When you get a conservative government, who have pride in their history and contribution to world freedom through conflict, then you may have your second Lancaster restored to where it belongs.

The Consevatives were in power at that time Major.

The conservatives were in power up until just recently when Trudeau and the Liberals replaced them. My fear is who may get elected next if it's not Conservatives or Liberals. The next party will be more left than the Liberals are.

Canada is going to the right, the western world is going to the right and it's all the fault of your mate Mr Trump. It may be just wishful thinking right now for Britain and Canada both. At least we will have an election soon and hopefully it will happen then. Remember though our right is considered more centre than the States. There is a different between right and far right and we have no far right here thank goodness.

In 1932 the Greek navy wanted a torpedo come bomber and so approached the Fairy Aircraft Co to design one for them. The result was the PV, a derivative design from an order from the Air Ministry for a reconnaissance aircraft. The plane first flew in 1933 with an Armstrong Siddeley radial engine, which after testing, was replaced by a Bristol Pegasus radial and named the TSR1, which meant torpedo, spotter reconnaissance. Unfortunately this plane crashed and the design team went back to the drawing board to lengthen the fuselage and give the wings a slightly swept angle. The result was a biplane, with an open cockpit, no retractable undercarriage and wires connecting both wings to themselves and the fuselage. The first one went into service in Britain in 1936. In an age when fast monoplanes were the future this ugly duckling looked outdated before it arrived. Its top speed was a mere 138 mph, it was fabric covered and had only one gun for protection, operated by a rear facing gunner but it would go onto become one of the greatest planes in history. Because of all the wires holding it together it was nicknamed the string bag, after the shopping bags made of string but its real name was the Fairy Swordfish.

Yes Tom. The plane carried a crew of three, pilot, gunner and observer-radio operator. The first thing people think when they get close to one of these planes is.... it's a lot bigger than I thought they were. It was in fact, a very versatile machine indeed, despite impressions. The pilot had his own 7.7 mm machine gun at the front and the gunner at the rear had the same, which in the scheme of things were just popguns. It was however, a wolf in sheep's clothing, being amazingly versatile. It was a very robust and stable platform which could carry a 1.650lb torpedo, or a 1500lb mine for sub killing. It was the eyes of the fleet and its heavy horse, it even went onto carry and fire rockets later in the war. It was able to take huge damage and stay aloft. Some models were fitted with floats, making them available to smaller ships using a catapult for take off and a crane for recovery, where they became invaluable eyes of the fleet. Its top speed of 138mph was only attainable in perfect conditions but incredibly, this actually made them difficult for a fighter to shoot down, if the fighter was spotted soon enough. It could float about like a butterfly and fighters would shoot passed it before the pilot realised it. In 1940 a Swordfish was attacked by three German fighters and managed to avoid them all. Another first for the Stringbag was the sinking of U64 after being fired off HMS Warspite (Britain's greatest battleship) in the early Norwegian campaign and followed that up in 1943 by being the first plane to use rockets to sink a Uboat.

Extremists of either persuasion are dangerous, stick to the middle.

We will make a Canadian out of you yet Mark.

We will start him off in a lumberjack shirt and finish him off in a toque. Actually I think a lot of Brits are already dressing like Canadians.

Elmer Fudd is what American hunters look like. As you can see, we look much different.

The pie chart or graft shows 3.8% of all domestic terror in the States is down by the left. 74% by the right and the remainder by home grown Muslims. No domestic terror from any group should be exceptable and even a small amount is too much.

I could wear that shirt, it's rather nice. Not the silly hat though. It's obvious that you have never frost bitten your ears before Mark..

The reason why Tommy calls it a Buffalo shirt is that is the standard dress for Canadians while shopping in Buffalo. Don't even know why they call it Buffalo in the first place. Probably even borrow a Buffalo from us to show in their zoo, if they have a zoo.

Why I mentioned wearing them in Britain already is because we have a Canadian A&W ad on TV right now done in London. They are stopping people in the streets and asking them to try a Teen burger. They all seem to like it and then tell them it only costs right now less that 2 quid to buy one. The plaid shirts or jackets were being worn by Londoners being stopped. 

We always had them at the cottage for when we went out fishing in the evenings and I use to wear one while playing or ruff housing with one on my Great Danes. We are all sitting out one evening at the picnic table and my sister says she's a little chilly so I go in the cottage and bring one out for her to put on. The dog waits patiently till she has it on then grabs one of the sleeve cuffs and pulls her off the bench seat and starts dragging her around the property on her backside. The dog probably out weighed her by 60 lbs so had no problem doing it. I told her to snap her fingers and say off to the dog. She did and it stopped but because she was still on her back side the dog thought it was a good opportunity to give her face a good wash. We still joke about it when we talk about the old days at cottage.

