Warfare1
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ORIGINAL: targul
Canada liberated Holland after suffering 25,000 casualties, and to this day Canada and Holland are close friends.
I didnt know Canada was disliked by anyone. Far as I knew they are friends to everyone. At least when I visit Canada I find them very friendly.
I do worry though since the Canadian Army is massed on the American borders. Not sure of there intentions with that. Hehe
It's a very special friendship (more so than with other countries).
Canadian Forces played an important role in liberating the Netherlands. Canadians who landed on D-Day, fought battles through France, Belgium, the Scheldt and in Germany before being dispatched back to the Netherlands with the Canadians who had fought in Italy.
Canadian orders were to push the German troops occupying the northeast back to the sea and to drive German troops in the west back into Germany. The advance was halted on April 12, because of concern for the well-being of citizens in the western Netherlands, who, having been starved for months, ran the risk of having their country flooded if the Germans panicked and opened the dykes.
On April 28, the Canadians negotiated a truce which permitted relief supplies to enter the western Netherlands and end the "Hunger Winter". No part of western Europe was liberated at a more vital moment than the Netherlands and the Dutch people cheered Canadian troops as one town after another was freed
To show their appreciation to the pilots who dropped food from the air, many Dutch people painted, "Thank you, Canadians!" on their rooftops.
In honour of their gift of freedom Dutch people have donated 10,000 tulip bulbs to Canada for the National Capital Region annually since the war's end. If you go to Ottawa to this day, the tulip bulbs you see growing on capital hill are the same tulip bulbs that are still being donated by the Dutch people.
In 1995, the Netherlands donated an additional 5,000 bulbs for Parliament Hill, 1,000 for each provincial and territorial capital and 1,000 for Ste. Anne's hospital in Saint-Anne-de-Bellevue, Que. (the only remaining federal hospital in Canada, administered by Veterans Affairs Canada).
When Holland was overrun by the (Germans) in May 1940, Queen Wilhelmina sought refuge in England and, from there, headed her country's government-in-exile. But even Great Britain was a precarious haven, and in 1942, the Crown Princess Juliana was persuaded to leave for Canada where she made her wartime home. Here, on January 19, 1943, in a room in Ottawa's Civic Hospital specially decreed to be Dutch territory, her third daughter Margriet was born. The tiny princess captured the hearts of Canadians who claimed her as their own.
Princess Margriet of the Netherlands, is the third daughter of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and Prince Bernhard, the former Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. As a daughter of the late Queen Juliana and a younger sister of the current monarch, Queen Beatrix, she is currently eighth in line to the Dutch throne.
Since she is also a descendant of King George II of Great Britain, and is therefore theoretically in line for the British throne, she became a British subject after a 1957 court case.
When victory was secured in 1945, Princess Juliana and her family returned to their homeland where they found the people recovering from the ravages of war. They also discovered a tumultuously happy Dutch population deeply grateful to the Canadians who had recently liberated them and saved thousands of people from starving to death.
Eventually the capital of Ottawa and the Hague became twinned cities, all Dutch children are STILL taught about Canada's liberation of their country (called Liberation Day), and if Canadians ever visit Holland to this day they will be treated like Royalty. The Dutch have NEVER forgotten!
The Groesbeek Canadian War Cemetery is a field of honor to the memory of the Canadian soldiers killed in WWII. The Canadian War Cemetery reminds the inhabitants of Groesbeek of the allied solders who were killed during Operation Veritable. It is the largest cemetery of British Commonwealth soldiers in The Netherlands.
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< Message edited by Warfare1 -- 7/22/2007 10:51:21 PM >
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