Around Europe at war.

[wain 879]

JG your having bad luck with PC..hope you get it sorted..

[wain 879]

Sorry it wouldnt do anything then bang...

[brett 2,310]

It happens sometimes Wayne, I did get rid of the other six posts and I'm sure JG still appreciates your concern.

 

@JG- Hope it all works out and it will be something simple. See you up soon.

[J G 927]

Thanks for your commiserations guys.  

 

Its back at the manufactures now and hopefully I should get it back in a week or so. 

[Lucy.P 168]

What a great read!

I've enjoyed every moment of this adventure and hope it continues, this has been well conceived and is very educational.

[J G 927]

Thanks Bumblebee, I am glad you enjoyed the ride.

 

Unfortunately my PC has had to go back to the manufacturers again and on its return I have upgraded to P3D, so yet more delay to my progress here.  The PC seems to be behaving itself  now and P3D is installed.  However I don't think my Hawk is P3D compatable and so I must find another aircraft. 

 

What this will be I don't know yet, I have a limited choice at the moment but I do have a couple of aircraft in mind. when my decision is made I will introduce it in the story.

 

Sorry to keep you all waiting.

 

J.

[Lucy.P 168]

It's worth the wait, so when you're ready

[J G 927]

Chapter 6 –Flight to La Rochelle.

My Hawk was gone. Reclaimed by the Red Arrows for their 2016 air show tour. It serves me right for not getting on with my schedule. Still, every cloud has a silver lining and so did this one. The chaps at the RAF saw fit to send a pilot in a Eurofighter Typhoon to take the Hawk back, and to leave me with the keys to the Typhoon so to speak.  I was to continue my tour in a much faster kite.

 

However the aircraft was only a single seater and so Jas’s role would be a ground based one, going ahead of me to organise things for my arrival at wherever.

 

As soon as we were informed of the aircraft change Jas hurried off with half the ground crew to our destination to make things ready, I would be following in a couple of days.

 

Day one rushed past and was a day where I prepared everything for my flight to La Rochelle, the flight plan, the meetings with the aircraft’s maintenance crews etc.  The day was finally done at 21:30 after I had some food and a nice red at the hotel restaurant before bed.

 

Day two was a drag.  Having done the blue-arsed fly thing the day before there was not much to do.  I settled down poolside at the hotel and was just about to order a G&T when I realised I was in the no drinking before flying zone. I ordered a tonic with Ice and a slice instead. I ended up having an early night to kill the boredom.

 

On the third day I headed off to the airfield bright and early. I was looking forward to flying the typhoon. The flight plan was already submitted, so I made a polite visit to the Control Tower, after which I went out to the aircraft and after my walk round, was settled into the aircraft by the remaining ground crew.

 

The flight plan as submitted is detailed below.

As you will no doubt have noticed, the end of the flight plan is somewhat complicated. This is because we will be visiting our first historic site from the air. We are not the first RAF aircraft to set out to visit this this landmark, it has been deliberately visited several times by the RAF. However, despite the fact they came home without some of their “passengers”, the previous RAF visitors didn’t land.

Below is the last part of the plan in detail.

 

 

You will note that we fly across the port of La Rochelle.  One of these waypoints is directly over our point of interest.  But more of that later when we fly past and in the next chapter.

 

The Typhoon was ready on the stand when I strolled out of the airport building.

 

 

I did my walk around and was satisfied that all was as it should be and climbed into the cockpit, aided by one of the ground crew. I started my pre-start checks and signalled to the crew member, who was now visible to my port side.

External power connected, the crew member, gave the signal to start up the engines and then he walked back observe the engine start from the rear. I had completed my pre-start checks, and started the engines one by one.

A minute later he walked back to my cockpit port side to indicate that all was going as it should be while a colleague disconnected the ground power. The power disconnected the two ground crew disappeared under the aircraft to make their post start checks, as I did mine, eventually returning to their port and starboard places but further back this time for safety.  I gained Taxi clearance from the tower, and when I could see both men were in a safe position and on a signal from the port side man I started my taxi.

Opening the throttles a crack, I commenced my taxi to runway {number} and came to a stop just short of the runway and completed my pre take-off checklist.

Next I contacted the tower for take-off clearance and once this was given I taxied on to the runway and pointed the aircraft down the centreline. Once I was satisfied with my aircraft's runway alignment I pushed the throttle forwards, increasing it to reheat as I gathered speed.

