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Inaccuracies

posted 7 years ago by Sum Ting Wong (1)
4 replies | jump to latest

In one scene Archer is described as a Chief Superintendent, however in another scene he is addressed as both a Superintendent (not Chief) and an Inspector.

At the beginning we are told the Germans and Soviets are friends. This is supposed to be set in November 1941, however Germany invaded the USSR in June 1941. The defeat of the UK would have only hastened the invasion.

[–] Cranmer (139) 4 years ago

In '41 Hitler had the option of invading both Britain and the USSR; he chose the USSR and by September 1941 the invasion of England (Operation Sealion) was postponed indefinitely. In the alternative timeline of SS-GB, presumably the Fuhrer decided to carry out the invasion of England and so the Nazi-Soviet Pact remained in place.

One inaccuracy I noticed was that when Archer and Woods are in the school chapel, neither remove their hats. No Englishman (or Scotsman) of their class would keep their heads covered in a church in 1941. Similarly with Silvia calling the King 'Georgie' all the time, such informality would have been unthinkable for a middle class woman then.

[–] Karl Aksel (1451) 2 years ago

In '41 Hitler had the option of invading both Britain and the USSR; he chose the USSR and by September 1941 the invasion of England (Operation Sealion) was postponed indefinitely. In the alternative timeline of SS-GB, presumably the Fuhrer decided to carry out the invasion of England and so the Nazi-Soviet Pact remained in place.

Hitler never had any plans to invade Britain. Operation Sealion was meant as a last resort to bring Britain to its knees, but Hitler had no desire to even fight the British, let alone occupy them. The Battle of Britain took place because Britain, in honouring their agreement with Poland, had declared war on Germany. Germany needed to subjugate the British in order to carry out their actual plans, which was always the invasion of Russia. Marxism was always Hitler's enemy #1, bar none, as he saw it as the biggest threat to civilisation. Even his hatred of the Jews came second to this. The non-aggression pact with Stalin took everyone else by surprise, because it was so anti-thetical to everything the nazis stood for. Hitler never intended to honour it, and indeed, no one really expected him to.

But even before Hitler's violation of the pact, when he pretended to be Stalin's friend, there is no way in hell the nazis would have allowed a banner celebrating Karl Marx in any of their territories. This series - and possibly the book it is based on - shows a disturbing lack of historical knowledge by even entertaining the notion that something like this would be possible.

[–] marktayloruk (2374) 2 years ago

In the book Germany hadn't invaded Russia.

[–] Karl Aksel (1451) 2 years ago

Neither in the series, obviously. And that's just the trouble: Hitler always meant to. And he would never promote Marxism even as a ploy to lull the Russians into a false sense of security, because he had been extremely clear from day 1 that he considered Marxism to be poison.