this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2025
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[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 days ago (6 children)

Hmmm.

When were Holland, Belgium, France, Germany, Spain , Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Austria or Romania invaded by the British?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)
  • Netherlands - Holmes’ Bonfire, 1666, 1944
  • Belgium - Napoleonic wars — Waterloo
  • France - (as England) 1230, 1337-60, 1369-89, 1373, 1415-53, 1562, (as Britain) 1794, 1795, 1813, 1815, 1944
  • Germany - 1914-18, 1944-5
  • Spain - 1808-13
  • Italy - 1944-45
  • Austria - 1945
[–] [email protected] 25 points 6 days ago (2 children)

France and Britain have a long history of warfare.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 5 days ago (2 children)

I think it would be easier to list the periods where France and Britain were NOT at war which each other rather than the opposite.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago

I think they still deserve some invasion for their awful food (jelly and honey glazed carrots). They need some education and it can only happens with some kind of war.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago (4 children)

Warfare and invasion are not the same thing.

[–] athairmor 22 points 6 days ago

Are you saying the British never sent troops into French territory? Any incursion by armed forces into another state’s territory is the very definition of invasion.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago

There's been a lot of occupation as well. E.g. the hundred year war.

If we can say Russia invaded Ukraine, England invaded France

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

You're trying to be a pedant, yet you appear foolish.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Ignoring history and being pedant on the Internet are not the same thing. But you're doing a good job at both.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

Germany, and probably Austria: World War 2

At the time the Netherlands and Belgium were occupied by Germany. Don’t know if that counts.

France: Probably during the Hundred Years’ war.

[–] LarsIsCool 3 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Weird to exclude Luxembourg from that as they were also occupied by Germany and freed by the Allied forces

Edit: checked the book and:

  • Netherlands, The: it counts the Battle of the Sluys and other various navel battles fought on Dutch territory as valid examples
  • Belgium: it counts the battles that were fought on the land that is now Belgium, so not counting from its creation. It also counts assisting the local people, so for example fighting off the French in defense together with the Flemish

So the book is taking "invasion" more lenient than the comment section:

  • The act of invading, especially the entrance of an armed force into a territory to conquer.

The introduction also states "invasion, had some control over, or fought conflicts in the territory"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Italy, probably WW2 too (operation dragoon)

[–] Redredme 3 points 4 days ago

Rampjaar. 1672. We where the dutch republic back then so it included belgium, Luxembourg. We had a lot of wars before and after between us and the English in which the english took a lot of our colonies by fotce.

Belgium was "invaded" during WW1 and again during WW2.

Spain: ever heard of Gibraltar?

The English fucked with everyone who had a ship back then.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Maybe they are counting any wars where the British fought? If so, the two world wars would account for a lot of it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago

Yeah, they are. It's bullshit.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Still Switzerland? We weren’t invaded in WW2 or WW1.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago

Switzerland was a part of the wars of the 2nd, 5th and 6th coalition against Napoleon against the British.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 days ago

Parts of probably, e.g. Gibraltar