Who was the UKs worst PM and why.

[pablo42]

Bowlocks!

Ha, you sound like WW now....

[jobee]

As a footnote: remember the American war in independance [1775 ? 1783]? Here was this superior militarial technological country [Great Britain] possessing the most powerful empire the world has seen....who were defeted by local militia, who knew the terrain well, and employed unorthodox methods of fighting.

[/QUOTE]
Blimey your history wants brushing up, the French king had his head chopped
off for busting his country in this war. We were up against the Dutch and Spanish as well.They were all jealous of our empire.

Kingdom of France
Spain
Dutch Republic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War

[dazza]

Blimey your history wants brushing up, the French king had his head chopped
off for busting his country in this war. We were up against the Dutch and Spanish as well.They were all jealous of our empire.

Kingdom of France
Spain
Dutch Republic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War

Yes, but my example [a side footnote] was just highlighting the differences between tatics, in reponse to WW's post. ie: Germans only had horses to pull their guns, and soldiers had to march, whereas the British were more advanced and 'motorised' army. In the American War of Independence, we had a professional army, they had a militia. I didn't want derail on the whys and wherefores of all contributory factors underpinning what was a global conflict in all but name, fascinating nontheless.

[jobee]

No I am not joking. The US said get out the British did what they said. It was a watershed moment, when the British empire was clearly over.

But I was twenty miles up the canal at el cap, bored stiff and looking for something to shoot at when the yanks and Russians started crying.

It was all over. There would have been no Suez if Nasser had kept his head.

Eden ask him for share compensation and Nasser replied " Let them choke on their tears".

We were the leading shareholders with France.

Before the Yanks said anything Nasser had already agreed to talks.

We were sitting there waiting for the withdraw command.

We didn't want the canal back, we wanted the monies due.

Which we eventually got.

Suez had a lousy press.

[captain kong]

Quote.......As a footnote: remember the American war in independance [1775 ? 1783]? Here was this superior militarial technological country [Great Britain] possessing the most powerful empire the world has seen....who were defeted by local militia, who knew the terrain well, and employed unorthodox methods of fighting.

The British beat the Americans at Lundys Lane in Niagara.They were attempting to take over Canada, the Brits stopped them. Remember the British Army was fighting over three thousand miles away from their home bases across the wild North Atlantic, getting men and supplies across by sailing ship. The men were in a poor condition after one of those voyages.
Visit the Forts in Kingston, Niagara, and in Erie, all the history of the battles are there, with memorials to many Liverpool Regiments including the Kings and also the Lancashire Fusileers.

[Waterways]

But I was twenty miles up the canal at el cap, bored stiff and looking for something to shoot at when the yanks and Russians started crying.

You totally missed it. It was political failure. The might of the British Empire was no more, the empire climbed down as it was clearly over.

Eden's resignation marked the last significant attempt Britain made to impose its military will abroad without U.S. support.
..
..
Some argue that the crisis also marked the final transfer of power to the new superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union.

For a taster:
Suez Crisis

[Waterways]

Quote.......As a footnote: remember the American war in independance [1775 ? 1783]? Here was this superior militarial technological country [Great Britain] possessing the most powerful empire the world has seen....who were defeted by local militia, who knew the terrain well, and employed unorthodox methods of fighting.

The British beat the Americans at Lundys Lane in Niagara.They were attempting to take over Canada, the Brits stopped them. Remember the British Army was fighting over three thousand miles away from their home bases across the wild North Atlantic, getting men and supplies across by sailing ship. The men were in a poor condition after one of those voyages.
Visit the Forts in Kingston, Niagara, and in Erie, all the history of the battles are there, with memorials to many Liverpool Regiments including the Kings and also the Lancashire Fusileers.

That quote is tripe. The UK pursed peace as they nothing to gain to keeping the colonies. The UK made more money from Jamaica alone than those 13 colonies.

Kong, you are confused here. Lundy's Lane was in the Anglo-American War of 1812, which took place on 25 July 1814. A different war. Another one the UK won.

[RonnieW]

RonnieW.? Can you quote any sources for saying that British troops were sent into Viet Nam?? I only ask because it is a subject close to my heart.? I do know for certain that a British general who had successfully employed the fortified hamlet concept during the Malayan Emergency of 1948-61 did attempt to impose his knowledge on MAC-V, and, to their credit, the Americans did allow him to come and make his assessment of the situation.? I believe his name was Templar, and the fortified hamlet thing worked quite well in Malaya, simply because the indigenous population were Malay, whereas the insurgents were mainly ethnic Chinese.? The insurgency in Viet Nam was a made in Viet Nam product with 100 per cent Vietnamese participation.? The only British troops in Viet Nam, that I am personally aware of, were half a dozen Military Police on temporary duty from Singapore, and a small detachment from the Gurkas from HK, tasked with guarding the British Embassy in Saigon.

