Ulsterman

Well done paddywhack and IG!

I love Ramen, but it's getting more and more expensive.

Very,very cool

ah ha! I wondered who was bidding me up on these lowly EK1 shots...... ....glad it went to a good home. did you see the one of the Gefreiter who looks all of 16 a few weeks ago?

Luerror?

at the hardware store...after the great rabbit chewing debacle of 2008 , where the Only printed Offizierverein Stammrollliste of IR 71/72/73 was chewed up and eaten...causing Rick to scream so loud that I could hear him across the parking lot...I put it all in hard plastic.

Wow...that brings back memories of school holidays . Max Hastings first job was as a researcher on this series.

Could well be......:)

ack! doh! The notation at the bottom regarding his EK1 is very cool. I think I have a photo of this chap as I have the regimental handwritten history of IR 467 with a photo album somewhere in a rabbit proof box.

Yeah, I agree with Chris, mostly. but commentary upon NATO and its short comings, financial, logistical and moral dependence upon the USA is well within the ambit of contemporary politics.

Bottom line, large wars are almost unthinkable today, except maybe in Asia (including the Ukraine) and that's the legacy of the World Wars....so maybe a price worth paying......and the legacy of the Brito-American elites who created the modern international political, technological and economic system, that's created a more peaceful world.

What medal did he get on 10.21.14?

The Bavarian long service awards available to regulars/Volunteers continued to be awarded throughout WW1 with war years service counting double.

These medals being DA3 9yrs service, DA2 12yrs service and DA1 15yrs service.

However Landwehr awards were different.

The LD2 was not associated with time served, it was eligible to any Reservist/Landwehr/Draftee AFTER service in a war. So you could serve 6mnts abroad with a rifle and get the LD2. (Only AFTER the event)

Unfortunately they never honoured this rule AFTER WW1 and no LD2's were awarded, presumably because there was no cash to manufacture several thousand medals.

The LD1 however was associated with time served and is a 20yr award, BUT war years NEVER counted as double and you had to serve the full twenty to get this one, hence the relative scarcity.

Oh?

"actually, this is almost a word for word quote of Rick Lundstroms' ...but. I'd like to see the regulations. After the monarchy fell the regulations changed and there were a large number of medals still available for awards. we know this from the manufacturing inventories. .I recall Tony Colson saying something years ago about Bavaria issuing LD medals and counting war time service, including police service and time served in the Freikorps ! ! Jim and Chris have the largest collection of Bavarian Militaerpasses I know of but maybe someone

r can have a look at a few Landwehr files on Ancestry? it's an interesting question".

If old Fritz hadn't died in '99, I'd say you two have a special thing... I agree that his thesis has a lot of merit. I wrote about the Dec 1912 War Council in an earlier post. But it's too one dimensional. We still need to look at the other Powers and what they did, didn't do, and wanted to do...going back to the turn of the century. It's cliche, but it takes more than one to make a party. I would even be willing to say Germany owns a larger share...but I would put that share at less than 75%.

Fun debate. one could also blame Italy for whussing out of their treaty obligAtions. Had Italy attacked France, the Republic would've collapsed under the pressure, the war would've been over in the West by Christmas and everything would have been different.

Fritz was special all right for a very "richtig" Teutonic Professor who always managed to say "American" with a slight sneer in his voice, but I admire his book and the counter attacks for their logical conclusions and rigor. however, to truly be special Fritz would have had to look like Imogen Stubbs in the Rainbow.

I bet that this was awarded to a German NCO seconded to the A- H army to stiffen their units in Russia and Italy. Ive never seen one awarded to anyone on thevWestern Front or in the navy.

Pretty cool. I'd love to see a contemporary CDV of one of these being worn. Maybe this year......

Cool!

Good to hear. I for one consider this a club of Gentlemen. So far the discussion has been enjoyably heated and (somewhat) fact filled, but no one has broken a bottle over a table and screamed "Die you YankeeF&:ck"! As they lunged at me. also, I don't have a sister. maybe Chris is feeling a bit sensitive post holiday season?

I would challenge this statement... I would say they could not longer win by taking Paris... but they were still doing OK... There were times after 1915 when a victory may have been possible... like after the Failed French offensives in 1917... apparently the germans did not realise the near state of collapse of the French army, but if they had made the most of the situation, things could have been very different.

