I have alluded to the fact that I don’t build WW2 German marked schemes, I hope to set out why. Please note that what follows is not a criticism of those that do.

As stated before I was born and raised on the Island of Guernsey. The Channel Islands were occupied by the Nazis during World War 2 and were not freed from this yoke until 9th May 1945, a day after VE Day. There was great hardship, stories of heroism and of course collaboration. Quite frankly I am surprised by how little collaboration there was, given that melting away into the countryside was not an option. Starvation was rife. Both sets of grandparents and my parents were evacuated before invasion. My father’s family to the Cheshire countryside, and it would seem that my father had a comparatively comfortable time, his father helped on building the Mulberry Harbour before shipment to Normandy. My mother’s family were sent to the much less safe city of Bristol. She spoke of terrifying air raids, her father became an Air Warden. From what I know of Grandad, if he could have reached up and dragged the bombers down, the aircrew would have had a frightful time of it.

After the war had ended, Guernsey started celebrating Liberation Day on May 9th. This mostly consisted of the Muratti which is the inter island football match against Jersey and a cavalcade. As a young child I was taken along to the cavalcade. Any float with reference to Guernsey and Great Britain was loudly cheered, and flags waved. Any float with a German theme was roundly booed. I remember being very puzzled as I had been taught that booing anything was extremely bad form. The hate boiling off the adults around me was real and visceral, in hindsight not surprising as only 20 odd years had passed. I must add that as we head into the 80th Anniversary of Liberation the day has morphed into something more wholesome. Whilst still officially called Liberation Day it is more a celebration of island life, focusing as much on our Norman heritage as the act of freedom. The cavalcade still takes place, but much more in the spirit of reconciliation. In fact the Tourist Board actively encourages visitors from Germany. I mark the day in my own way up here in Aberdeenshire.

Fast forward a few years, my family went away for our first ever holiday. We made the long (12 minutes) flight to Alderney for a week’s camping. I can assure you that this was quite the adventure. Just up the road from the campsite was a small memorial. We visited, and I learnt that when war came to the northernmost of the Channel Islands it did so in a manner much more horrifying than that experienced by the other islands. The memorial was to slave workers, brought from eastern Europe to work on turning Alderney into a mighty concrete fortress. About 20 workers are remembered, as horrible as this is the truth is slowly being unearthed and it would appear that there were 3 camps, and those poor souls that perished number hundreds possibly thousands. We had to pass this memorial at least twice daily, and each time Dad made us stand and reflect in silence. You can imagine the impression this would make on 10 year old me.

The seminal World at War was on television around the same time, and similar to moonshots, Muhammad Ali fights and test match cricket my father made sure that I watched it. My mother did not want me to be subjected to the episode on the Holocaust, Dad insisted. I watched through tears, constantly asking the question “Why?”.

Those games of Germans v British at school no longer seemed like harmless fun. What few models that depicted the swastika went in the bin.

Since returning to the hobby I have been adamant that old me should not disappoint young me. That age has not altered my values. Thanks to the internet and the after market, it became possible to learn about captured equipement, rebadged and used against the evil regime. Quite frankly from an aesthetic point of view, the equipment used by Germany in the war is pleasing to the eye. It’s the underlying ideology and purpose that is so virulently hateful to me. So having never done so during my young years I finally built a Tiger tank, albeit in the markings of the Free French in the act of liberation of course.

Other German armour followed, also Free French but including some Syrian and what ifs.

4 ME109s have a shelf to themselves, but you won’t see an Iron Cross.

Even a He111 has been built because quite frankly I am not going to pass up the chance to build Motorhead’s Bomber.

One exception has been made, unfortunately my skills not up to the task of painting a yellow 6 pointed star. The sentiment is there.

So there we are, the reasons why my builds will never include the swastika, and I will build German but not Nazi. I hope you understand that this is a personal decision and not a general critique on why it shouldn’t be done. These things are nuanced. The finger of insensitivity could certainly be pointed at me, after all there is a proliferation of Soviet Red Stars and Japanese Rising Suns to be found on my shelves. In my defense I do try to portray the Soviets as both bungling and evil, and to my limited understanding it is the Sunburst flag which is offensive and not the Hinomaru.