Paris was freed from Nazi rule on August 25th 1944 by the 2nd Armoured Division of the Free French army, a few months after D-Day. The strange thing is that all the soldiers seemed to be white – even though the French army at the time was two-thirds black. As it turns out the British and Americans who ran D-Day would only let all-white army divisions cross the Channel. Even the black American soldiers were left behind in Britain and joined the fighting only later.
France in those days ruled much of Africa and had black soldiers in its army. In 1940 when Paris fell to Hitler 17,000 black soldiers had lost their lives defending France. In spite of that no black soldiers were allowed to take part in the liberation of Paris four years later. And to this day there is no monument in Paris to honour them.
After the fall of Paris, De Gaulle fled to Africa to raise an army to some day return to free France. By 1944 his army was two-thirds black. But then five months before D-Day the British and Americans told him they did not want black soldiers freeing Paris – they would allow whites only.
De Gaulle was against it – he did not separate his men by race like the Americans did – but he had little choice.
Most of De Gaulle’s divisions were about 40% white. The whitest one was 75% white – the 2nd Armoured Division in Morocco. It would be hard to move it into position for D-Day because of all its tanks, but it was the only one that could be made all-white in time. But even as it was, many of the “whites” were not French at all but Spanish, Syrian and North African.
But why did the British and Americans want an all-white division? They said it would be better for propaganda and French morale – as if they knew more about French morale than De Gaulle himself.
Propaganda: it seems the (white) American commanders were afraid of how the sight of black soldiers freeing Paris would look on newsreels back home where everyone had been brought up on whitewashed history. So to maintain that image they forced the French to whitewash their army, forcing fiction on fact.
At the time the American army was segregated on the grounds that blacks were not brave enough to fight in battle. Blacks worked in the supply chain behind front lines as truck drivers and dock workers. They were not thrown into battle until near the end when General Eisenhower had little choice. But the black African soldiers had already proved their courage in France in 1940 and had even fought alongside white Americans in Italy in 1943.
The American motives seem clear, the British ones do not. Their army was not segregated by race and they had nothing like Jim Crow to maintain on the home front. Some say it is because they were afraid of having a black fighting force on their soil – D-Day was staged from their shores.
See also:
- Tirailleurs Senegalais – the main black fighting force
- Frantz Fanon – who fought in France in the Second World War
- Hitler
- Jim Crow
- History in Texas schoolbooks
- Mighty Whitey
- The casting of “The Last Airbender” – where only whites are allowed to be heroes in spite of the original
- darkies
I’ve seem some of the old black & white movie footages when France was liberated, and I honestly don’t recall seeing black soldiers in it.
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The American motives seem clear, the British ones do not.
Well, Churchill himself was a racist. Could be one of many reasons.
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Was this your source Abagond
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7984436.stm
and to listen to the show
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00jhp5d
Here’s some other things tied to the link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/document/gallery/french-colonial-soldiers/
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No doubt white American citizens would probably be shocked that *gasp* black soldiers had a hand in liberating the French.
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One of the many things that have been whitewashed in terms of military recognition.
Memorial Day was started by Blacks…but I bet you’ll never hear the genetic recessive admit it, much less out it in His-story books.
White people don’t shock me anymore. I find it sad that this is their legacy and no one seems surprised anymore. What are they so afraid of that they can’t even recognize someone’s valiant efforts because they have melanin in their skin?
Is the fear of white genetic annihilation so deep seated and rooted that they would deny even a heros death and acknowledgment because of skin color. Apparently so.
My mother always said that white people are the way they are because they can be wiped out so easily. It is in their best interest to be self segregating assholes because joining the human race would result in the destruction of their recessive genes which are globally sparse.
Being civil towards other human beings is detrimental to genetic recessive survival.
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And one of the strange thing about this is that many POC fought for world peace, justice etc essentially in the defence of ‘White supremacy’, but did not have the presence of mind to fight for their ‘own freedom’.
This is why many radicals just after the World War 1 said they would not fight in any ‘White man’s war’ – the term used at the time. Since after the war, the returning Black soldiers etc were met with severe rioting by the local population in the UK and USA
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Great post, Abagond. Getting linked as usual.
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My dad was one of the support troupes during WWII. Since he had not been in combat or mentioned other Black troupes in combat, it was hard for me to believe that others had, as a child. This included my mother”s cousin. The propaganda so affected the minds of many Blacks during that period. Not even during Black History month did the Black Soldier get his due.
I think they were more worried about what Black people would see, than whites. It would then give the general Black populace the idea that they could fight and win. Now they didn’t want an insurrection.
It sometime boggles my mind how much I didn’t know about Black people until I was over thirty.
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Little known fact: Brazil had 25,000 soldiers who fought with the Allies against the Axis on the Italian front in WWII. An entire combat division with supporting units: the Força Expeditionária Brasileira, or FEB.
As soon as hostilities were over, the Brazilians were hustled out of Europe as quick as possible because many of the soldiers were black or brown and it was presumed that this would cause “problems” in occupying Europe.
As a side note, as far as I know, the Brazilian Army was the only NON-SEGREGATED army to participate in WWII. Not that this means that FEB didn’t have its own racist issues, but segregated, it wasn’t.
Here’s a pícture of FEB in action:
http://www.mauxhomepage.com/geraldomota/feb023.htm
This is a trippy picture for those who know their racism and military history, because here’s an obviously integrated unit in WWII American military gear and most U.S. military history buffs will tell you such a unit never existed.
It did. Just not in the American or British armies.
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Given the fact that Britain did not segregate its forces and had a large and valued Indian army, one might have expected London to object to such a racist policy.
Yet this does not appear to have been the case.
from the aforesaid bbc link
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@Thaddeus
The French army was initially not segregated either, at least not until the Americans put pressure on De Gaulle. There had been a long history of mixed troops since WWI.
My camerounais grand oncle (my mother’s brother) fought for France in WWII. He kept talking about those days, tough times for everybody but the cameraderie in the army between all sorts of backgrounds was about the only thing that stuck as a positive memory.
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sorry I meant to say grand mother’s brother. I’m not that old… 😉
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Britain did indeed segregate its forces, AFAIK, J. Units were white or “native”. Of course as in all colonial armies, native battalions would have white officers, but that was as far as it went. Indian brigades, for example, would have three “native” battalions and one “white” battalion.
The U.S. took segregation one step farther, with all black divisions. Some black supporting battalions were also on the OoB. One of Patton’s best tank battalions was a black battalion – the 705th IIRC. In spite of being amply praised by Patton(who was a fairly racist guy), the only got their presidential unit citation in the Clinton administration. At first they had trouble working with white units who didn’t want to deal with an “orphan” black battalion for racist reasons. From what I’ve heard, however, no one doubted their combat skills from the Ardennes on.
But the British didn’t have mixed basic units: battalions were segregated by race and nationality, AFAIK.
If you have any other info, let us know!
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I think there’s some confusion as to what is meant by “segregation”. When most military historians say “segregated”, they are talking battalion level and lower. All colonial powers raised “native” battalions and regiments and these often fought alongside “white” troops, just as the 705th tank battalion (black) would often be assigned to a “white” division.
At the Brigade/Regimental level on up, units were often “mixed”, as I describe above, though the americans made an attempt to keep their divisions segregated.
AFAIK, Femi, your uncle would have fought in a colonial battalion made up of 100% African soldiers, with the odd white officer thrown in.
What’s interesting about the Brazilian Army is that – again AFAIK – it was the only WWII army that didn’t segregate AT ANY LEVEL. Even squads could have a mix of white, black and brown soldiers. Because Brazil was and is a racist country, the officer corps was overwhelmingly white. But field soldiers would share food, accomodations and everything else, independent of race. Again, AFAIK, that wasn’t the case in any other army. In all other armies, all of one’s squad, platoon, company and battalion mates would be of the same race.
(For those of you who are having trouble following the terminology, a squad is the most basic military unit of 8-12 men.
3-4 squads make a platoon
3-4 plattoons make a company
3-4 companies, a battalion
2-3 battalions a regiment
3-4 battalions a brigade
2-4 regiments or brigades a division.
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France and England also used Caribbean troops in WW II. Their insane fight to keep their colonial property. What they did in Algeria was absolutely Godless and their need to keep Vietnam led to our involvement in what started out as a war for independence. The cold war was not cold anywhere outside of America and Western Europe.
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That ridiculous. America unloading our racial baggage onto another country.
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I have heard stories of the Pope being wary of black soldiers setting foot in Vatican.
I don’t know if it’s true, though.
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My father served under Gen. George Patton. He spoke of some of the racism he experienced while fighting in WWII.
Yes, Abagond, the liberation of not only France, but, Europe, has been white-washed to the max. Black soldiers showed themselves capable in their fight during WWII:
“Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, U.S. Third Army commander, pins the Silver Star on Private Ernest A. Jenkins of New York City for his conspicuous gallantry in the liberation of Chateaudun, France…” October 13, 1944. 208-FS-3489-2. (african_americans_wwii_017.jpg)
24. “Two smiling French soldiers fill the hands of American soldiers with candy, in Rouffach, France, after the closing of the Colmar pocket.” February 5, 1945. Todd. 111-SC-199861-S. (african_americans_wwii_024.jpg)
Black American soldiers were not the only ones to help liberate France, but, not mentioned in WWII history is their hand in liberating one of the infamous concentration camps of Hitler’s Nazis:
Of note is the undisputed record of the 761st:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/761st_Tank_Battalion_(United_States)
During 183 days of combat in 1944 and 1945, the 761st, wearing the Black Panther patch, captured or liberated more than 30 major towns and four airfields. It suffered a 50 percent casualty rate and lost 71 tanks. It pierced the Siegfried Line into Germany and fought in the Battle of the Bulge. And it did liberate at least one concentration camp, the Gunskirchen camp in Austria, May 6, 1944.