Sir Gerald Templer was High Commissioner in Malaya duringthe emergency in Malaya. He was in charge when the British Army was given the go-ahead to round up civillians and re-settle them in camps, and to arrest union officials in Malaya who led strikes against this action. This gave the US military the idea that the same sort of thing might work in Vietnam.
In his book, 'Web of Deceit. Britain's Real Role in the World' Mark Curtis gives some details of SAS involvement alongside the Australian and New Zealand SAS in Vietnam. He also mentions MI6 helping the Malayan Government to tranfer arms and other supplies to South Vietnam, the British training US, Vietnamese and Thai troops at their jungle warfare school in Malaya during the late 1960s.
Intelligenge gathered from MI6 field hands in Hanoi was handed over to the US and the British monitoring station at Little Sai Wan in Hong Kong supplied information to the US until 1975 which was used to carry out air raids on North Vietnam.
Curtis does not name the British military advisor who went to Vietnam to assist with the fortified hamlet programme, but he supports his claim by giving reference to Hansard of April 1964 where the subject was brought up in parliament.
Britain also supplied the US with napalm and 500lb bombs during Harold Wilson's time as PM. The Conservatives simply carried on after Ted Heath became PM, no surprise there, but the idea that Wilson kept Britain out of Vietnam is a myth.
Mark Curtis mentions other British involvement in Vietnam in 'Unpeople-Britain's Secret Human Rights Abuses'. Tory Blur does not come out of either book well, but how could he? He was only carrying out orders.

[ChrisGeorge]

Quote.......As a footnote: remember the American war in independance [1775 ? 1783]? Here was this superior militarial technological country [Great Britain] possessing the most powerful empire the world has seen....who were defeted by local militia, who knew the terrain well, and employed unorthodox methods of fighting.

The British beat the Americans at Lundys Lane in Niagara.They were attempting to take over Canada, the Brits stopped them. Remember the British Army was fighting over three thousand miles away from their home bases across the wild North Atlantic, getting men and supplies across by sailing ship. The men were in a poor condition after one of those voyages.
Visit the Forts in Kingston, Niagara, and in Erie, all the history of the battles are there, with memorials to many Liverpool Regiments including the Kings and also the Lancashire Fusileers.

As a historian of the American Revolution and the War of 1812 -- more the latter than the former, although I have written and lectured about the Revolution including on the participation of Liverpool's own Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton -- I have to say that the British were at a severe disadvantage in both wars because of the vast geographical distances that they had to march and keep properly supplied.

Thus it was not only the Americans' superior local knowledge... and even that was not always the case. American commanders complained in the War of 1812 that escaped slaves, seeking their freedom, sometimes guided the British to their targets and had better local knowledge than the militia.

In the War of 1812, as in the Revolution, Britain and the Canadian militia were lucky to retain Canada -- having to defend thousands of miles of territory, but in the later war they were aided by the fact that the Americans despite their several attempts to "grab" Canada were not prepared to fight a war, were badly led at the beginning of the war, and suffered because of their over-reliance on poorly trained militia -- some New York Militia refused to cross the Niagara River to invade Ontario in October 1812, since they maintained that the law said they should only defend their own state.

Chris

[Waterways]

Poppycock! Let's not kid ourselves here? This 'motorised' army and superior Matilda II tanks would not have been able to sustain the effort had it not been for the creation of U.S. Lend-Lease act, in March 1940 [Germany invaded France May 1940] which cancelled US previous impartiality concerning conflicts overseas, and were now able to send aid [goods for loans] to whoever they saw fit - mostly to Britain & France. Without this aid our war would have finished in 1940. And a more 'primitive' [though effective] solider's on foot with dependable horse drawn carriages may have won the day for the Germans? So much for our preparedness? Epic FAIL on our part...and for Chamberlain.

It was not poppycock. Germany was no super industrial power. The UK alone stripped in in many fields of production. Economies win drawn out wars. Germany should not have won in 1940 as everything was against Germany winning. Allied ineptitude won it for them.

