THE BRITISH ARMY IN 1945.

THE BRITISH ARMY IN 1945.

During the liberation of Holland in 1945 the British Army liberated great parts of our country from German occupation.

The British information service from the Army printed a brochure in the Dutch language to inform the liberated Dutch people.



The Armored Division in formation on the move.



The brochure had the intention to inform the people about the daily live and work in the British Army starting with basic training, the different units and there tasks and the way it fights. Its an interesting piece of history with a combination of photo's and drawings (artist impression).

THE INFANTRY

On two pictures we can see how an easy target changed into a well camouflaged

rifleman.  Before camouflage in the

black and white picture and with camouflage in 

the collored picture.

Its clear that the enemy can't see him,

but can he see the enemy ?





Also interesting are the pictures which look like a basic training in streetfight, with covering fire from the other side of the street.





The Bren Gun in action.

On the following spectaculair view
we see the basics from
fire and manouvre
with 3 sections.

THE AIRBORNE TROOPS.



The Tetrarch tank which is driving out of the Hamilcar glider was not the best they had. The light tank was easy to transport by air but on the ground it was to light armered and the gun had a caliber which was to small.

The paratroopers where the elite fighting force.

An other elite fighting force are the Green barrets called Commandos.

Operating in small units they where able to fight in difficult situations with minimal logistic support.



   THE ARTILLERY.

The main task for the artillery is to suport the other fighting units like the infantry. The artillery can fire a barrage which is aimed at targets just in front of the own troops.

When the infantrie goes forward, the artillery stops firing

and the barrage goes also forward looking for

new targets, like enemy positions.

The battery with 5.5 inch canons.

The main cannon is the 25 pounder.

A special detail is the plate on the ground which

makes turns to the left or right easy.

First you see the 25 pdr. in action and

in the second picture you see the

details from the ground plate.

A special place, the John Frost bridge at Arnhem.

From the movie a Bridge to far.

(Operation Market Garden)

The groundplate for the 25 pdr.

In the mountains you need a light piece of artillery

which can be transported in heavy terrain in

parts. The 3.7 inch mountain canon

is the one you need.

The 3.7 inch mountain canon.

When you have time and place and a good infrastructure

like railroads ,you can use the heavy equipment.

Have a look at the 18 inch railway canon

18 meter long with a firing range of 32 km.

KOREA AND THE DUTCH UN DETACHMENT.

THE KOREAN WAR

AND THE DUTCH UN DETACHMENT.

On 25 june 1950 the communists from North Korea invaded South Korea.
The American troops in the south under command of the famous General Mac-Arthur landed at Inchon and puched the invaders back till the 38 parallel.
The United Nations asked for military assistance from its members and the Dutch responded by sending a torpedo destroyer, the Hr. Ms. Evertsen.



The Royal Dutch Navy was active with in total 4 rotating ships during the period 1950 till 1953 as part of the 7 Th. Fleet.

On 23 november 1950 the Dutch UN Detachment arrived in Pusan. Battle hardend Dutch Indies veterans were very capable with handeling the US equipment and weapons. The Dutch were a part of the famous 2Nd. Indianhead Division. About 100 Korean Army Troops US Army supported the Dutch detachment.

The battle was hard and the artic weather conditions made it worse. I saw in a documentary that the US soldiers complained about there weapons and equipment which was mainly based on World War Two equipment. The North Koreans received weapons from the USSR and the T34 tank had a very good reputation. The rockets from the American bazookas could not penetrade the armor from this tanks. The same problem was the lack of winter uniforms.

On 30 september 1954 the Dutch Detachment ended a long periode of action.

They received 1 Presidential Unit Citation, 2 Distinguised Unit Citations, 14 Silver Stars and 100 Bronze Stars. In totall 5.268 men served in this unit and 122 were killed in action, 3 missed in action.

With deep respect to the last veterans from this almost forgotten war.





The Cold War.

THE COLD WAR.

When i was in front of a classroom with kids from the age about 16 years during my young veteran presentation about my mission in the Middle East i was suprised by the lack of knowledge about our recent history. My story always begins with 1985, the time when i was 18 and entering the military service (draft).

I always explain that the situation then was totaly different from the situation now.

The end of World War Two divided centrall Europe in two parts.

The free and democratic Western part and the communist eastern part. It was the time when the western countrys secured there freedom with the NATO membership. An attack on one of them was an attack on all of them. The communists kept their borders closed because the people from the east wanted to go to the free and democratic west.