Another never discussed historical fact of WWII is the fighting of Black troops in the Pacific Rim—Japan, China, Burma, Iwo Jima— (known in WWII parlance as the “Pacific Theater”). Black American troops fought there as well:
16. “Cautiously advancing through the jungle, while on patrol in Japanese territory off the Numa-Numa Trail, this member of the 93rd Infantry Division is among the first Negro foot soldiers to go into action in the South Pacific theater.” May 1, 1944. 111-SC-189381-S (african_americans_wwii_016.jpg)
14. “Negro troops of the 24th Infantry, attached to the Americal Division, wait to advance behind a tank assault on the Jap[anese], along Empress Augusta Bay on Bougainville.” 1944. 111-SC-202491 (african_americans_wwii_014.jpg)
13. “Seeking to rescue a Marine who was drowning in the surf at Iwo Jima, this sextet of Negro soldiers narrowly missed death themselves when their amphibian truck was swamped by heavy seas. From left to right, back row, they are T/5 L. C. Carter, Jr., Private John Bonner, Jr., Staff Sergeant Charles R. Johnson. Standing, from left to right, are T/5 A. B. Randle, T/5 Homer H. Gaines, and Private Willie Tellie.” March 11, 1945. S/Sgt. W. H. Feen. 127-N-114329 (african_americans_wwii_013.jpg)
10. “A U.S. Army soldier and a Chinese soldier place the flag of their ally on the front of their jeep just before the first truck convoy in almost three years crossed the China border en route from Ledo, India, to Kunming, China, over the Stilwell road.” February 6, 1945. Sgt. John Gutman. 208-AA-338A-1 (african_americans_wwii_010.jpg)
Abagond, also lost in this whitewashing of WWII history, are other battles as well:
-The Battle of the Bulge
The Black units that faced the heaviest fighting during WWII were the following:
-761ST
-Tuskegee Airmen
-92nd and 93rd, which fought in the Po Valley in Italy:
40. “Negro `doughfoots’ of the 92nd Infantry (`Buffalo’) Division pursue the retreating Germans through the Po Valley. German forces in Italy have since capitulated unconditionally.” Ca. May 1945. 208-AA-49E-1-13. (african_americans_wwii_040.jpg)
Has anyone ever heard of the Red Ball Express?
This transportation unit of truck drivers, which was predominantly Black, was set up to supply the rapidly advancing US forces. Th eRBE suffered heavy casualties. They drove many times behind German line to get the needed supplies to Patton’s army to continue the war effort:
http://www.skylighters.org/redball/
Not trying to derail the post, but, not mentioned at all in the history of WWII are the Black women who served in the military. Yes, they did not fight on the battle lines as the men did, but, they still made a major impact in their dedicated service in WWI II. Black American women also fought to serve in the war effort as nurses. Despite early protests that black nurses treating white soldiers would not be appropriate, the War Department relented, and the first group of Black American nurses in the Army Nurse Corps arrived in England in 1944.
Not well known is the important efforts of the famous 6888TH Central Postal Battalion:
-6888TH (aka the “Six Triple Eight”) Central Postal Battalion:
148. “The first Negro WACs to arrive [on] the continent of Europe were 800 girls of the 6888th Central Postal Directory Bn, who had also been the first to arrive in England. After the battalion had set up its facilities at Rouen, France, it held an `open house’, which was attended by hundreds of Negro soldiers. Pvt. Ruth L. James,…of the battalion area is on duty at the gate.” May 26, 1945.Pfc. Stedman. 111-SC-23707. (african_americans_wwii_148.jpg)
D-Day. VE-Day. Pacific Theater.
So many battles that still wear a whiteface.
The dedication that many Black men and women showed during WWII is exemplary.
That they fought two enemies—–overseas, and back in America—-is a true testament to their courage and bravery.
Patriotism has no color.
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Ann:
Excellent comment! Thank you!
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[…] Read the rest of Abagond’s post here. […]
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Thanks, Ann. The 761st was the tank battalion I was talking about, not the 705th.
The FEB fought alongside the 92nd Infantry Division in Italy on several occasions and was repatriated out of the theater at war’s end under the same general order that removed the “non-whites” of the 92nd.
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Thad
With regard to:
“But the British didn’t have mixed basic units: battalions were segregated by race and nationality, AFAIK.”
I am not sure I have understood your point about ‘segregation’.
I do not wish to get into ‘semantics’…However and…
Personally in the U.S I thought ‘segregation in the army was a continuation of government policy that which was already embedded in everyday society.
The British did not have a ‘policy’ of segregation in their society and hence none in their army, if you follow.
Perhaps would you like to clarify
Cheers!!
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No, no… This isn’t a semantical issue. Segregation was carried out at the battalion/regiment level in the British army and (mostly) at the divisional level in the American army. But BOTH armies had mono-racial basic combat units.
What you didn’t have – in either the British or American armies – were whites and non-whites in the same basic combat unit. The only difference in terms of segregation was that the Brits would routinely brigade non-white battalions and white battalions together while the Americans prefered to try and clump all their non-white battalions in mono-racial divisions.
But even that is a bit of an ideal and not real division. Units like the 761st tank battalion (The Black Panthers) weren’t permanently attached to any division and were hooked up, as needed, where they were needed. So they were routinely serving alongside of white ballations.
In both the American and British armies, segregation meant having men of the same “race” eating, bunking and fighting together. In modern armies, that means the battalion/regiment level and lower. All allied armies (except Brazil, AFAIK) segregated by race at the battalion level and lower and all allied armies – even the Yanks – cross-attached battalions multi-racially.
The Brazilian Army, by contrast, was like the American army is today: it was desegregated at all levels. You’d have, for example, blacks and whites on the same gun crew, eating at the same mess tables and bunking in the same tents.
It was at the daily life level that armies were segregated, and that’s where 99% of a soldier’s experiences occur, not on the battlefield. AFAIK, only the Brazilians didn’t do this. In fact, the Brazilians have had a desgregated army since 1865, at the very least.
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Of course, like the American Army in Vietnam, dessegragation doesn’t mean anti-racist. It’s just that in Brazil, poor white footsoldiers were treated, effectively, as blacks and zero to vanishingly few blacks were officers. MAYBE a few light brown people were officers.
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It might help to understand, in the context of this topic, that in the anglo-american system, regiments are the “holders of tradition” – the basic combat unit which is generally recruited from one specific place and among one type of people.
By the time WWII rolled along, regiments had mostly degenerated into purely symbolic units in the American army, except for Infantry regiments, which were still fielded together as a unit. In the British Army, regiments served to train and recruit battalions, which were then deployed independently and often called, in fact, “regiments”.
So segregation as a practice is deployed at the regimental level and is either slightly reinforced by deploying regiment’s constituent battalions together with other like-race units or slightly reduced by splitting them up among other unit.
But at the day-to-day level, a soldier’s life is conducted within the regiment/battalion. Brigade and Division – as well as higher levels like corps and army – are just notional abstractions. You’re not liable to have any friends outside of your battalion unless you made them prior to your military service.
This is why the battalion/regiment level is generally where segregationist policies come into play. In a segregationist army, you won’t see many (if any) multiracial units below this level, but you’ll also not see many monoracial units above this level.
The Brits did indeed have some “pure Native” divisions, btw, though their preferred practice was to brigade one “British” battallion with 2-3 “native” or “Commonwealth” battalions. Note that they didn’t do this because they were interested in dessegregation: they didn’t it because they doubted the fighting quality of the commonwealth’s troops. The ONLY Commonwealth units which didn’t have British battalions brigaded in were – you guessed it – the ones from the “white” dominions: Australia, New Zealand, South Africe and Canada. These were supposedly “trustworthy” enough (though the South Africans had their asses handded to them on a platter several times by the Germans and Italians in North Africa).
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Cheers Thad,
I think I understand what you are saying here.
So in this respect there was a division between POC and Whites in the armies, just as there had been a ‘division’ in colonial lands.
It is this ‘division’ which you are referring to as ‘segregation’, and in contrast to where some suggest that it is an official policy a la US and S. Africa.
However, point taken nonetheless.
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@ Thaddeus
Don’t shoot the messenger 😉
My grand oncle was born in Cameroun but full French citizen and lived in France since the 30s. I’m totally military illiterate but as a matter of fact he was a soldier among other black french, white french, maghrébins in the FFL (the ones that never ultimately surrendered). The Vichy forces were most likely segregated, the fascists they were.
Once again, I’m only talking about what I experienced as a kid from their veteran meetings and anecdotes. I saw all the men from different backgrounds talking about how they were fighting side by side, the cameraderie, and all that stuff that’s quite boring for a kid.
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Brazilian Expeditionary Force (BEF/FEB)
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Ahn, the FFL. I believe that they are the exception which proves the rule: they would take ANYONE. That was, after all, the point of the FFL. After WWII, they even took in members of the SS. It was presumed that if you were desperate enough to join the Foreign Legion, you’d not be overly picky about whom you served with.
But the Free French forces were indeed segregated. The units which came out of North Africa were either “native” or “settler” regiments. They were combined in mixed divisions. But white settlers didn’t serve with non-white natives in the same battalion, in the exact same way that the men of the 751st tank battalion got no white recruits, but served alongside other white battalions.
As for this not being segregation, that’s an interesting point as, after all, colonialized peoples are not considered to be citizens. But reflect on the fact that Algeria was supposedly a department of France and STILL had settler and native battalions.
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it’s absolute lies the Germans shot them after surrendering
However, it would be typical of the French under De Gualle to not recognise colonial African troops. They can be arrogant like that. The frogs will never change
I think the figures supplied re the amount of colonial troops is a rubbery one, however, they deserve recognition
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Tautology???
“No, no… This isn’t a semantical issue” (ie what is segregation?)
=
“As for this NOT being segregation, that’s an interesting point”…
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@Thaddeus
By FFL I was referring to the Forces Françaises Libres.
You might want to keep in mind that there were Black French citizens living in France métropolitaine before WWII. Some were even born in Europe, some were born in the colonies but naturalised French. Those black men were assigned to troops alongside any other French citizen from France métropolitaine. There were neither logical nor legal reasons to be sent off to colonial troops as a Parisian resident.
I don’t get where this myth is coming from that France métropolitaine was always 100% white until after WWII.
The thing is that in 1940 after the defeat the nazis picked the black soldiers out and executed them on the spot. My grand oncle had quite a few stories to tell about that…
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Hey Abagond, if you’re against racist comments on your blog, why do you let “CaucasiansBroughtRatsToThe”New”World” spew racist non-sense on your blog? But i know you feel that only whites are racist.
