Comments by "doveton sturdee" (@dovetonsturdee7033) on "Imperial War Museums" channel.

  1.  @rossbrown6641  Graf Spee was scuttled after being engaged and damaged by a Royal Navy cruiser squadron, one ship of which came from 'The New Zealand Division of The Royal Navy.'
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  2. Except that the German fleet never risked a further confrontation with the Grand Fleet. Two sorties were aborted almost before they had begun. As a result, whilst the HSF swung around cables in the Jade, the British Northern Patrol systematically drove Germany into malnutrition, revolution, mutiny, and defeat.
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  3. Except Tirpitz was never torpedoed by anyone.
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  4.  @Boppy-B-B  Perhaps you should read his post before responding in a knee jerk fashion. That wasn't actually what he wrote at all.
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  5.  @Finnbobjimbob  Yes, he is. He is a troll who posts simply to annoy. Best to ignore him.
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  6. Reality check. No, they didn't. Why on earth would they? If you want your enemy to come to terms, letting an entire field army escape to an island protected by the largest navy on earth is an odd way of bringing that about, don't you think?
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  7. What went wrong? Surely the Houses of Parliament were well within range!
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  8. Given the level of ignorance shown in your post, I can take it for granted that you have no idea at all about the casualty levels at Gallipoli sustained by the tea-drinking do nothing British. The lack of knowledge displayed by some of the people who post on here is almost astonishing.
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  9. Most battles are decided by more than simply corpse-counting. Do you really think that the tactical 'victors' were the ones who, in reality, fled the battlefield?
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  10. She had a thicker armoured belt than either Bismarck or the Iowas, and no one has ever called them battlecruisers.
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  11.  @angloaust1575  The Imperial forces in Malaya outnumbered the Japanese ones. The failure there was not of resources but of leadership.
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  12.  @robertpearson8798  I once sarcastically suggested that, as a teenager, Churchill might have been Jack the Ripper. I swear some of the idiots believed me!
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  13.  @raypurchase801  Define 'superdreadnought' and define 'state of the art warships.'
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  14. The British used Colonial Troops as cannon fodder? Why not look up the actual casualty figures, instead of posting nonsense?
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  15.  @kenmazoch8499  Sorry. I am a great support of The Auk, and have argued in debate at military colleges about his role in WW2, both in North Africa and later in India. In particular, I believe that Alam Halfa was his battle. However, I cannot accept that he had much input into Second Alamein.
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  16. Sadly, both Onyx and Plymouth have now been scrapped.
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  17. It is sad that Warspite, for one, wasn't saved. But the reasons, among others, are that Britain was in a parlous financial state after the war, and politicians tend not to give a dam about history or heritage, or indeed about much other than self-advancement. Quite possibly, a public vote on whether a WW2 battleship should have been preserved would have won significant support, which is why British governments never permitted one.
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  18.  @robertotamesis1783  Sorry, but you really are wide of the mark. Churchill did not, despite 'Darkest Hour' ask FDR for destroyers. They were actually offered by the US Ambassador to Paris, and the British saw the old four stackers as useful Atlantic escort stop gaps until new construction became available. In short, they were offered, not requested. The Germans in September 1940 had no landing craft at all, just large numbers of canal barges, hastily converted and to be towed, at just above walking pace, into the Channel by tugs and trawlers. The known presence of the Royal Navy, in large numbers within a few hours of Dover, was a far greater deterrent than the weather, although by mid October that would have become a problem given the lack of seaworthiness of the Barges. Air lift helicopters in 1943? No, they hadn't. Moreover, in 1943 weren't the Germans rather busy elsewhere?
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  19.  @Ballinalower  The U-boat offensive was based on the assumption that the calculations of Von Holtzendorff, Kaiser Bill's Chief of Naval Staff in WW1, was still applicable. This determined that, in order to starve Britain into submission, 600,000 tons of British shipping needed to be sunk each month. After, December, 1941, this figure became meaningless, but in any case even prior to Dec. 1941 the monthly tonnage figure rarely exceeded 300,000, and in many months was below 100,000 tons. The possibility was a remote one.
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  20. Montgomery was a disgrace, shamefully using intelligence information in order to ensure victory. I assume you understand what sarcasm is?
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  21. Perhaps you haven't read the many assessments by British naval historians which accept that there were failings on the British side?
