re: World War 2 still boggles my mind

I've always been a student of WWII and have a number of books and video's about it. I just finished for the second time: "With the old Breed", by E.B.Sledge who fought in the Pacific. He kept a daily diary of everything he went through and the series "The Pacific" was mostly based on this..Many historians say "sledgehammer" as they called him presents the most factual happenings of many of the battles he was in. If you are faint of heart however, don't read it because he goes into vivid details of the brutality of the Japanese and the gruesome things he witnessed.

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"With the old Breed", by E.B.Sledge who fought in the Pacific. He kept a daily diary of everything he went through and the series "The Pacific" was mostly based on this.

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Just ordered from Thriftbooks $6. Thanks for the rec.

Most American fighters had .50 caliber machine guns, but some had 6' and I think some even had 8. The P-38 had a nose mounted cannon and 4 .50s. It would frick you up.
Some German, British and Japanese fighters also had 20mm cannons and a couple of machine guns.

I was fortunate enough to know my grandfather and five great-uncles who fought in the war. All in different theaters in different branches. I knew family friends who served. I knew Australians who fought in North Africa, New Guinea, and Borneo. I knew a lady who lived in Lyon, France during the occupation. Every one of them are gone now but I thank my lucky stars to have known them, and that they shared their stories with me.

No goretex Maybe some wool there is a reason it’s the greatest generation ever.

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I started studying WW2 around 1980 and just realized more time has passed from that year to now then the actual war itself when I started. It seemed like ancient history back then! I'm boggled.

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Most WWII vets weren't even senior citizens then. There were even lots of WWI vets around.

here's a butterfly effect hypothetical:

IRL when Germany invaded the Netherlands, the Dutch government escaped to London and set up a government in exile. The Germans installed a puppet government but the Dutch colonies ignored it and heeded the legitimate government. If the Germans had been able to capture the Dutch government intact they could have had a puppet regime the colonies would listen to. They could have ordered oil sales to Japan and there's little the US could have done short of invading the oil fields ourselves, which we weren't prepared to do at the time.

Japan gets its oil, a free hand in China, and avoids a direct confrontation with the United States for the time being. So, no Pacific War for the time being. And with no Pearl Harbor, Hitler doesn't have a brain fart and declare ware on the US. FDR doesn't have an excuse to offer large scale aid to Russia unless there's some other provocation, which might have happened-we were in a quasi-war with German Uboats in the Atlantic at the time so something could have kicked off over that. At any rate, the war could have gone very different based on one relatively small change of events.

Illuminati affiliated Serb peasant that is.

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Wait til we see what WW3 looks like….

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If there is ever a fourth it will be fought with sticks and stones