Most people know that blacks contributed in WWII, its just that compared to the total number of soldiers, blacks made up a very small percentage of the soldiers in WWII. There is no white washing like you love to claim. The French army was not mostly black as you claim. You need to do better research.
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Hey Amurah, why don’t you post your sources? Abagond never needed to “claim” that the French army was majority black. He merely cited a historical fact.
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The french army wasn’t mostly black. 1944 is almost the end of the war. Operation Dragoon is the only real victory for France during this time. The invasion was initiated by an amphibious assault by elements of the U.S. Seventh Army, with a follow-up force made up primarily of the French First Army. The First Army was mainly composed of North African units (Maghrebis and french Pied-noirs soldiers, not black soldiers.
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Femi, like I say, this is all AFAIK. I do know quite a bit about military history and race, however, though most of it is in regards to brazil and the U.S. If you’ve got some good evidence that significant numbers of black metropolitan French served in regular metropolitan battalions, I’d love to see it.
However, I’ll bite as to the myth of a white France. So what percentage of metropolitan France before WWII was black? We’re talking hundreds of guys here in the service? Thousands? Tens of thousands?
In any case, if you look at France’s North African divisions, which made up the vast majority of the FFL forces in WWII up until the last year of the conflict, you’ll very clearly see that their battalions are divided by ethnicity, race, color, etc.
Here’s a link to an OoB of the FFL forces in June 1944:
Click to access 944FJAA.pdf
Note that at the battalion level, units are quite clearly segregated by race and ethnicity. Morrocan battalions, for example, are made up of “non-whites”. Morrocan COLONIAL battalions are made up of white settlers.
France’s African battalions, in which your grand served, were certainly all black except for the officer corps.
Now I’ll buy the idea that the (probably very few) metropolitan black French citizens may have indeed been put in regular metropolitan battalions. But given the persistent racial segregation in the French Army, I think this is something that needs to be SHOWN and not assumed. It was not the case with your uncle.
Here’s Abagond’s comment:
De Gaulle was against it – he did not separate his men by race like the Americans did – but he had little choice.
Most of De Gaulle’s divisions were about 40% white. The whitest one was 75% white – the 2nd Armoured Division in Morocco. It would be hard to move it into position for D-Day because of all its tanks, but it was the only one that could be made all-white in time. But even as it was, many of the “whites” were not French at all but Spanish, Syrian and North African.
The French did indeed segregate, however: those non-whites and non-French served in seperate battalions, just like black Americans. The difference is that the Americans tried to have all-white DIVISIONS whereas French divisions, as the OoB above shows, were multiracial and multinational.
As I’ve mentioned above, however, this racial split is more ideal than real. As the OoB shows, the French did indeed have several “all white” and “all non-white” divisions while the U.S. had many black support battalions – like the 751st – which were cross-attached to “white” divisions.
In the case of the French division which liberated Paris, what happened was that battalions were taken out and other battalions put in. Now note that OoB I posted. The Second Armored Division was the one that liberated Paris. It was supposedly 75% white. Its subunits are clearly delineated as to ethnicity.
Because of France’s dehabilitated condition, white refugee units were often tossed together with non-white units in the “African” divisions, but this was a matter of necessity and not policy.
Here’s a wikilink to the division’s mechanized infantry regiment, which was made up of black Africans who had managed to escape from the debacle of the fall of France and a company of die-hard Spanish anti-nazis. Guess which subunit was chosen to participate in the liberation of Paris?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%A9giment_de_marche_du_Tchad
France began the war, apparently, with a segregated army. (Though again, I’m willing to believe that a few metropolitan black French may have shown up in met battalions here and there).
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quote Femi
“The thing is that in 1940 after the defeat the nazis picked the black soldiers out and executed them on the spot. My grand oncle had quite a few stories to tell about that…”
That is absolute rubbish
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Amurah said:
“Most people know that blacks contributed in WWII, its just that compared to the total number of soldiers, blacks made up a very small percentage of the soldiers in WWII. There is no white washing like you love to claim. The French army was not mostly black as you claim. You need to do better research.”
If you think the France’s army was not mostly black in 1944, then they did succeed in whitewashing history for you.
My main source for this post was the BBC:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7984436.stm
They are pretty careful with their facts. You will need a source as good as or better if you seek to persuade me.
“Hey Abagond, if you’re against racist comments on your blog, why do you let “CaucasiansBroughtRatsToThe”New”World” spew racist non-sense on your blog? But i know you feel that only whites are racist.”
I allow people to say racist stuff on this blog all the time. What I am against are ethnic slurs since they are only used to offend, not to advance a reasoned argument.
Maybe it is easier for me to see racism in whites but I know full well that blacks are racist too:
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Alan:
It is not absolute rubbish at all. The BBC:
“Many of them were simply shot where they stood soon after surrendering to German troops who often regarded them as sub-human savages. “
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Amurah, you and I are the only honest people here
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Yet, your “honesty” has no sources…
Stop mucking around, and come back here with an actual, credible, quote to prove otherwise.
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abagond. The BBC showed no source. The BBC is known for inaccuracies when it comes to nazis, as the journo looks good before a ceratin pwoerful group
If you were to write to that journo and ask him for sources, he couldn’t supply them
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quote King
King
” Yet, your “honesty” has no sources…
Stop mucking around, and come back here with an actual, credible, quote to prove otherwise. ”
there is no historian that’s ever written about this. It’s not known
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Amurah aka Andrew aka Nicole is hereby banned.
Amurah is a sock puppet of Andrew/Nicole. I warned him about this before.
I was thinking he was Alan’s sock puppet but then when I checked I found out it was Andrew.
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abagond. I’ve never met Amurah. Why ban someone like this?
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Because I do not allow sock puppets. Amurah is not your sock puppet but Andrew’s.
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i don’t think I’ve met Andrew, either
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So much for “Amurah” being an honest guy, neh? 😀
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intellectually accurate from what I could see
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Pay no attention to Alan B’Tard. He’s off his meds again and been allowed to wander the interwebs. Probably best to ban his IP unless you want to be inundated with his idiocy.
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KeyserSoze says
The American motives seem clear, the British ones do not.
Well, Churchill himself was a racist. Could be one of many reasons.
There were no blacks in the British Armed forces in WW2. It was against King’s regulations to have them in service. Blacks of british colonial heritage were protected from the fighting
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Keep in mind that it is unconstitutional in France to keep track of ethnicity and religion since the 18th century. Even during the Vichy admin there were only very rough estimates available despite massive pressure from the nazis. So any assumption made about ‘race’ of a given national group is merely academic by the standards your own culture might dictate. There are no clear statistics by ethnic makeup, only by nationality. On the other hand, for instance you cannot extrapolate that all Moroccans are light brown skinned mediterranean types.
As for the disputed fact that the majority of French armed forces were black (at least non-white), keep in mind that the vast majority of the French speaking world are in fact black Africans who, still under colonial rule, could be drafted for the French army.
I was fortunately not there back then and can only go by the testimonials from my own family. Perhaps they were a big exception (which I know they are not). However it would be kind of arrogant to assume they are delusional, especially by someone who has never lived in France as part of a minority.
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Uh, Justice is Coming and Alan — do you two have a personal disagreement you need to work out (away from abagond’s blog)?
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^Scratch that, I see some clean-up has occurred.
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Femi
Relatives are like fisherman
The truth is sometimes doubtful
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Whats that supposed to mean???
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[QUOTE]
There were no blacks in the British Armed forces in WW2. It was against King’s regulations to have them in service. Blacks of british colonial heritage were protected from the fighting[/QUOTE]
Where did you get that nonsense from?
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I had no such regulation!!!
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HA! Very Good my leige 😀
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@Femi
I was fortunately not there back then and can only go by the testimonials from my own family. Perhaps they were a big exception (which I know they are not). However it would be kind of arrogant to assume they are delusional, especially by someone who has never lived in France as part of a minority.
Femi, I’m certainly not presuming that they were delusional. I am wondering, however, what they mean when they say that they “fought alongside the French”. At what level? And remembering that this was a very big deal for Africans at the time.
Your uncle could be remembering, for example, that his African Tirallieurs battalion had a company of Spanish refugees attached to it. Or he could be remembering that, at the divisional level, there were all sorts of white battalions in his unit. Or he could be remembering that, within his squad or platoon, there were white guys. Or he could be remembering that he had a white officer and maybe a white non-com.
All of these memories would classify as “fighting alongside white comrades”, but only one of them would indicate that there was no segregation.
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When Germany could not meet it’s heavy reperations payments during Weimar, the French invaded using Black colonial troops. They were very unpopular as they were ill disciplined when against a German population that was unarmed and starving
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Source?
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[citation needed]
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Actually, I heard the French used Australian mercenaries in black face.
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I think what Alan is alluding to is true. And I quoted it previously in a conversation between Thad and I.
Wherein Hitler suggests that France is bastard-ising (excuse the pun here) the Rhineland by using Black African troops
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They were Aussies in blackface, I’m tellin’ ya!
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Tirailleurs Senegalais
Look that up!
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Hitler charged that “the Jews had brought the Negroes into the Rhineland with the clear aim of ruining the hated
white race by the necessarily-resulting bastardization.”
Mein Kampf
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And again excuse the pun
Rhineland Bastard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhineland_Bastard
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@Thaddeus
Once again my grand uncle didn’t have a colonial passport when the war broke out. He was a full French citizen. His camerounais origin didn’t make a difference. He hadn’t put his foot on African soil for many years. Although he fought side by side with them at some point, he was not a ‘tirailleur sénégalais (ou autre africain)’. He just happened to be black.
I found a couple of pictures. If you scroll down to
“Tirailleurs sénégalais d’une unité mixte en campagne en Alsace, septembre-décembre 1939.Source : ECPAD France”
http://www.cheminsdememoire.gouv.fr/page/affichecitoyennete.php?idLang=fr&idCitoyen=22
Mixed units did exist.
Thanks J for the Rhineland bastard link. I had one of those ‘bastards’ in my family too.
