'Preserved' WWI British officer found 90 YEARS ON (In Flanders)

The Scotsman ^ | Mon 30 May 2005 | ALLAN HALL

[orionblamblam]

Another Bog Body, like those thousands of years old.

[massatoosits]

Brins to mind the senseless slaughter of Ypres and most of the European war of 1914-1918.

[BenLurkin]

Ping

[blam]

Bog People

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks BenL. I'm not going to ping the list, just add it to the catalog, under "Thoroughly Modern Miscellany". The loss of life in WWI was atrocious. One would have thought that the Allied command would have learned its lesson from Flanders and not made the same stupid blunder in the Battle of the Somme, in which almost a quarter of all WWI casualties took place.

Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
The GGG Digest -- Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)

[nuconvert]

pong

[SunkenCiv]

Whoops, 1/4 is way too high. The total casualties are shown as 420,000 British, 200,000 French, and an estimated 500,000 German casualties. However, the British and French systematically underreported Allied casualties and issued inflated estimates of German casualties.

The Myth of the Great War: A New Military History of World War I by John Mosier paperback

[massatoosits]

remember your history...Flanders is a reference to the Belgian territory upon which the three battles of Ypres were fought. Passandaele I believe was the third of those battles, occurring in late 1917. It remains that it, as were most of the large land engagements, frightful slaughters brought on by generals and politicians trapped in the age of Napoleon and Bismark.

[SunkenCiv]

mind-boggling... 1 in 8 KIA, 1 in 3 wounded, millions additional MIA...

---

World War One 1914-1918

Main Source: A 1930s Military study done by US Army Officer Vincent J. Esposito, Colonel, US Military Academy. All are Official figures.

Country	Mobilized	Killed	Wounded	POW/Missing	Died as POW or by Disease	Total	% of Mobilized
Russia	12,000,000	1,700,000	4,950,000	2,500,000		9,150,000	76.3%
France	8,410,000	1,357,800	3,588,470	537,000	297,000	6,160,800	73.3%
British Empire	8,904,467	908,371	2,090,212	191,652		3,190,235	35.8%
Italy	5,615,000	650,000	947,000	600,000	530,000	2,197,000	39.1%
USA	4,734,991	53,402 (combat) 63,114 (non-combat)	204,002	3,973 / 3,350		364,800	8.4%
Japan	800,000	301	907	3		1,210	0.2%
Romania	750,000	335,706	120,000	80,000	62,000	535,706	71.4%
Serbia	707,343	45,000	133,148	152,958		331,106	46.8%
Belgium	267,000	13,716	44,686	34,659		93,061	34.9%
Greece	230,000	5,000	21,000	1,000	32,000	27,000	11.7%
Portugal	100,000	7,222	13,751	12,318	4,100	33,291	33.3%
Montenegro	50,000	3,000	10,000	7,000		20,000	40.0%
Allied Total	42,188,810	5,152,115	12,831,004	4,121,090	925,100	22,104,209	52.4%
Germany	11,000,000	1,773,300	4,216,058	1,152,800	224,000	7,142,558	64.9%
Austria-Hungary	7,800,000	1,200,000	3,620,000	2,200,000	32,000	7,020,000	90.0%
Turkey	2,850,000	325,789	400,000	250,000	163,000	975,000	34.2%
Bulgaria	1,200,000	87,500	152,390	27,029	184,500	266,919	22.2%
Central Powers Total	22,850,000	3,386,200	8,388,448	3,629,829	603,000	15,404,477	67.4%
All Total	65,038,810	8,538,315	21,219,452	7,750,919		37,508,686	57.7%

[SunkenCiv]

seems like there was a FR topic regarding some recently discovered photos from Alpine warfare in WWI. Oh well, maybe someone here has the link. Meanwhile...

World War One Color Photos
Big D & Bubba Show | 3/2/05 | Unknown
Posted on 03/03/2005 2:25:44 PM PST by Jinjelsnaps
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1355366/posts

[SunkenCiv]

roo, the old switche', to me. Thanks.

[TexasTransplant]

Wow,

I need to study up on WW1 some more, those numbers are staggering and humbling

Salute

[SunkenCiv]

The WWII numbers for mobilization are of course much larger; US losses were more than double for WWII; the scale of that war was much greater; in the battle of Kursk alone (July 1943), six thousand tanks took part, of which more than half were destroyed. The US alone built tens of thousands of planes and tanks, thousands of ships and landing craft, and much of that was scrapped by 1950. Scrapping it all took a lot of time, because of the sheer quantity.

In each of the World Wars, looks like about 1 in 40 US personnel died.

[Antioch]

With 11,000 dead at Vimy alone, I think Canada can be counted separately from the "British Empire"

Enlisted 595,000

Served overseas 418,000

Killed in Action 35,666

Died of wounds 12,420

Died of disease 5,405

Wounded 155,799

Presumed dead 4,671

Missing 425

Total Dead 60,383

[TexasTransplant]

The number that struck me was 67% of the mobilized were either killed, wounded or missing (combined total, both sides)

I am worried that our war on terror will not be as kind to our side until we get as serious about winning as these folks were and to get there what will the ROP have to inflict upon us before we do get serious, and We Demand Unconditional Surrender or Death from them as they demand from us? When will the War really begin?

[John Filson]

Yet today it is popular on the left and the far right to downplay the significance of WW1, its combatants, and America's "dubious" role in it. It's unforgivable that our contemporaries are forgetting the sacrifices so many made to save the west just 110 years ago.

[nickcarraway]

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields

[geopyg]

Saw something on the history channel where Gen. George Marshall grabbed Pershing (the overall commander of the army) by the arm in front of the troops and held on to him until he was done berating him for the lack of material, planning, training, etc. from the higher ups. Instead of a court-marshall, Pershing took Marshall as his right-hand man.

[kms61]

Those are some astounding numbers. One can easily seey why, with >70% casualties, Russia was ripe for revolution and France was sent into a seemingly irreversible decline. It's also easy to see wny the Western democracies had such an aversion to war during the twenties and thirties--an aversion that Hitler used to his advantage.