Fighting on the frontline

[Guest pelmetman]

I am watching this program at the moment and am amazed how the technology has advanced since my days in the Navy8-)

Now that I am older, I won't say wiser;-)......are these young men and women losing their lives and limbs for us? or our politicians?

:-( 

[aultymer]

They are always losing their lives for the politicians not me.

[Guest Peter James]

For 'Queen and Country'

Her before everyone else, and no mention of ordinary folk.

 

The Government has always thought its frst duty is to defend the Government. Even in a nuclear war where there would be nobody left to govern, the Government would remain intact in their nuclear bunkers.

 

[Guest Peter James]

aultymer - 2011-09-26 1:12 AM

 

They are always losing their lives for the politicians not me.

 

Yes. When our lads were dying in the Falklands, Thatcher said they were dying for 'their country' (whoever or whatever that means)

Apparently her husband Dennis corrrected her by saying 'No Margaret, they are dying for you'

[CliveH]

Ah yes - that famous misquote of a US General in Vietnam:-

 

"We had to destroy the village in order to save it"

[antony1969]

Peter James - 2011-09-26 10:17 AM

 

aultymer - 2011-09-26 1:12 AM

 

They are always losing their lives for the politicians not me.

 

Yes. When our lads were dying in the Falklands, Thatcher said they were dying for 'their country' (whoever or whatever that means)

Apparently her husband Dennis corrrected her by saying 'No Margaret, they are dying for you'

 

 

They were dying for a small part of Britain and for the people of the Falklands who want to stay British and they were dying to remove a foreign invader that thought they could take the Falklands and not pay the consequences . Had mad Michael Foot and his cronies been in power then I suppose there would have been no military action .

I salute the brave lads who went there and fought for a small part of Britain and whatever Dennis Thatcher did or did not say is hearsay and totally irrelevant .

I have a relative who served there and he is extremely proud to have fought for his country there and to have helped in giving back the Falkland islanders there freedom .

[aultymer]

Do you really think that the wishes of the Falklands people were even considered in this debacle?

 

Thatcher decided to withdraw Endurance thereby signaling to the Argies that the UK government had no further interest in that area.

 

 

[antony1969]

aultymer - 2011-09-26 7:57 PM

 

Do you really think that the wishes of the Falklands people were even considered in this debacle?

 

Thatcher decided to withdraw Endurance thereby signaling to the Argies that the UK government had no further interest in that area.

 

 

You use the word " debacle " , this means failure , fiasco . How was going all that way and liberating the islanders a failure ? . That's a terrible slur on the brave lads that took part .

[francisgraham]

antony1969 - 2011-09-26 7:43 PM They were dying for a small part of Britain and for the people of the Falklands who want to stay British and they were dying to remove a foreign invader that thought they could take the Falklands and not pay the consequences . Had mad Michael Foot and his cronies been in power then I suppose there would have been no military action . I salute the brave lads who went there and fought for a small part of Britain and whatever Dennis Thatcher did or did not say is hearsay and totally irrelevant . I have a relative who served there and he is extremely proud to have fought for his country there and to have helped in giving back the Falkland islanders there freedom .

Well said! If the cowardly and unprincipled idiots in this thread had been alive in 1939 they'd have objected to 'Our Boys' dying just because one Herr Hitler had invaded a distant foreign land.

Europe would have had one currency like today, but it would be the Deutsch Mark and we'd all be speaking German.

Still, the good part for a lot of people would be that there would be none of those pesky Jews and mental defectives and gypsies and homosexuals around to bother us. 

Thatcher was a woman of principle and wasn't going to allow a military dictatorship to invade sovereign British territory simply to take the mind of its own citizens off its own massive internal problems.

And let's not forget that the defeat of Argentina resulted in the end of the Galtieri dictatorship  and restored democracy in that country and an end to the tens of thousands of 'The Disappeared', people who vanished off the streets to be tortured and killed just because they opposed the regime.

That's what you get by the way when you have no Habeas Corpus and a separate judiciary to protect people from the power of the state!

Were we wrong to send 'Our Boys' to fight the Germans and the Japanese? Were we wrong to send 'Our Boys' to Korea to stop the advance of communism, the end result being that South Korea is a prosperous democracy, whilst in the north the people starve and languish in political prisons?

Were we wrong to send 'Our Boys' to Bosnia and Kosovo to stop the Serbs massacring thousand of innocent men women and children?

We were right to do these things and I have listed just a small number of theatres-of-war in which 'Our Boys' have been involved and guess what, none of them have any oil, which is often the reason that the cowardly, cynical and unthinking give for our involvement in anything!