The Somme, Nivelle Offensive, Various defensive efforts in Flanders... the Germans were not realy on the ropes.... Some folks can do a lot with the little they have left...

...and I would disagree. The German high command knew they had to take Paris for the rail junctions. take Paris and cripple France's supply chains. also, defensive ties were NOT victories. the Germans were at a loss as to how to defeat Russia...just too much land to occupy, no occupation plans. Etc.. armies they could destroy, cities they could capture, but then what? revolution and conquest ... even with a replacement government like Kerensky was. NOT what the Junkers wanted. they too still basically had debt serfdom and a similar socio-economic system and they knew it. they were terror died of the SPD and the universal franchise and the chance that the Reichstag might limit the Kaisers' almost absolute powers. fritz Fischers details the internal debates and confusion within Berlin..." What to do about Russia? german Princes in the Baltic? Finland with a German monarch? separate the Ukraine? absorb Poland? no one had any idea what to do.....hence drift...and defeat.

The Germans did issue a peace proposal in 1916 in response to Wilson's memorandum to each of the warring powers. From what I can find out about it it was on the arrogant side, but it was a starting point from which the other powers may have tried to hammer out something. Whatever it contained, it was certainly a better chance of peace than Lloyd George's reply, ''We shall put our trust rather in an unbroken army than in broken faith."

true...BUT, the German proposal was at best half hearted and indeed, designed not to succeed. I believe Buelow wrote about this. France was adamant at that point in no negotiated peace, as was Russia (stupidly).

Why am I not surprised you offer up some water from Antrim? I'll bring the Red Breast.

Perhaps you could arrange for Megan Foxs' Red Breast instead of yours? Bushmills is the water of God after all.

A commiseration card, including pomp, glory and medals, condolences for the sons death, and at the same time the thought that "What can be more beautiful than dying for the fatherland"... I can think of plenty of things...

Now, if it had been my sons death... I would have knocked on the senders door, and made him eat this. But this is more or less a standard card....

And many of the death cards ordered by the families show PRIDE in having lost a son.... and did the average man in the street undestand anything more than "We are fighting the bloody Tommies!" or "We are fighting the bloody hun!"

But it is 2014... maybe in 1914 "Fatherland" was something different.

Another point, back then people did not travel, or few of them did. It has always been a theory of mine that the less people see of the world, the more they live in their own little sorner of the globe, and anything further than their next village is marked "Here be dragons!" on the map.

I wont be alone in saying I have friends in South Africa, Canada, France, UK, Germany... could not really see myself involved in a war against any of them.... but I also remember as a kid in South africa, a kind of circled Wagon mentality where there was Anti South Africa stuff on the news all the time and even as a kid you thought of those countries where a boycott of South african peaches was taking place as "the enemy"....

I think the last scene of the last episode does more to show the bravery of the simple man, in the face of the madness than many histories... I defy anone to say that it is not patriotic.

I agree...so Eisenhower, Churchill and Roosevelt won. The world has never been so pacific and so interconnected.

The protection of the British Empire? From the Germans? Really? The 2 excellent allies of the 19th century? The 2 armies sharing common battle honours against common foes? The 2 countries sharing the same royal family? I remember reading on how a young MP by the name of Winston Churchill highly praised Germany for its remarkable social programs during a pre WW1 state visit, and how honoured he would be to be able to introduce such programs back home...

.......except that public opinion in the UK across all party lines hardened against Kaiserism and German's demands for European domination. after the Kaisers's interview after the North African crisis and the Prince of Wales Charm offense in Paris along with Germanys' hysterical bombast and massive ship building program turned British opinion against Germany. The Riddle of the Sands is a good book on this subject.

The British Empire chose the French side because it couldn't afford France to lose the war and default on its debt to it! Economics pushed the UK to the French side... Otherwise they might've probably stayed out of it if at all possible. Had they respected traditions and historical alliances, they would've joined with the Germans and turned France into a parking lot...

not really. France leant more to Russia and everyone owed the USA a lot more.( still do actually).

There isn't a European crowned head of head of state with clean hands in this mess of a war...

except the French didn't have a monarch and the British Monarch is innocent because he had limited power.

Brutal. horrible job. Didn't telegraphs boys and women deliver most of these?

economical officer? Would that be an ordinance/commissary official?

Outstanding!

Well, yes. of course. why whose feelings have been bruised? certainly not mine and I reckon Irishgunner is bullet proof. Chris?