Winston Churchill was a Druid

[December]

Any thoughts about it?...

http://www.savethemales.ca/druid4.jpg

http://www.savethemales.ca/001071.html


The Fraternal Druid
Beginning in 1717, Ancient Order of Druids was founded. Since then, several more British revivalist groups formed, often to this day acting more as a fraternal or charitable group, such as Masons. Usually only men, often Christian. Members have included Winston Churchill to British royalty.
http://www.dobhran.com/DPtypes.htm

It is a relatively little know fact that one of Britain’s most celebrated, though far from uncontroversial, statesmen, Winston Churchill, was a Druid. In the first decade of the twentieth century the still relatively obscure Churchill dabbled with a number of esoteric organisations most notably the Freemasons and his initiation into Druidic rites appears to have been an outgrowth of this.
http://www.angelfire.com/weird2/obscure2/druid.html

[PatrickHenry]

Umm...he also was in favor of poison gas for Iraqis.

What are you getting at, December?

That we shouldn't worship Sir Winston?

I never did...

[December]

Umm...he also was in favor of poison gas for Iraqis.

Where did you read about it?

What are you getting at, December?

That we shouldn't worship Sir Winston?

I never did...


Well.... I thought we'd discuss the Druids and try to find out who today's Druids really are....

[Pookie]

Cool. My Dad was a Druid. I don't see why it's important to find out who today's Druids are, though. You mean like a membership list or something?
Not trying to be rude, but just wondering what the point is.
Purrs,
Pookie

[PatrickHenry]

Umm...he also was in favor of poison gas for Iraqis.

Where did you read about it?
The mainstream English language press seems to worship Churchill, so finding sources that are not assailable for "bias" is difficult.

Asia Times might be considered mainstream: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FH18Ak02.html
To crush the Iraqi national liberation movement, Winston Churchill, as British secretary of state for war, introduced new military tactics with massive bombing of villages as the original "shock and awe" doctrine, revived eight decades later by the US military. Churchill ordered the use of mustard gas against the Iraqi civilian population, stating: "I do not understand the squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favor of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes." Churchill argued that the military use of gas was a "scientific expedient" and it "should not be prevented by the prejudices of those who do not think clearly". Whole villages were bombed and gassed. There was wholesale slaughter of civilians. Men, women and children fleeing from gassed villages in panic were mercilessly machine-gunned by low-flying British planes. The Royal Air Force routinely bombed and used poison gas against the Kurd, Sunni and Shi'ite tribes without discrimination. President George W Bush was highly selective when he proclaimed that the world was a better place with Saddam Hussein removed from power because Saddam used gas on the Iraqi Kurds. To be consistent, history without a double standard would have to say that the world would have been a better place had Churchill been removed from power.

But why should I care about the modern Druids?

[el comandante]

Another piece on the gassing in Iraq, from one of the very few decent British media institutions


Iraq is the product of a lying empire. The British carved it duplicitously from ancient history, thwarted Arab hopes, Ottoman loss, the dunes of Mesopotamia and the mountains of Kurdistan at the end of the first world war. Unsurprisingly, anarchy and insurrection were there from the start.
The British responded with gas attacks by the army in the south, bombing by the fledgling RAF in both north and south. When Iraqi tribes stood up for themselves, we unleashed the flying dogs of war to "police" them. Terror bombing, night bombing, heavy bombers, delayed action bombs (particularly lethal against children) were all developed during raids on mud, stone and reed villages during Britain's League of Nations' mandate. The mandate ended in 1932; the semi-colonial monarchy in 1958. But during the period of direct British rule, Iraq proved a useful testing ground for newly forged weapons of both limited and mass destruction, as well as new techniques for controlling imperial outposts and vassal states.

The RAF was first ordered to Iraq to quell Arab and Kurdish and Arab uprisings, to protect recently discovered oil reserves, to guard Jewish settlers in Palestine and to keep Turkey at bay. Some mission, yet it had already proved itself an effective imperial police force in both Afghanistan and Somaliland (today's Somalia) in 1919-20. British and US forces have been back regularly to bomb these hubs of recalcitrance ever since.

Winston Churchill, secretary of state for war and air, estimated that without the RAF, somewhere between 25,000 British and 80,000 Indian troops would be needed to control Iraq. Reliance on the airforce promised to cut these numbers to just 4,000 and 10,000. Churchill's confidence was soon repaid.

An uprising of more than 100,000 armed tribesmen against the British occupation swept through Iraq in the summer of 1920. In went the RAF. It flew missions totalling 4,008 hours, dropped 97 tons of bombs and fired 183,861 rounds for the loss of nine men killed, seven wounded and 11 aircraft destroyed behind rebel lines. The rebellion was thwarted, with nearly 9,000 Iraqis killed. Even so, concern was expressed in Westminster: the operation had cost more than the entire British-funded Arab rising against the Ottoman Empire in 1917-18.