Opening the throttles a crack, I commenced my taxi to the runway and came to a stop just short of the runway and completed my pre take-off checklist.

Next I contacted the tower for take-off clearance and once this was given I taxied on to the runway and pointed the aircraft down the centreline. Once I was satisfied with my aircraft's runway alignment I pushed the throttle forwards, increasing it to reheat as I gathered speed.

I rotated the aircraft and was airborne. Gaining speed for a few seconds I raised the undercarriage and once they were up and locked I put the aircraft into a steep climb. The altitude dial span around as we quickly climbed to our cruising height of 33,000ft. During this time I completed my post take-off and I was soon throttling back for my cruise, turning on to my course toward La Rochelle.

 

Passing my first waypoint, I set my course towards the next one and when passed that I continued to my next waypoint but started my decent to 1000 ft. and as the coast passed me I dropped further to 500 ft and further reduced my speed.

At 500 ft. I roared over the port at 500ft, banking over the port to get a good view of one of our points of interest. At La Rochelle the Second World War U-Boat pens survive to this day, a massive concrete bunker that kept the scourge of the Atlantic safe in harbour.   

I had looked at the above aerial view as part of my pre-flight briefing and so I knew what I was looking for.

Having completed my fly-by I turned for the airfield completing my pre landing checks and set up my approach. ATC gave permission to land and I was soon on the tarmac.

 

I taxied to the stand where Jas and the ground crew were waiting for me. They guided into my allotted parking spot and I quickly went through the shutdown procedures.

 

 

When all was safe, exited the aircraft, The ground crew was all over the aircraft tarting it up for some dignitary or some such things. For me, now was the time to relax and seek out beer as tomorrow I was to explore the history of La Rochelle.

 

 

 

[wain 879]

Great read and some nice pics too.. looking forward to the next.. 

[Captain Coffee 2,030]

Glad to see you back on your tour. Quite the upgrade to continue along in. Seems like you may spend more time on the planning than in the plane flying with a ride as fast as that.

[J G 927]

Thanks Guys.

 

24 minutes ago, Captain Coffee said:

........ Seems like you may spend more time on the planning than in the plane flying with a ride as fast as that.

 

To true!  Some of the trip was done at Mach 2!

[Corsaire31 419]

A nice leg !  Bet they don't see Typhoons very often in La Rochelle ...

 

I see your flight path took you over the Chef de Baie industrial zone where I worked for 6 years in the 80s and over the south of Nieul sur Mer where I lived. (Almost over my garden !)   I left in 1987 when they where starting to build the bridge to the Ré Island (which is therefore no more an island...). You can see this bridge on the left of your close up flight plan.

[J G 927]

Chapter 7– La Rochelle: Conflict, rebellion and deep secrets.

 

La Rochelle was founded in the 10^th century and by the 12^th century it was an important harbour.  Duke Guillaume of Aquitaine ruled over the town, made it a free port and thus further promoted the importance of the port.

 

Duke Guillaume of Aquitaine

 

It was also established as a commune and therefore able to mint its own coins and run some of its own business. 

Where is La Rochelle?

Such was the success of the port that fifty years it came to elect a mayor, the first ever in what we call France today. This Mayor was assisted by 24 Magistrates and 75 notables with jurisdiction over all of the town inhabitants.

 

English Rule

England’s King’s Banner

Guillaume of Aquitaine’s daughter married Henry Plantagenet in 1152, and when Henry became Henry II King of England two years later, the rule of La Rochelle passed into English hands. Henry II built the Vauclair Castle to protect the town, some remains of which can still be seen today.

 

 

The remains of Vauclair Castle

French Rule.

France’s King’s Banner

The period of English rule lasted until 1224 when the town was besieged and captured by King Louis VIII of France.  It was to be a French position for almost 150 years.

 

English Rule (again) and the Hundred Years War

 

England Again

 

The hundred Years War started in 1337 and ended in 1443. It was actually a series of conflicts rather than a continuous war. Following the treaty of Bretigny in 1360, the French ceded a huge tract of land from the Loire in the north to the Spanish border in the south and from the Atlantic in the west to Limosin in the east.

 

La Rochelle was part of the land given to the English under that treaty. However following a English Naval defeat at the hands of the Castillian and French fleets of the coast at La Rochelle the town rose up and expelled the English.

