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All right, so England and Germany are at war. What does that mean for the English? Well immediately not a lot. There was the usual "hey we are at war" hysteria and everyone got some sexy new accessories. (namely gas masks and unfortunately NONE of them came in teal or magenta.) Children and many non-essential workers were evacuated into the countryside and after a few weeks of nothing (at least on English soil) everyone returned to London because people wanted to be home. Even if home was crowded and filled with coal dust. As for outside of England; Poland fell to Germany within days and THEN Russia came in at Poland from the other side like some creepy frat guy preying on the passed out girl at a party. Germany and Russia divided up Poland like they were some shifty corporate CEOs selling off a company. "You get some of this, we will give this to Slovakia and... why don't we just fucking bomb Warsaw to the ground." As for the Poles, some managed to escape to England and France to re-group and take on Russia and Germany because it would take a coin toss to decided which ones Poland wanted to fuck up more. Some went underground and everyone agreed, "we will fight from whever we can until we can get back to Poland." The Polish Air Force joined ranks with the RAF. The RAF (which was filled with their own brand of dare-devils,) didn't always get the PAF because they were down right maniacs at times. But hey when your country is being treated like a tied up goat in Wales, you might as well go for broke.
British troops went to France and everyone there sort of hung out like it was a holiday in Brittany. But with guns and airplanes. Everyone probably bought cheap crates of wine, caught up on the latest best-seller, and thought, "not too bad" for a war. Also Germany was still busy making Poland cry uncle.
This period was referred to as The Phony War or the Bore War. You can thank the English for the latter phrase. Because if you can't make a bad pun out of an anxious situation, then why bother getting up in the morning?
Then U-boats began to sink British warships and none of it was pretty. France was trying to play it cool despite what lay before them. Germany invaded Scandinavian countries and Benelux. Of course it didn't take much to really invade those countries. The Germans were total motherfuckers with their tanks. They would just come in and run down EVERYONE and EVERYTHING in sight. The other side would not even have time to catch their breath and say, "WHAT was that???" It was more like, "Wha -" OH HEY IT IS THE MOTHERFUCKING NAZIS AND OH BY THE WAY WE ARE IN CHARGE NOW. The Germans honed some of those scary as fuck skills during the Spanish Civil War. And even if you tried attack them, they were pretty swift with a counter attack. They would play that game of, "ouch ouch you hurt my hand" and you would go over to say, "oh man sorry, let me look" and then Germany would come and punch you in the fucking face... with a few thousand of his buddies and their fucking guns. Then Germany invaded France using some of this action.
Now before anyone uses the same boring-ass line about how France bowed down so quickly, I would like to point out that France had taken a seriously bad beating during the last war and I could understand from a psychological perspective, "hey if we play nice, show our belly, they will play cool with us." If you know anything about the history of France and of Paris, you know these guys know how to do a siege. They will fucking eat their zoo animals before giving up. They will put a damn cream sauce on a rat to show how hard they are. And when you consider how crushed their population was after WWI, they weren't in the best position to go mano-a-mano with the Germans. They saw what was going on in other countries. So the British troops began to retreat (along with everyone else) and they were stuck on the beaches of Dunkirk. Between this, the sinking of ships, Hitler getting his paws on every bit of Western Europe, and so on, England who had been trying to play it cool and calm and trying to act not too bothered by what was up, kind of felt freed up by the looming reality of war.
In the book, a number of journalists (the American ones in particular) noted that after Dunkirk, the English nation was pretty damn cheerful. It was a fatalistic kind of cheer. Let me explain. Okay so those who don't know, at Dunkirk a whole fuck ton of British/Canadian troops were stuck on the beaches. It was all manner of fuckery. The Germans were fast approaching, people were dying, it was chaos galore. Everything was being left behind. Guns, tanks, planes, that crate of cheap wine. EVERYTHING. And there was no way to get off that damn beach.
So that is when All manner of boats from England, I am talking EVERYTHING. From big motherfucking ships to a teeny tiny pleasure boats ( used to sail about the Thames while you sipped pimm's and said, "oh isn't this nice") CAME ACROSS the Channel to pick up all of those soldiers. (some of whom were half dead) And despite the Germans laying into them, they got a good number of soldiers back to England. It was amazing. The armed forces were pretty honest with these civilians. "Shit is going to get real. You better have enough gas to get back, and it needs to be done because we are good and truly fucked."
So England was all alone. And everyone was kind of giddy and relaxed after all the stress of not knowing what was next. Here was this little island in the North Atlantic. They had these assorted refugees from allied nations, they had themselves, they had the power of their empire (which at the time covered 2/5 of the world. All those pink/red bits) and well... not much else. Germany was across the water just itching for some of this business.
I think I understand the giddiness. You are backed into a corner. The odds are not exactly in your favor, but you know what, you have reached that point where you have NOTHING to lose. It is like when Allie from Hyperbole and a half discussed her depression. As things just get worse and worse and you lose control over so many things you eventually reach the point.
after a lifetime of feelings and anxiety and more feelings, I didn't have any feelings left. I had spent my last feeling being disappointed that I couldn't rent Jumanji.
