The Poles...

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TheGreenGoblin
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The Poles...

#1 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Sun Feb 14, 2021 11:24 am

Though you remain
Convinced
"To be alive
You must have somewhere
To go
Your destination remains
Elusive."

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llondel
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Re: The Poles...

#2 Post by llondel » Sun Feb 14, 2021 11:50 pm

I did like the bit where the GC went up for a look and came away convinced.

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Re: The Poles...

#3 Post by Pontius Navigator » Mon Feb 15, 2021 8:55 am

Excellent film. The scenes from the 60s BoB film were very similar - non of your Polish chit chat.

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Re: The Poles...

#4 Post by Undried Plum » Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:43 pm

Cracking good vid, Gobs.

it's so ironic that the warmonger Chamberlain took us to war on behalf of Poland; and that when it was won, the appeaser Churchill sold the Poles down the river. Quite the opposite of what we are trained to believe happened.

Try explaining that one to Murricanes. I have tried, many times, and always failed. They are trained to believe that Chamberlain was the appeaser and that Churchill was the opposite. Directly opposite of actual truth.

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Re: The Poles...

#5 Post by Pontius Navigator » Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:50 pm

Tehran - we needed to keep Stalin on side AND out of western Europe. We interceded in Greece but could not afford it and dropped in the Americans lap..

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Re: The Poles...

#6 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Mon Feb 15, 2021 6:46 pm

I have always found the story of the Poles, during, and post the Second World War, fascinating, but tragic too. My better half's father was Polish and he was captured as a partisan and sent to a concentration camp in the last year of the war when he was just 17, and was lucky to survive, making it out of the chaos after his release, to Switzerland. We have photo's of him in his camp fatigues, taken by the Germans, who were merciless, and bureaucratically cruel, clinical and efficient. One can understand the Polish pilots' cold blooded hatred of the Germans.

I am currently reading about this chap...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Zumbach

Some good detail here..

https://www.historynet.com/the-forgotte ... ritain.htm
Though you remain
Convinced
"To be alive
You must have somewhere
To go
Your destination remains
Elusive."

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Re: The Poles...

#7 Post by Rwy in Sight » Mon Feb 15, 2021 8:17 pm

Pontius Navigator wrote:
Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:50 pm
Tehran - we needed to keep Stalin on side AND out of western Europe. We interceded in Greece but could not afford it and dropped in the Americans lap..
And for that Greeks should be grateful. This phrase must be an integral part of Greek school history books.

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Re: The Poles...

#8 Post by Undried Plum » Mon Feb 15, 2021 8:38 pm

I remember sleeping on the rooftop of the Youth Hostel in Kypselis, circa 1972, hearing the screams of the tortured ones only a city block or two or three away, who had displeased the Colonels in those days. It was terrible.

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Re: The Poles...

#9 Post by ian16th » Mon Feb 15, 2021 8:40 pm

Undried Plum wrote:
Mon Feb 15, 2021 5:43 pm
Cracking good vid, Gobs.

it's so ironic that the warmonger Chamberlain took us to war on behalf of Poland; and that when it was won, the appeaser Churchill sold the Poles down the river. Quite the opposite of what we are trained to believe happened.

Try explaining that one to Murricanes. I have tried, many times, and always failed. They are trained to believe that Chamberlain was the appeaser and that Churchill was the opposite. Directly opposite of actual truth.
In yesterday's Guardian, one of their esteemed columnists stated that WSC declared war on Germany!

A re-writing of events that I missed.
Cynicism improves with age

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Re: The Poles...

#10 Post by Pontius Navigator » Mon Feb 15, 2021 8:54 pm

UP, when the Colonels took over there was quite a flap in NATO and we had to do an urgent change of codes. We were given a temporary issue PDQ by signal. IIRC it was just before Easter and we had not got the new code codes. I had to go to Scampton and get copies to carry us through to Easter Tuesday. I was fairly new in the job so it would have been March 67.

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Re: The Poles...

#11 Post by Rwy in Sight » Mon Feb 15, 2021 9:23 pm

April 21, 1967 it was the day of the coup, PN.

UP thanks for the story. Problem is that a big part of those protesting against the Colonels managed to greatly benefit from those protests greatly harming the country later. In other words a lot of those people managed to land jobs within the government or their connections to their pals in the government to land the juicy contracts linked to the EU assistance packages in the 80's and 90's.

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Re: The Poles...

#12 Post by Alisoncc » Tue Feb 16, 2021 5:56 am

Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?"
But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll,
The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,
O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;

While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind",
But it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind,
There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind,
O it's "Please to walk in front, sir", when there's trouble in the wind.
It has always been so. Yet there is an expectation towards the end of the video that it would be different. Sorry. :(
Rev Mother Bene Gesserit.

Sent from my PDP11/05 running RSX-11D via an ASR33 (TTY)

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Re: The Poles...

#13 Post by TheGreenGoblin » Thu Feb 18, 2021 2:59 pm

My copy of Johnny Kent's autobiography One of the Few has just arrived.

Jean (sic). (Jan) Zumbach's On Wings of War: My Life as a Pilot Adventurer is proving a lot harder to source.

Jan Zumbach in Africa...
Though you remain
Convinced
"To be alive
You must have somewhere
To go
Your destination remains
Elusive."

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Re: The Poles...

#14 Post by ExSp33db1rd » Fri Feb 19, 2021 3:33 am

Poles .. My experience of flying with the ex-WW II poles is that despite having been in the RAF and BOAC for many years, their intelligible use of spoken English still had a long way to go. Remember flying with one and whilst understanding flight deck requests, Gear Down, Flaps Ten, etc. normal conversation was largely impossible. Between Karachi to Tehran I was beating my brains out trying to get a response from Tehran on HF, and finally threw my headset off in frustration. Let me try, my friend, said the Captain, and in a very fractured accent called Tehran, who came straight back with an ack !! You bastard ! I said. He just smiled and said, It's the way you hold your lips, my friend.

Good guys, and good pilots.

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Re: The Poles...

#15 Post by Pinky the pilot » Mon Feb 22, 2021 9:36 am

One can understand the Polish pilots' cold blooded hatred of the Germans.
Indeed. I remember reading a book of a B of B Fighter Pilot's memoirs who wrote of a Polish pilot's attitude to the Germans.

Upon being woken by his Batman in the morning with "Good Morning Sir. Would you like some breakfast?" his reply was along the lines of "No want Breakfast. Want to kill Germans!"


* May have been 'First Light' by Geoffrey Page
You only live twice. Once when you're born. Once when you've looked death in the face.

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