The deaths, within a few days of each other, of the last surviving First World War veterans in Britain, Henry Allingham and Harry Patch, have generated the most enthusiastic tributes from the high and mighty: the Queen, Prince Charles, Gordon Brown, and all the rest of them. In addition to massive media coverage, we will soon be treated to a spectacular service at Westminster Abbey to remember the ‘sacrifice of a generation', who, we are told, laid down their lives in the cause of freedom...