My apologies, it's been crazy busy for the last 2 days so I haven't been online.
Away from music and onto the joys of accountancy - The current rate of VAT is 20%. What was the rate when VAT was first introduced in the early 70's, replacing the outgoing purchase tax?
I think Zag is close, I'm sure I read it was about 40,000 when they did a bit on WW2 before Armistice day. I'm guessing most were fighters because of the Battle of Britain, and when we were bombing Europe, we had the Yanks to do that.
So I'll go with 35,000