I should add that if this post becomes about politics then I retract everything, this isn't the place.

did not YOU make it about politics????

To a degree but the UK sent 'advisors' to the south during the ACW iirc (we may have sent them to both sides to make sure we were in with the winners )

Oh yes the war of 1812, the one where we burnt down the whitehouse... thats why it had to be painted white.

Sorry about that

We'd have done a total number on you but we were a bit busy kicking napoleon around spain at the time and could only send our third rate troops over to give you a kicking

(joking again patriots... )

But yes i think you're right its WWI where the real collaboration comes in. I don't actually think we've not assisted each other in a war since. Even in vietnam we sent our SAS over covertly to train your marines as we'd won two jungle wars in Malaya and Borneo (in which im sure we had some discrete help from your chaps as well) and we were pretty good at sitting in stinking swamps ambushing terrorists by that point... we'd pretty much been doing it since 1941 at that point with Burma, Korea, Malaya, Borneo, Sarawak etc etc

I know for a fact my fathers friend who was with british special forces in malaya was 'seconded' with some mates to the Australian SAS for the vietnam war so we could assist without being seen to take sides

I think my main point is that while a little light hearted ribbing never hurts, we're actually culturally very closely aligned these days. I spent a fortnight in Canada recently (and while not the US being on the border its not that different around Toronto) and didnt feel 'alien' in any way.

If they had sent the 42nd, they would still control the US :D

My regiment sent one of our battalions to the revolutionary war. The 38th regiment of foot. Or as we were better known 'the staffordshire regiment, staffords, or 'black knots'

I don't think we did too well over there tbh

We were there at the start though and fought at Bunkers Hill and Brandywine.

(also oddly have the record of the longest overseas posting of a British Army regiment ever, about 60 years in the west indies. The crown forgot they were there and when they sent a relief force they found the garrison manned by the sons of the original garrison with 'tropical' uniforms made from old sail and sacking... its why we used to wear a piece of sackcloth behind our cap badge even as late as 2007)

I should add that if this post becomes about politics then I retract everything, this isn't the place.

did not YOU make it about politics????

Honestly, I was saying I thought your president was awesome, which was more offensive than I could have imagined, apparently.

He is quite popular in the UK

Then again his predecessors were pretty terrible.

Of the three "presidents" listed above, Bush was the only one with actual piloting experience

I'm not sure spending his time in the ANG high as a kite counts as actual piloting experience

Fermenting discontent for their own ends just about sums it up. The founding fathers continued to toast King George throughout the war of independence.

The whole thing about no taxation without representation.. well:

https://books.google.ca/books?id=tW_Cy4uvqTgC&pg=PA11&dq=salutary+neglect+navigation+acts&cd=7&hl=en#v=onepage&q=salutary%20neglect%20navigation%20acts&f=true

Then of course this: https://books.google.ca/books?id=lZUHwGxyI2oC&pg=PA111&dq=stamp+act+ben+franklin&cd=2&hl=en#v=onepage&q&f=false

As Gadge also mentioned that whole boston tea party, well https://books.google.ca/books?id=XWbcrS9SV-sC&pg=PA175&dq=tea+party+smugglers&lr=&cd=19&hl=en#v=onepage&q=tea%20party%20smugglers&f=false

I found that quite interesting too.

Not saying that the British were entirely the good guys, but we weren't Mel Gibsonesque baddies either. As per usual this was a matter of personal gains and politics, just like most wars revolutions and schizms in history.

Ha, "fermenting"... I see what you did there with the Sam Adams reference...

I couldn't get the first of those to open to the page you had linked, and the others opened between two pages, so I tried to skim the nearest pages. Could you give me page numbers for your evidence and I'll go back and read them more thoroughly? I certainly believe there are at least two sides to any story, but I don't think the arguments presented in those papers are particularly well-supportive of the idea that we were completely "ungrateful colonials" making up an excuse to revolt. Certainly, King George was not "oppressive" in the 20th-century sense of an oppressive regime, but for colonists from what was a "first-world" territory in the 18th century, running our own government for internal matters but not being allowed to vote on the mother country's policies that effected us was upsetting.

Oh, and I definitely don't think Mel Gibson makes historical fiction films. He just makes fiction. I've jokingly referred to The Patriot as Braveheart II: The New World. I'm sure you're familiar with the trope in American TV and films that all bad guys have English accents (which itself is rather paradoxically hilarious, given the history of the Received Pronunciation).

Of the three "presidents" listed above, Bush was the only one with actual piloting experience

I'm not sure spending his time in the ANG high as a kite counts as actual piloting experience

I seem to recall reading that Bush was honourably discharged because he barely turned up, his less gentle critics suggested we was awol and hammered but his family 'smoothed things over' .

Considering he managed to get into the white house despite having less votes than his opponent or any form of majority he did spectacularly well to be president at all.

(If you believe the account in M.Moore's 'stupid white men' that is)

or any form of majority

He had a majority in the Electoral Collage, which is what really matters. The nation wide popular vote doesn't actually decide who the Pres is.