although I’m guessing here.
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  40. There’s a new trend in WW1 history to portray the generals are more professional and competent. They were neither. Some of them may have been a bit less callous and detached and somewhat more effective in local actions but they were often removed through jealousy and nepotism. British generals were the antithesis of class snobbery and were tactically inept and slow to react to a new situation. French and German brass weren’t much better but this just extended the bloody stalemate. Generals cannot be expected to make battles without losses but to suggest that they weren’t “donkeys’ is only right in that donkeys were very useful.
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  41.  @leonpaelinck  Isn’t the point though that they had already been detached before the battle of Tannenberg?
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  42. “Machine guns?? Pah!! Charge!”
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  43.  @Goulmy86  Agreed. But that small factor:) wouldn’t have stopped the hype.
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  44. The picture at 13:47 is amazing / horrifyingly. Took me a second to see exactly what’s going on. Some of the sailors look so nonchalant - clearly they do t know what’s about to occur.
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  45. So here’s my two pence worth - what if Bomber Command had gone for mass fleets of Mossies instead of the ‘Heavies’?? Accurate and fast. Serious question folks.
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  46. French mutinies were mainly a refusal to attack. They were ‘happy’ to defend but refused to take part in anymore suicidal frontal assaults.
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  47.  @nathanstruble2177  And you’re right, of course, but I didn’t have the time or inclination to go into the whole thing of comparing the TT and Nuremberg (US bias/led etc etc) but you re correct and I was being lazy. I should have put that the TT were considerably more expedient regarding post war anti Soviet precautions.
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  48.  @frankmiller95  That’s just a bloody daft thing to say. Because I wasn’t there!!! So no one can make a judgement unless they set there? Cobblers. And, with respect to your relatives, I’ll take the historical data over a couple of tales from your family.
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  49. Don McCullum was kicked off the Task Force just before it sailed. Literally, according to him.
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  50. Wow! A actual proper reply with citations! Amazing. Good work, mate:) My overall impression from my reading of WW1 history is that many of the ruling elite in ever country just liked having a war and hd no idea how it was going to develop this time (eg parts of Europe are still no go areas today because of it). Sounds a bit ‘conspiracy theory’ but it’s not meant to be. They’d always had a war or two and nothing really bad happened (to them). So why not have another. Sort out this whole mess, eh? Tragic.
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  51. Quick shout out to the RAF ….. who got pretty much everything wrong. Apart from fighter interception they got everything wrong. Everything. They left RAF Coastal Command in a woeful condition and when they should have been bombing the construction sites of the u boat pens they were bombing fields in Germany. Planes that would have been vital to the Atlantic were killing women and babies in German cities. Useless. .
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  52.  @captainpoppleton  Very good!:) Adolf getting slotted in battle opens a whole can of worms, doesn’t it…. So, Key word was “almost”. I think the quote “Prussia was hatched from a cannonball” sums up how things would have gone if the UK had not joined the French. The Kaisers obsession with defeating the Royal Navy would certainly have led to war between the British Empire and Germany eventually.
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  53.  @Mrstrangert392  Agreed.
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  54.  @kenstrumpf909  He does! Badly for him as he’s usually better at that sort of argument. I think he misses the essential fact about The German industrial military complex (the worlds first* yay!:) and where it would inevitably lead. The Kaisers utter consuming obsession with beating the Royal Navy would have meant war for Serbian for one thing. Personally, I can’t stand Ferguson but he does write some good history books. Well, his book on WW2 is the best single volume overall history of that conflict and “The Pity of War” is good. I think what I’m trying to say is his facts are good but his opinion stinks.
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  55. What sort of Defiants were they?
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  56. Is it “Fock” or “Fock- uh? Surely it’s the latter?
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  57. I think it’s an exaggeration to say the 262 was ‘years ahead” It wasn’t the first at much either.
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  58. Were some Mk 1 spits equipped with Cannons due to a supply problem with the 303 Brownings?
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  59. Small point. Sunderland’s were called Porcupines because of the radar ariels that stuck out across the top of them and not because of the armament.
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  60. Not the nicest person by all accounts. And by that I mean he was an utter twat.
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  61. “When the German attack the allies take cover. When the British attack the Germans take cover. When the Americans attack everyone takes cover”.
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  62. They should have just made them all watch Jojo Rabbit.
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  63. It’s all so very sad……
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  64.  @bkane573  I take your point but I don’t think that would have been ‘alliance breaking’ enough. Post war alliances survived selling the Soviets jet engines (used to power the Mig 15’s) and the Cambridge spy ring even if the US now saw us for what we were - an old empire falling down, like it or not. The US still needed us even if it was just as an unsinkable aircraft carrier. Don’t get me wrong though - you make an excellent point:). They just can’t shake off / get past 1776:)
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  65.  @WanderlustZero  Yes - that makes sense. Good point.
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  66. There’s a story that the first British’H’ Bomb was actually three ‘A’ Bombs exploded simultaneously to fool the USA into thinking we had the H Bomb so they would start to co-operate with the U.K. (The USA declined to share due to British nuclear research being a leaky as a sieve and U.K. being full of Soviet spies).
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  67. In WWII the British were actually aware that their conscript army could not take sustained hardship and casualties so they put a steel before skin policy ie blast the enemy with arty and air first to avoid massive losses.
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  68. You only discuss Haig here and I get that time is a factor but there’s ample evidence that many other generals were useless (I really like donkeys so I don’t like that phrase - yeah, I know:) For a start the fact that they were so unprepared for the war is damming. Why did they get it so wrong? The writing was on the wall in the 1850s in the US. Also, the machinations of the British class system and imperial arrogance led to a horrible detached and aloof officer class. Certain countries regiments were also used carelessly because they were t British. Along with the Serbs the Scots had the highest % casualty rate of the war. Why?
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  69.  @hardroaddavey5399  it was from ‘the Pity of War’ by what’s his face. The Scottish historian who wrote the book about how lush the British empire was.
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  70. This is very true, alas.
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  71. Great video. Love the Cat. Short S@#derlands were called Flying Porcupines because of the radio direction finding masts that stuck out of the back of some versions. Not ‘cos of the armament which wasn’t particularly formidable. It was pretty standard.
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  72. Yeah, it was way to rigid.
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  73. To quote a five star general in the USAAF who I just happen to know - “They’re like sitting ducks up there!” This was in response to my son’s comment about how cool the hogs are.
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  74. Among other unpleasant miasmas.
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  75.  @emilrydstrm3944  Ha! Yes, good point. It was something I was watching rather than reading I think. I can picture it but can’t remember, sorry. In my head it was a collision with a 210 and I can picture the old guy in his USAAC baseball cap.
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  76. Source?
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