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Femi, do you know which unit he fought with? That would be very, very interesting to me.
As for “mixed units”… The problem is, which level where they mixed at? That source doesn’t say, does it? It could have been a brigade or a division. Hard to say goping on the photo alone, especially when the photographer or the captioner might have seen white and black guys in a picture together and just presumed it was some sort of mixed unit.
Tirailleurs Senegalais regiments were not mixed: they were raised separately and your source there confirms that. The regiments could be assigned to other, higher units which were nominally white. Thus the divisions were mixed units, but the regiments weren’t, as I said. So it would be odd that said guys would be called “TCs” and be in another regiment. If they were in another regiment, as you claim your uncle was, they were ipso facto not TCs.
But they could have been soldiers from a TC regiment working with white soldiers from another regiment.
Again, I’d like to see some harder evidence than a photo of a black soldier alongside white soldiers. There are photos of black and white American soldiers, too. That doesn’t mean the units weren’t segregated.
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Regarding the Rhineland Bastards, that was an interesting link. I note that it says, however, that other African Germans was unaffected, however.
Apparently, the Nazis made a distinction between the RBs and black Germans who were not RBs. I wonder why?
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because Thaddeus they didn’t blame one group for the invasion.
It appears a video I posted has been removed. Why I wonder
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There was no segragation in the british Army. it had no blacks to segregate. There weren’t even blacks living in Britain at the time. They were in the colonies and were exempted from fighting
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Thaddeus, perhaps we have a fundamental misunderstanding due to very different approaches cross atlantic. There certainly was a segregation by national origin but this does not automatically imply segregation by ‘race’ in the way other countries may segregate people of the same nationality. My grand oncle was a French citizen, full stop. There was no utter reason to assign him to a division composed of sénégalais, tchadiens etc. All I know is that he volunteered to join the army in the 30s and that he was stationed somewhere in Alsace among soldiers of, yes predominantly white, but also antillais, maghrébin, réunionais and mixed origin, all of whom were French citizens. They certainly were a minority. As there are no stats on ‘race’ it’s unknown how many there really were but it would have been nonsensical to segregate them from the white French soldiers when the nazis invaded France.
My grand oncle died in the 70s when I was still a kid. All I remember is that he was in a bataillon d’infanterie.
As I said I was never interested in anything military…
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Alan,
you have to be a little more cautious when making the claim that African-Caribbeans in the British colonies saw no action in WW2 on behalf of Britain. Many thousands did; including my own grandfather, as it happens!
I’m not sure what your motive is some of the time but if being ‘politically incorrect’ means being insensitive to people you describe as “japs” “frogs” etc then maybe Stormfront is the place to be. Debate is debate but one cannot take place where lies, slurs and misinformation are present.
Thanks
Menelik Charles
London England
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Menelik,
I like the way you put even though you only addressed half the issue viz there were Blacks living in England back then and had been doing so for hundred of years
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Should read
‘put that’
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There certainly was a segregation by national origin but this does not automatically imply segregation by ‘race’ in the way other countries may segregate people of the same nationality.
I can believe that. But seriously, Femi, how many black metropolitan frenchmen were there in 1940? Again, hundreds? Thousands? Tens of thousands? It certainly wasn’t millions. So I can see that individual exceptions would just be overlooked.
Effectively, however, segregating units by origin in the French Empire WAS segregation by race. You forget that these weren’t nations at the time, but colonies.
Tirallieurs Senegaleses were black. White French colonists in Senegal and Cameroon did not serve in TS battalions, AFAIK, but in “Colonial” battalions. So again, it wasn’t just by geographic origin which the French segregated by: whites from the colonies were in separate regiments than non-whites.
Under the stress of defeat and rebuilding in WWII, I’m sure this system broke down somewhat. Still, the French OoBs are clear that they didn’t simply toss everyone together in one big mix: regiments were as homogenous as they could make them (sometimes that meant “not very” as in the case of the Chadian Mechanized regiment).
Now, I’m willing to believe that your Grand was in a metropolitan unit, but again, how many men were there like him? Germany, for example, had a ‘native” black population of about 1000 at this time. France’s was what? 4,000? 10,000? Even if it was ten times Germany’s, that’s still only about 2,500 black men of military age that you need to slot in somewhere. In an army which totalled some 2,000,000 on mobilization, that’s an easy thing to overlook.
That the logic of the French Army was indeed segregationist can easily be shown by the fact that they had “native” and ‘”pied noire” battalions in Algeria, which was supposedly part of metorpolitan France at the time. If there was no ethnic or racial segregationin France, why would that be the case?
And again, presuming that your Grand DID get sent to a “non-white” battalion in Alsace, he could still very easily have been serving alongside the other groups you mention at the brigade and division level – or even lower, given the clusterf@#$ that was the defeat of 1940.
Again, Femi, I’m not saying your oncle was delusional, I’m just saying memory is a tircky thing, especially at 50 years remove. I would like to see something more substantial than your memories of his memories before I believe that France wasn’t segregating, because all the evidence out there in the military history world shows that they did indeed segregate as mucha s they could.
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Anyone know what the black populations of England and France were in 1940? I don’t believe that there’s no data on this.
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and this
1948
Nearly 500 people arrived in Britain on board the Empire Windrush though some of the arrivees had already been in Britain during the war (Thomas-Hope 24). Over 100 Afro-Caribbeans also entered Britain on the S. S. Orbita (Rich 50). The Windrush’s inhabitants were detained on board, interviewed, and most were placed in agriculture, the iron foundries, railways, and in other industries that needed laborers. 9
Passage of the British Nationality Act provided for common British citizenship for Commonwealth members. 8
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There weren’t ANY?
What years was Saartjie Baartman being paraded about London in her birthday suit? Was that 1940? Her hairstyle looks a bit out of date…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saartjie_Baartman
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there wern’t any blacks in Britain in 1940.
BS. “Few”, OK. “Not any”…? This is on a par with your assertion that the King’s African Rifles didn’t exist.
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Can’t count her. She was sent there as an exhibition, rather sadly. Nothing to do with immigration which didn’t exist then
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@King
He’ll probably say “She wasn’t a British citizen”, ignoring the fact that he originally claimed that there weren’t any blacks IN Britain, independent of nationality.
But even so, this is about the most assinine thing I’ve ever heard. Nary a one? Not ONE child of an Englishman who married a West Indian…?
Bull.
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Um… when someone is sent, shipped, or dropped from the sky, from Africa into England, it’s immigration. Now how much do you want to bet she wasn’t the only African in London that you missed???
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I wonder if African slaves would count?
Doesn’t seem sporting to leave them out…
“The first Englishman recorded to have taken slaves from Africa was John Lok, a London trader who, in 1555, brought to England five slaves from Guinea”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Britain_and_Ireland#African_slaves
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Btw, Femi, according to Wiki (and confirmed by my military history books here at home)…
The noun tirailleur, which translates as “skirmisher”, was a designation given by the French Army to indigenous infantry recruited in the various colonies and overseas possessions of the French Empire during the 19th and 20th centuries.
Note: indigenous infantry. And…
The Armée coloniale did not include the famous North African regiments such as the Foreign Legion, Zouaves, Spahis, Algerian Tirailleurs (sharpshooters) and Goumiers, all of which were part of the Army of Africa, a part of the French Metropolitan Army. Instead the “Troupes Coloniale” can be divided into:
1) French long service volunteers (or colonial settlers doing their military service) assigned to service in France itself or as garrisons in French West and Central Africa, Madagascar, New Caledonia or Indochina; and
2) Indigenous troops recruited in any of the above, serving under French officers. These were designated as Tirailleurs sénégalais, Tirailleurs malgaches, Tirailleurs indochinois, etc. according to the name of the colony of origin. Tirailleurs sénégalais was the name given to all West and Central African regiments, since Senegal had been the first French colony south of the Sahara.
Segregation, yes indeed.
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Slave trade blacks died out after britain made it illegal stopped the trade
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http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-66157032.html
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Alan, do not live up to your name
You have been informed that Pa** is a very offensive word, and a racial insult in this part of the world.
I wonder why I have the feeling that you are not too far from being banned
Hmmmm!!!
Thad,
I had decided not to respond but since you asked:
1.
Blacks in Britain
Before the Second World War, the largest Black communities were to be found in the United Kingdom’s great port cities: London’s East End, Liverpool, Bristol and Cardiff’s Tiger Bay, with other communities in South Shields in Tyne & Wear and Glasgow. The South Shields community (mostly South Asians and Yemenis)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_British
2. Asians or South Indians in Britain
Scholars have shown that Asian settlement in Britain did not begin in the 1950s with the post-war labour demands of the British economy, but goes back almost 400 years, to the founding of the East India Company in 1600.
http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpsubject/history/history/asiansinbritain/asiansinbritain.html
3. British Chinese
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Chinese
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“Died out”, did they? Why? Because dlavery was what was keeping them alive?
Hell, King, if Alan’s going to troll, the least we can do is copypasta correct information…
Green argues that to ignore the diverse black presence in Britain prior to the 1940s is to perpetuate a distorted view of British history: here he fills in some gaps.
HOW DO WE EXPLAIN the widespread ignorance of the presence of people of African and Caribbean origin in British history? Black men and women appear, for example, in Pepys’s diaries; in eighteenth-century portaits; sailing with Captain Cook on the Endeavour, not to mention the stories of Thackeray, Trollope, Dornford Yates, W.S. Gilbert, Laurie Lee and Evelyn Waugh.
Yet there is a general misapprehension that people of African descent were absent from Britain until very recently. This misconception has been nurtured by a belief that apparent exceptions can be ignored.
There is a further mistaken belief that those black people, who do appear were temporary residents — and often worked in unskilled occupations — and this added to the notion that they made little contribution to British society. In 1998 celebrations were held of the half-century anniversary of the arrival in England of the immigrant ship Empire Windrush from Jamaica, but these often merely re-confirmed the prejudice that the black presence in Britain was recent, alien and working-class.