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  22.  @Purvis-dw4qf  I know, and I agree about not scattering the convoy. The concern was that the Distant Covering Force, of two battleships, two cruisers, and twelve destroyers was too far away. The Cruiser Covering Force, of four heavy cruisers three destroyers, was close enough to intervene, however, especially after Broome ordered those destroyers from the close escort armed with torpedoes to join Hamilton's cruisers.
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  23. They were not with the BEF at Dunkirk. They were with the French IX Corps, which surrendered on 12 June.
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  24.  @AUCHTERMUCHTYZZ  Left behind because they had been obliged to surrender when IX Corps did. The Royal Navy had sent an evacuation fleet of 67 merchantmen & 140 smaller vessels to St. Valery, intending to lift 51HD on the night of 12 June. General Marcel Ihler, of IX Corps, took the decision out of their hands.
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  25.  @hardeshmanhas4102  If you mean the treaty of Versailles, then the driving force behind that was France. Britain & the US both believed the terms were too harsh. If you seek to blame Britain for the rise of Hitler, then don't forget that France was equally, if not more, responsible. The US, of course, helped to create the conditions, then wiped her hands of them. Something like Kabul as I write.
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  26. Firstly, Force Z was sent as a deterrent, not to a war zone, and secondly air cover was available, but not despatched.
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  27. Air cover isn't much use in the Arctic night.
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  28.  @iansneddon2956  You are wasting time and effort replying to this 'Mark Harrison.' He infests a host of sites, almost entirely with 'controversial' single sentence anti-British comments. The quintessential troll.
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  29.  @anthonyweedonweedon1426  I agree. I am British.
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  30.  @theuksmostwanted6103  Churchill was born in 1874 and died almost 50 years ago, yet you seek to attack him because he didn't subscribe to the transient and bizarre opinions prevalent at the present time? Certainly Churchill believed that British culture was superior to that of India, China, or Africa. Other European countries, and certainly the United States, believed exactly the same of their own, largely because every advance in science, technology, and education since the mid 16th century had been developed by Europeans. I wonder how, in 100 years time, observers will view some of the lunatic opinions which currently exist/ As to the use of poison gas, would you explain why using shells, bombs, and bullets is quite acceptable, but using gas isn't? The use of gas was, at the time, actually regarded as less brutal than the other weapons I have mentioned by many, if not most, military men of all nations of the period. To give you just one quote among many, "Gas is a more merciful weapon than [the] high explosive shell, and compels an enemy to accept a decision with less loss of life than any other agency of war." As to Churchill being an aggressive tyrant, which wars of aggression did he pursue, and, as the democratically elected Prime Minister of the UK in WW2, how was he a tyrant? By the way, presumably you are aware that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi referred to Africans as an inferior breed of humanity? Would you wish to add him to your list of evil people?
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  31. If you had visited the IWM recently (as I did, just before the first lockdown) you wouldn't even need to ask that question.
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  32. Not correct. You should look beyond the war in the Pacific.
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  33.  @Ralphieboy  Actually, preventing the French fleet from returning to mainland French ports and, potentially, being ordered by Vichy to support an attempted German invasion. Maintaining British naval control of the Mediterranean, and engaging the Italian fleet on the rare occasions when it did appear. This wasn't often and, to quote the old song, 'If they won't fight us, what can we do more?' Screening Arctic Convoys against a possible sortie by Tirpitz or Scharnhorst, before ensuring that one Sharnhorst emerged, she did not return. Finally, using older battleships of the 'R' class to protect Atlantic convoys from possible attacks by German raiders. Particularly during Operation Berlin.
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  34.  @jonathanwilliams1065  Yes, it was a massacre, but it wasn't a betrayal. The British alliance with France had ended when Reynaud's administration collapsed, and a collaborationist government had succeeded it. The Armistice of 22 June required that the French Navy be returned to ports in Mainland France. As the German Navy had taken heavy losses during the Norwegian campaign, the main obstacle to an invasion attempt on Britain was Germany's lack of a navy. The British Government feared that the French navy might be allocated to provide support. Gensoul, the commander at Mers, was given a number of alternatives to pass on to his government, but refused so to do. In the situation of the time, the British government concluded that the action by Force H was a regrettable necessity.
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  35. There were 28,000 Australian casualties (killed & wounded). 7,900 New Zealanders. 27,000 French, 4,700 Indian. Oh, and 73,500 British & Irish.
