The EU does not keep the UK safe

Let me be very blunt to all Remainers in the UK and also to the EU its self

If you think that the EU and all it surveys keep you safe in your bed at night from world enemies that wish you harm then you are sadly mistaken

The UK has a proud and established Defence Force that has had the distinction of defending our shores with honor, pride, and heroism.

First and foremost our Royal Navy has served our Nation since 897 AD. Of course, it was not called the Royal Navy back then that name would appear further on in our glorious past. However, it was way back in 897AD that a certain King Alfred who would later become to known as Alfred the Great, the only king or queen to have that distinction saw the need for ships to defend Wessex his then Kingdom from raiding Vikings.

He built a small fleet of Longboats and attacked a raiding Viking party of Longboats that has sailed into a Wessex estuary. They were far heavy than the Viking ships and when the tide went out they became grounded on the sandbanks. There followed a series of land battles where the Vikings were well beaten. Many surviving Vikings managed to get back to their ships that had also been grounded, as the tide came back in it was a race against time who could get their ships afloat first. The Vikings managed it first, their ships were lighter and they escaped back to the Danish colony in East Anglia. Only one of the ships managed to get back home. That was the first recorded victory by a Saxon King on water and it established our first Navy, It might have been small but it had defended our shores against an invading force of Danish sailors and warriors intent on conquering a part of Britain. King Alfred the Great went on to establish the Kingdom of England. Before that river, land and sea battle what we now know as England was a series of small Saxon and Danish Kingdoms ruled by various Kings.

From that one water battle, we can see how important it was to establish a Navy to protect our shores and ultimately the citizens living on them. At the time there was no land army. Any army was formed by the Lords who owned land all over England and Wales and Scotland. They were mainly farmers and anyone else who worked o the Lord’s land. The Lord would have an obligation to raise an army of men to defend his kings land and that distinction would be down to the serfs and all low bred men and boys over a certain age. If the King’s land was threatened all the Lords would be asked to form an army of men then they would all meet up and meet the invaders on the battlefield and it would be down to the serfs and low bred men to win the battle. Once it was over the survivors would trudge home disband and once again become farmers. This method of raising an army would continue until 1661when King Charles 11 issued the Royal Warrant that created the first regiments of what would become the British Army, although Scotland and England maintained separate military establishments until the Acts of Union 1707.

Until 1914 there was no need to form an Airforce as no one else had a way to dominate our skies and to attack us that way. That would change as the UK saw German Zeppelins bomb London, Great Yarmouth, and King’s Lynn, Southend, Ipswich, and Bury St Edmunds. Over the battlefields of Flanders soldiers of all countrys involved in the war would look up into the skies and watch the first air battles in history as countrys found another way to fight each other.

Our first form of defense if we are attacked from the sea is our Royal Navy the same Navy that went after the Spanish Armada on 19th July 1588, the same Navy that harried 150 Spanish ships in the English Channel until they boxed them in just off Gravelines, near modern-day Calais and sent in what was then called Hell Burners, old ships full of material that would go up in flames causing panic among those 150 ships. who then cut the lines and made for the open sea where our Navy picked them off one by one.

The same Navy who on 21 October 1805 thwarted Napoleon Bonaparte attempt to invade our Nation. Make no mistake, if had not been for our Royal Navy at the Battle of Trafalgar just of Cadiz Spain Napoleon Bonaparte would have invaded southern England. We may or may not have repulsed his Army, we will never know as the Royal Navy destroyed 19 ships killed 14,000 French and Spanish seamen and shattered Napoleon Bonaparte ambition of invading England for the time being

Our proud Royal Navy fought battles in WW1 and won major victories.

In WW2 again they engaged our enemy's off our shores and across the globe winning many notable victories. and also escorted Merchant Ships across the Atlantic bringing both food and war materials so we could survive and take the battle to our enemy's.

In 1982 they again defended our people this time 8,000 miles away sailing into what became known as Bomb Alley to land and protect our land army on islands of the Falklands as they went to liberate our Falkland brothers and sisters from a then brutal dictatorship.

It's now 2019 and our Royal Navy still protects our shores and continues to protect British interests worldwide.

Just a few years after Trafalgar the scourge of Europe escaped his prison island and formed a large French Army. On 18 June 1815 that large army had reached a small village, that village would become famous because of what happened next It was at this Village named Waterloo that the allied army of Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington decided to stop and hold the army of Napoleon Bonaparte until such time as Field Marshal Gebhard von Blücher could reach the field of battle a five hour march away. Hold Waterloo and make sure Bonaparte could not get past and march to the coast and once more threaten our shores.

Our Army stood fast in line and in a square as the French came at them time and time again. Again one of our main military forces saw off a threat to our shores, Of course, it was done with the help of our then allies however but it was the British lines that held steadfast, the British squares that saw off the French Calvery charges the British who lay down just below the ridge waiting for Bonapartes Old Guard.

