Dougpol1
16 Oct 2014
History / Why HMG (Her Majesty's Government) abandoned Poland to the Soviets [30]
Dan -I always bow to someone who is polite, so I apologise for the insult.
That you didn't know your grandmother is a pity - but you see, I guessed from your posts that you have an axe to grind. And for the last 30 years I have been often called out after a few vodkas by some very nice Polish gentleman for "Churchill's indifference" and British "lack of due diligence" or criminality, call it what you will.
My protests that we did what was possible and some very hard decisions had to be made (albeit some harsh and unnecessary deportations) to prioritise, were always scoffed at.
But neither I or said gentlemen had to make those decisions.
The Poles and the British had and have an excellent relationship ( whatever Cameron rants on about in the Daily Mail), and I don't know what those transcripts say - but the reality of the time was that Britain was screwed by war too, having to pay (as you would know) huge war bond debts to that place across the sea..... as well as funding the new social charter at home for the returning servicemen, plus the "loss" of empire.
Add rationing, austerity, loss of markets, personal and national bereavement etc etc - and all the time helping to deal with the priorities - vast populations displaced, millions starving or dying of dysentery in the camps, de-nazification of a brainwashed nation - when you take all that responsibility into account I reckon the fact that we took large quotas of Polish refugees, and fought our corner against the appeasement of Roosevelt and his mob, while facing down the Soviets, was a credit to Britain at that time.
So, yes I do take umbrage at pointless attacks on the greatest Briton to have lived in modern times.
Sadly, I never had the opportunity to speak to my babcia, as she having died quite a few years before my birth, a broken and traumatised woman who never recovered from the death of her husband during the Rising in 1944.
Dan -I always bow to someone who is polite, so I apologise for the insult.
That you didn't know your grandmother is a pity - but you see, I guessed from your posts that you have an axe to grind. And for the last 30 years I have been often called out after a few vodkas by some very nice Polish gentleman for "Churchill's indifference" and British "lack of due diligence" or criminality, call it what you will.
My protests that we did what was possible and some very hard decisions had to be made (albeit some harsh and unnecessary deportations) to prioritise, were always scoffed at.
But neither I or said gentlemen had to make those decisions.
The Poles and the British had and have an excellent relationship ( whatever Cameron rants on about in the Daily Mail), and I don't know what those transcripts say - but the reality of the time was that Britain was screwed by war too, having to pay (as you would know) huge war bond debts to that place across the sea..... as well as funding the new social charter at home for the returning servicemen, plus the "loss" of empire.
Add rationing, austerity, loss of markets, personal and national bereavement etc etc - and all the time helping to deal with the priorities - vast populations displaced, millions starving or dying of dysentery in the camps, de-nazification of a brainwashed nation - when you take all that responsibility into account I reckon the fact that we took large quotas of Polish refugees, and fought our corner against the appeasement of Roosevelt and his mob, while facing down the Soviets, was a credit to Britain at that time.
So, yes I do take umbrage at pointless attacks on the greatest Briton to have lived in modern times.
