This re-invention of historical facts so long portrayed by Hollywood was however, also in fact a deliberate media manipulation of events necessary for several reasons at the time. The British had effectively disarmed and were pretty much bankrupt after trying to maintain their crumbling Empire. American cash was desperately required to fund our own war effort.
The Americans too, needed to sell war-bonds to finance their massive mobilisation into Europe and the Pacific... and keep it going!
As previously mentioned in this blog, the British had managed to defeat Hitler's Luftwaffe (airforce) and prevent an all out invasion of Britain in 1940 with he help of British Commonwealth pilots... and nine brave American volunteer pilots did take part, to whom we are grateful.
During the entire Battle Of Britain America was officially 'neutral'... but there is historical evidence that many Americans at the time, including Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh together with an estimated upwards of 25,000 members of the German American Bund actively supported the ideals of Adolf Hitler's Nazi movement.
Bundesführer Fritz Kuhn thrived in America from 1936 through 1939. “Certainly there were enough Bundists to develop a nationwide system of family retreats, businesses, publications, plus the organization’s own versions of Hitler Youth and SS squadrons. At their height in February 1939, the Bund held a rally in Madison Square Garden with some 20,000 people packing the arena to hear speeches by Kuhn and his flunkies.” (thehistoryreader.com).
However, as is so often the case, fate intervened in the shape of Japan who decided to attack Pearl Harbour, (conveniently for us) omitting to inform Hitler of their plans and thus unwittingly sealing their own fate; the ultimate downfall of both, Japan in the Pacific and the Nazis... in Europe.
Personally, I love Americans, but my father was not so keen and probably to this day, spins in his grave every time I watch another Hollywood movie where Tom Hanks or Brad Pitt saves the day for the rest of humanity... and I think he probably had good reason?
By the time American troops hit European soil in 1943 after supposedly 'training' for war, the British Eighth Army had been fighting the Nazis non stop in North Africa since 1940. Some Americans took part in 1942 towards the end of that battle but in truth, that was more for the purposes of the media manipulation I referred to earlier!
After the North Africa Campaign British Forces (including my father with the Eighth), headed for the invasion of Sicily joining forces with the Yanks to commence The Italian Campaign 1943.
I was pretty young at the time, but I'm fairly certain his accounts to me of what happened, were from events that took place there:
Having defeated a Nazi position on a ridge, the British handed it over to the Americans... who lost it. The British who were then ordered to attack and retake the same position, handed it back over to the Yanks who lost it again... and again!
My father would visibly wince every time he heard the phrase "let's get the hell outta here!" because that is the phrase that resulted in so many of his comrades dying.
Now, before you burst a blood vessel... I'm not saying Americans are cowards... the fact is many of them were just kids, eighteen year-olds who had trained for war but never actually fought in one, unlike the battle hardened Brits who'd been fighting since the war broke out in 1939. Unfortunately, many of those American kids took much of the credit as it was presented to the world at that time, in the media and we the British were instructed to let them have their glory for sound political reasons.
My father personally related to me an event where the Brits alone fought, liberating an Italian town. At the end of the battle, the Eighth were ordered to leave, while American troops were trucked in to take the Victory Parade in front of the media. Those Americans never took part, never fired a single round in anger in that particular battle. Yes... I think I would have been a bit upset about that, don't you?
You won't find facts like these very easily, maybe as we've finally repaid the war debt (2006) the real truth will out, as it so often does. But maybe not... because the Brits that were actually there, who took part in these event, are now long gone.
There are only those of us like myself left who witnessed the telling of their story at first hand, and who choose to try and put the record straight, not to belittle Americans, but to honour the heroic acts of our fathers.
Long before the Allied invasion of Europe in 1944, the real truth is that the Nazis were really defeated on the Eastern Front, (officially constituted as the largest military confrontation in history) and in North Africa where my father fought with the Eighth Army.
On the Eastern front fighting involved millions of German lead (Axis) troops and Soviet lead troops. It was the widest land front in military history and by far the deadliest single theatre of war in World War II... in which neither the Americans (nor British) actively fought.
The North Africa Campaign took place from 10 June 1940 to 13 May 1943. It comprised of major battles fought in the Libyan and Egyptian deserts... and was also known as 'The Desert War'.
The Allied forces were dominated by the British. The Eighth Army was a British formation, always commanded by British Army officers... however its personnel also came from throughout the British Commonwealth and included exiles from Nazi occupied Europe. The United States entered the war in 1941 and began direct military assistance in North Africa on 11 May 1942.
British Commonwealth losses were estimated at 220,000 dead, wounded, missing and captured. Axis losses estimated at German: 18,594 dead; 3,400 missing; 130,000 captured. Italian: 22,341 dead or missing; 340,000 captured.
The British had 1,400 aircraft destroyed; 2,000 tanks destroyed while Axis forces lost 8,000 aircraft destroyed; 6,200 guns, 2,550 tanks and 70,000 trucks destroyed or captured. 2,400,000 gross tons of shipping was sunk.
"Operation Torch in November 1942 was a compromise operation that met the British objective of securing victory in North Africa while allowing American armed forces the opportunity to engage in the fight against Nazi Germany on a limited scale."
American losses: 2,715 killed; 8,978 wounded; 6,528 missing. The facts speak for themselves.
After fighting and losing on such a scale as on these two major battle fronts, (together with the British RAF's demoralisation and virtual destruction of German air superiority in Hitler's misguided attempt to invade Great Britain) both the Nazi leadership and forces would never fully recover to their former strength.
As far as Allied British and American forces kicking the Nazis out of Europe... that was by no means an easy task, but probably would not have happened in such a relatively short time, but for Hitler's defeat by the British both at home and in Africa... and by the Russians on the Eastern front.
Many 'War Films' have chosen to concentrate on D-Day and the American lead invasion... and these were brave men who took part, witnessing horror on a scale that we today cannot even begin to imagine, let alone live with for the rest of our days. However, the real story is what happened before the Normandy Invasions.
The British Eighth Army in North Africa: "a see-saw series of battles for control of Libya and parts of Egypt... reaching a climax in the Second Battle of El Alamein when British Commonwealth forces under the command of Lieutenant-General Bernard Montgomery delivered a decisive defeat to the Axis forces and pushed them back to Tunisia".
The British Fourteenth Army in Burma since 1943 "... often referred to as the 'Forgotten Army' because its operations in the Burma Campaign were overlooked by the contemporary press, and remained more obscure than those of the corresponding formations in Europe for long after the war".
These true historical events should no longer be overlooked helping to perpetuate the myth... that America won the War.
The Pacific however, was a whole other story.
For all those, of all nations who fought bravely, who sacrificed their lives for the democracies of the world that we now take so easily, for granted. RIP.
“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning. We will remember them”.
