Breitbart/Reddit/Pol: "Only White People fought at Dunkirk."
WARNING: HIGH EFFORT POST FOLLOWS
This misconception particularly riles me up, as its so ubiquitous and ignorant. It started with a USA Today writer, mentioning (snarkily, I think), that a lack of people of color or women in the upcoming film Dunkirk may "rub some people the wrong way." >archive.is/WYULf
The conservative share-o-sphere went running with it (archive.is/LFvCF), in their quest to make any search for representation in the movies look ridiculous. And now I see it posted everywhere, eg:
>"They're mad that a British film about British soldiers during WWII has no women in it or blacks? Open a fucking history book." >"When feminists and SJWs start revising history to make it fit their agenda, they have become really stupid. History is written. This movies reflects the facts not the fairy tale wish list of fat feminists." >"A friend made a joke about this very thing a few days ago. We all laughed and laughed at how ridiculous it would be for anyone to complain about such a thing. And yet, here we are."
I'd like to respond to the charge that there were no people of color involved at Dunkirk. What bothers me most, probably, about this line of thought is that none of these comments are based on history--rather, just based on assumptions--which in themselves are based on either earlier pop culture, or what one *wishes* to see in a movie. Nevertheless, as these commenters requested, I cracked open a history book, and found pretty much the opposite of what they would like to see.
The British and French empires, at the outset of the war, were global and multiethnic — with their holdings in Asia and Africa far outweighing the European home countries in population . The British Indian army, by the close of the war, was the largest volunteer army — ever (britishmilitaryhistory.co.uk/documents.php?nid=12). Colonial subjects from places like Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Algeria were pressed into service in large numbers. When the Allies were at their most desperate, attempting to defend Britain as the German army menaced it from across the channel, attempting to also prepare to press the offensive in North Africa, they recruited Indians in massive numbers to stem their losses following their retreat from Europe.
What about Dunkirk? By the time the Allies were retreating from Europe, the French army was at its most depleted for manpower. The units they fielded at Dunkirk had huge percentages of Chadian and Senegalese soldiers, who went on to form the Free French army (pambazuka.org/governance/forgotten-african-soldiers-wwii-celebrations) following evacuation. As an interesting aside, when they returned to liberate Paris, American commanders requested (news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7984436.stm) that de Gaulle remove them from service so an all-white army could enter the city.
1. In 1940, the French army included more than 100,000 black French soldiers from France’s African colonies, mainly Senegal, Mauritania,and Niger. More than 75,000 of them served in France before and during the German invasion; the rest of them served guard duty in the various colonies. As the Wehrmacht panzer divisions swept across France in May-June 1940, some of those black French soldiers (about 40,000 of them), mainly organized in black regiments or mixed units, were engaged in fierce combat against German soldiers. About 10,000 black soldiers were killed, some wounded, and others taken prisoner during the French debacle >h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=24173
Juan Hill
2. At least two thousand Indians and hundreds of East African conscripts fought with the British (here's a photo: imgur.com/mPQ66Om.jpg of a Sikh soldier at Dunkirk):
3. Four contingents of the Royal Indian Army Service Corps were sent to support the British Expeditionary Force in France in 1940. There was a need for animal transport companies to help with the supply of troops, as the British Army had disbanded its animal transport companies after the First World War. The British, French and Canadian Forces were cut off by advancing German troops in their push towards the Channel. The soldiers retreated to the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk from where 338,226 were evacuated, among them three contingents of the Royal Indian Army Service Corps, while one contingent was taken prisoner by German forces. >open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/battle-and-evacuation-dunkirk-operation-dynamo
Dunkirk was a massive event, so a tour of occurrences happening over its course could ignore these people while remaining more or less accurate— but their appearance (and I’m hearing a single black French soldier does appear), should hardly be out of place. Representation of colonial troops at Dunkirk would be nothing more than realistic representation — to display otherwise might be called revisionism.
I feel compelled to call out this type of bad history because this is more than whitewashing a movie--it's whitewashing real, lived experience for the sake of remembering only the involvement of white people, to the point that people laugh at the assumption that people of color could be involved in anything at all.
James Moore
Thats it for me. I hope this post gains some traction, even though its not a 3 sentence baitpost, but I'm not optimistic.
Thanks for reading, if you did.
Julian Miller
fpbp
Grayson Edwards
Name 1 (one) colonial division at Dunkirk.
Luis Gomez
>four mule companies of the Indian Army Service Corps joined the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France. They were evacuated from Dunkirk with the rest of the BEF in May 1940,[4] and were still stationed in England in July 1942
A company is 80-150 people, so at the most there would have been 600 Indian troops, and that's presuming their officers were also Indian, which i doubt.
Considering there were 338,000 soldiers evacuated from Dunkirk and the immediate locale, i make that to be 0.1% of British forces not being white
Brayden Lopez
shut up poo boy
Jordan Gonzalez
good posts
Easton Russell
didn't read a single word of this
Elijah Reyes
Did you copy and paste from /r/badhistory or wrote there as well?
Alexander Jackson
So you're saying that there were Women and non-whites at the evacuation? I'm sorry I just can't quite make out your argument. Although this is potentially true in small numbers, women might have worked in some field hospitals along side the Divisions as well as in general administration and maybe there could be some non whites in the forces Britain held in in Europe at the time (Remember this was all forced on the British not expecting to be fighting too much and expecting to have France bear the brunt of the land war, as such not starting real conscription to expand the army until after Dunkirk had been successfully evacuated) suggesting that there would have been less than a half a percent of non-whites in the Army, not because of racism specifically but because of the small numbers of non-whites actually living in Britain pre WW2, as wind rush and mass immigration only started with the Labour Atlee Government in 1948. As such women and Non whites can only be expected to make up a tiny fraction of the army, except in admin, medical and intelligence where women were slightly more common than men suggesting that if the film makers do want to make a historically accurate film or pander to liberals for cash
Samuel Hall
Badhistory is infested with commies, myself and one of the mods have noticed this but he can't do anything about it because the others think it's a good thing.
Asher Long
What's the over/under on how many watch lists you're on?
Nathan Stewart
>Now what? Nothing. Posting the plain facts is easier than ranting for 3 posts isn't it?
Liam Watson
/thread
Angel Bell
Genuine question, not being sarky: how much is a contingent?
>Four contingents of the Royal Indian Army Service Corps were sent to support the British Expeditionary Force in France in 1940. There was a need for animal transport companies to help with the supply of troops, as the British Army had disbanded its animal transport companies after the First World War. The British, French and Canadian Forces were cut off by advancing German troops in their push towards the Channel. The soldiers retreated to the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk from where 338,226 were evacuated, among them three contingents of the Royal Indian Army Service Corps, while one contingent was taken prisoner by German forces.
>The Indian troops were subsequently stationed in various locations in the UK and received press and publicity coverage. They stayed in the UK until the end of 1943 to help on the home front. Their presence is not well documented in historical writing, however newspaper coverage and photographic evidence held at the Imperial War Museum attests to their presence. Their conduct is invariably praised, especially their bravery and discipline amidst the chaos at Dunkirk. In many ways, the Indian Army Service Corps contribution marks the beginning of India’s significant contribution to the Second World War and precedes the arrival of twenty-four Indian pilots who would train at RAF Cranwell in September 1940 to join the RAF.
Asher Barnes
/thread
Jonathan Barnes
At least one of the French soldiers and the mole was black.
Christopher Davis
im guessing they mean a battalion so about 300-800
Robert Lopez
No set size on a contingent. The four contingents were company sized elements so like the other user said 80-250 soldiers each and since they were animal handlers probably on the smaller size