 

However they did not allow themselves and their town to fall into French hands. The Town held out against the French King until he recognised the town’s port and tax privileges. The French eventually granted the privileges and came under French rule once more.

 

Wars of Religion

 

Back to France

The French wars of Religion started in 1562 and lasted until 1598. The rise of Protestantism (Huggenots) in Europe caused friction between the Roman Catholic aristocratic houses of France and those houses that had become Protestants. These wars were bloody. It is estimated that between 2,000,000 and 4,000,000 people died as a result of this war, killed in conflict or the famine and disease that followed.

La Rochelle declared for the Protestants, partly because of the change in religious beliefs, but in La Rochelle’s case because it was a chance to gain some political independence. La Rochelle experience riots and many Catholic churches were attacked and on one infamous occasion murdered 13 Catholic Priests. Eventually the wars came to an end with the Catholics gaining the upper hand.  However Protestant worship was to be allowed in just three places:  Montauban, Nimes and La Rochelle.

Huguenot Rebellions

 

The cross of the Huguenots – Neither England or France

 

In 1622 the Huguenot people of La Rochelle rebelled against their French masters, fighting a sea battle off the coast of La Rochelle.  The French prevailed and French control continued.

 

The French again

 

Only five years later in 1627 the Huguenots rebelled again, this time bringing the English to the aid of the Huguenots and triggering the Anglo-French war which was to last until 1629 when the English attempted to land a force of about 6,000 soldiers from 100 ships on the island of Ile-de-Re. This and several other attempted were to fail and eventually England ended its involvement in the conflict and withdrew in 1629.

 

Following the events at La Rochelle, the French King set the suppression of the Huguenots as a priority and a period of persecution began.  As a result many Huguenots fled to the Americas and to England.

A period of decline.

The Seven Years War fought with Spain against what was by then Great Britain, Saxony, Austria and Prussia, in which Britain gained the upper hand, winning over many French and Spanish territories in the New World. It was during this period that the port lost its trade and prominence.

 

The French Revolution.

Up until the French Revolution La Rochelle was a slave trading port but with the onset of the French revolution this lucrative trade ended with the ship “Saint-Jacques” being the last La Rochelle Slaver. This ship was captured in 1793 in the Gulf of Guinea by the British, and so the trade was ended. In 1794 the French Revolutionary government passed the Universal Emancipation decree effectively freeing all colonial slaves and preventing the trade from being revived.

 

Madam Guillotine

 

The Napoleonic Wars

 

The Basque Roads are a sheltered bay on the Biscay shore of France, the port of La Rochelle stands at the northeast corner of the roads. The French naval base of Rochefort is to the south of La Rochelle.

 

During the Peninsular War in Spain and Portugal the Duke of Wellington depended on maritime supply. The French fleet in the Basque Roads operated against the British supply ships. To protect the convoys, the Royal Navy maintained a blockade of the Basque Roads, but this was expensive and never wholly effective.

 

Napoleon Bonaparte

In late October 1808, Napoléon sent orders for the ships at Rochefort to deliver reinforcements and supplies to Martinique. However, the continual presence of a large British fleet offshore impeded their departure. On 7 February 1809, Napoleon ordered Admiral Willaumez to break the British blockade with the Brest fleet to allow these naval ships to make their way to Martinique. Two weeks later, Willaumez finally set out from Brest with eight ships-of-the-line and two frigates towards Lorient.  This lead initially to the Battle of Les Sables-d'Olonne.in which a force of five British ships attacked a force of three smaller French ships. These ships were attempting to slip past the blockading British while the British Fleet were engaged by the French Brest Fleet.   However because of calm winds the force was late leaving port and the Brest fleet had passed when they approached the blockade. In the ensuing battle, the French repelled the British but at a cost.  All of the French ships were badly damaged they had to return to port and were subsequently written off by the French navy so bad was their damage.

Fearful of being caught by the British, Willaumez and the Brest fleet made his way south to Rochefort to join the French Naval ships there, but the Rochefort squadron was in no shape to sail, having been recently ravaged by sickness. With the subsequent arrival of a large British fleet, Willaumez was trapped in Rochefort.

The French were held fleet in Rochefort until Gambier arrived with the rest of the British Channel fleet to impose a full blockade. The British Admiralty became concerned about the concentration of such a large segment of the French fleet in one place. If the ships escaped they could ferry supplies to Napoleon’s Peninsular forces, making it very difficult for the British campaign there.

