“This isn't the Britain We Fought for,” Say the “Unknown Warriors” of WWII
“Our British culture is draining away at an ever increasing pace, and we are almost forbidden to make any comment.”
Sarah Robinson was just a teenager when World War II broke out. She endured the Blitz, watching for fires during Luftwaffe air raids armed with a bucket of sand. Often she would walk ten miles home from work in the blackout, with bombs falling around her. As soon as she turned 18, she joined the Royal Navy to do her bit for the war effort.
Hers was a small part in a huge, history-making enterprise, and her contribution epitomises her generation's sense of service and sacrifice. Nearly 400,000 Britons died. Millions more were scarred by the experience, physically and mentally. But was it worth it? Her answer - and the answer of many of her contemporaries, now in their 80s and 90s - is a resounding No. They despise what has become of the Britain they once fought to save. It's not our country any more, they say, in sorrow and anger.
Sarah Robinson, who joined the Royal Navy when she was 18, says the Britain she once knew no longer exists
He rounded off his request with this question: 'Are you happy with how your country has turned out? What do you think your fallen comrades would have made of life in 21st-century Britain?' What is extraordinary about the 150 replies he received, which he has now published as a book, is their vehement insistence that those who made the ultimate sacrifice in the war would now be turning in their graves. There is the occasional bright spot - one veteran describes Britain as 'still the best country in the world' - but the overall tone is one of profound disillusionment.
'I sing no song for the once-proud country that spawned me,' wrote a sailor who fought the Japanese in the Far East, 'and I wonder why I ever tried. My patriotism has gone out of the window,' said another ex-serviceman.
They feel, in a word that leaps out time and time again, 'betrayed'.
They feel, in a word that leaps out time and time again, 'betrayed'.
'This Land of Hope and Glory is just a land of yobs and drunks'
'People come here, get everything they ask, for free, laughing at our expense,' was a typical observation. We old people struggle on pensions, not knowing how to make ends meet. If I had my time again, would we fight as before? Need you ask?'
Many writers are bewildered and overwhelmed by a multicultural Britain that, they say bitterly, they were never consulted about nor feel comfortable with.
'Our country has been given away to foreigners while we, the generation who fought for freedom, are having to sell our homes for care and are being refused medical services because incomers come first.'
'People come here, get everything they ask, for free, laughing at our expense,' was a typical observation. We old people struggle on pensions, not knowing how to make ends meet. If I had my time again, would we fight as before? Need you ask?'
Many writers are bewildered and overwhelmed by a multicultural Britain that, they say bitterly, they were never consulted about nor feel comfortable with.
'Our country has been given away to foreigners while we, the generation who fought for freedom, are having to sell our homes for care and are being refused medical services because incomers come first.'
The loss of British sovereignty to the European Union caused almost as much distress. 'Nearly all veterans want Britain to leave the EU,' wrote one.
'Our culture is draining away and we are forbidden to say anything'
As a group, they feel furious at not being able to speak their minds. They see the lack of debate and the damning of dissenters as racists or Little Englanders as deeply upsetting affronts to freedom of speech.
'Our British culture is draining away at an ever increasing pace,' wrote an ex-Durham Light Infantryman, 'and we are almost forbidden to make any comment.'
A widow from Solihull blamed the Thatcher years 'when we started to lose all our industry and profit became the only aim in life'.
Her husband, a veteran of Dunkirk and Burma, died a disappointed man, believing that his seven years in the Army were wasted.
'It is 18 years since I lost him and as I look around parts of Birmingham today you would never know you were in England,' she wrote.
Her husband, a veteran of Dunkirk and Burma, died a disappointed man, believing that his seven years in the Army were wasted.
'It is 18 years since I lost him and as I look around parts of Birmingham today you would never know you were in England,' she wrote.
'He would have hated it. He also disliked the immoral way things are going. I don't think people are really happy now, for all the modern, easy-living conveniences. I disagree with same-sex marriages, schoolgirl mothers, rubbish TV programmes, so-called celebrities and, most of all, unlimited immigration. I am very unhappy about the way this country is being transformed.
I go nowhere after dark. I don't even answer my doorbell then.'
A Desert Rat who battled his way through El Alamein, Sicily, Italy and Greece was in despair.
'This is not the country I fought for. Political correctness, lack of discipline, compensation madness, uncontrolled immigration - the "do-gooders" have a lot to answer for.
'This is not the country I fought for. Political correctness, lack of discipline, compensation madness, uncontrolled immigration - the "do-gooders" have a lot to answer for.
This Land of Hope and Glory is in reality a land of yobs, drug addicts, drunkard youths and teenage mothers who think they are owed all for nothing.'"
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