Posted on 03/05/2010 4:39:29 PM PST by Kaslin
I’m sure Obama will piss off Poland, as well.
No Wurries Mate ... (have to start learning that Aussie strine) :)
He’s managed to do that to just about every country ... Thank God for Australia ....
Wow. Just how many troops did Australia provide?
Depends how many Aussie-Born men signed up to join the British Regular Army or the Royal Navy. There is no doubt many did, especially the Royal Navy....
Settlement began in 1788, and the first white child, William Nash, was born soon afterwards in the same year (others had been born on the ship on the voyage in). Not all the settlers were convicts. Plenty of time for children of settlers to have been born in the meantime and grow up to join the King’s forces, which it is inevitable that some of them did...
Apologies again.
None, because there was no independent country called Australia then. Australia was a crown colony and therefore part of Britain.
William Nash died a year after his birth. So obviously he didn’t enlist. Infant mortality was a serious problem then and very few other children born in the next ten years where unlikely to have enlisted either as they were needed to help the colony to grow. So your “inevitable” is really completely unlikely.
What is even more unlikely is that an Australians would have served in Atlantic Fleets or operations for the next hundred years. The British had plenty of other interests in India, Asia and Africa where the Australians did participate.
Even given your silly assumption that australians served in the British forces in 1812, your argument that Australia invaded the US is nutty. It would be the same as saying America invaded France because Germans born in America fought for the Axis.
None, because there was no independent country called Australia then. Australia was a crown colony and therefore part of Britain.
Exactly, however “sinsofsolarempirefan” begs to differ, even though he has zero evidence and is providing pure speculation as support for his argument.
Thousands of people living in a British colony, and none of them join the RN or the Army? I find it highly implausible, considering that in Britain’s former American colonies, many of the founding fathers/patriots were ex-British Army/Navy...
In any case, based on your premise that Australia didn’t even exist when Britain was at war with America, you may as well argue that Zimbabwe is a better ally of the US, based on the fact they didn’t exist at the time and have never been to war with the US either...
What happened beyond living memory is much less relevent than the situation as it exists today...
That would never happen. Fools such as that would be taken care of, in a summary fashion.
Officially everyone living in Australia in the nineteenth century was British, and as Britain was at war with the US between 1812 and 1814, by definition Britons living in Australia were at war with the US as well. It’s not a mere matter of semantics either. Theoretically every one of those “Australians” could aspire to any office in the British Government. As late as 1912 a Canadian did, when Henry Campbell-Bannerman became Prime Minister (there is no rule in Britain that the PM has to be native born).
A nation’s leadership would have to insane to be an ally of the USA right now.
Question: Did Australia as an independent nation declare war on the US?
Answer: No.
Question: Did Great Britain as an independent nation declare was on the US?
Answer: Yes.
Question: How many Australian citizens were there between 1812 and 1814?
Answer: None. Why? Because they were as you point out British citizens.
Officially, Britain supported the American position on Vietnam. We just didn’t send any troops, (a consequence of the move of Britain’s forces to the East of Suez following the Suez crisis).
That aside, the USS Winston Churchill is the only US Naval vessel named after a non-American person, and always has a RN exchange officer on board as a crew member. Secondly, where is your evidence that the Aussies despise us? Based on what? Banter over our respective rugby and cricket teams? Australia and Britain and America are as close to each other as the next nation.
I think you will also find that, although Australia was militarily involved in Vietnam, whereas Britain’s support was limited to political support (or perhaps clandestine special forces involvement), more recently, the British contribution to Iraq and Afghanistan has been the most substantial and proportionately largest outside of the US itself. In 2003, Britain deployed 50,000 troops for Operation Telic, which was more or less equal per head of population to the 250,000 troops America contributed to the Iraq invasion. Australia sent 2,000 troops, which whilst fairly substantial, falls short of the 6,000 or so neccessary to constitute a proportionally equal contribution for their population....
I think you will find that in 1812, America declared war on Britain, not the other way around. Britain did not actually want to go to war with the US, and she addressed most of the US’ grievances (particularly with regards to the impressment of sailors) before the declaration of war, but news of this did not arrive until after Congress declared war. Following this, America decided to press ahead with its ultimately unsuccessful bid to conquer Canada anyway...
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