Australia & France.

[chris]

The US capitalists made enormous profits out of WW2

Probably still are. Isn't the British Government still paying off lend lease....?

I may need confirmation on this one, but aren't the French still claiming reperations for the damage inflicted on the country by the Allies during the liberation of France?

[Lou Girardin]

I agree about France.
But Australia's "where the US goes, we go" just smacks of 1940's colonial cringe.
BTW it was Aussies who stopped the Jap army on the Kokoda trail, there were no Yanks there.
If it wasn't for Pearl Harbour the Merkins would have remained in their isolationist haven until threatened. Their history is a continual one of self-interest.

[Pixie]

Everyone knows Winston Churchill and the Poms won the war.

Yup,the Beatles said so in a song

[Dafe]

What a load of shit Dafe.


I'm proud of NZ, proud of the essentially anti-oppression, pro-human stance we take on the world stage, and damn proud that we have the balls to put militarism in its place, and thrilled to hear that NZ troops are in hot demand for UN mandated peace keeping missions.

I'm ashamed that we don't have the capability to agressively maintain our borders and territorial claims though. The bloody National party should have bought those F16s while they had the chance.

Here I was thinking you were up with the play Jim. Obviously not.

The only reason NZ UN troops would be in hot demand is because the UN council can spend the New Zealand tax payers money, rather than dipping into their own pockets. and we all know how Helen Clark won't limit her spending there - considering she's runnning for the position of "Secretary of the UN Council" later this year.

The only reason we do not have the F16's is because there was no policy reversal protection and even though the deal was signed and sealed, a loop hole managed to allow the change over government (labour) to back out from the deal. Hence why I resigned from the RNZAF's 75 Squadron (Skyhawks) the following month.

Obviously you think our military stance is somewhat impressive.
Well, you should talk to anybody in the NZDF or any retired serviceman. Be warned though, you'll get a good laughing at.

[onearmedbandit]

I'm seeing double!

[Dafe]

It's It's OK OK, , It's It's only only the the drugs drugs and and booze booze..

[Big Dave]

Probably still are. Isn't the British Government still paying off lend lease....?

I may need confirmation on this one, but aren't the French still claiming reperations for the damage inflicted on the country by the Allies during the liberation of France?

Yeah - but nobody else puts that much value on cheese.

[Timber020]

Such a shame that NZ has its own identity and doesnt roll over and be the lapdog of anything bigger that might look like it could throw us the odd bone.

We should be more like aus, wouldnt it be great to be a nation that george bush can name without it being a place where US troops are dying or theres more oil to be got.
Its a pity we arent as mineral rich and cant just find a few billion dollars by digging more holes in our nation.

Heres the good news, they will happily have you there.

[oldrider]

I do not want to enter the political debate but I do want to correct the notion that Australia and New Zealand were not under any real threat from the Japanese in WW2.
Australia was being bombed and Japanese submarines were sighted around the NZ coast. (My current nieghbour saw a submarine off Wellington)
Japanese reconnaissance planes were flying about NZ, this I can vouch for because I actually saw one when I was a kid and that is backed up historically.
It was a relief to everyone in NZ when the Americans came out here to train before they went up to the war zone where thousands of them died pushing the Japs back.
Churchill would not let NZ troops leave Europe to come back and defend NZ, the Aussies gave him the fingers and came back anyway, thank goodness.
Stuff your political reasons I am thankful to all the men and women from wherever, who fought back the Japanese advance on our countries or me and my family would have just been bayonet practice without them and you smug Johnny come latelys shouldn't forget it.
I lived through it and I will be eternally grateful to them all and don't kid yourselves they (The Japs) "were" coming here alright. (Emotionally) John.

[Dafe]

Sure New Zealand wasn't engaged in the war on home soil at that stage, but it was only a matter of time.
The Japanese had already printed and produced the new currencies destined for use in Australia and New Zealand.
Australia and the Islands were already being invaded, Luckily we we're the furtherest away!

[Hitcher]

The only reason NZ UN troops would be in hot demand is because the UN council can spend the New Zealand tax payers money, rather than dipping into their own pockets. and we all know how Helen Clark won't limit her spending there - considering she's runnning for the position of "Secretary of the UN Council" later this year.

Wrong, and wrong.

The UN contributes to the costs of troops on peacekeeping detail. How else do you think the Fijians can run to three full battalions of infantry -- two operational and one reserve? Its the UN's cheques, that make the difference, thank you very much.

And Helen Clark is not running for Secretary of the UN. Please.

[Hitcher]

The Japanese had already printed and produced the new currencies destined for use in Australia and New Zealand.

Really? I'd like some corroboration of this claim, if you don't mind.

I think you'll find that the Japanese had no intention of invading either Australia or New Zealand. Neither territory held any strategic importance for them. They were much more interested in the oil wealth of China and the then French Indo-China, and were more than a little extended on that front. A couple of submarine and spotter aircraft sightings do not an invasion make. Japanese attacks on mainland Australia (in Sydney and Darwin) were more nuisance value than anything else -- there was no supporting invasion fleet for either incursion.

[Madness]

Go for a walk up Queen Street in Auckland. The invasion started in the late 90's and continues today.

I will never admire the French. They are the only nation to have made a military attack on New Zealand during my lifetime. May I suggest that they are stopping immigration because their country is full of unemployed migrants from their former colonies. France has failed to cater for migrant needs in education and cultural areas and has been suffering as a result, in the forms of mass rioting etc. This new immigration policy of theirs kind of sounds like an ambulance at the bottom of a cliff, hardly admirable.

You can't sink a rainbow.

[John Banks]

Go for a walk up Queen Street in Auckland. The invasion started in the late 90's and continues today.

By 1996 there were 7,461 Japanese living in New Zealand; in 2001 the number had reached 10,023.
In 2001 there were 14,889 South Africans living in New Zealand.

Hardly an invasion.

[Madness]

My post was of course a pisstake. The observation on which it was based is imho a common observation amongst many Kiwi's (particularly those from outsite Auckland). Perhaps the fact that most South African migrants to NZ seem to blend into our society, mostly as families moving into suburbia etc, that they are so much less obvious than the Japanese.

If you are suggesting that South Africans are invading New Zealand in a truer sense than the Japanese are, consider the following...

What percentage of Japanese in New Zealand are based within a 15km radius of the Skytower?

What percentage of South Africans in New Zealand are based in Auckland?

Now read this http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=Invasion