Whatever, you think of Thatcher she was tough and principled and did what she thought was right for Britain. I rate her above Churchill, another great leader who was responsible for ensuring that we remain a free nation, where the citizens can voice their views, no matter how repulsive, without fear of ending up in a camp.

[Guest pelmetman]

The Falklands was our last proper war with a clear cut reason, and I can understand why we helped out in Bosnia etc................Iraq and Afghanistan are a totally different kettle of fish, we invaded Iraq because of Blairs WMD, words of mass deception*-)  

[francisgraham]

pelmetman - 2011-09-26 8:42 PMThe Falklands was our last proper war with a clear cut reason, and I can understand why we helped out in Bosnia etc................Iraq and Afghanistan are a totally different kettle of fish, we invaded Iraq because of Blairs WMD, words of mass deception*-)  

That's your opinion! We're in Afghanistan because if we weren't it would now be governed by the Taliban and would be one massive drug-funded training camp for terrorists who will attack the West. One reason there hasn't been another 9/11 for ten years is because we're in Afghanistan! 

Iraq was also a just war in my opinion and no one has yet been able to prove that it was illegal.

Saddam claimed to have WMD and why shouldn't we have believed him? It was a credible threat and what if it turned out that he actually had them? What would you be saying now? Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

It's lovely to hear you say that the Falklands was a war with a good reason but would you have been saying that when it happened? I doubt it very much! Hindsight again!

One thing has always puzzled me about the nutters who claim that we never landed on the moon, that Diana was killed by the Secret Service and that 9/11 was a gigantic conspiracy by George Bush to give him an excuse to invade Afghanistan.

If the US and GB are so sophisticated as to be able to perpetrate such amazing conspiracies without one single person (out of the thousands who must have been involved) letting something slip, how come we couldn't plant a few WMDs in the Iraqi desert in order to justify the invasion?

Go figure!

[antony1969]

I remember as a youngster feeling really proud of our lads going down there and also Mrs Thatcher coming out of number 10 and saying Rejoice to the press . I for one say not everything she did was great but in my lifetime there has not been and will probably not be a better prime minster . She was indeed an Iron Lady and not like the lightweights we had before or since .

[aultymer]

antony1969 - 2011-09-26 8:12 PM

 

aultymer - 2011-09-26 7:57 PM

 

Do you really think that the wishes of the Falklands people were even considered in this debacle?

 

Thatcher decided to withdraw Endurance thereby signaling to the Argies that the UK government had no further interest in that area.

 

 

You use the word " debacle " , this means failure , fiasco . How was going all that way and liberating the islanders a failure ? . That's a terrible slur on the brave lads that took part .

 

I am afraid that it is your interpretation that is a slur on 'our boys'.

The failure was in creating the conditions that favoured an invasion.

There was a failure to ensure that the UK was in a position to respond adequately to any such invasion. (eg, we had no defence agains Exocets because "the Russians didn't have Exocet!!)

 

Please do not hide behind the flag to advance political arguments ( unless you served) Thatcher did that to get re-elected over 'our boys' bodies.

Once again FG's paucity of reasoned argument sees him leap from the Falklands to Hitler just like he goes from a garden shed to Dale Farm - what is that guy on? Sweet sherry?

[Guest Peter James]

They were dying for a small part of Britain and for the people of the Falklands who want to stay British

 

Actually the Falkland Islanders were not British until after the Argies invaded because they were not allowed British Passports to live in Britain. What would have been the difference betwen them and the other 'foreigners' you want to send back 'home'?

[Guest Peter James]

antony1969 - 2011-09-26 8:12 PM

 

You use the word " debacle " , this means failure , fiasco . How was going all that way and liberating the islanders a failure ? . That's a terrible slur on the brave lads that took part .

No, its concern for the thousands who died or were injured.

[Guest Peter James]

francisgraham - 2011-09-26 8:54 PM

Saddam claimed to have WMD and why shouldn't we have believed him? It was a credible threat and what if it turned out that he actually had them? What would you be saying now?

Nothing I expect, because we would be dead.

I have never understood the logic of sending our boys to attack him if he had WMD.

Saddam claimed not to have WMD and was proved right.

 

[Guest Peter James]

antony1969 - 2011-09-26 9:00 PM

 

I remember as a youngster feeling really proud of our lads going down there and also Mrs Thatcher coming out of number 10 and saying Rejoice to the press . I for one say not everything she did was great but in my lifetime there has not been and will probably not be a better prime minster . She was indeed an Iron Lady and not like the lightweights we had before or since .

 

Well the Iron Lady didn't cry when they were bringing our lads back from the Falklands in bodybags.

But she cried when she lost her job.

[antony1969]

Peter , The falklands have been under British rule since the 1830s , which therefore in my book makes it our duty to protect it .

