Are they really immune?

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article2758829.ece

Steve

Phantom II,

I think the Kent State thing is an aside, illustrating how both protests and responses from officialdom can both get out of hand.

If anyone wants to expolre the relationship between protest and responses to it, can I sugest reading ‘My Experiments with Truth,’ by Mahatma Ghandi.

Steve.

To directly equate freedom and democracy ie ‘Democracy = Freedom’ is foolish.

Only this weekend we have seen in England a ban on smoking in enclossed public places introduced, which many here in the UK (a democracy) see as severely limiting their personal freedom. Such a limitation of freedom is now common in many western democracies.

It is also of course worth noting that Adolf Hitler was democratically elected, surely an example of democracy destroying freedom rather than reinforcing it.

Or that (I believe it was) George Orwell who once observed that True Communisum and True Democracy would be indistinguishable.

In the light of the above it is clear that Freedom IS NOT the same thing as Democracy, although the two concepts often have a close interelationship.

Steve.

Anything Imperial Airways would be nice, as virtually nothing except for a few DH Dragon/Rapides, Fox Moths and perhaps the odd Short Scion restoration project, survives from the formative years of British air transportation.

Practically one of the smaller wooden interwar airliners would be great, and should be possible; perhaps a DH34, Airspeed Ferry or Armstrong Whitworth Argossy (which from memory I think was wooden). After all there have been two flying Vimy replicas to my knowledge, which must have presented similar engineering chalenges.

Steve.

Here, here Cees.

I couldn’t agree more; if one of the reasons we preserve aircraft is to remind future generation of those who made the ultimate sacrifice, then we must reflect the fact that many amongst them died both on operations and training, at least partly, because their equipment was inadequate.

If we only preserve successful aircraft we only tell part of the story, the ‘glamorous’ part. Therefore aircraft such as the Skua and Botha are essential to the accurate remembrance and portrayal of history.

This touches upon something that has been worrying me increasingly recently. There is a very fine line between commemoration and glorification. If we only preserve aircraft such as Spitfires and Mustangs and always paint them in the marking of aces etc. do we not run the risk of forgetting the ordinary airmen? – those who flew a few missions and then failed to return. Does painting the BBMF’s Lancaster as Phantom of the Ruhr, and its remarkable achievement of more than a hundred operations run the risk of detracting from the 50,000 allied aircrew who died in the bomber offensive? Might not a well researched colour scheme and crew history of a plane that failed to return commemorate the fallen aircrew better? Would the stories of young men who died, leaving a widow still carrying their first child, eighteen year old virgins, and promising careers truncated better reflect the sacrifices a generation was called upon to make?

Steve.

I agree this smells like yet another Branson/Virgin publicity stunt.

There is only one organistion that could achieve a Concorde return to flight and that of course is Airbus, and I do seem to recall reading somewhere that the Concorde at Toulouse has had its systems maintained since retirement.

However it would take several million bucket loads of money and an unusual level of political will to achieve this, which given thier current problems with the A380 seems unlikely. And even if it did happen it would almost certainly be ‘subsonic only,’ which would save a very large sum.

That said stranger things have happened, aren’t some people attempting to return a Vulcan to the sky? 😉

Steve

As Pete says there are free airshows like Southend around, and there are a lot of other good value events around too. Personly I don’t like the big shows like RIAT and Flying legends, so this year I will go to Shuttleworth, the DH Moth Club Charity flying day and perhaps another small show.

At the end of the day ‘you pay your money and take your choice.’ Mine is not to spend £40 getting into a single show only to be charged another £80 for a burger & £160 for a pint;)

Steve.