What We Are Fighting For - 1 of 17

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WHAT WE ARE FIGHTING FOR

Politicians have told us what they are fighting for. To many their aims sound unreal and far-away. Here, in the simplest possible terms, are the things the British people -- you and I and the man next door -- are fighting for. Here, too, are the things we are fighting against.

ONE by one, the lights have gone out all over Europe. Only if we win the battle which will be fought here during this lovely summer, can those lights be lit again. We, and we alone, can save the sum of things.

If Hitler is going to snuff out this final candle, then it is over our dead bodies that he'll have to do it. Never was the danger so sharp. Never was the opportunity so thrilling. Fifty generations of dead Britons would sell their souls to be alive this year. And there is not one of them but would recognise the nature and import of this war.

This is a war, firstly, for the land we live in. England or Wales, Scotland or Ireland. Whatever other things we may be fighting for, we are fighting first for the physical body and shape of Britain. A war for the county we live in, Kent or Cornwall, Cardigan or Ayr. A war for the Fens and the Dales, the Downs and the Highlands. A war for the village we live in. For the independence of Oakhanger Village. For the territorial integrity of Headley Green.

This is a war for everything that we can see from our own window. For the cottage at the end of the lane, and the old bridge by the mill. We are fighting for the very soil and stuff of Britain. Intact for a thousand years, it is not to be tampered with now. Lambeth Walk is not to be a stamping ground for storm-troopers. Stratford-on-Avon is to be no site for Goering to build a castle. Clovelly gives no admittance to the Gestapo.



Jay's thoughts:  Churchill posed with his trade mark cigar with the word "...Democracy" under the photo is simply awesome.  Go on and airbrush that out of our history! Go on! I dare you!  Also, fellow bloggers, note the outstanding use of pro-British propaganda -- we can learn a great deal from this (and from the text in the posts that will follow).  This was a call to arms, a rallying cry, an appeal to British patriotism and sovereignty.  Such sentiment is all but abandoned in modern Britain in 2013.  Can we ever get it back?