The lions sleep tonight
And as promised a week ago, on the eleventh day, of the eleventh month, and in the eleventh hour in east coast US zone, by the time I finish this, we are one hundred years on from the end of the great insanity that was World War 1. Of course that orange, wigged buffoon from the US couldnt even be bothered to turn up at the US Military Graves for those of his country that fell there in the Great War, because of a little bit of rain. Poor thing, but I bet if they were Russian, his boss would have made him turn up, but anyway…
I actually went to see a good play this week put on by the drama group in Cookridge, which a couple of my fellow workers were taking part in. Too late for you to go now, but they put on a good show. And its from that, that I got the blog title, the not unreasonable line about lions being led by donkeys. Because, sadly, its true, most of the so called leaders of the war force were barely able to tie up shoe laces, judging by their decisions, let alone send brave young men into war, many to meet their death, at far too young an age.
To put it into perspective, if I remember the figures rightly, the group of ‘Yorkshire Pals’ that the play was about on Thursday, 900 men went over the top at the Battle of the Somme, only 150 even made it to the assembly point a few hundred yards ahead of them. The rest of them died, some quite literally never to be seen again.
The thing is, some of the leaders knew what a disaster this was, as I read this morning of Lloyd George, trying to convince a young relative of the Canadian Ambassador not to go to the front, as he wished to. The comment was that things were ‘bad for our forces’, an understatement if ever there was one.
The biggest irony, and leadership incompetence however, was saved for this date, 100 years ago. On this date, an attack was launched, leading to about 2000 young men dying, when the leaders knew that the Armistice was being declared about 3 hours later! I think calling them donkeys, would be insulting donkeys, in truth.
Anyway, 100 years on from that date, let us all remember those ‘brave lions’ that died in that war, and try to forget the ‘idiot donkeys’ that led them there. RIP!
Right, the blog has been serious, the video is not. I need to do something lighthearted for the event, or I’ll scream, so…
For reference, Pat & Stanley are the 2 in the video. As far as I can tell, the singing is the version by The Tokens
stevielounicks 
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