With the above in mind, the First Lord of the Admiralty, Lord Mulgrave, proposed an attack on the French fleet at anchor using fire ships. Cochrane's superior officer, Lord Gambier, commanding the Channel Fleet, was opposed to the plan, calling it "a horrible and anti-Christian mode of warfare".

Cochrane was given twenty-one fireships to command, but he was also focusing on his own invention: explosion ships, which were basically fireships packed tightly with explosive powder. What ensued became known as the Battle of the Basque Roads.

 

A British chart of the Basque Roads

Gambier's opposition and Mulgrave's persuasiveness meant that full responsibility for executing the plan fell to Lord Cochrane.

 

Cochrane led the way into Basque Roads with two explosion ships, followed by 25 other ships. Because of delays resulting from Gambier’s indecision, the French were alert to the British plan. Admiral Allemand, who had replaced Willaumez, had struck the topmasts and yards of the big ships, stowed their sails to reduce the amount of exposed flammable material, and placed a stout boom across the harbor entrance. Allemand had anchored his ships in an apparently impregnable position drawn up in two lines between the Ile d'Aix to the northeast and Ilôt Boyar to the southwest, so that were defended by gun batteries.

Destruction of the French Fleet in Basque Roads by Thomas Sutherland 

 

On the night of April 11, 1809 Cochrane floated in on the flood-tide aboard the foremost explosion vessel with the other explosion ships following. Once he had reached the boom, Cochrane lit the fuse of the vessel and he and his handful of men swarmed into their boat, only to discover that they had left their pet dog behind, which they went back to rescue. They managed to escape with their dog just in time. The explosion ships succeeded in breaking the mile-long boom of heavy spars and chains the French had placed to block the British ships from engaging the French. Unable to see clearly in the smoke, the panicked French gunners fired into the line of protecting French frigates. Anchor cables were hastily cut to escape the surge of flame, and without sails, the ships piled up on the shoals.

A second attack using 20 fire ships was made which missed their targets completely, but still inflicted some damage on the French fleet indirectly as thought they were seeing more exploding ships and panicked. In trying to get away, they caused a significant amount of damage to themselves and causing many ships to run aground.

Finally a third attack was made by the British in which Cochrane managed to lead a force of several British ships into the harbour and spent a day destroying and capturing French ships.

This disaster for the French resulted in four French captains being court-martialled, one was relieved of his command and a second was executed by firing squad.

 

After this the port of La Rochelle declined as the offshore British fleet continued its blockade until the war's end.

 

19^th Century

 

In 1864, the harbour of La Rochelle was the site for the maiden dive experiments of the first mechanically-powered submarine in the World, Plongeur (Diver) which carried a code name of Q00. The sub was commanded by Marie-Joseph-Camille Doré, a native of La Rochelle.

The submarine used a compressed-air engine , propelled by stored compressed air which was contained in 23 tanks which took up a huge amount of space and requiring the submarine to be of unprecedented size, the submarine was 43 m (140 ft) long. The engine could propel the submarine for 5 nmi (9 km), at a speed of 4 kn (7.2 km/h).

 

A model of the Plongeur

 

Compressed air was also used to empty its ballast tanks, to enable it to surface from a dive The submarine was armed with a ram to break holes in the hull of enemy ships, and an electrically-fired  torpedo, fixed at the end of a pole.

These secret tests were a portent of dark things to come.

 

Second World War

During the Second World War, Germany established a submarine naval base at La Pallice (the main port of La Rochelle).

 

La Rochelle harbour

The occupying German forces built a reinforced concrete bunker to house part of its fleet of submarines, known as U-Boats. This structure projected out over the water and allowed surfaced submarines to dock in a bomb proof shelter, thus protection them whilst in port. The structure was started in April 1941 and completed just six months later. It could house six U-boats.

 

 

U-Boats in their pen

Later in 1942 construction of a bunkered Lock was built to maintain U-Boats. This was finished in March 1944.

 

It was from these pens and similar ones in Lorient, St Nazaire, Bordeaux, Brest and at other locations in Europe that the U-Boats sailed to destroy allied shipping in the Atlantic. In all the German U-Boats sank 2,779 ships or a total of 14,000,000 tons of shipping, accounting for 75% of all allied naval losses.

