The restoration and preservation of these precious images make this documentary extremely valuable. It is a pity that we saw the British, French and German soldiers who fought bloody battles in the film, and the soldiers of the British Indian colonies, but we did not see any faces of the 140,000 Chinese laborers.
The First World War was closely related to China. At that time, the Beiyang government of China joined the First World War. However, as a victorious country, China did not share the fruits of victory, and was actually asked to transfer the privileges originally belonging to Germany to Japan, which led to the "May Fourth Movement".
The reason why it was despised was that the Allies believed that the Chinese army had not assembled to fight on the European front. But about 140,000 Chinese laborers in China were recruited by Britain and France to travel across the ocean to Europe to provide military-related logistics for the Allies. Among them, the United Kingdom hangs alone overseas and has become the rear of the Allied Powers, and has recruited nearly 100,000 Chinese workers. However, for a long period of time, they forgot about the 100,000 Chinese laborers who made great contributions to the end of the First World War. To this day, this situation has not changed.
As the British soldiers in the film said, when they retreated to the rear to rest, the soldiers were even more tired than the front line most of the time. Although the Chinese laborers did not directly face the guns and cannons of the Allied soldiers, their blood and sweat should never be ignored.
To reiterate this historical fact, I just want to tell the director and all Europeans that a war without Chinese labor is definitely not a complete war. The blood and sweat of 140,000 Chinese laborers is worth leaving even just one frame in this so-called blockbuster movie. I would more like to tell our young people to cherish their country and do everything they can for its prosperity. This is not a big talk, this is the painful lesson that the bloody history has taught us. Without the dignity of the country, the dignity of the individual is not worth mentioning in front of outsiders.
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