What WW2-related museum or site has stayed with you?

Sad and yet beautiful...

 

This is just one reason why war is such a horrible waste of lives, resources and effort. We should know better.

 

For the Doctor Who fans...

 

^^^That's right. People are nasty creatures. You don't rise up and stay on top of the food chain for 2 million years otherwise.

We are nasty creatures but we are successful: there are more of us alive now than ever before.

 

The weird thing is that there will be not enough food for all of us soon. Who decides who can eat and who cannot? Man vs man for food only next after Putin??

 

Many species have become too successful and eaten themselves out...Natures answer is simple...survival of the fittest. Mass starvation and mass death until the population drops to a point the food source can sustain them again...Would have happened to our ancestors in Africa and for sure during our migration to Europe...
Early Australia starved for it's first 20 years until successful farming was achieved...This was a time when stealing a loaf of bread meant the death penalty! The highly populated countries like China, India and the USA would become meat grinders with millions fighting for the few scraps thrown from the back of trucks, killing each other for the tiniest morsel...Mass murder.

Australia produces three times more food than it needs...(It also has 50 odd million kangaroos sitting in the bush - Plus millions and millions of feral rabbits and camels and pigs and goats) - Some countries would/will do alright and become "life boats" - These countries need to be able to protect their borders...

 

According to an increasing number of scientists and thinkers (Elon Musk for one), we're headed for a population collapse. Most European nations are already below replacement rate, the rest are at stasis. China, India, Indonesia, and several African countries still have increasing populations but much slowed. Japan's population is already collapsing. The US birth rate was at .035% IIRC, half of its population growth was immigrants (the largest number of any country and double the next largest country). The US still produces a large food surplus in all areas except fresh fruit. One of the reasons for China's aggressive expansion into other countries/territorial waters is that it is unable to feed its population without massive imports. 30 percent of US pork production is exported to China and China is still running a 10 million metric ton deficit in supply vs. demand per year. They are also importing record amounts of US beef, soybeans and corn.
The biggest threat from food instability in the US is supply chain disruptions, and if it collapses densely populated urban areas are the most vulnerable. We too have a feral pig problem, in fact hunters in many areas are encouraged to kill all they can by game wardens.
CAC, be careful if the SHTF when it comes to eating feral pigs (also bear), Trichinosis is endemic in them. There is also a disease in deer, elk, reindeer and moose called CWD (chronic wasting disease) a form of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy, it is spreading throughout the US and Canada, and has been seen in Europe and South Korea, it kills the animal over 18-24 months and can be transmissible to humans through ingestion of the effected animal. One thing that is really scary is the prion responsible for the disease can live in the soil for years and a large percentage even survive incineration of the infected carcass.

 

Yeah there is a bunch of shite you can get sick from...TB, Brucellosis to name but two...but if you butcher it properly and cook the crap out of it...You should be right.

*Remember Australia has one of the strongest policies against disease - We have large food producers who are protected from many overseas diseases...You might catch someone at the airport getting cautioned about the marijuana in their bags...two cubicles over is someone standing over an Asian just landed with an apple held over their heads..."Why did you bring the Apple! WHY!? You didn't declare this fruit! WHY!
Even from border to border in Australia they have bins and stop points to check your cars etc for fruit or other products that can spread and devastate our food industry...we take this shit seriously.



My point is that Australia doesn't have many diseases found around the rest of the world (we are an island and can enforce far more successfully) - One that comes to mind is rabies...

 

And I bet that never got old for you…

Moving prisoners? Mate you’ve lived a couple of lives…

 

And why not too…

That reminds me of what was once a favourite book series…the Jack Reacher series, which is still going…please don’t watch the Tom Cruise movies…Reacher is about 6’4 and 220 pounds of muscle…Which wouldn’t be Tom Cruise. Anywho, Reacher’s job before becoming a travelling hobo by choice, was capturing special forces members who’d gone AWOL…You have to be super bad to take down a bad ass…Alive usually. Recommend the series if you’re looking for something different…

 

You never know, I've encountered five other people with my name, plus recently one by e-mail. Fortunately none yet with the same middle initial.

 

The Polish cemetery at Cassino is very moving. It's on a hillside facing the monastery, laid out like an amphitheater with ascending curved rows of simple gravestones. In the center is a larger tomb for their commander, General Anders, who died after the war.

These were mainly men who had been captured by the Russians in 1939, survived a couple of years in prison camps, then were released to the British after Hitler attacked Russia. They formed two divisions and an armoured brigade and fought through the Italian campaign (some also in North Africa).

There's a very moving inscription on the back wall:

We give our souls to God
Our bodies to the ground of Italy
And our hearts to Poland