wars

My friend (who was a sandwich short of a picnic) believed that 'Storming Norman' of Gulf War fame was actually called Storeman Norman. I can just picture him in his brown overalls striding across the deserts of Iraq with his trusted Thermos and ham sandwiches in his pocket!

Becky

I used to think that war was like a sporting event, in which two opposing armies would line up on opposite sides of a football field then run at each other and try to kill each other...and "war" never extended beyond that field.

britta

i used to believe that if there were bombings, that the world will split in half..

kins

I used to think that the word "Nazi" rhymed with the word "Navy" and they rhymed because the Nazis had invented the concept of a navy.

Jonny boy

I used to believe that the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) club was actually a club for Very Fat Women. My older brother encouraged me in this belief.

George

When I was much younger (1970's) I was shocked when I saw Germans participating in an international game show (It's a Knockout for the UK readers) after all, weren't we at war with them?

Sharruma

Whenever i heard the beatles song war is over i always got really confused as i thought they were singing about one of the world wars but i knew they couldn't be old enough to be singing (or even born)just after both had ended. I decided they must be singing about world war 2 and carried this in my head till i was thirteen and i was embarisinglly corrected by my mother

jay

I was young during Desert Storm, but I still remember hearing the the newscasters talking about Saddam Hussein... only I thought they always said "Saddam, who's saying.."

Kat

I once got in a lot of trouble in school, when I was in Grade 5. I was obsessed with battleships, and tanks, and aircraft and all that, which isn't really all that unusual. I was obsessed with World War II at the time, but no one had ever told me about the Nazis and the Jews. One time at lunch hour I was running around with some friends of mine, and I decided to pretend that we were planes from the war. We all got to be British planes, and when I ran into some other people I knew, they became the Nazis, which at that point I think I believed was synonymous with 'German'. Because one of these 'Nazis' was Jewish, my teacher yanked me into the classroom and gave me a stern lecture about how what I did was wrong, and then made me go out and apologize to this child, who (I think) was about as oblivious as I was. The teacher then called my parents at home, and I hid in the closet, because I was afraid they would be mad at me.

I'm not sure exactly why the teacher made such a big deal out of it, when a basic clarification of terminology would have fixed the situation... I'm still obsessed with the Second World War, but I know the difference between Germans and Nazis now. :)

Matthew

This is actually a common belief among children. But, when I was little, I used to believe that the Cival War was called the Silver War.

Anon

When I was about 6 there was a war in my country and I asked my mom how long it was going on. She said 4 years. I don't know why but untill I was about 12 I believed that every war lasted 4 yrs.So when we were learning about wars in our History class and the teacher said that a war lasted for 100 yrs i thought that she was completely off the track

Lemony

not long ago,i used to believe that Cold war was described as cold because it took place in snow

Kafka

I used to believe that wars were a thing of the distant barbarian past until I was about 8 and came to realize that the Vietnam war had just ended

reee

Somehow I made a connection between Jesus and the World Wars, thinking my grandfather who had been a naval officer during WW2 had played some part in rescuing Christ from murder/execution by taking him away on his boat. It was of course all exaggerated by my 'vivid' imagination as my reception teacher clarified for me gently after I bragged to the class about what my grandad had done. Well that was my distorted idea of heroism!

Dana

I used to think the civil war was fought by the Confederacy and the Union (like the Food that makes you cry) Soldiers

Anon

When I was small, the war was on and there was a bridge near me tha had a large red sign saying DANGER TROOPS. For years I was convinced that there was a weapon called a 'dang-er' that was used by troops who 'danged' people.

Charles

During World War II we lived in Sydney's harbour suburb Balmain, and government warnings included taking shelter under a staircase or strong piece of furniture in a confined space during air raids. When japanese submarines raided Sydney Harbour in 1942 all sirens went off and our terrified Mum put my sister and me under a heavy table she had dragged to the hallway. At age 7 I thought the japanese must be very exciting people because I was never allowed to play under the table at other times. My belief was strengthened when the Royal Australian Navy buried the recovered japanese bodies with full military honours - which surprised even the japanese, who had not suspected that "barbarians" could behave with such honour!

Swanny

When we learned about the Civil War in the second grade or so, I was very happy to learn that the North had won. I live in North Carolina, and obviously hadn't been paying attention, because I thought it was a battle between the Carolinas. I'm sure I did a good job of confusing my friends when I was gushing about how good we, the North, had done in the war.

Jocelyn

When i heard about Irish Bombers on the news during the 70s i used to think that planes were dropping bombs.

Moose

My grandparents built a bombshelter in their garden during the 2nd World War.When I was a child, I was terrified of it, because I believed that there were rotten remains of dead soldiers from the war in there.I do not where I got the idea from.My grandparents actually never used the shelter for anything else, but to store their jars of homemade jam.

L