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  36.  @seraglioborneo2803  The British did begin landing troops in Cherbourg as early as 7 June, until Weygand told their commander, Alan Brooke, that the French army was no longer capable of organised resistance.
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  37. How would nationalism in the colonies affect voting patterns in Britain?
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  38. Yet the Beveridge Report was published in November, 1942.
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  39. Legend. The Luftwaffe was the most 'nazi' of the German armed forces. It failed badly at Dunkirk, despite Goering's promise to Hitler that the destruction of the pocket was 'a special job for the Luftwaffe,' made on 23 May.
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  40.  @iansneddon2956  Grossly unfair. The HSF did sortie again. On 25-27 November, 1918. They even went as far as Scapa Flow.
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  41.  @Rohilla313  A slight correction. The evacuation was actually a success for the Royal & Merchant Navies. They were expected to be able to lift around 40,000 men before Dunkirk fell. 323,000 were actually brought out.
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  42. What 'rosy nationalist myth?' No one with any knowledge of the period has ever had any doubt about the fact that Britain received the support of the Dominions and the Empire.
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  43.  @karlheinzvonkroemann2217  The Okinawa invasion was supported by a fleet consisting of 18 battleships, 27 cruisers, 177 destroyers/destroyer escorts, and 39 aircraft carriers (11 fleet carriers, 6 light carriers and 22 escort carriers). Overlord involved 1,213 allied warships.
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  44.  @richardarsenault865  If he was such an 'abrasive unpleasant human being' why did they need him again? What was the crisis that demanded his return?
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  45.  @sharonprice42  Potentially, but not actually. Of the 200,000 British troops on that beach, how many returned to Britain? 193,500.
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  46.  @sharonprice42  What British equipment do you think the Germans used against the allies? A few trucks, actually.
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  47. 'When the Americans came into the war they took charge of British and Canadian troops on D-DAY.' Really? The Allied Ground forces commander was British, the Air Force commander was British, and the Naval commander was British. 3261 0f 4127 were British manned, 892 of 1213 warships were RN or RCN, two thirds of 11,600 aircraft were RAF, and two thirds of the troops who landed from the landing craft were British/Canadian. The minesweeping in advance of D-Day was almost entirely carried out by RN & RCN ships, and the Escort & Support Groups which destroyed any U-boats which tried to intervene were RN or RCN. Oh, and of course the Intelligence Operation was dominated by Bletchley Park. In the East, the largest single land defeat sustained by the Japanese Army was Operation U-Go, in March-June, 1944. Inflicted by the Anglo-Indian XIV Army. The French liberated Paris, whilst the British liberated Brussels and Amsterdam, before reaching the Baltic and ensuring Denmark did not fall into the Soviet Sphere of influence.
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  48.  @sharonprice42  I would ask you to provide a source, but, apart from your prejudices, you haven't got one. Most equipment left behind was destroyed, particularly armoured vehicles. Even AA guns or 2 pounder AT guns were of no value without sources of ammunition. Some trucks were captured in working order, but once again the spares problem was insurmountable. The British had a similar problem after Beda Foom. A number of M11s and M13s were captured intact, and used by an Australian Division Cavalry regiment, but for a month or two only.
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  49.  @sharonprice42  Just the opposite. My posts are always fact based. What do you think I have made up/
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  50.  @sharonprice42  By captured, I assume you mean 'destroyed.' The British sen onlly two Armoured Units with the BED, 1st Armoured Division & 1st Army Tank Brigade. Ist Armoured Division had 250 tanks, of which 110 were light Mark Vis, armed only with machine guns only, whist the remained were a mixture of cruisers, A9s, A10s & A13s. A small number were captured intact, but only one German unit ever used any, actually 9 A13s, as training vehicles in France & the Netherlands until mid 1941. 1st Army Tank Brigade consisted of two regiments, wquipped with a total of 12 Light tanks, 77 Matilda Is (armed with a machine gun) & 23 Matilda IIs, armed with a two pounder gun. These had been lost in action or destroyed by their crews, either at Arras or afterwards. Only one Matilda II is known to have been used by any German unit, after the turret was replaced by a German AA gun, on the French coast. If you have a source which tells you anything different, what is it? .303 Ammunition was useless to the Germans as it was incompatible with their own weapons. A similar comment applies to the AA & AT weapons. Trucks were of more use, nut only briefly until the lack of access to spare parts became too great. You keep posting exactly the same thing, time after time, without providing any evidence for your nonsense. You are becoming tedious.
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