You’re right in terms of Berlin and the final days of the war. And the way it was taught here in school way back when you’d think we were the most important and heavily effected country by WW2 despite the massive sacrifice of the Soviet Union, the number of Poles sent to camps etc. Still, half a million dead and years long bombing campaigns at home aren’t nothing. I went to school near the coast and it was a regular occurrence for us to be sent home for safety because they kept finding unexploded German ordnance on the beaches and cliffs nearby even then.

That being said, in my lifetime I’ve watched the original meaning and sentiment of remembrance and VE Day completely warp in this country. It’s almost exclusively a pro-militarist, culture war thing now, with the noisiest people about it being almost exclusively made up of shallow American-style ‘salute the troops you traitor’ types. And don’t get me started on the fucking poppy these days…