You’re sort of right - I was trying to explain it more precisely. I wouldn’t call them British (quite), but it’s closer to the truth than any other plausible nationality. They are certainly entitled to British Passports, but special ones that don’t give them the special rights to live anywhere in the EU that someone from the mainland UK would get.
The closest similar situation is probably the Isle of Man…
What eventually happened to the German garrisons on the channel islands? Anyone know? I wouldn’t think that they would “rot on the vine” as the Japanese did on different islands in the PTO.
They surrendered in the Summer of 1945, at the same time as the rest of the German forces.
Thanks! Who knows what they had to endure on the islands, but sounds like they were kind of lucky to miss out on a lot of fighting and hardship. Especially considering they were still on the islands at the time of surrender.
It is rather a complicated subject because while they are subjects of the British crown and can therefore be classed as ‘British’ because of this, they cannot be classed as British because of where they live as the Channel Islands are not considered to belong to the British Isles, in geographical terms they are considered to be part of the land mass that makes up France.
I once read the personal story of a german soldier who was based on Jersey (the biggest and most populous channel island). You would rarely find better places for a german soldier to be in WW2. They had a good live there and weren’t seriously attacked. The official statement of the allied had been that they just didn’t want to linger with an unimportant island. But there were supposed political and public law reasons for -as pdf mentioned- the channel islands were not part of the UK but “crown dependency”.
I agree totally. I think the only Germans getting to England in sizable numbers enough to overwhelm the British would have been the ones washing up on shore…
Thank you too, flame! That was an interesting bit of information.
Operation Sealion was f-cked up cause of Hitler.
He may be good at speeches but with prepairing operations he should of listen to his much smarter Generals.
He did. That’s why it never took place.
According to Colonel-General Halder, the chief German Army planner for Operation Sealion, the operation would be like “putting the troops through a sausage machine” * 
- he stated this when he found out the logistical capabilities (or lack of) of the German naval forces :lol:
ps; At the start of the planning the German army was thinking in terms of 40 divisions in the first wave, by the time of the final plan this had been reduced to 11 divisions (9 infantry, 2 Airborne and a small number of tanks) landing over a period of 10 days.
Wow, with only those forces, it would have been a sausage machine.
It gets worse. That logistical plan relied on having to use most of the barges multiple times. Given how bad the weather can get in the channel and the resistance they could expect from the RN, this is an incredibly optimistic assumption!
Those barges would have been lucky to make it across once, and they wanted to send them out some more times? They should have used their “fleet” to try and divert some attention from the barges, even then it wouldn’t have been much, because the RN would have massacred the German “fleet”.
The only time Hitler listen.
Yes hitler really wanted too do this.
I dont think he even cared about hes own troops at all:)
they wanted to invade england put they never invaded if they would have the allies would lose the war
i wouldnt want to be in england when it would happen
I bet youre one of the younger ones on here, i can tell by youre typing,
I dont think Germany had the resoucers and equitment to get too England.
It was a death sentence really.The only reason it was easy for the Germans to invade the other countries is that they were join up to them, and those countries had much weaker army than Germany.
England on the other hand, had a big army and the royal air/force and an Even bigger navy than the Germans did.
If the Germans knock out the English navey and the Royal/air force, then they could of enterd England.
Cheers
Well… You were like that too… And you should put apostrophes… Just saying… :mrgreen:
Yeah thats how i knew.
he sounded the same as me.
I didt really need you telling me.just saying .Haha just playing with you
Sir Winston Churchill.