Posted on 03/26/2009 5:49:43 AM PDT by DFG
It was film night in Stalag Luft III and the dwindling band of surviving PoWs was marking the 65th anniversary of the daring breakout by watching The Great Escape. Even though this is Hollywood’s celebration of their story and ensured their enduring fame, it wasn’t the Nazis they booed — it was Steve McQueen and his motorbike.
“We were not impressed when that film came out,” said Reginald Cleaver, 86, a flight engineer who had been shot down over the Netherlands and who helped to make disguises for the escape. “The bits about the way the tunnel was dug and how things started was quite accurate, but the later bits were nonsense.
“The Americans played no part in the escape. To have Americans riding motorbikes was ridiculous.”
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
Baloney. They had Neville Chamberlain in office, and were a bunch of ‘head-in-the-sand’ wusses whose unique advantage against Hitler was being across a body of water. Otherwise, they would have gone down as meekly as France. They hid inside while Germans bombed the hell out of their cities from the air, only taking time for an occasional glance over their shoulders to the west to see if those ships from America were anywhere close to the horizon yet. Gimme a break.
And today, Britain is a bunch of weak wusses who have allowed the Muslims to once again put them in jeopardy, where once again we will likely have to come and bail them out. Your lack of knowledge and perspective ‘is obscene’.
You are one amazing stupid person. Obama supporter, I presume?
I don’t have any proof. That is just what is stated in the IMDB trivia section for the movie.
Over 150 British soldiers have died in Afghanistan alone since 9/11, simply because the Brits stood with the Americans.
Would you like to make these comments directly to the mothers of those young men?
Your comments are graceless and disgusting.
Please send back the $34+ Billion that we gave to your country. I think that would be close to a half trillion in today’s dollars. The blood we spilled to save your hides is priceless.
“The sound of a vertical twin is like nothing else”
True, However the sound of a 360 twin is one heck of a lot different from 180 degree twin. Most (not all) British twins were 360 and most(not all) Japanese twins were 180
Big difference.
But I know, everyone is an expert.
Btit bike collector
Yeah, Obama supporters are generally found sticking up for the U.S. Military and their historical contributions to the safety of the world. Nice response. Hitler’s tanks roll right into London but for that body of water keeping them from doing so. So pardon me if I don’t attach any great significance to the British being able to hold out longer, even when most of their military supplies were coming from the United States as we risked our asses against the German subs to transport them across the Altantic. And for you to argue in any way that they would have been able to hold out much longer without U.S. involvement is clownish logic. Get a grip. Our military was the singular reason that continent was not overrun by Hitler. Period.
Yada, yada, yada.
But Garner and McQueen were added for the benefit of American audiences...
Really don’t know much history, do you? Others here have said it...you sound like a pompous ass.
Ping
Would you like to tell that to the parents of the 150 British soldiers who have died in Afghanistan? I'm willing to bet that you've never risked your live in Afghanistan, but you call them "weak wusses"?
Your comments are disgusting.
I spent 25 years in the US Air Force. I flew over Iraq with Brits taking full part. I’ve been to Afghanistan, where the Brits are fighting.
In 25 years, I didn’t meet anyone who felt the need to ‘stick up for’ the US military by attacking the British one.
Dear God, you are an idiot.
Ever heard of a little thing called the Battle of Britain? Summer of 1940? “Their finest hour” and all that? That was a year and a half before we got into the war.
Could the UK have won WWII if we’d never gotten involved? I don’t know. The point is, they had fought the Nazis to a standstill and kept them off British soil far before we Americans ever declared war on Hitler. And if you think for one second that Winston Churchill and the British of the 1940s would have “gone down as meekly as France,” then truly, your stupidity may not be curable.
}:-)4
As a point of interest, how many times have you risked your life in Afghanistan? Since you call the 150 British soldiers who died there "cowards", you must an expert on courage.
So we go back to the original post, countering a back-handed slap at “the Americans” not being involved in the ‘Great Escape’, uttered by a British vet. My position was and is correct, that it is getting real old listening to every anti-American, anti-U.S. military statement being made on such a regular basis. This guy’s comment was just more of the same, with the underlying notion being a lack of proper recognition for the U.S. Military’s contribution to WWII. He’s not even alive today but for our military. Which is my original point, his own “escape” was facilitated by our military and our citizenry’s contributions to their war effort.
The British soldier who died in an explosion in Afghanistan was killed days before he was due to return to the UK for a family visit has been named today as Private Peter Cowton, 25, from Basingstoke.
Private Cowton died in Helmand province on Tuesday, the Ministry of Defence said today.
His parents, Karen and Robin Rolfe, said in a statement: "Peter was proud to serve his country."
A USAF salute to a brave man.
As for knowledge about WW2, my eight year old has a clearer picture of who did what (not kidding).
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