However, a study of the historic evidence reveals that people of African birth and descent lived in Britain four centuries before the Windrush reached Tilbury. They and their descendants usually conformed to the prevailing social rules in language, education, style and ambitions, and, accordingly, are to be found at every level of British society. These men, women and children were widespread geographically, even though it is not possible to gauge their overall numbers. But investigations restricted to cities such as London, Cardiff, Liverpool, Glasgow and Tyneside only add to the mistaken stereotype of a foreign-born black working class living in urban ghetto communities.
The assumption that black people were largely absent from Britain until the arrival of Windrush cannot be successfully challenged until it is realised that black people had as broad a range of experiences in Britain as others. They were not exotics, even though a proportion worked in entertainment — in music making, theatres, halls, fairs and boxing rings. The partial nature of much recent research has placed blacks in ports or pictured them as musicians (largely in the world of 1920s and 1930s jazz), or has focused on protest and injustice. This misrepresents the wide nature of black activities, ignoring doctors and others of the middle classes, men and women of education.
Thus commentators on the Trinidad-born Dr John Alcindor, who practised as a doctor of medicine in London in the early twentieth century, have tended to mention his work at black-led conferences in 1900, 1921 and 1923, but ignored his published medical research, his charity work, his healing of hundreds of people in Paddington, or the fact that his eldest son was an army officer who fought in France in 1944.
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Alan:
Please learn to use Google. No black people in Britain in 1940? That is like something a six-year-old would say.
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You’re right Thad, I should have saved him the click 🙂
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abagond. Why do you think there wre blacks in Britain in 1940? Please explain
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there were no blacks, well, you coculd could them on one hand. Tiger bay, Liverpool. That’s about it, and were they authentic negroes by this time? No. They interbred with the locals and were light skinned and even then, they were so few
No pure negroes in britain in 1940
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What is a “pure negro?”
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@ Thaddeus,
I’ve not done an internet search – which would certainly be required in order to answer your question based on established facts. What I can say – because I was taught as much in university, is that significant Black populations existed in England in places such as Liverpool, Bristol and Glasgow since the 1900s.
Oh, and those interested in the presence of Caribbean troops fighting on behalf of Britain during WW2, here’s a link:
http://socyberty.com/history/i-will-tell-you-how-it-was-for-black-people-in-london-in-early-1940s-1950s/
Menelik Charles
London England
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Why do I do this…Why do I punish myself??
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=mvZ044cpW48C&printsec=frontcover&dq=Black+Edwardians&source=bl&ots=9j_iDBZU-l&sig=Haa3-rx9m4VbY7a-DeLEkIlj6zA&hl=en&ei=qIIhTJLMD4ju0wTXmJXgDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false
ha ha ha
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Alan:
In 1940 London was the seat of a vast empire of 600 million, a good share of it in Africa and the West Indies. The idea that no blacks were then in London is extremely improbable.
In any case there is no reason to wonder: we know blacks have been in Britain since at least Shakespeare’s time. Even in the case of Sarah Baartman, it was a JAMAICAN who objected to her being kept in a cage.
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Alan:
It is pointless to argue with you: you do not bother to look up simple facts and you keep moving the goalposts. It is like arguing with an eight-year-old.
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@ J.
You charlatan… you mountebank!
How did you falsify that book so quickly?!!
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Alan:
If you continue to use “Jap” or “Paki” you will be banned.
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@ Alan B’Stard M P,
I think you’ll find that my link shows that there were, indeed, what you deem “pure Negroes” in the UK in 1940. You will never provide any evidence to the contrary, so please save your breath. Come to think of it, you NEVER provide evidence for any of your claims or prejudices. How very odd!
Menelik Charles
London England
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@ J
why indeed punish yourself lol
http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9780861047499/Staying-Power?gbase=true&utm_medium=Google&utm_campaign=Base&utm_source=UK&utm_content=Staying-Power
M Charles
UK Black
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And just that little bit further with my own punishment Menelik, especially since you have highlighted a very interesting book that begins Black presence in Britain with the Roman armies in the fourth century
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=J8rVeu2go8IC&dq=staying+power+peter+fryer&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=b4UhTMO9PIyy0gTyxeHhDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAw#v=onepage&q&f=false
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well there weren’t
You people think it’s like now, blacks everwhere.
Blacks in britain before 1940 were rare indeed
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And I hope no–one minds that I would like to see the ‘liberaton of this topic’ to what it was, before the incorrect and untimely intervention.
Liberate away…Vive Le France
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All who think that the fourth Century comes BEFORE 1940 please raise your hand.
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@ Alan B’Stard M P,
I think you’ll find that my link shows that there were, indeed, what you deem “pure Negroes” in the UK in 1940. You will never provide any evidence to the contrary, so please save your breath. Come to think of it, you NEVER provide evidence for any of your claims or prejudices.
How very odd!
Menelik Charles
London England
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“You people think it’s like now, blacks everwhere.”
Nobody said that. We were just disputing your incorrect statement that there were not ANY blacks in England prior to 1940.
Wouldn’t you feel better to admit that you were totally wrong on that point?
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Blacks in britain before 1940 were rare indeed
Well, we got him to shift from “no blacks” to “rare indeed”, so I suppose that’s progress of a sort. 😀
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You people think it’s like now, blacks everwhere.
Well, there might be some of those Aussie mercenaries in black face lolling about, too.
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well there weren’t any amount to speak of
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@ Alan B’Stard MP,
and where’s your evidence, to speak of?
MCharles
UK
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migration records, electoral roll,the Enoch Powell appreciation society / I’m sure you’ll find it if you really want it
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Ah, so you have no evidence. This is what we call an unsupported hypothesis.
There probably were few. “Few” is still many, many more than “none at all”, as you originally claimed.
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Still wondering how you missed the fact that Her Majesty had several regiments of black troops active in World War II. So far, you’ve missed far more than you’ve hit with your guesses, Alan.
Again, it would be wise to remind people that if you go to Alan’s site, you’ll quickly see that he is a self-proclaimed troll, so it’s no wonder that he makes a lot of poorly-supported incendiary remarks and throws them out there shotgun style.
He’s doing it for the lulz.
I don’t mind playing along, because it allows us to air easy responses to common prejudices and that’s always a good thing. Plus, it probably takes me less time to type a message like this than it takes Alan to type one of his 144 character wonders.
But be aware that the name of the troll game is to get you to waste more time than the troll expends.
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Alan B’Stard M P said:
“well there weren’t any amount to speak of”
Queen Elizabeth I disagrees with you. In 1601 she said there were:
“great numbers of Negars and Blackamoors which (as she is informed) are crept into this realm”
Source:
http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-147059961/too-many-blackamoors-deportation.html
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Alan:
Other commenters have been able to support their claims. You have not. The burden is on you, not us, to support your claims.
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hang on. It’s not a big deal to me. I still claim, with defernce to Hm QEI that there were next to nione or no blacks in Britain before 1940. Next to nothing
I’m not here to prove anything. Investigate it as you will
Thaddeus. not the King’s African Rifles again? The never saw front line in WWII bedise the white fellas
They fought in Africa against other natives, but in Burma, they were behind the front lines
Any black you found in Britain was not allowed to serve on the front line
quote Thaddeus
” Still wondering how you missed the fact that Her Majesty had several regiments of black troops active in World War II. So far, you’ve missed far more than you’ve hit with your guesses, Alan. ”
Thadd ol fruit, Elizabeth was not coronated until 1953, her father George VI was monarch during the war and until he died in his sleep at Sandringham House, aged 56
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Thad said:
Again, it would be wise to remind people that if you go to Alan’s site, you’ll quickly see that he is a self-proclaimed troll, so it’s no wonder that he makes a lot of poorly-supported incendiary remarks and throws them out there shotgun style.
I highlighted this fact about a week ago. Why are people trying to argue with him? He has made it known that he is merely trollin’, yet commentors keep taking the bait. LOL.
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Y,
It is so addictive…
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…And as I like to say…It in fact reveals more about the feelings, sentiments off those who are ‘reacting’ rather than about Alan himself
I am guilty as charged too….
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On Alan’s own website someone asked him why he was on this blog:
“What are you doing on another site, floozie?”
Alan answered:
“stirring shit. They are easilty stirred too. All lefties who blame everything on whites.”
Another commenter there said:
“LOL… You got pwned by that Thaddeus dude, Al.”
Source:
http://www.thetrollhouse.net/forum/index.php?topic=5353.0
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yes Abegond. Bur don’t take that seriously. Have I really trolled your site? No! In fact I told someone to get back to throllhouse as this here was not a troll site.
Trollhouse is a troll site, that’s what it’s made for, people can troll each other.
My hope is you’ll become members there and make the occasional post and have fun. Give what you take
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@Alan
Thaddeus. not the King’s African Rifles again? The never saw front line in WWII bedise the white fellas
First of all, you’re wrong: the did indeed fight along all sorts of people, including British whites, in the Ethiopian Campaign, against Italians and Ethiopians. This campaign was hardly a minor or bloodless affair.
Secondly, your original point was, and I quote you directly here:
This infoers Britain had black troops. No they didn’t. Ther were no blacks in HM Imperial Forces.
So again, pwned, Sonny Jim. Yes, HM’s Imperial Forces had black troops. Yes, they fought and yes, they fought alongside whites in the same way that the 751st tank battalion or the Tirallieurs Senegaleses did: as part of segregated regiments and battalions.
You are correct that it was HER Majesties forces at the time, which is so far about the only thing you’ve gotten correct about your country’s participation in WWII.
Frankly, I think it’s pretty damned embarassing that a Brazilian knows more about Britian’s military history that you do, Alan.
Like I said: pwned.
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^Whoops. HIS Majesties forces, of course. Typing while running…
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And regarding Alan as a troll, here’s what he has to say about this site…
thanks ” Justice is coming” you cunt. I show you a buch of darkie loving lefties and you attack me, you treacherous prick
The above and the following is in regard to his co-troll, whom he obviously thought would join him in his under-the-bridge activities…
treacherous cunt totally avoided the coonery and froggery on the forum and had a go at me
Given this stuff, Abagond, I’d say you’re totally justified in banhammering Alan’s delictable double-wide ass. The dude is only on here, in his words, to “stir shit up”. But it’s your call, man, obviously.
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@ Thad
I would go back to that old saying, “you make your bed, now ‘lie’ in it.” (slight adaptation) I think the magic of this is trapping the baiter in his own trap with his own words.