As for Mrs Thatcher not crying over dead soldiers . I would imagine any leader of any party who sends lads and lasses to war be it The Falklands , Iraq , Ireland etc would privately pay a heavy personal toll for doing so .

As for the " Thousands " that died as you say there was actually less than a thousand on both sides , 255 brave British soldiers who I personally salute . Even one death is too many in any conflict but don't super inflate the figures to try and make your point more valid .

[Guest pelmetman]

francisgraham - 2011-09-26 8:54 PM 

Saddam claimed to have WMD and why shouldn't we have believed him? It was a credible threat and what if it turned out that he actually had them? What would you be saying now? Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

I think your find it was Blair who thought Saddam had WMD.......Correction he tried to convince us that he had WMD*-)

Seem's that even some memembers his cabinet at the time now believe they were mislead, and I reckon most of the thinking part of the world didn't believe Blair either(lol)

Funny how we were proved right and Blair was wrong, but he new that all the time didn't he;-)

[francisgraham]

Peter James - 2011-09-27 12:00 AM

francisgraham - 2011-09-26 8:54 PMSaddam claimed to have WMD and why shouldn't we have believed him? It was a credible threat and what if it turned out that he actually had them? What would you be saying now?

Nothing I expect, because we would be dead. I have never understood the logic of sending our boys to attack him if he had WMD. Saddam claimed not to have WMD and was proved right.

You have never understood the logic of sending our boys to attack him if he had WMD? What an unprincipled person you are. Are you really saying that, if a regime has WMDs and embarks on a murderous campaign against another country that we should allow them to carry on because we're frightened of them? Anyway, This was about stopping him before he completed his planned programme of nuclear armament.

That one sentence sums up the appalling attitude of the typical peacenik, who would debase himself to any dictator before he'd go to war to protect his country and other weaker countries from Facism or any other ism.

Apart from which Saddam never denied having WMD. He never denied any accusations that he had them in order to strengthen his standing in the Arab World.

Anyway, define WMD! In th 1980s he gassed thousands of Kurds and, in his war with Iran, used chemical weapons. From 1983 to 1991 he used chemical weapons on fifteen separate occasions again Iranian Kurds and Iranians.

The number of deaths from attacks using mustard gas and nerve gas are in tens of thousands, so please don't try to tell us that Saddam was an innocent patsy in a war of contrition by George Bush!

The man was a vile murderer. Look up his treatment of his own citizens, the Marsh Arabs and then tell me that he didn't deserve everything that he got.

From an interview in 2009:

Saddam Hussein told an FBI interviewer before he was hanged that he allowed the world to believe he had weapons of mass destruction because he was worried about appearing weak to Iran, according to declassified accounts of the interviews released yesterday. 

From Wikipedia:

During the regime of Saddam Hussein, the nation of Iraq used, possessed, and made efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Hussein was internationally known for his use of chemical weapons in the 1980s against Kurdish civilians during and after the Iran–Iraq War. It is also known that in the 1980s he pursued an extensive biological weapons program and a nuclear weapons program, though no nuclear bomb was built.

Are you so naive as to believe that if he had eventually managed to make a nuclear bomb, that he wouldn't have used it? Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

The only part of this debate in which you come out with any honour is in the fact that you haven't, as yet, managed to blame the invasion of Iraq on the Royal Family, the entire political class and any others for whom you seem to harbour a bitter and irrational hatred.

[francisgraham]

aultymer - 2011-09-26 11:38 PM

antony1969  Once again FG's paucity of reasoned argument sees him leap from the Falklands to Hitler just like he goes from a garden shed to Dale Farm - what is that guy on? Sweet sherry?

If you're going to use words such as 'paucity' you really ought to understand what they mean.

The only paucity in the dwelling-shed debate is from you. You made an unthinking and silly statement in which you would support a local council ignoring a genuine complaint and in which you argue that it is acceptable for this couple to break the law, I, and others, have put forward logical arguments about why this is the thin end of a very dangerous wedge and why it is important that everyone, no matter who, should comply with the law.

Since then you have not written one word offering a defence, probably because you know realise that your opinion was an emotive gut reaction and that you hadn't considered the implications of what you said.

All you have done is to criticise me personally, without any substantive argument, as in the post above.

You are now in a very deep hole about this, so perhaps it's time you stopped digging!

As for my comparisons with Dale Farm, which is exactly the same legal position of the shed-dwellers, if you do not have the intellectual capacity to understand my arguments that is hardly my problem.

The same goes with my position regarding the Falklands and the Second World War. If you are unable to see the parallels between allowing the Argies to invade the Falklands and sitting back and allowing Hitler to colonise Europe then again, it isn't my problem if you are unable to understand, everyone else can.

