VE Day 75
Author
Discussion

pequod

Original Poster:

8,997 posts

162 months

Friday 8th May 2020
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I'm quite amazed that this topic hasn't been raised already, given it's prominence on the mainstream media all day.

Has anyone on here been involved in a street party as permitted by the Govt or raised a glass at 3pm to all the heroes of WW2 who made it possible for this place to exist?

Too far back in history to involve anyone currently posting on PH and with the current pandemic worries, not a time to 'celebrate', maybe?

What's your view?

irc

9,423 posts

160 months

Friday 8th May 2020
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No street party but I marked it my own way. My dad, aged 16, spent VE night on top of Ben Lomond. I'm working tonight but spent last night on a hilltop walking distance from home and within sight of Ben Lomond. 2 metres? I was several hundred metres from the nearest other person.




V8covin

9,472 posts

217 months

Friday 8th May 2020
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My neighbours had an impromptu gathering in the street.Social distancing mostly observed.

100SRV

2,328 posts

266 months

Friday 8th May 2020
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Hope lockdown is lifted by the time the 75th anniversary of VJ day arrives.

Ructions

4,705 posts

145 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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Anyone who loves freedom owes such a debt to the Red Army that it can never be repaid.

FredericRobinson

4,789 posts

256 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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Ructions said:
Anyone who loves freedom owes such a debt to the Red Army that it can never be repaid.
Not so much anyone who lived in Eastern Europe

Fast and Spurious

1,802 posts

112 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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Ructions said:
Anyone who loves freedom owes such a debt to the Red Army that it can never be repaid.
+1000

Eric Mc

124,980 posts

289 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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FredericRobinson said:
Ructions said:
Anyone who loves freedom owes such a debt to the Red Army that it can never be repaid.
Not so much anyone who lived in Eastern Europe
Russia really benefited from that freedom too. - or maybe not.

Zirconia

36,010 posts

308 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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They partied late into the night around here, everyone pulled out the chairs and tables to the drive ways and a lot of shouted conversations.

InfoRetrieval

390 posts

172 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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I'm rather ambivalent about WW2 anniversaries. My family had a quiet "tea party" (i.e. cup of tea and cake) as a nod to the occasion, but that's about it. Didn't watch any of the TV programmes.

I guess I'm sick of certain politicians attempting to invoke Blitz Spirit as a smokescreen to cover bumbling incompetence.

Graveworm

9,153 posts

95 months

Saturday 9th May 2020
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Eric Mc said:
FredericRobinson said:
Ructions said:
Anyone who loves freedom owes such a debt to the Red Army that it can never be repaid.
Not so much anyone who lived in Eastern Europe
Russia really benefited from that freedom too. - or maybe not.
Of course if their bosses hadn't signed a deal with Hitler to carve up Europe in the first place things might have been different from the get go.

glazbagun

15,178 posts

221 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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InfoRetrieval said:
I'm rather ambivalent about WW2 anniversaries. My family had a quiet "tea party" (i.e. cup of tea and cake) as a nod to the occasion, but that's about it. Didn't watch any of the TV programmes.

I guess I'm sick of certain politicians attempting to invoke Blitz Spirit as a smokescreen to cover bumbling incompetence.
yes It's a really important anniversary, probably the last big one we'll have veterans from (which feels unbelievable to me) and countless books have and still can be written about it's importance and the lessons to be learned. But the baby-kissing of anything half-decent in the UK is all getting a bit much.

Jonesy23

4,650 posts

160 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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Nothing around here but one of the family had something in their street. They had a photo that one of the neighbours dug out of the original street party in '45 - they were there for it and were in the photo.

AlecT

199 posts

233 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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Most residents on our housing estate got involved, it was quite a good afternoon and the weather was brilliant.



Social distancing observed of course

Graveworm

9,153 posts

95 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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Gromm said:
We could've been a part of Hitlers victory if Churchill went ahead and negotiated a peace deal with Nazis in 1940.
But the UK didn't, Russia did and went much further than a peace deal, they invaded Poland at the same time as Germany, only opposing Hitler when he double crossed and attacked them - not sure of your point.

Eric Mc

124,980 posts

289 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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Graveworm said:
But the UK didn't, Russia did and went much further than a peace deal, they invaded Poland at the same time as Germany, only opposing Hitler when he double crossed and attacked them - not sure of your point.
Hitler went to war specifically to attack into the east as soon as practicable. Stalin knew an attack would come at some point. The 1939 Pact was entered into by both sides in order to buy time - and Russia saw it as an opportunity to grab territory to its west to create a buffer zone against the expected future German attack.


Edited by Eric Mc on Sunday 10th May 12:14

JagLover

46,219 posts

259 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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Eric Mc said:
Graveworm said:
But the UK didn't, Russia did and went much further than a peace deal, they invaded Poland at the same time as Germany, only opposing Hitler when he double crossed and attacked them - not sure of your point.
Hitler went to war specifically to attack into the east as soon as practicable. Stalin new an attack would come at some point. The 1939 Pact was entered into by both sides in order to buy time - and Russia saw it as an opportunity to grab territory to its west top create a buffer zone against the expected future German attack.
Well that and most of the territory taken from Poland by the USSR was populated mainly by Belarusians and Ukrainians and had been seized by Poland in the 1920/1921 war.

In 1939 Poland contained over five million Ukrainians and Belarusians. Virtually all of whom were concentrated in its eastern provinces.

vonuber

17,868 posts

189 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
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JagLover said:
Well that and most of the territory taken from Poland by the USSR was populated mainly by Belarusians and Ukrainians and had been seized by Poland in the 1920/1921 war.

In 1939 Poland contained over five million Ukrainians and Belarusians. Virtually all of whom were concentrated in its eastern provinces.
Ignoring the Poland Lithuanian commonwealth.

Anyhoo, no celebrations around here in central london.
Whole thing just went past unremarked really.

JagLover

46,219 posts

259 months

Sunday 10th May 2020
quotequote all
vonuber said:
JagLover said:
Well that and most of the territory taken from Poland by the USSR was populated mainly by Belarusians and Ukrainians and had been seized by Poland in the 1920/1921 war.

In 1939 Poland contained over five million Ukrainians and Belarusians. Virtually all of whom were concentrated in its eastern provinces.
Ignoring the Poland Lithuanian commonwealth.
The Poland-Lithuanian commonwealth was an empire and one that, at its peak, contained many Russians, Byelorussians and Ukrainians. That didn't make its inhabitants Polish, anymore than the Poles that became subject to Prussia, Austro-Hungary and Russia following the partitions adopted the nationalities of those empires.

It is a bit difficult to argue for self-determination on the one hand and then to seize the lands of other peoples on the other. The Poles kicked a Bear when it was down on the ground in 1920/21 and then found themselves caught between Hitler's third Reich and a USSR growing rapidly in strength and power and looking for revenge.