Thoughts:
Ignorance is bliss. Knowledge is power.
For those who fail to acknowledge the “knowledge”, they will always be powerless. The truth will set you free; however, if one chooses to believe “lies”, then more “hallucinatory power” to them.
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Trolling?
Effective trolling is when you’re able to single-handedly turn an otherwise intelligent discussion into a flamefest. Alan has not been able to do that here. If his claims are met with intelligent counter arguments, and relevant source references, then he’s having a “discussion” whether he admits it on his own blog or not.
He is “trolling” with his own opinion and worldview, which is representative of a sizable minority, and is therefore worth rebutting, IMHO.
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King
i have not been trying to troll. I troll bigger tougher types than you ol boy!
My trooling as you call it is an opinion and some facts. You can’t handle the facts. Don’t blame be if I saysomething true. I didn’t invent history
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king, you haven’t said anything of worth. Mere statements
THAD thinks HM QE2 was the wartime monarch. I mean really!
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Thadd
i have already stated accurately, the African rifles sae action in Africa against fellow blacks. However, blacks were not allowed to fight in thr front line in WW2 against our major opponents
In Burma they were in the rear echelons only
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THAD thinks HM QE2 was the wartime monarch. I mean really!
You`re right, a gaffe. Then again, I`m not a British citizen, am I?
You are and you`re making claims that Britain didn`t have black troops, that there were no blacks in Britain before WWII, etc, etc.
No matter how you cut it, Sonny Jim, I apparently know basic facts about YOUR country which you`ve never ganned to.
So who should be embarassed here? I don`t expect foriegners to know basic facts about BRAZIL, but I`d better damned well know them.
You fail that simple test, Alan.
And here`s one of the main facts about your own country`s history that you simply ignore.
You say:
i have already stated accurately, the African rifles sae action in Africa against fellow blacks. However, blacks were not allowed to fight in thr front line in WW2 against our major opponents
But Italy, of course, was one of Britain`s main opponents in the war and the KAR spearheaded the Brit invasion of Italian-held Ethiopia. A third of Italy`s troops in that campaign were Italian metropolitan and included some of the best troops in Mussolini`s army. The KAR did indeed fight Italian troops in this campaign.
Elements of the KAR did indeed FIGHT in Burma as well.
Furthermore, to put the cherry on nthe top, your claim was that there were no black african battalions ih the British forces, correct? The KAR ANTEDATES WWII and fought like demons for the Brits in WWI against some of the best troops in the German army (the German Army in Africa, it should be recalled, was never defeated on the battlefield and surrendered after the surrender in Europe. And yes, it included significant numbers of white German units).
So like I said, sucker: pwned. You don’t even know your own country’s history. 😀
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I’m not a British citzen
There were no troops that fought on the front lines of the British army in WW2. I did however, say they fought in Africa. Against Mussolinis troops, also Africans, the KAR acted as coastal defence, they did not speahead a thing
Where’s your sources?
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Alan said:
“THAD thinks HM QE2 was the wartime monarch. I mean really!”
At least Thad admits his mistake. You would have us prove that Queen Elizabeth was NOT the queen during the war and whatever sources we brought forward you would find fault with. You know, because an ignorant Internet troll should be believed over the BBC or Encyclopaedia Britannica.
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To: Thad
Re: Alan
What I need – for cases like Alan, No Slappz and other well-behaved but time-wasting trolls – is a good definition of a troll that I can apply fairly and without an appeal to ideology.
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There were no troops that fought on the front lines of the British army in WW2. I did however, say they fought in Africa. Against Mussolinis troops, also Africans, the KAR acted as coastal defence, they did not speahead a thing.
Africa WAS part of the frontlines in WWII, Alan. I presume that you`ve heard of the DAK? Italy had close to 300,000 troops in Ethiopia and the campaign had hard fighting and significant casualties.
The KAR lead the invasion from Kenya, fought several actions with the Italians and eventually ended up liberating the Ethiopian capital of Addis Abba.
My sources?
The Italian Army, Africa, 1940-43 Osprey Military Publications for starters, which contains an overview of the campaign.
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Abagond,
How about this one from Encyclopedia Dramatica?
A troll, most commonly encountered on the internet, is any person who purposely causes controversy in a web community (by posting offensive and crude comments) and disrupts sh#$ for his own amusement to prove how extremely corrupt our society is.
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The “offensive and crude” is, of course, subjective, but the “for his own amusement” part and “disrupting sh#$” is flatly admitted by the principal in this case, so…
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Thadd
I think you will find the troops they fought against were local blacks in Italy’s service Keep checking
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quote abagond
To: Thad
Re: Alan
What I need – for cases like Alan, No Slappz and other well-behaved but time-wasting trolls – is a good definition of a troll that I can apply fairly and without an appeal to ideology.
Thadd can’t handle disagreement or a difference of opinion, or worse, facts that don’t fit his theories
So he shouts “troll”!
I’m a damned good troll, but I troll at my own forum and not other people’s
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@ Abagond,
I think among all the definitions and discussions of what is meant by a troll, and trolling, that I’ve found, this one is pretty good:
http://curezone.com/forums/troll.asp
Alan B’Standard said:
Thadd can’t handle disagreement,differences of opinion, or worse, facts that don’t fit his theories.
Menelik replies:
trolls are also in their element when accusing others of not being able to handle the “facts”. However, trolls also provide few, if any, links to support their “fact”. A good thing about trolls is that they can “handle disagreements”. Why so? Because they start them of course!
Menelik Charles
London England
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i don’t troll here
Menelik, if I fail to support evidence to support an opinion, it’s because it’s an opinion, rather than a fact
Certain facts on touchy subjects may be banned anyway, perhaps because they prove an unsavoury truth. “Thadd ” the Brazil nut has this problem
Menelik, you wanna know what a troll is, go to fuckfrance.com or the trollhouse.net and you’ll find people there that will make standard trolls look postive
On my site though, you don’t get censored of banned and you can give what you’ll get, an believe me you’ll get it LOL!/ Sometimes they may agree with you!
You Menelik is the type that treats Trever Philips like a God
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@ Alan – disagreements are welcome. Discourse and Debate are always healthy; However, I think your motives are questionable.
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as you wish C o L
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@ Alan
Not as “I wish”, for I wish all things to be a level playing field. This does not occur if we don’t play by the same rules. So… I say, what is your motive for being here?
To educate and enlighten? It doesn not seem so. You do make some valid points. However, they are sometimes thrown in with half-truths. Does the term ‘disinformation’ mean anything?
By all means, keep contributing, but “play fair”. (if that makes sense.)
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it’s no use me trying to educate anyone, indeed, some may find it offensive if I ( or you ) try
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We are all being educated by one another. The difference is that some of us will admit it, and others will not.
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lol well I certainly can’t admit to what’s happening. Nothing to admit here
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Alan, on the subject of Black people in Britain—pre 1940, you stated that there we NO black people there… NONE!
1) I pointed out that off the top of my head, I could recall Sarah Baartman, so that was at least one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saartjie_Baartman
2) Then I went on the say that Black slaves had been brought to Britian as far back as as 1555.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_Britain_and_Ireland#African_slaves
3) I then provided you with an article, stating that Blacks had a legacy in Britain pre-1940
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-66157032.html
4) Followed by J siting a wikipedia entry, stating the same thing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_British
5) Followed by Menelik posting yet another book on the history of Blacks in Britain http://www.bookdepository.com/book/9780861047499/Staying-Power?gbase=true&utm_medium=Google&utm_campaign=Base&utm_source=UK&utm_content=Staying-Power
5) Followed by J siting a book on the very subject of the history of Blacks in Britain before 1940.
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=mvZ044cpW48C&printsec=frontcover&dq=Black+Edwardians&source=bl&ots=9j_iDBZU-l&sig=Haa3-rx9m4VbY7a-DeLEkIlj6zA&hl=en&ei=qIIhTJLMD4ju0wTXmJXgDw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false
6) Followed by Abagond pointing out to you a quote from an article stating Queen Elizabeth’s issuance of an “open letter” to the Lord Mayor of London stating that there were waaay to many Black people in her realm.
http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-147059961/too-many-blackamoors-deportation.html
And to this compendium of information, you have not provided one reference or rebuttal further than your own uninformed opinions.
Are you really this obtuse?
If you have not been educated, then it is only because you have not been listening.
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“way to many blacks” back then would have been a relative few, still too much for a Monoculture
I pointed out an Act of parliament was passed to bring them out in 1940. If there were was a element left over from the slave trade so be it
Speaking practically, there wasn’t any to speak of
Your example of the African lady doesn’t count as she was not to stay permanently
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“Blacks in Britain” is hereby declared off topic for this thread from this point forward. I will delete all future comments on it.
King and Alan summed up their sides well, so we can stop there. It is plain that nothing will persuade Alan so it is pointless to go on.
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@ Thad and Menelik:
Thank you for your comments on what a troll is.
@ Alan:
What is your definition of an Internet troll?
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I don’t have one. It is fair to say that anyone who comes out with unpopular comment, even if correct, is often viewed as a troll
I certainly don’t get up to the sort of behaviour here that I allow & even expect on my own site. Now that really is trolling!
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I think you will find the troops they fought against were local blacks in Italy’s service Keep checking
Sorry, no. Yes, they fought against some Askaris (and just for the record, Italy had some particularly good Askari troops – often better than their metropolitan forces, in fact), but they also fought against several metropolitan and Black Shirt units.
By the way, what difference does it make who they fought, exactly? This has no bearing at all on your point that HM had no black soldiers, ever. And the KAR did indeed FIGHT in Burma. And they carried the main weight of the war in Africa in WWI.
If you want to downplay the KAR, say something rational at least. Something like “they were only a relative few units and fought mostly on secondary fronts”. That would be the truth. But to act as if they didn’t exist or fight or fight white troops… That’s simply stupid, Alan.
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@Alan
I don’t have one. It is fair to say that anyone who comes out with unpopular comment, even if correct, is often viewed as a troll.
The problem isn’t “unpopularity”, Alan. I’m DAMNED unpopular here because I’ve questioned certain dogmas on several occasions. I’m also unpopular because certain people feel that I’m an arrogant cuss. I’m not banned, however.