The 1933 German census gave 56.8% of the population in rural areas (towns less than 20,000 population) - Tooze, page 167. Tooze emphasises how backward German agriculture was. Tooze describes Germany as a medium sized workshop economy dependent on imported food. A situation Hitler did not like, as to him Germany had to be self sufficient in food and have as much natural resources as possible to compete on a world industrial scale. Hence the drive to steal land.

Cheap fast transportation, the steam ship and trains, had meant food could be transported between continents. This also prevented European famines. The USA and Canada were pouring out cereals super cheap which affected European agriculture setting it back. German, French and UK agriculture was mainly outdated to North America's. Global food production was in the hands of the USA and UK using the UK's sea lanes and massive merchant fleet to transport food - animal and human consumption. The UK produced food around its empire and other countries like the USA and Argentina linking it to the UK and empire with cheap to run and fast merchant ships. Liverpool was a massive grain importing and processing port.

This contrasts Germany with its smallholdings, who had more in common with backward agricultural nations as Ireland, Bulgaria and Romania, as Tooze emphasises. The UK had a backward agricultural system in parts, however controlled food importation across continents.

Germany would have been far better off making their backward agricultural system state-of-the-art in technology, rather than focussing its leading brains on war technology, then they would have had no need for war and grab other lands. This simple notion appears never to have occurred to them too much.

Anglo-French Alliance
In 1940 the Anglo-Franco alliance was that the French would provide the bulk of the land forces as their army was much larger. The UK would concentrate more on the navy and air - although France was large enough in these. The RN blockade of Germany was highly effective all through WW2 - Germany could not obtain essential alloys and rubber. At one time considering de-motorising the army because of no rubber.

Collectively the Anglo-French force dwarfed Germany's in 1940.

Only about 1/3 of the British Army went to France, the BEF. The French complained of the British luke-warm response. Those left in the UK had the latest off the production line equipment, which was not available to most in France. Also, the UK had a just introduced a tank in the Matilda 2 that the Germans could not knock out. A handful were used in France to great success. Canadian troops were bolstering the UK troops and the recruitment boot camps were turning out troops like wildfire. UK industry, which was bigger than Germany's in 1939, was working 24/7 to make up loses, as well as equipment bought from the USA.

US Aid:
Which was not aid as it had to be paid for and in gold initially stripping the UK of its gold reserves.

The UK pre-war did much trade with the USA and owned about 1/5 of US industry. The industry had to be sold off top US interests. Pre-war nearly 100% of the UK wheat came from the USA. Post 1939 they regarded this as war aid. Anything that was supplied as war aid. Deduct the normal trade and the so-called "aid" was not so great.

As a footnote: remember the American war in independance [1775 ? 1783]? Here was this superior militarial technological country [Great Britain] possessing the most powerful empire the world has seen....who were defeted by local militia, who knew the terrain well, and employed unorthodox methods of fighting.

In 1775 the UK did not have much of an empire. The UK pulled out as there was little to gain from retaining the 13 colonies. They made more more money from Jamaica than all of the 13 colonies.

[Waterways]

In the War of 1812, as in the Revolution, Britain and the Canadian militia were lucky to retain Canada -- having to defend thousands of miles of territory,

The US declared war on the UK. The UK went over to their country and took the war right to them even sacking the White House. When Canada was secure the UK pulled out as the had desires on US territory. Job done - the UK won. It was not a draw as many perceive the war to be.

[Waterways]

but the idea that Wilson kept Britain out of Vietnam is a myth.

This poppycock. Supplying some arms - the US also used Canberra bombers made by Martin in the US - and giving some advice and intelligence is not committing British forces. British troops were not on the ground, in the air or the seas around fighting.

Wilson kept us out. Many reading this would have been crawling through those jungles only for Wilson. And few would not have been reading this either.

[pablo42]

This poppycock. Supplying some arms - the US also used Canberra bombers made by Martin in the US - and giving some advice and intelligence is not committing British forces. British troops were not on the ground, in the air or the seas around fighting.

Wilson kept us out. Many reading this would have been crawling through those jungles only for Wilson. And few would not have been reading this either.

There were some on the ground WW. Not many, but some did serve in that theatre.

[Waterways]

There were some on the ground WW. Not many, but some did serve in that theatre.

Apart from assisting in intelligence etc, the UK committed none.

[pablo42]

Apart from assisting in intelligence etc, the UK committed none.

Don't you believe it WW. There weren't many granted.