That’s a funny kind of logic…..[the] decision to prevent a Polish contingent marching behind a Polish flag (which they had, IMHO, every right to do) would have been corrected by a selection of Poles marching in the RAF contingent?

I hadn’t actually realised that the victory parade didn’t take place until June 1946. I suppose the Poles actual concern was that Poland had fallen under Soviet control and their refusal to take any part in the parade was a protest to highlight this issue (a pretty effective protest if we’re talking about it today).

The lack of a representative invitation to the Poles by the parade organisers (whoever they were) was a disgrace, on the face of it, but perhaps we are forgetting the bigger picture and looking at this from the safety of 2009.

Tension between the west and the Soviet Union were high, the Berlin airlift was only two years away, NATO didn’t exist, Britain was exhausted and bankrupt, the empire was dissolving and it is unlikely that our overseas allies would be thrilled at the prospect of more European conflict. Was including Poland in the parade really more important than maintaining an uneasy peace with the Soviets? And what of the Poles who fought alongside the Russians? There were whole divisions of Poles fighting on the eastern front, under Russian control…..so it is not really a black-and-white issue as some have seen it.

The Poles clearly felt betrayed but I still maintain that Britain couldn’t free Poland in 1945…..I know people see that as a betrayal but these people haven’t been able to say how it should have been achieved.

I thinks it’s absolutely disgusting that the Poles were excluded from the victory parade.

Which victory parade exactly, and was it only Poles that were excluded?

I stand by my statement… I really do think we sold them short.

When you say ‘sold them short’ do you mean Britain as a nation?

Don’t get me wrong I’m not condoning the treatment of Poland (or any other formerly independent state) by the Soviet Union as the Iron Curtain descended, far from it, but I personally don’t see what Britain could have done. I agree Poland should have been free and Poles should have been free to return home…

…but how would you (as Britain’s government) have achieved this?

Hamilton Standard / de Havilland hydromatic.

I think if you research what happened after the war in Poland under the Soviet occupation you might come round more to agreeing.

Irrespective of the Soviet treatment of Poland post-war I don’t agree that Britain ‘sold them short’.

How could we? All of Poland’s much changing and disputed territory was in Soviet hands and would not be relinquished without military force, and military force would have meant war between Britain and the Soviet Union in 1945, with the war in the Pacific still raging. Would America have agreed to war with the Soviet Union in 1945? Unthinkable. And if America had, would the outcome for Europe, and Poland, have been better?

I also wonder about our (Great Britain’s) 1930s treaty/alliance with Poland. When the Nazi invasion of Poland started (which was far from a suprise) did Britain do anything physical, ie other than beat it’s breast, to assist the Poles? It would have been almost impossible for the Army (and, probably, the RN) to have helped but did the RAF do anything at that time?

The treaty was presumably designed to prevent German aggression against Poland, once Germany invaded its intention was irrelevant. At least Britain and France declared war on Germany, declarations that neither caused nor prevented Germany’s invasion of Western Europe.

And, as has been stated, what could Britain have done that it did not? Poland is on the other side of Germany from Britain; what aircraft did the RAF have that could even reach Poland? The effects of Bomber Command’s efforts against strategic targets in Germany in the early war years are well documented failures; Poland would have succumbed despite any effort by the RAF and that effort would possibly have brought us into conflict with the Soviet Union, at the time allied to Germany.

Were any of the pilots in Pearl Harbor actually portrayed as illiterate?

I only remember the pilot played by Ewen Bremner having a pronounced stutter:

“Bandits at t…t…t…t…ten o’clock!”

It does annoy me a bit when so called experts wade into to WWII films as being innaccurate, especially when it’s obviously intended just as a piece of ‘entertainment’ loosely based upon a certain event.

But that’s the problem as I see it; in isn’t obvious that it is ‘just a piece of entertainment’ to a large section of the audience…

…it’s only obvious if you know something about the real events, and most people don’t.

Filmmaking, especially good filmmaking, can be incredibly powerful, especially because for every person that reads a book about Pearl Harbor, for example, many thousands will watch the film. (I don’t actually regard Pearl Harbor as being that bad, historically, it’s not my cup-of-tea but I can see its popular appeal.)

One of my favourite pieces of filmmaking is JFK, it is a masterful piece of storytelling, but it deliberately skews the ‘facts’ to serve its own ends. Now I took the trouble to check the actual events because my interest had been sparked by the film but what percentage of the audience did?

I’m not against fictional dramatisations but I think it’s a shame that an opportunity to tell some really important history is being lost, and it doesn’t need to be, from the examples I and others have given. History, real history, can be both entertaining and factually accurate, even if some elements are dramatised.

The trailer for Tarantino’s film is clearly selling the film on its violent content, I don’t think it will do his career any favours, or for Brad Pitt, it surely won’t do anything but skew ‘history’ and I don’t predict any Oscar nominations…..so what has been achieved?

Tarantino and Pitt are talented, they could do better…..easily. Again just my opinion…..time will tell. 🙂

Of course, but I wasn’t suggesting that war films should be documentaries or that fictional characters and events couldn’t be portrayed. I suppose what I am trying to say is that there is a big difference between war-fiction and war-fantasy.

I agree with your assessment of Das Boot, possibly the perfect illustration of my point, it is historically accurate in its portrayal of the Battle of the Atlantic and therefore educational, extremely entertaining, but the characters and events portrayed are fictional.

The other stand-out mini-series for me is Band of Brothers, the perfect illustration of how to do a ‘documentary’ war film. On the other hand Saving Private Ryan after a demonstration of its ability to entertain and educate descends into an utter fantasy.

I fear that Tarantino’s effort will be similarly fanciful and it will use fighting the Nazis as an excuse for the ‘heroes’ (or anti-heroes) to behave in an otherwise inexcusable way – two wrongs don’t make a right!

I wouldn’t say that’s true of some, especially the likes of The Guns of Navarone or the films of the 1960s and early 70s.

No, as I said, there are exceptions but there has also been a tradition of ‘war stories’ (as opposed to dramatisations of historical events) that have shaped the popular view of warfare (especially WW2) and left many actual acts of military daring and bravery in the shadows.

In my opinion, The Guns of Navarone, The Dirty Dozen, The Eagle Has Landed and Where Eagles Dare all fall into this category. They are undoubtedly entertaining and feature some of the great actors of a generation but because of that the effect on the popular view of ‘history’ is magnified.

Even when a film goes to great lengths to portray history accurately, such as in the Great Escape, it seems to be the non-factual parts, featuring the biggest stars and the greatest stunts that people remember.

How about bringing (or bringing back) some genuine daring and heroism to the big screen; Operation Jericho instead of 633 Squadron, the Bruneval Raid instead of The Red Beret or the Saint-Nazaire Raid instead of Attack on the Iron Coast?

I thought Hollywood was making steps in the right direction with Valkyrie but from the trailer Inglorious B******s seems to be going back to the bad old days of the 1970’s and I suspect it owes as much to Tarantino’s directing style as any other consideration.

Just my opinion of course. 🙂