Why?
I’m not trolling and I try to back up my statements with proof. I don’t just fire out one assinine statement after another and move on when I get pwned, as you do.
Yeah, unpopular people get called “trolls” and often aren’t. Been when you simply toss crap out their to cause a reaction and don’t engage in edbate, or if your proof is “Things are that way because I say they are. Nyah!”. then you are a troll, strito sensu.
Take the above debate on the KAR. You say they never existed. I proved you wrong. You then claimed they never fought. I proved you wrong. You then claimed they never fought Europeans. I got out a primary Order of Battle source and showed that they did. You then ignored that and told me to “keep searching”.
Well, why should I keep searching when I have a book in my hand which shows the prices units the KAR fought, their victories, etc? Alan, they accepted the surrender of 1500 Italian and 1500 native troops at one point. Yes indeed, they did fight.
So yes, it’s trollish behavior to claim you’re engaging in debate and then ignore anythign substantial anyone tells you.
King’s comments on the Blacks in England topic and how you dealt with it are another case in point.
You’re stirring up sh@# for lulz. You’ve even admitted to it, repeatedly, on your website. It’d be hard to find a more clear cut example of being a troll.
So to my mind, if Abagond decides to sh!@can you, he’s fully within his guidelines as a modertor.
Enjoy your ban.
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Snd I’m ending the troll feeding now. We’ve suckled you long enough, I think.
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quote
“So yes, it’s trollish behavior to claim you’re engaging in debate and then ignore anythign substantial anyone tells you.”
substance my foot
They accepred the surrender of 1500 native troops perhaps, although I admit the Italians surrendered to anyone. Blacks weren’t allowed to fight on the front;ine of british forces of the day
You proved nothing. Careful how you interpret thing
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thad says
By the way, what difference does it make who they fought, exactly?
A big difference in terms of the KRs ( King’s regulations )
The British command didn’t want to deal with strange religions, dietary habit and any cultural issues. They equired troops to fit right in when fighting the Germans which is a different thing to Itlaians whio coldn’t wait to surrender
Nonethless there was a rule that front line troops be British
Mark Clark, the U.S general had a US army assisted by all sorts Hindus didn’t like eating meat and required a special diet, some others wanted to stop and pray regardless of the situation. It caused no end of trouble and the Germans with a determined homogenous fighting force beat the hell out of them
Clark learned from the mistake, as he personally stated in and old BBC TV doco
Also there is the reasons that black colonials really had no business in the white man’s war. The british wanted to protect them from it
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They accepred the surrender of 1500 native troops perhaps, although I admit the Italians surrendered to anyone… You proved nothing. Careful how you interpret thing”
So… the Italians successfully perforated the British front, and then inexplicably surrendered to the Black troops somewhere in the rear of the British formation?
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King
What the hell are you talking about?
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Actually, King, the KAR surrounded 3000 Italian troops. The holdout groups in Ethiopia fought very well and it took some time to wrinkle them out.
The whole “the Italians sucked in WWII” is actually a myth based upon the Brits’ easy victory in Operation Compass in 1940. Outside that ONE campaign, the Italians put up a damned hard fight everywhere in Africa, a fact that’s increasingly recognized by military historians today.
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Thaddeus LOL 😀 Have ever though of doing the comedy curcuit
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Hey, Alan I can understand that you Brit types would be sensitive about the war and your role in it. After all, if we look at the roll-call of great British cluster-fu@#s, it’s worse than the Italians, by far. France, 1940, Greece 1941, losing North Africa not once but twice, Leros 1943… I mean you guys couldn’t seem to win a victory until the Yanks started helping you out.
Meanwhile, with crap equipment and leaders, the Italians lost the first round in Africa. Fair go. They then reworked their organization and tactics and fought very well alonsige the DAK from the end of 1940 until their surrender in 1943. The also fought decently in Russia, finally being overrun in operation saturn by a force that was about 5 times their size with ten times their tanks.
Italy has little to be ashamed about regarding its history in WWII, at least from the strictly military viewpoint. And they did it all with crap equipment from the 1930s.
Britain, on the otherhand…
Before the U.S. got in the game, Britain could hardly win a victory. Afterwards, British tactics ammounted to “walk up to your adversary and hit him with a hammer. If the hammer breaks, send back to (Yank) stores for a bigger hammer”.
I mean, it’s totally understandable why you guys had to push the myth of the laughable Italians. If you didn’t, half the world would have started looking at YOU. 😀
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A Romanian I saw on TV, a member of the Romanian SS is Russia said he hated Italians till this very day as the Italian SS unit collapsed that allowed the Soviets through
There is no doubt the Russians would not have gotten over a German SS unit
It was the collapse of the Italians that forced the retreat of the Axis
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Er… Alan meladdie… The SS were a GERMAN thing. The Italians didn’t have any SS until Germany took them over in mid-1943 and there were never any Italian SS on the Russian front.
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With regard to
“Hey, Alan I can understand that you Brit types would be sensitive about the war and your role in it. After all, if we look at the roll-call of great British cluster-fu@#s, it’s worse than the Italians, by far. France, 1940, Greece 1941, losing North Africa not once but twice, Leros 1943… I mean you guys couldn’t seem to win a victory until the Yanks started helping you out”.
I was never taught the above in school, though I did become aware of the defeat at Dunkirk subsequently.
Was it not Napoleon who suggested that ‘history is a set of lies agreed upon’??
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The SS started as German thing, however there were multinational SS units, including French Dutch Norwegian Georgian, Russian, Indian, and British, but not too many in the latter, which included Australian and New zealanders
there were Italian SS on the Russian front. Look it up
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It is not for us to go finding support for your fanciful claims.
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Sorry, I have. You’re wrong.
There were no Italian SS who ever fought alongside the Romanians on the Russian front. The only Italian SS were used in Army Group Center in 1944. The Romanians fought alongside the Italians in Army Group South in 1942 and early 1943.
You’re confusing blackshirts with SS, Alan.
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None of those countries would have qualified with the exception of the Nordic ones as they were not considered to be ‘racially pure’ as in Aryan/Nordic. A typical Nordic:
caption:
A group of Nordics shopping at the mall
A Typical Italian Man:
Note, he is too racially ambiguous to have gotten into the SS, not blond enough, too swarthy for the SS’s liking, at least the ones who weren’t gay or female.
As for the Russian Men:
They have bigger lips especially those of Tartar descent, you can still see the Mongol blood in some of them so they wouldn’t do!
Forget about the Romanians:
I don’t thinks this guy would integrate to well into the SS, his teeth are a big giveaway. Besides, he might start feeding on other SS officers.
Besides which, Have you never read Mein Kampf and Hitler’s view of the ‘lesser races’, espeacilly ‘slavs’, and anything not Northern European? With the exception of the Aryan/Nordics?, none of these men would have qualified for the SS. Even the Scandinavians couldn’t be bothered for the most part, and they were what people at the time called ‘Nordic’.
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@ Herneith
Lol. The Nosferatu was a nice touch.
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No I’m not Thad
Herneith
That was intially, but that was loosed as time went on and more men required
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the clainm is not fanciful. You want to prove me wrong, you look it up. It matters not to me if you believe it or not
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Herneith, Alan is correct in that small numbers of Italians did indeed fight in the SS towards the very end of the war. By that time, things had gotten to be so desperate for the Nazis that they were recruiting whomever they could. IIRC, the SS Italian presence ammounted to a battalion or so of die-hard black shirts who arrived on the Easter Front just in time to be swept up by the Soviet offensive that destroyed Army Group Center in mid-1944.
There was only one time the Italians served alongside the Romanians: the campaign of 1942 in the Ukraine, the one which led to Stalingrad, which was a full two years before the SS began recruiting whoever they could. This was the Romanian and Italian army, not the SS. The Italian army had one division of blackshirts, however, which served as front reserve and it was precisely this division that was overrun by a massive Russian offensive in the early hours of Little Saturn. Said offensive caused the weakened northern flank of the Axis line to collapse and what was left of the Romanian 3rd and 4th armies was destroyed in the ensuing pursuit.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Little_Saturn)
This was the turning point of WWII, by the way, so it wasn’t some minor little battle. This was what idrectly led to the elimination of the German 6th Army at Stalingrad.
If you want to see a basic order of battle for the Italian forces in Russia, you can find it here:
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Army_in_Russia)
Where Alan’s got it wrong is in his presumption that this failure was due to Italian incompetence (it wasn’t: they fought as hard as anyone could in such circumstances), that it was Italian SS that did the fighting and that if, somehow, the Supposedly superior German SS had been in the same position, they wouldn’t have been overrun (a presumption belied by the fact than many German SS divisions in such circumstances were overrun during the war).
Sorry for making such a long post in response to a troll – and on an anciliary topic, no less, but military history is something of a hobby of mine, as I said.
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To summarize once again for the TL;DR crowd, there were no Italian SS volunteers until 1944 and the Italians only served alongside the Romanians in 1942 and early 1943.
So Alan, as per usual, has his basic facts wrong, once again.
Pwned!
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I did not say Italian SS served alongside Romanians in the literal sense. It was the Italian SS that collapsed on the eatern front, just like they collapsed everywhere else, and this Romanian SS member whose unit was somewhere in amongst this huge brawl, in another location blamed everything on the Italians
Now please look the matter up yourself
Rommel in WW1
Then Rommel approached the crown of the Mrzli Mountain. After some thinking Rommel decided to do something very bold. He walked up to the Italians with a white hankerchief in his hand and shouted for their surrender. At 150 yards away the 1500 defenders layed down their weapons, lifted Rommel to their shoulders and cried “Evviva Germania!” 6,500 prisoners were now captured by Rommel’s 2000 soldier battalion!
http://houseofice.tripod.com/history/rommel.shtml
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The battle order of the Ities is of No relevence.
There may be some truth here in your post, trouble is, it’s Wiki. Anyone can alter and add anything…Anyone can!