The RAF was vindicated as British military expenditure in Iraq fell from £23m in 1921 to less than £4m five years later. This was despite the fact that the number of bombing raids increased after 1923 when Squadron Leader Arthur Harris - the future hammer of Hamburg and Dresden, whose statue stands in Fleet Street in London today - took command of 45 Squadron. Adding bomb-racks to Vickers Vernon troop car riers, Harris more or less invented the heavy bomber as well as night "terror" raids. Harris did not use gas himself - though the RAF had employed mustard gas against Bolshevik troops in 1919, while the army had gassed Iraqi rebels in 1920 "with excellent moral effect".

Churchill was particularly keen on chemical weapons, suggesting they be used "against recalcitrant Arabs as an experiment". He dismissed objections as "unreasonable". "I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes _ [to] spread a lively terror _" In today's terms, "the Arab" needed to be shocked and awed. A good gassing might well do the job.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,939608,00.html

[Drocket]

I'm a druid too, mostly feral specced but with a bit of resto. I usually just solo, mostly in cat form. The flight form added in the expansion is amazingly sweet.

Oh, wait, you're talking about real life, not World of Warcraft. Never mind.

[Trish]

The use of mustard gas by different countries was fairly common place between WWI and WWII. Although we now view such use of chemical and biological agents as strictly forbidden, that was not always the case. History tells us that armies have used biological and chemical warfare for thousands of years. Certainly, catapulting disease-infected corpses over a wall is a crude delivery system for biological agents, but an effective one. Use of poisoned arrows, scorpion bombs, snake bombs, poisoning water supplies with corpses, toxic smoke, and other bio and chemical weapon usage can be traced back thousands of years to ancient China, Greece, etc. The technology of the times was crude, which limited the scope of the damage of such weapons, but these weapons were used effectively by many peoples against their enemies long before mustard gas entered the picture.

Mustard gas (and other toxic gases) was first used as a weapon in the battlefield by Germany in WWI. Its use was quickly adopted by other countries including Great Britain, France, Spain, Italy, the US, Japan, China, the USSR, Egypt and probably every other country in the world capable of either producing the gas or obtaining the gas from a third party. Use of chemical gases against enemies was regrettably all too frequent. Even after 1925 and the Geneva Protocol which prohibited the use of such gases, countries were easily able to take advantage of many loopholes in the protocol. So while it is unquestionably true that the British used mustard gas in the early 20th century, projecting them as the only ones to do so, is not accurate. The refrain, “But, everyone was doing it!” certainly does not relieve Britain, the US, Germany, or any other country from responsibility for their actions in using gases like mustard gas, but it does put the use into historical perspective.

If we’re going to get up on our moral high horse about Britain using mustard gas against the Iraqis, we also have to condemn our own use of such weapons, as well as condemn their use by every other party ever using them, no matter who they were used against. And that’s really the point. “Most” of the world’s nations have recognized that the use of such weapons cannot be tolerated any longer. Our technology is now such that the potential damage such weapons can cause is just too dangerous to contemplate any longer.

That chemical and biological weapons were used in the past does not mean that we can ignore or permit their use now. We used to live in caves and knock each other over the heads with clubs; we used to burn people at the stake; we used to hang, draw and quarter people. We don’t do those things anymore because we’ve learned better. We’ve grown, we’ve learned, and hopefully moved beyond many of our more barbaric practices and just as hopefully that growth with continue.

Winston Churchill was no saint. And with the benefit of decades of hindsight it is easy for us to identify areas where his views and opinions in some areas were seriously lacking. The same microscope applied to any other historical figure will reveal just as many, and in some cases, infinitely more, faults and failures as well. Taken as a whole, Churchill’s contributions and positive influence on world events far outweighed his failures.

As to whether or not Churchill was a Druid - who cares?

[PatrickHenry]

...
That chemical and biological weapons were used in the past does not mean that we can ignore or permit their use now. We used to live in caves and knock each other over the heads with clubs; we used to burn people at the stake; we used to hang, draw and quarter people. We don’t do those things anymore because we’ve learned better. We’ve grown, we’ve learned, and hopefully moved beyond many of our more barbaric practices and just as hopefully that growth with continue.

...
Yeah, Trish we used to nuke whole cities out of existence and we used to threaten to do it again.

But we've grown, we've learned and... oh, wait!:shock: :shock:

[Trish]

...
That chemical and biological weapons were used in the past does not mean that we can ignore or permit their use now. We used to live in caves and knock each other over the heads with clubs; we used to burn people at the stake; we used to hang, draw and quarter people. We don’t do those things anymore because we’ve learned better. We’ve grown, we’ve learned, and hopefully moved beyond many of our more barbaric practices and just as hopefully that growth with continue.

...
Yeah, Trish we used to nuke whole cities out of existence and we used to threaten to do it again.

But we've grown, we've learned and... oh, wait!:shock: :shock:


We haven't nuked anyone else in 60 years have we? I'd say we'd learned quite a bit.

[apdst]

I have a thought on it. Who cares?