Marshal Ney ordered the famous French Old Guard to split into two columns, two battalions heading toward the defiant farmstead of Hougoumont and the rest moving toward the Allied center along the ridge of Mont-Saint-Jean. As the Old Guard advanced, recognizable with their distinctive bearskin hats, Wellington’s artillery, loaded with double shot and canister, opened a deadly fire. The French lines did not waver. On they came

Wellington watched and waited in the midst of one of his Guards brigades, veterans of earlier fighting against the French on the Iberian Peninsula. The riflemen were ordered to lie out of sight on the ground along the reverse slope of the battle-torn ridge and wait for the command to rise up in unison.

Marching on a front that was about 70 soldiers wide, the French were easily taken under flanking fire from the British line that overlapped them on both ends. They continued up the muddy, bloody, and body-strewn slope. When they had approached to within 40 yards, the command rang out, “Stand up Guards! — — — — — Make ready! — — — — Fire!”

A devastating volley tore into the ranks of the advancing Old Guard like a scythe. French soldiers fell in heaps, and flanking fire intensified. In seconds, the 1st Foot Guards took advantage of the shock effect, charging directly into Napoleon’s Old Guard with fixed bayonets. The soldiers of the 52nd Foot moved to the right and smartly down the side of the ridge, then wheeled to their left and poured heavy flanking fire into the enemy. The Old Guard tried to deploy to no avail, wavered, broke, and fled in disorder back to Napoleon, who waited at La Belle Alliance.

The short-lived revival of Napoleon’s dream of empire was destroyed in a day. He was again banished into exile, this time on the island of St. Helena, where he lived the last six years of his life. Casualties at Waterloo topped 40,000, with the French suffering 29,000 killed and wounded, the British 15,000, and the Prussians 7,000. The price had been high, but Napoleon was finished.

Two centuries later, the Battle of Waterloo stands among the most significant engagements in history. Its repercussions, both political and military are still being assessed today. One thing is sure though if we British had not held fast at Waterloo Field Marshal Gebhard von Blücher and his army would have been too late to stop Napoleon reaching the coastal towns. Just like years later in the 1940s we British could have been speaking another language other than English, which brings me to our Royal Airforce.

Our Royal AirForce was formed 1 April 1918 by the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps and the Royal Naval Air Service.

All through WW1, we saw the way war was fought change forever, first, we saw that Calvery charges were now useless against the rapid firepower of machineguns and the rapid power of rifles that could be loaded rapidly.

This then saw the invention of the Tank to do the job that the Calvery did.

We saw the formation of airplanes a new invention that would also not only change how we fought but also see how after WW1 the way we would travel. At the beginning of the war aircraft from all sides were only used for reconnaissance. How good was it for both sides to fly high above the trenches to see troop movements? Within an hour they could land report that on the left or right flank the British French-German were moving thousands of troops to a position where an attack would be coming from.

All these aircraft were unarmed, then it became obvious that could be used to fight other aircraft so Pilots went up into the sky with side arms and took pot shots at each other, then it became obvious that they could actually fly over enemy trenches and drop explosives into the trenches, machine guns were fitted to them so they could also straff the trenches, then they saw they could fight each other in the sky. the way we were fighting wars changed forever between 1914/1918.

In 1940 a year after the WW2 began Germany decided to fly over the United Kingdom and bomb city's, and our own airfields. It was a well planned out attack to subdue us into submission thousands of civilians died when the German bombers flew over our city's dropping their firebombs that lit up the city's so that the main body of German bombers could drop their high explosives on targets.

It was our Royal Airforce who became our first line of defense against the German bombers, it was they that took the fight to the enemy over our sky.

From 10 Jul 1940–31 Oct 1940 our Royal Airforce defended our nation as the first line of defense as we were attacked. While down on the ground our army once again made preparation to defend our coastal towns and cities. We also went back to doing what our ancestors once did forming units that would consist of men and boys who were not in any of the Armed Services either because they were not old enough or were too old to fight with the main services. They became known affectionally as Dads Army. We might smile at them now however in 1940 many would have seen service in the bloodiest conflict called the WW1 where they would have got in among the enemy and used the bayonet to good effect, they might now have been in their late 40s 50s but they knew first hand how to kill any enemy that came to their village town or city.

Our Royal Airforce between 10 Jul 1940–31 Oct 1940 outfought the German Luftwaffe. They made sure that no Nazi German would step foot on mainland UK.

It's now 2019 and our Airforce is still defending our sky. Not a week goes by where a fighter squadron does not take to the sky to intercept not a German aircraft but a Russian one that is testing our ability to defend ourselves. In seconds after the scramble is given they are up in the sky heading for the Russian aircraft just like in 1940 they are the first line of defense.

They even directly protect an EU country which is the ROI because the ROI is not in NATO but being the Good Neighbours we are we watch over the Irish if a Russian comes anywhere near to the ROI we intercept.

Our Royal Navy also watches over any incursion of potential future enemies in the last two years alone they have shadowed Russian Navy ships that come down the East coast of the UK and into the English Channel to get to the Mediterranean Sea.

We have a proud history of defending our United Kingdom. The EU does not and never will defend our shores. Defending our shores are up to us, we may ask for help from allies but ultimately it is we British who will defend ourselves just like we have always done

These are the ones who keep you safe as you go about your daily lives.