The position at the start of the war was that North Africa was pretty much split up between the French, Italians and Brits. The Italians threatened the Brits in Egypt, which meant the strategically important Suez canal and the oil fields. If you take a look at a map of the Med, you can see what a dominant position Italy holds and from Sicily to Africa at its closest, it is only around 150 miles. Typically, for the Brits, very few people controlled the vast area that was Egypt and Suez and if the Italians had got their boots on earlier it could have proved embarrassing to say the least, so the Aussies and Kiwis were rapidly shipped in the protect the vital route. Between Italy and North Africa sat the strategically important island of Malta, another British colony, which had superb naval facilities but the navy had to abandon them, as they were considered indefensible against air power, so they moved to the less desirable base at Alexandra in Egypt. In the pre war years Mussolini had built up a superb fleet to tackle the RN's dominance and it vastly outnumbered them in all areas. Not for no reason did the Italians call the Med our lake. The Italians had 6 battleships compared to the RN's 4, 21 cruisers to 9, 52 destroyers to 25 and 106 submarines to the RN's 10. The action at Taranto was not the first success for the Swordfish, it had sunk a destroyer and a freighter in the port of Tobruk and followed that up a few weeks later by sinking two more destroyers. It wasn't all one sided though as the Italians had their own successes, destroying two subs and a number of merchantmen. The navy's leader was the dashing Admiral Cunningham, a real fighting admiral of the old school and with the inclusion of the carrier HMS Eagle to his armoury, he had a weapon to go and attack the Italians in their own back yard. He was looking for a fleet action, a good ol' set to with big guns but as the Italians had so far been reluctant so he decided to pay them a visit instead.

With the inclusion of the more modern aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious in his fleet, Cunningham decided to go on the offensive and if they wouldn't come to him, he'd go to them. The RN's main task was escorting merchant men to to the beleaguered Island of Malta but all the time they were wary of the Italian fleet coming out to do battle or attack the convoys and with this constant threat hanging over their heads the RN was forced to operate as one fleet, so as not to get caught and destroyed piecemeal. In November 1940 the fleet made it known through various channels, which the Italians could pick up on, that they were escorting a convoy from Egypt to Malta. As nightfall arrived The Illustrious and two escorting vessel slipped away from the main group and made their way under the cover of darkness towards the Italian coast and when they got within 170 miles of the main Italian naval port of Taranto, they launched their Swordfish. The attack would be carried out in two waves, the first one of 12 aircraft and the second with 9. The first wave was to hit from the west, the second from the north. Nobody was sure the attack would succeed because of the anti torpedo nets but by an amazing stroke of luck, the nets were lowered because the fleet had actually been readied to leave that day and didn't but they never put them back up. Before take off, one of the planes was accidentally damaged and was quickly taken off for repair, its pilot was so desperate to be in the attack he had them patch it up and he flew off the deck alone long after the rest had left and made his way alone. As the first wave arrived arrived, one of them left the formation, flew around the bay and dropped flares on the dock to light up and silhouette the ships for those following in to attack. Immediately the immense anti aircraft fire began but this was hampered by the fact that a the Swordfish were flying so low, the gunners were hitting their own ships. The first two planes attacked the battleship Conte Di Cavour, one missed but the other struck home. One of the planes escaped but the other was hit and crashed into the harbour. Both crewmen survived and were taken POW. Next came the Littorio, which took two hits. One other ship was hit but the torpedo failed to explode and the last of the group flew into the heavily defended docks and blew up the fuel storage depots. The second wave arrived short, as one plane had to turn back when its long range fuel tank fell off. Two split off and dropped flares on the dock to light the place up and carried on to bomb the docks facilities. Three others came in together but one was hit and crashed into the sea, killing both crew. There was another hit on the Vitorio followed by the Caio Dulio. The surviving aircraft left for the carrier and when it seemed it was over, the damaged and repaired Swordfish finally arrived all alone and attacked amidst what was already a sea of flames and gunfire. They managed a hit but for all their courage, it failed to explode. The survivors returned to their ships, having only lost 2 aircraft. Nobody knew at the time how successful the operation had been but when the news broke, they had sunk three battleships, damaged three cruisers and two destroyers. They had wrecked the vital port facilities and blown up the fuel depots. It was an amazing achievement from as most unlikely aircraft and a handful of very brave men. It freed up the navy to operate individually and secured the convoys for months to come, giving Malta a much needed break and getting the army ready in North Africa for the great battles to come.

Notice that Mynarski's VC is still being displayed on the Lanc.

We can't move on without mentioning what was probably the Stringbag's most famous victory and that was their role in sinking the Bismarck. I say most famous because that's the action most people associate with it. With the Bismarck almost within distance of Luftwaffe protection and the safety of the French port, having sunk the pride of the navy, the Hood, the only chance the Brits had to stop the leviathan were the Swordfish.  When they came into attack, one of the German officers said... and zen zay attack us wiz ze antiques. I don't suppose you can get a greater example of the old world and new at war. Fortunately for the Swordfish, this played into their hands, as the Bismark's guns were so advanced they were not able to calibrate correctly against aircraft flying at under 100mph, whereas the Swordfish were coming in between 50 and 60 MPH. Many of them could not train low enough to get a shot and because the Swordfish were flying just feet above the waves, it went straight over their heads. 56 anti aircraft guns opened up on them and even the second armourment, the 10 inch guns, which they fired into the water in front of the incoming planes because if the plane was to fly into one of those walls of water, they would have been destroyed. Hits against the armour belt did little damage but the one that sealed her fate was probably delivered by a Jock called John Jock Moffatt, although Lieutenent Patterson also laid claim to it. He let his torpedo go late because his observer behind him was hanging upside down, almost out of the plane shouting....not yet not yet. He was trying to time the drop of the torpedo so as to miss a wave and in the end he shouted, now, and off it went and hit the rudder. From that second her fate was sealed. Battleships HMS Rodney and King George V were able to catch her up and destroy her. She was finished off by torpedos from the Destroyers and in a futile gesture of defiance, the crew skuttled what was left of her.