NATO Survey, 1943 Pt 2

Midnight_Fox, on Jan 12 2015 - 03:03, said:   This goes back to the American Revolution, Where Gen. Washington wanted his men to be distinguished in superior moral character that what the British Army was like. Back then you fought better sober and to a certain point, our armies behaved better. In several war moves of the WW2 genre there seemed to be an anal retentive restriction of alcohol in naval units and in one ingenious Bob Hope movie, The Private Navy of Sergeant O'Farrell, it was focused on his unit salvaging a sunken load of beer in a rear area with some real consequences of overindulging without anal retentive officers getting in the way of the fun. That it's beer and not rum is besides the point. The point is that wed had the only "dry" combat units on the front line compared to other combatant armies. General Patton's statement was probably a personal preference in how the British army handled the situation irrespective of the historical beginnings of a dry military on the front lines. Would you want drunks in combat? Being drunk playing computer pixel tanks is nothing compared to fighting drunk in real tanks in real combat: after the battle the need for a stiff one or two is understood but that would be splitting hairs.