 

The seaward side of the bunkers as it is today

 

German U-boat losses were light at the start of the war, but as Allied detection equipment and depth charges improved losses went up dramatically, especially in 1942 where losses rose dramatically towards the end of the year. 1944 and 1945 were also bad years for the U-Boat crews, with heavy losses

 

In all the Germans lost 768 U-Boats in the course of the second world war, the last two years of the war saw losses at ten times the rate of losses for the first two years.

The allies attacked this bunker complex several times during the war. On 8^th August a single Tallboy bomb was dropped on to the bunker. This was the first of just 5 raids carried out on the sub pens at La Rochelle during the whole war.  Little damage was done and this can be see today as the bunker still stands with very little damage. 

 

Individual pen entrances.

La Rochelle was the last French city to be liberated at the end of the war. The Allied siege of La Rochelle took place between 12 September 1944, and 7 May 1945; the stronghold, including the islands of Ré andOléron , was held by 20,000 German troops under a German vice-admiral Ernst Schirlitz. Free French troops entered La Rochelle on 8 May, only after the official capitulation of the German forces.

 My tour finished I had a night in a local hotel and the following morning made my to the airport for my next destination, hoping that the Typhoon would still be there for me and my next leg.....

 

[Captain Coffee 2,030]

Cool background to the next leg John.

Did those sub pens have doors? Seems like a Mosquito coming in fast a low could have Bounced a Betty into those things...though it might have taken a lucky bounce to pull it off. Wonder if that was ever tried, or did they just try to bust them with high altitude bomb drops?

[J G 927]

Looking at the pen entrances I would say yes.  It would not be like the Germans not to.  

[allardjd 1,853]

I don't believe any of the Nazi sub pens at any locations had doors, at least not armored ones.  Triple-A defenses in and around the ports and I suspect maybe barrage balloons, were thought to be, and mostly were, proof against low-level attacks.  It's not terribly difficult to defend a ground target from a low-level attack that must be aligned along one axis. I don't know of any historical references to that being tried, though there may have been some.  

 

Sub pen attacks were almost exclusively carried out by medium and heavy bombers from medium and high altitude.  German triple-A was formidable and night area attacks were not really precise enough to be practical for attacking small targets like sub pens.  It required daylight precision bombing, or later in the war, perhaps, radar bomb-aiming in night raids.   Even then, hits with conventional bombs were mostly not much more than a minor nuisance.

 

For whatever the reasons, little serious damage was done to the German submarine pens during the war, despite a great deal of effort being expended against them.  It turned out that the subs were far more vulnerable at sea than when in their shelters.  I would have to say that the German expense and effort put into them turned out to be well worth the time, trouble and treasure that it took.

 

John

 

EDIT:  

I just found a reference to some massive blast-proof doors at one location, in five of the bays.  I still don't believe it was wide-spread but they apparently did it in some locations.

JDA

[J G 927]

In my European travels I have come across many German Bunkers, from Jersey to the Austrian boarder, and all of them had heavy armoured doors.

 

Two weeks ago I was in south west Belgium at a place called Bruly-de-Pesche from which Hitler planned and executed the invasion of France in 1940.  It has a bunker for Hitlers personal use if the invasion didn't go to plan. It had two sets of steel doors. From what I have seen, the Nazis didn't like to show any weakness in what ever they built, steel doors were 'de rigueur'!

 

But with respect to the pens themselves.  Take a look the entrances on the picture titled "Individual pen entrances". The left most entrance shows two things:

 

Firstly, inside the entrance on the wall you can see what looks like a long pipe on the wall near the top. where this pipe ends are a series of openings to neighbouring pens, There may have been doors here that isolated the pens to protect them from blast from within another pen, although they may have been for protection from mishap when loading ordinance into the boats. The pipe it's self is part of an air conditioning system presumably to extract the exhaust fumes of a boat under diesel power.  

 

Secondly, at the mouth of the same pen there is vertical steel object on the end of the right hand wall (missing from the righthand pen) This may be a runner for a steel door that could be lowered to seal off the pen from water level upward, however I can find no pictorial evidence for this except this video that clearly shows these steel objects to be guides of some sort.

 

 

There were two types of pen. Wet pens which were harbours for active U-Boats and dry pens which were for U-Boat repairs and refits.This latter pen type did have Pen doors.

