Imperial War Museum

We really enjoyed the Imperial War Museum.  A lot of United States history is, of course, intertwined with Great Britain's.  They had on display propaganda, articles and vehicles from every war fought by Great Britain in the last probably 1,000 years including a section on genocide in our world in the last century.  It's easy to forget that it hasn't stopped with World War II but still continues in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa.



"The military possibilities of aircraft were not fully appreciated in 1914, but by the end of the first world war they had begun to exert a significant influence...In this picture is an early two-seat reconnaissance machine, the BE2c, and a Supermarine Spitfire Mark 1A which saw action in the Battle of Britain.  The German plane is a second world war aircraft called the Focke Wulf 190 or FW190 and was one of the fastest and most manoeuvrable fighters of the war."




This is a German Vergeltungswaffen called the V2, similar V2 were launched against England in 1944.  The V2 rocket travelled faster than sound and was impossible to intercept.  A total of over 6,500 V-weapons fell on London and the South East killing 8,938 people.  I don't know how they acquired this one.  There were several pictures of buildings destroyed to rubble by German missiles and bombing.  No wonder they sent children to the countrysides.



This is not the original 'Big Beautiful Doll' but is the same make/model of the American plane, the P-51D Mustang, painted to commemorate American Lieutenant-Colonel JD Flanders, commander of the 78th Figher Group at Duxford.  Something that I noticed throughout my trip to England is that only Americans seem to put slogans on everything from their clothing to baggage or backpacks to airplanes.   As I walked through customs, I noticed that almost everyone speaking American English wore clothing and carried bags or backpacks with slogans or pictures like 'Angry Birds' or sports teams etc. while anyone speaking with a foreign accent wore plain solids, plaids, stripes, corduroys, etc. and carried plain unidentifiable brands of baggage.