I refuse to dumb down my debate because of one or two people have an IQ well below avarage.

So, in future, why not try rational and logical argument to back up your case? We can all recognise the diversionary tactics of a man backed into a corner and unable to justify his position.

Paucity by the way, means a shortage. I am the one putting forward copious amounts of argument to make my case. The paucity is in your total lack of proper, reasoned response!

[aultymer]

"Paucity by the way, means a shortage. I am the one putting forward copious amounts of argument to make my case. The paucity is in your total lack of proper, reasoned response!" to quote fg.

 

Paucity, by the way, means a shortage of reasoned arguments in your case.

Your use of hyperbole, in almost every discussion demonstrates your inability to get your point across using the facts. This is hardly surprising from someone who never needs to work but sponges from society by encouraging the "compensation culture".

[francisgraham]

aultymer - 2011-09-27 11:52 AM"Paucity by the way, means a shortage. I am the one putting forward copious amounts of argument to make my case. The paucity is in your total lack of proper, reasoned response!" to quote fg.Paucity, by the way, means a shortage of reasoned arguments in your case. Your use of hyperbole, in almost every discussion demonstrates your inability to get your point across using the facts. This is hardly surprising from someone who never needs to work but sponges from society by encouraging the "compensation culture".

Oh dear, still you continue to show your ignorance! How do you know what I do for a living or how hard I work and have worked? How do you know that I encourage the compensation culture? My job has nothing to do with the compensation culture. I simply continue to point out that the people, such as you, who libel lawyers at every opportunity will, when something happens to them, be the first go crawling to a lawyer to try to get a big fat payout!

And as for reasoned argument, since you posted your stupid comment about turning a blind eye to the shed-dwellers' illegal occupation you haven't, despite repeated requests from me, given one logical argument about why your view should prevail. I asked you what you would say to the next person who put a couple of sheds in his garden to house a few people when he claims that, as the council let the young couple do, why can't he?

You have never once, come back with a logical argument. That's because there isn't one and you're deep in a hole and once again, all you can do as above, is insult the poster and not challenge his posts.

Please show me where, since your original post, which was:

In spite of all the things you say you could be FG, you are obviously just an arsehole. 

If this couple are made homeless through the application of the rules you support then they will be eligible for temporary B&B paid for by the ratepayers. WOW thats a result for us all??? 

I hope they send you the bill.

It would appear that you've fallen hook line and sinker for this couple's unlikely sob story. As Mel B pointed out, they could live in their parents' house and why spend £14K on a shed when they need £20K for a deposit? 

You haven't the brains to work out the consequences of your statement and the result of what would happen if the council stared to turn a blind eye to illegal developments.

Read what others have said, not just me. I suspect that you now realise that you're totally wrong and that all you are doing is obfuscation by insults and wild claims about how much argument you've put forward.

Come on, give us the reasons why the council should turn a blind eye. Tell us when it's OK for a council to start deciding who should be exempt from the law.

I await your reasoned response with great anticipation!

[aultymer]

Oh, fg, how I wish I had the time (no doubt being paid for by clients) to spend the time you do on pointless argument.

The couple are not 'living' in the shed, they are sleeping in it.

The council are mistaken.

If your mates in that area are any use they will soon have the council withdrawing their order.

[francisgraham]

aultymer - 2011-09-27 1:01 PMOh, fg, how I wish I had the time (no doubt being paid for by clients) to spend the time you do on pointless argument.The couple are not 'living' in the shed, they are sleeping in it.The council are mistaken.If your mates in that area are any use they will soon have the council withdrawing their order.

Once again you make unfounded comments about me and in this case, my honesty. To suggest that I would dishonestly charge clients is appalling and shows us how desperate you are to salvage some credibility after your nonsensical drivel.

What kind of brainless oik can claim that sleeping in a luxury £14K shed does not constitute living?

I ask you again, if the council turns a blind eye, what do they say to the man who puts three sheds in his garden, fills them with bunks and rents them to immigrants? They can all eat in his house, as eating takes up little space compared to sleeping. Before you know it half the gardens in many cities would be full of ugly sheds where people live in unsanitary conditions. But you just can't work this out can you?

I notice, now that you're in a corner, that you claim that the discussion is becoming pointless. That's what people usually say when they been made to look a total pillock and are looking for an excuse to sneak away!

Your argument is stupid, you haven't really thought out the consequences of your comments and, from your contribution so far, I don't think that you're are capable of working out why we cannot give unelected officials the power to abrogate the planning laws!

So, next question - what does the council say to the next person who, because he hears of this, decides that he too can put a shed or two in his garden where people can 'just sleep'.