 

 

The photo above shows some dry pens into which a U-Boat could be placed for maintenance.  These pens were at Lorient. further north of the ones at La Rochelle.

 

As for bouncing a bomb into them, I dont think there would be room to do that, or to mount a torpedo attack. The pens at La Rochelle were off a small dock and there would not be enough space. 

 

An attempt to bomb the pens at La Rochell was made by the RAF using a single 1,000 lb "earthquake" bomb but with little or no success.

[allardjd 1,853]

I found this reference, I think to the installation at Lorient...

 

Quote

The design of K1 allowed for submarines to be berthed in the heavily protected slip-way, then, as the water was pumped out, lowered onto a transportation cradle which was then winched up the inclined plane of the slip-way until the cradle and submarine were at the same level as the floors of the pens. The cradle and its submarine were then moved to a vacant pen. The first submarine to use the system was U123 on 25th August 1941, even though the building of K1 was not completed until September 1941. K1 has 5 pens each fitted with a pair of massive blast-proof doors.

 

I wouldn't be surprised by the use of doors to block WX and even caissons to permit pumping out a stall and settling the boat onto pre-placed blocks, but not sure that massive blast-proof doors were widely used for submarine pens.

 

I think the earthquake bombs were considerably more than 1,000 lbs.  The two I could find stats on are Tallboy at 6 tons and Grand Slam at 10 tons. 

[UKJim 502]

Great posts mate - enjoyable read at work  very informative too so thanks for that. Glad you got your PC up and running too, looking good there in P3D

[Captain Coffee 2,030]

Thanks for the additional detail on the pens sir! After viewing the video it looks like a low level assault directed at the mouth of the pens by air would have met heavy resistance in the form of a dense lead environment issuing from the pill boxes on top of the pens as well as to the sides.

Yeah, they considered the problem for sure. I wouldn't be surprised if they had raisable chain nets in the water in front of the pens to explode torpedos in case the attempt was made.

[J G 927]

It seems like I am permanently rebuilding my PC these days.  There has to be another hiatus as somehow I managed to screw up P3D,  I think it was when I was trying to install an older FSX add-on using a migration tool. 

 

It seems that when you install using a migration tool you are to some degree playing Russian Roulette with your P3D install.  It seems that I will have to live with a few less aircraft in P3D as I might have liked but I can live with that. I will have a simplified FSX install should I want to use some legacy addons. 

 

The next installment will be with you just as soon as I can complete the install.

 

J.

[wain 879]

yeah I learnt that on an earlier installment of P3D, dont use it now, if I cant install with original installer or a little bit of tinkering it doesnt get installed, trouble for you though is thar problem limits your AC.....best of luck I had that about a year ago drives you bonkers....

[J G 927]

I have a few favorite aircraft that are P3D friendly so I will be happy with them. So it is not so bad. 

 

What is bad is trying to get my joystick and throttle working. Windows 7 64-bit just dosent like the Saitek drivers as they are not signed.  I am trying a manual install at the moment but is is not going well. 

[J G 927]

You may have noticed that things have ground to a halt in my historical adventures. I just don't have time to continue at the moment as I have had to ground myself at the moment. I plan to use all of my free time for the highly important ATWC 7.

 

My reasons for doing this are simple. In the space of two months I have had to put my dad into a nursing home following a stroke, my Mum into sheltered accommodation as she cant cope with the large family home on her own and is starting to show signs of short term memory loss, and my aunt into an old peoples home as she has dementia. Also in this time my father in law has had a stroke, but thankfully he is showing signs of a good recovery, and has just moved back into his house with a carer. 

 

My cockpit (study) is full of "stuff" from my Mum & Dads house as well as from my aunts place.  However my tunnelling efforts are starting to pay off and I caught sight of my FS PC for a while before a landslide of useless ornaments once more hid it from view.

 

What has been said about having to sell your parents house to fund nursing care under a future Conservative Government is tosh.  You have to do this already!

 

[Captain Coffee 2,030]

The Cycle of Life keeps us Pedaling hard to keep up and sometimes just keeping our seat or hanging on can be a challenge, thankfully, the Cycle of Life has Bars for that.

 

A toast to you sir.

 

And we hope you get the simbox out of the hangar and fallovers in time to face the Putinfeld in what is sure to be a Suspensful 007 ATWC...I can hear the theme music coming up in the background already. (whaaa whaaa wha whaaaaaa wha wha whaaa)