To keep the people in they created the Berlin wall and on a greater scale the Iron curtain armed with border gards which fired on people which wanted to escape.

In the millitary there was a continious threat of nuclear attacks, both sides kept great numbers of weapons, called the arms race.

A nuclear explosion

Civil Defence, shelter at home.

To protect civilian targets most governments gave instructions to the people how they could protect themselve (Civil Defence), in Holland there was the BB organisations which had a image problem which was linked to  Dads Amry (old men in silly outfits).

Soldiers learned how they could identifie the enemy with pictures in their handbook .

The frontpage from a USSR defence news paper.

A typical Cold War tank was the German build Leopard main battle tank, no modern elctronics these days which ables a modern tank to drive and fire at the same time. enjoy the clip.



The reality with tension between east and west.

The iron curtain and the Berlin wall .

To stop the outgoing flow of people which wanted to live in the democratic west and wanted to escape from the supressing Communist one party system in the DDR, the DDR build a wall in the eastern part of Berlin and later this was a part of what Churchill called an Iron curtain from the Baltic to the Adriatic (see the map above).

The guards at the wall had permission to shoot and they posted two men on a watchtower which came from different parts of the DDR. In this way they tried to hold them in and the communist system had a secret service (Stasi) which build up massive archives about all the details from the men and women in the DDR.

But thousends of people tried to escape from this system.

A world famous escape is from Conrad Schumann.

Conrad Schumann jumped on 15 aug 1961 three days after the DDR started with "the anti fashist barrier to protect the DDR".

In the propaganda from the East the barrier was promoted as a victory.

But Conrad knew better and jumped to the free West.

This picture has become iconic for the Cold War and a divided Europe in a free Western part and a Communist Eastern part.

The picture was made by Peter Leibing with an East German (!) Exakta camera.

The picture was made on the junction Bernauer Stasse and

Ruppiner Strasse.

Conrad Schumann after the jump. (19 years old)



Its sad that his mother reported his letters to the East German secret service after he jumped to the West.

Conrad suffered also from depressions and hanged himself at the age of 56 in 1998.

In remembrence of the jump in 1961 this silver soldier was made

and placed in Berlin in 2009.

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Today at the Military Event in Assen, DDR army vehicle GAZ.



The borderguard with license to shoot



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Cold War Civil Defense (Dutch BB) with Magirus air cooled
diesel engine, the tools and equipment truck.



Dads Army ?



The fuction from a person in a city was
visable near to the front door of a house

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THE NAVY.

The Navy flag from the Sovjet fleet.



 



The Royal Dutch navy.
The impressive HNMS. battleship De Ruyter.

HNMS De Ruyter (C801) with his impressive looks which are linked to the great battleships of World War Two has a history which goes back to 1939.

They started the building of this impressive ship in 1939 but it was not finished because of the German invasion in 1940.

The lessons from World War Two made it necessary to change

the design and in 1953 this ship was ready for action.

The black and white pictures are from the information

publication from the Royal Dutch Navy (1969)

Published by De Alk N.V. Alkmaar Holland.

Showing the flag.
If you want to make a point : send the Navy !

The Royal Dutch navy had two of this impressive Battleships.
The C 802, HNMS. De Zeven Provincien
was upgraded with support from the USA
during the mutual assistance programme with
a anti aircraft Terrier rocket installation
on the backside deck.

The Terrier anti aircraft installation.

Launching the rocket.

An other important task during

the cold war was the anti submarine

action with special ships, and

with operations from the air. 

Two long distance Navy airplanes which where very capable for this anti submarine task where (left) the Lockheed Neptune and the Breguet Atlantic (right), build in cooperation with the NATO members France, West-Germany, Belgium and The Netherlands.

For the short distance the Grumman Trackers where available, very well known on US Aircraft carriers for a lot of years.

Grumman S-2A Tracker in action.

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Static defence works

We can still find traces of Cold War history in the field.

In the northern part of Holland you can find an impressive bunker

complex restored by the foundation Kornwerderzand.

The building of this complex started in 1931 as part of the

waterdefence works, therfore they could use the best materials

and modern design.

With the German attack in may 1940 this defence works
could stop the attack in cooperation with  navy canons
from ships north of the complex.

During the German occupation, the Germans used this
complex for their defence against a Allied atack
and made some modifications.
This bunker with the rare camouflage patern was build
for a anti tank canon.

After the Second World War this complex was still in use

for the defence against the Russian bear from the east

during the Cold War.

Sherman tank turrets where used

to improve firepower.