The English nation just thought, BRING IT ON.
And really this is the nation that could do it. These are people who love their routine, traditions, and patterns. I should know. I am married to an Englishman who has eaten the same damn thing for lunch everyday since about 1984. And when you potentially fuck with these patterns and rituals. Things are not going to be handed over all that willingly. They began to see that they might actually have to fight on their own land. (which really had not been an issue for a few hundred years) So they might as well remember their Charlemagne.
They began to prepare.
Next post: No FUCK YOU. I'm going to have my tea thank you very fucking much.
British troops went to France and everyone there sort of hung out like it was a holiday in Brittany. But with guns and airplanes. Everyone probably bought cheap crates of wine, caught up on the latest best-seller, and thought, "not too bad" for a war. Also Germany was still busy making Poland cry uncle.
This period was referred to as The Phony War or the Bore War. You can thank the English for the latter phrase. Because if you can't make a bad pun out of an anxious situation, then why bother getting up in the morning?
Then U-boats began to sink British warships and none of it was pretty. France was trying to play it cool despite what lay before them. Germany invaded Scandinavian countries and Benelux. Of course it didn't take much to really invade those countries. The Germans were total motherfuckers with their tanks. They would just come in and run down EVERYONE and EVERYTHING in sight. The other side would not even have time to catch their breath and say, "WHAT was that???" It was more like, "Wha -" OH HEY IT IS THE MOTHERFUCKING NAZIS AND OH BY THE WAY WE ARE IN CHARGE NOW. The Germans honed some of those scary as fuck skills during the Spanish Civil War. And even if you tried attack them, they were pretty swift with a counter attack. They would play that game of, "ouch ouch you hurt my hand" and you would go over to say, "oh man sorry, let me look" and then Germany would come and punch you in the fucking face... with a few thousand of his buddies and their fucking guns. Then Germany invaded France using some of this action.
Now before anyone uses the same boring-ass line about how France bowed down so quickly, I would like to point out that France had taken a seriously bad beating during the last war and I could understand from a psychological perspective, "hey if we play nice, show our belly, they will play cool with us." If you know anything about the history of France and of Paris, you know these guys know how to do a siege. They will fucking eat their zoo animals before giving up. They will put a damn cream sauce on a rat to show how hard they are. And when you consider how crushed their population was after WWI, they weren't in the best position to go mano-a-mano with the Germans. They saw what was going on in other countries. So the British troops began to retreat (along with everyone else) and they were stuck on the beaches of Dunkirk. Between this, the sinking of ships, Hitler getting his paws on every bit of Western Europe, and so on, England who had been trying to play it cool and calm and trying to act not too bothered by what was up, kind of felt freed up by the looming reality of war.
In the book, a number of journalists (the American ones in particular) noted that after Dunkirk, the English nation was pretty damn cheerful. It was a fatalistic kind of cheer. Let me explain. Okay so those who don't know, at Dunkirk a whole fuck ton of British/Canadian troops were stuck on the beaches. It was all manner of fuckery. The Germans were fast approaching, people were dying, it was chaos galore. Everything was being left behind. Guns, tanks, planes, that crate of cheap wine. EVERYTHING. And there was no way to get off that damn beach.
So that is when All manner of boats from England, I am talking EVERYTHING. From big motherfucking ships to a teeny tiny pleasure boats ( used to sail about the Thames while you sipped pimm's and said, "oh isn't this nice") CAME ACROSS the Channel to pick up all of those soldiers. (some of whom were half dead) And despite the Germans laying into them, they got a good number of soldiers back to England. It was amazing. The armed forces were pretty honest with these civilians. "Shit is going to get real. You better have enough gas to get back, and it needs to be done because we are good and truly fucked."
So England was all alone. And everyone was kind of giddy and relaxed after all the stress of not knowing what was next. Here was this little island in the North Atlantic. They had these assorted refugees from allied nations, they had themselves, they had the power of their empire (which at the time covered 2/5 of the world. All those pink/red bits) and well... not much else. Germany was across the water just itching for some of this business.
I think I understand the giddiness. You are backed into a corner. The odds are not exactly in your favor, but you know what, you have reached that point where you have NOTHING to lose. It is like when Allie from Hyperbole and a half discussed her depression. As things just get worse and worse and you lose control over so many things you eventually reach the point.
after a lifetime of feelings and anxiety and more feelings, I didn't have any feelings left. I had spent my last feeling being disappointed that I couldn't rent Jumanji.
The English nation just thought, BRING IT ON.
And really this is the nation that could do it. These are people who love their routine, traditions, and patterns. I should know. I am married to an Englishman who has eaten the same damn thing for lunch everyday since about 1984. And when you potentially fuck with these patterns and rituals. Things are not going to be handed over all that willingly. They began to see that they might actually have to fight on their own land. (which really had not been an issue for a few hundred years) So they might as well remember their Charlemagne.
They began to prepare.
Next post: No FUCK YOU. I'm going to have my tea thank you very fucking much.