Thaddeus quote in part
Where Alan’s got it wrong is in his presumption that this failure was due to Italian incompetence (it wasn’t: they fought as hard as anyone could in such circumstances), that it was Italian SS that did the fighting and that if, somehow, the Supposedly superior German SS had been in the same position, they wouldn’t have been overrun (a presumption belied by the fact than many German SS divisions in such circumstances were overrun during the war).
The Italians were incompetent. The german SS was much superior. Certainly, due to weight of numbers against them, they were indeed eventuually thrown back
According to this Romanian gent on the BBC, who was there, in his opinion, it was the Italian cave in on the eastern front that allowed the Soviet breakthrough. He was very frank about the hatred he has for Italians to this day
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ooops! I did not close off Thad’s quote and my following comments are also in the quote. How do I deit please ?
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I fixed it
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appreciated abagond, thanks
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Sorry, no. The Italian SS never served alongside the Romanians. By the time they arrived, in 1944, the Romanians had been withdrawn to Romania.
Let’s apply Occam’s Razor here, shall we? Which is logically more likely?
1) That an Italian Blackshirt unit, the CCNN division, did indeed collapse during Little Saturn in early 1943 (as recorded in every history book ever printed on the campaign), leading to the elimination of the Romanian Army which was holding the Italians’ right flank at the time and that either you or your Romanian talking head on T.V. (who must be some 80 odd years old by now) are confusing the CCNN with the SS because, after all, one group of Party Troops in black uniforms look very much the same as another.
…or…
2) The Romanian in question was complaining about an Italian SS battalion, one tenth the size of the CCNN unit described above, which was eliminated in the Destruction of Army Group Center in 1944, a full year after the Romanians had been removed from Russia, and that said collapse of this very small and wholly unstrategic unit somehow screwed the Romanians over.
Add to that the fact that the Italian SS battalion in question was part of a handfull of reinforcements rushing to the assistance of Army Group Center, whose 100% German divisions had ALREADY collapsed, leading to the destruction of some 50 of them.
I mean, if we’re talking about that one battalion, they were a fart in the windstorm and there’s no way, shape, or form that they can be blamed for the collosal clusterf@#$ that was the destruction of AGS. 30 odd German divisions – maybe 300,000 men – had already marched into Soviet captivity by the time that battalion reached the scene, but somehow the Italians are responsible?
Right…..
There may be some truth here in your post, trouble is, it’s Wiki. Anyone can alter and add anything…Anyone can!
Alan, I have about six seperate historical references for the Italians in WWII lying about the house and every single one of them confirms that Wiki OoB. Just because it’s on Wiki doesn’t mean its wrong. In this case, the information in question is quite well known. If you’d like me to pass along a bibliography on this question I would be happy to, but I suggest that you start with the Osprey Campaign Histories and the Osprey Men-at-Arms series on Italy. These books have lots and lots of colorful pictures, so they should help ease the shock of you having to deal with actually READING something that’s not on a computer screen. 😀
But if you can’t bear the thought of turning actual pages, I invite you to take a gander at “Comando Supremo”, which is an excellent on-line resource for the Italians in WWII.
http://comandosupremo.com/
…and look in particular at the discussion here: http://www.comandosupremo.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=984
Now these are military history fanatics talking. The kind of guys who know the size of tunic buttons down to the millimeter. The only Italians they register in the SS anywhere near the Russian Front are in the Wallonien Brigade in early 1944. This unit got caught in the Korsun Pocket, IIRC, but managed to fight it’s way out. After Korsun, again IIRC, it’s Italian Battalion was stripped from it and sent on up to AGS, as I mentioned above.
The only major Italian SS units of any kind spent 1944 and ’45 fighting against the Western Allies in Italy. They never came anywhere near the Eastern Front.
Sorry, Alan: pwned. The supposed crucial role of the Italian SS in the Axis defeat on the Eastern Front is simply yet another fantasy of yours. Like I said above, like many Brits
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What’s interesting to me, Alan, is that you can’t even take balls and run with them when they are GIVEN to you.
I mean, if you want to blame the Italians for the Axis loss in WWII, hell, just concentrate on the collapse of the Eigth Army during Operation Little Saturn. Mosty modern military historians have more or less absolved them of blame, given that they were entirely outclassed to begin with and the Germans, fully aware of that fact, made the decision to leave them where getting overrun was only a question of time.
But if you want to blame the Italians, that would be the way to go – the tried and true route tramped by Brit historians ever since WWII.
But no: you have to insist that a mythical Italian SS unit was somehow responsible, even when it makes you look like a geetz who slept through history class. 😀
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Finally, regarding the SS… The German SS was much superior to any other SS in 1943 for the simple reason that the Germans didn’t start recruiting other nationalities into the SS until the end of that year. Hard not to be cock of the roost when there’s no one there to compare yourself with, neh?
By 1944, the quality of the SS divisions had decreased globally except for the 6 original divisions. This was independent of whether or not they were German or other ethnicities.
The six original divisions were Hitler’s Pretorian Guard and they were maintained up to par until the bitter end. But by that time, even they were acceptinmg foreign recruits and so couldn’t properly be called “German” divisions.
The idea that the SS were supermen and that this was somehow linked to their “racial purity” is simply a Nazi myth.
Why am I not surprised to find you repeating it?
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Thad says
The only Italians they register in the SS anywhere near the Russian Front are in the Wallonien Brigade in early 1944.
The Wolloniens were belgians, not italians
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I never blamed the Italians, that Romanian among others did. They may have had something to do with it. Let’s face it, they are not cut out for this sort of thing
They seem to be best at tossing pizza dough and organized crime
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Thad says
The idea that the SS were supermen and that this was somehow linked to their “racial purity” is simply a Nazi myth.
Strangely enough, all this racial purity stuff is a myth.
The multiculturalism forced on people today was not acceptable then. If Goering wanted to get good Germanic stock from the Nordic nations, well, that’s fine, i have no problem with it. To suggest they are superior to others is wrong, and all this business about racial purity only conjures up evil as stated via Jewish publishing houses, TV productions etc, on the basis that Germans would not have foreign ideas and peoples forced on to them in an age when this didn’t happen. Have you noticed the Japanese have not been attacked for racial purity by the critics of the Nazis?
Strange as it may seem to you, Hitler himself is on the record somewhere as dismissing Goering’s idea of race
All the Nazi High command had black hair
Germany was not Brazil with varying races, and neither were other parts of Europe. . Even Australia was a monoculture then, the Aboriginal people notwithstanding
You can’t see a European nation of the day the same as Brazil, or the US in terms of race. They were not multicultural societies and should not be judged by todays standards and practices.
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The Wolloniens were belgians, not italians
Give the boy a cookie!
Nevertheless, in 1944, what hard-core Italian fascists were left on the Russian Front were serving with the Wallonian Brigade. About a small battalion’s worth, as I mentioned above.
These were the volunteers taken out of 8th Army after it was removed from the Russian Front, following the Italian surrender in 1943.
They were the only Italian SS soldiers to come anywhere near the Russian Front and they weren’t active there at the same time as the Rumanians.
Like I said, all things considered, the Italians did pretty well in WWII. They had crap equipment, worse leaders but still managed to fight very credibly. The only large-scale screw ups they had were in 1940 in Greece and the Western Desert. To give the Italians their due, they seemed to fix their problems, as much as it was possible.
Their performance in Russia was very good and, as I mentioned, they finally only collapsed when the Germans left their butt hanging in the breeze. Even then, it took Russian forces of several times their strength to break through them.
For a nation with no decent industrial base and WWI weapons for the most part, Italy did quite well. The idea that there was something “innate” in the Italian character which led to their defeat is simply rubbish. What defeated them was their leadership and picking the wrong side.
Unlike the Australians, for example, who even though they had the wieght of the British Empire full on behind them, were sent running on more occasions than I can count. In fact, the only notable Aussie victory of any sort in Europe in WWII was at Tobruk, where all the Aussies had to do was defend a series of fixed fortifications – and even then, they nearly had their heads handed to them.
No, Aussies are good at throwing barbies and drinking Fosters, but they really aren’t that good at warfare. Probably because they have low self-esteem, being descended from British criminals and all…
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Have you noticed the Japanese have not been attacked for racial purity by the critics of the Nazis?
What log have you been sleeping under, Alan? 😀
Strange as it may seem to you, Hitler himself is on the record somewhere as dismissing Goering’s idea of race
Correct, but the very same quote has him stating that he will use it because the hoi polloi believe it and it gives him a good lever to move them.
You can’t see a European nation of the day the same as Brazil, or the US in terms of race.
Whoever implied – let alone said – that Nazi Germany was a multicultural society?
Are you hitting the ‘Tussin again Alan? 😀
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Another detailed OoB of the Italians in 1942, this one not infected with the taint of Wiki.
Show us the SS, Alan! 😀
http://comandosupremo.com/ussr.html
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Alan is hereby banned for continuing to use the J-word despite my warnings.
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Being that this topic dealt with a major troll (and also being that I don’t know where else to post this material), folks – and especially Abagond – might want to have a look at these three articles from Encyclopedia Dramatica…
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Forum_Trolling
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Forum_COINTELPRO_Techniques
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/PsyOps
An informed forum is a well-defended and democratic forum.
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Here are essays by Jamaican blacks who fought in WWII
http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/pages/history/story0047.htm
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Very cool, Esho!
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Good film, btw: Spike Lee’s “Miracle at Sta. Anna”.
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Interesting post…can’t believe I missed this one (linked from Tuskegee Airmen post)!
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Might be nice to learn about some other classic whitewashed history episodes (eg, the pictures of European-Americans completing the Pacific Railroad) as well as some other “white-washed” histories produced in other countries (eg, in China and Japan).
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“After the fall of Paris, De Gaulle fled to Africa to raise an army to some day return to free France. By 1944 his army was two-thirds black. But then five months before D-Day the British and Americans told him they did not want black soldiers freeing Paris – they would allow whites only.
De Gaulle was against it – he did not separate his men by race like the Americans did – but he had little choice.”
Abagond, where did you get this information from? What was De Gaulle threatened with to make him comply?
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@ gro jo
The main source for this post was the BBC, if I remember correctly.
De Gaulle was forced to go along with the US because it controlled logistics. He needed the US to get his men to France in time.
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This was 75 years ago yesterday.
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