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Yak-3 Normandie Niemen expected in August


Jan_K

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I notice that the 00 option doesn't include the kill marking for the RAF Wellington; chain of command is one thing, walking away would have been another, shooting down an aircraft fighting against the occupiers of your country is yet another - he could have shot to miss.

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When you flew with Vichy air force, you did not realy fly with the germans, it was still for France.

You just forget that british forces attacked french Navy short after french surrender, so they became ennemies to french forces.

So, nothing strange in this british bomber kill

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Again, based on the information we have now, this is plain obvious. However, I cannot say for sure this was the case for the guy in his plane! We shall not forget that for centuries France and England were enemies without mercy. This looks totally odd now in western Europe but this friendship was far from obvious before WW1 and this was less than 25 years before... This explains why propaganda against the Brits was quite easy to resurrect. Think about the famous "Remember Mers-el-Kebir".

 

Don't get me wrong, I am not defending this guy. I am just trying to look at the situation through the devil's advocate glasses ;-)

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Yep, I know all about Mers-el-Kebir - the French sailors were asked to surrender their ships for fear they would end up in German hands and refused, which led to them being boarded by British forces and deaths on both sides - but wasn't the German invasion of France worse? The invasion of North Africa was the opening up of a second front, which ultimately led to the liberation of France.

 

With the greatest respect Norbert, Vichy was in bed with the Germans - how many French citizens died as a result of Vichy collaboration, whether at concentration camps or other? Or was there nothing strange in that?

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Well, things were alas not so obvious.

 

When France surrendered, it was not obvious for most French citizens that the Vichy government would collaborate so actively with the Germans. Vichy became a fascist-like government but the situation was not clear-cut in 1940. Re-read documents of the era, including French newspapers and you will see that the situation evolved progressively and I guess this is what explains the fact that more and more soldiers defected to join the Free French. For some it was obvious before the French stopped the battle and they tried to leave with the Brits at Dunkerke whereas, for others, this took more time. Retrospectively, it is easy to consider what should have been the best choice. Generally, historical events are only understood decades later... We are lucky to be so informed now. However, I am not so sure this would prevent people from 2016 to do similar terrible errors!

 

Thierry

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  • 8 months later...

$36 for this kit is a fabulous deal. Thanks for the tip Coogrfan. I have this lovel bird in my limited stash here in SIN.

 

My wife will seriously going roll her eyes when she arrives and see what I've.......hmmmm, ah.....collected In my small apartment with no room to spare. Damn.

 

Troy

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