The use of mustard gas by different countries was fairly common place between WWI and WWII.

Trish,

A slight correction. The use of mustard gas, or any other chemical, or biological agent during WW2 was very [b]un]/b]common. The only usage that I am aware of was by The Italians in Abyssinia(Ethiopia) in 1935.

[Trish]

I have a thought on it. Who cares?

The use of mustard gas by different countries was fairly common place between WWI and WWII.

Trish,

A slight correction. The use of mustard gas, or any other chemical, or biological agent during WW2 was very [b]un]/b]common. The only usage that I am aware of was by The Italians in Abyssinia(Ethiopia) in 1935.


The use of mustard gas and other chemical weapons were if not "common" in the time between the two wars, were not exactly rare.

The British used chemical gases against the Bolsheviks after WWI. The Spanish used chemical weapons against rebels in Morocco in the 20's. Along with Italy's use of mustard gas in the 30's in Ethiopia, Japan's chemical and biological experiments against the Chinese in the late 30's were responsible for the deaths of thousands of Chinese. The Japanese also poisoned Soviet water supplies. In WWII a US ship carrying mustard bombs was sunk and many US sailors died in the resulting poisoned water. The Nazis used toxic gases in their gas chambers. After WWII, Egypt used mustard gas against Yemen. The US used chemical agents like Agent Orange in Vietnam. While used as a defoliant, the chemical also had adverse health consequences on the Vietnamese and the US troops as well. The Soviet's KGB used chemical weapons in their spy operations during the Cold War, and the spy business being what it is, wouldn't doubt that our undercover operatives used similar tactics.

The use of chemical and biological weapons is not a new thing. The only thing that has changed is that now technology makes the use of those agents much more deadly.

[apdst]

Trish,

I was only poiting out, that during WW2 the use of chemical weapons was very rare. Nothing on the scale of WW1.

[Trish]

Trish,

I was only poiting out, that during WW2 the use of chemical weapons was very rare. Nothing on the scale of WW1.


That's very true. During WWI everyone was gassing everyone else it seems.

[Scorpion]

Any thoughts about it?...

http://www.savethemales.ca/druid4.jpg

http://www.savethemales.ca/001071.html


The Fraternal Druid
Beginning in 1717, Ancient Order of Druids was founded. Since then, several more British revivalist groups formed, often to this day acting more as a fraternal or charitable group, such as Masons. Usually only men, often Christian. Members have included Winston Churchill to British royalty.
http://www.dobhran.com/DPtypes.htm

It is a relatively little know fact that one of Britain’s most celebrated, though far from uncontroversial, statesmen, Winston Churchill, was a Druid. In the first decade of the twentieth century the still relatively obscure Churchill dabbled with a number of esoteric organisations most notably the Freemasons and his initiation into Druidic rites appears to have been an outgrowth of this.
http://www.angelfire.com/weird2/obscure2/druid.html


Churchill was also a member of the Priory of Scion and an Illumenati.

[preservanation]

Trish,

I was only poiting out, that during WW2 the use of chemical weapons was very rare. Nothing on the scale of WW1.


That's very true. During WWI everyone was gassing everyone else it seems.
During WW11 it seemed most of the gassing moved into confined spaces...
Heavy chemical gas was ideal for the fox-hole and trench warfare in WW1.
Whats this about Churchill having dreds?
Learn something new every day.

[HumanBeast]

I have the same birthday as WC but not the same politics.

[preservanation]

I have the same birthday as WC but not the same politics.
or the same hair-do, I hope...

[moses2792796]

...
That chemical and biological weapons were used in the past does not mean that we can ignore or permit their use now. We used to live in caves and knock each other over the heads with clubs; we used to burn people at the stake; we used to hang, draw and quarter people. We don’t do those things anymore because we’ve learned better. We’ve grown, we’ve learned, and hopefully moved beyond many of our more barbaric practices and just as hopefully that growth with continue.

...
Yeah, Trish we used to nuke whole cities out of existence and we used to threaten to do it again.

But we've grown, we've learned and... oh, wait!:shock: :shock:


lol, progressive view of history = fail

Sure we've evolved, got so much better and more civilised. 8000 years ago we were simply primitives who barely survived day to day. These days we have powerful military technology, why just 60 years back we killed millions of people in a few years with our amazing technological wonders.

When will people learn that progress is a material factor only, society has been decaying for the last 2000 years. The fact that we now dedicate huge amounts of time and effort to creating more technology most of which is simply worthless consumer goods reveals a materialistic obsession only possible in a state of utter decadence.

[TheStripey1]

Any thoughts about it?...

http://www.savethemales.ca/001071.html


The Fraternal Druid
...snip



Nope... Don't care one way or the other... he's dead, you know...

just biding my time waiting for an answer on another thread...

:ponder:

[Phyxius]

And that has what to do with anything going on today? So, he was a Druid.

So what? :dizzy:

[Matt W]

Indeed. Surely this is more a History thread, December?