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By Aly Renwick

Operation BANNER is the authorized name for the operations of the British Armed Forces in Northern Ireland from August 1969 to July 2007. I believe that veterans should question the official history of Operation BANNER and I present the following as a contribution towards the construction of an alternative narrative.

As Britain entered the 1960s, the country was emerging from a long period of rationing and austerity that had lasted from the end of the Second World War – from which the UK had emerged victorious, but also deeply in debt. To preserve their power and wealth post-war, the British establishment had then set about squeezing every last drop of profit from the Empire – while using the armed forces to brutally crush anti-colonial revolts in places like Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus and Aden. In conventional warfare terms, our deemed main enemy – the Russians, had once been one of Britain’s key allies against the Nazis.

Nowadays, the 60s is often called the time of drugs, sex and rock ’n’ roll and has been blamed, by conservative politicians like Thatcher and Blair, for all manner of problems in modern society. In fact the decade was a contradictory period which saw a dramatic rise in consumerism, after the post-war restrictions, but also a start to the decline of industry. It saw the rise of a counterculture and the spread of soulless high-rise tower blocks and concrete town centres. Gays were still prosecuted, as were the publishers of Lady Chatterley’s Lover and anyone else who where thought to be out of line.

After the Education Act reforms of 1944, a better educated generation had gradually emerged, who were determined to question and contest the values of their ‘elders and betters.’ This is the main reason conservatives still fear the 60s, because it was a time when the establishment’s authority was challenged and some of us started to see them as the enemy – rather than those they pointed their finger at. Feminists and Greens appeared with the anti-nuclear peace movement, and most merged to became anti-imperialist in opposition to the US war in Vietnam. As workers and student struggles erupted in Europe and across the world, in Derry and Belfast civil rights protesters were being batoned off their streets by the local para-military style police, the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC).

The Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland took its inspiration from the 60s’ radical upsurge in general and the black struggle for civil rights in America in particular. And the period from August 1968 to August 1969 became a year of civil rights, but many peaceful protests were brutally attacked by the RUC, their auxiliaries the B-Specials and Unionist / Loyalist vigilantes. In August 1969, after an annual Orange march in Derry, the RUC and B-Specials tried to force their way into the Nationalist Bogside area, but were met by determined resistance from the local people. After two days of street fighting, the demoralised RUC and B-Specials were withdrawn and replaced by British soldiers. There was now a brief ‘honeymoon period’ between the soldiers and the Nationalists, who had regarded the entry of the troops as a victory over the Unionists Government at Stormont and their repressive police.

In the weeks before British troops were sent out onto the streets of Derry the number one hit in the UK record charts was Something in the Air by Thunderclap Newman. This song was to ring out over the barricades in Nationalist areas of Belfast and Derry and at student sit-ins and workers struggles in Britain:

Call out the instigators
Because there’s something in the air
We’ve got to get it together sooner or later
Because the revolutions here

But behind closed doors, the ruling class knew they were struggling to maintain their power and control and began to put plans into action. As well as continuing the ‘cold war’ with Russia, they were now also gunning for the ‘enemy within,’ which included ‘militant trade-unionists’ and ‘protesters’ and ‘troublemakers’ of every kind.

 

Counter-Revolutionary Operations

Also in August 1969, one of the organisations that became a main combatant in the Northern Ireland conflict issued a new training manual for its volunteers. It starts with a quote from Mao Tse Tung: ‘Political power comes out of the barrel of a gun.’ This instruction book was not, however, produced by any Irish ‘terrorist group,’ but was in fact, the latest volume of the British Army’s secret training manual Land Operations. This 1969 version -Volume III, entitled Counter-Revolutionary Operations – stated its aims as:
‘To give general guidance on the conduct of counter-revolutionary operations, whether they are concerned with civil disturbances, terrorism or insurgency in the pattern of revolutionary war. It examines the methods most likely to be used by the instigators of disorders, revolts and insurgency, be they nationalist or communist inspired or based within or outside the territory concerned, and it sets out the general principles on which the security forces, working in close concert with the appropriate civil power, should base their operations.’ [Land Operations, Volume III – Counter Revolutionary Operations, Ministry of Defence 29th Aug. 1969].

In 1970, Brigadier Frank Kitson was posted to Belfast to command the 39th Infantry Brigade. He had joined the British Army as a young officer soon after the end of the Second World War and helped sharpen the army’s counter-insurgency techniques in Kenya, Malaya and Oman. In 1971 his first book, Low Intensity Operations, was published and many people believed that the aim of the book was to promote the Army’s ‘new role’ in dealing with internal dissent within the UK:

‘The nature of the support the book received indicated that it was not merely an expression of one person’s views, but represented widespread Army opinion. The foreword was written by General Sir Michael Carver, then Chief of the General Staff. The book was defended in the House of Commons by the Tory Minister of State for Defence, Lord Balneil, who maintained: “This book is written by a most experienced officer in counter-insurgency, and it is regarded as being of valuable assistance to troops who will have to operate in the field”.’ [The Technology of Political Control, by Carol Ackroyd, Karen Margolis, Jonathon Rosenhead and Tim Shallice, Pluto Press 1980].

Kitson’s main experiences had been in former colonial wars, but his book suggested that troops might soon have to be used in the UK – and even against the trade-unions in Britain. Kitson’s appointment to Belfast reflected the changing military emphasis from policing, when Nationalists had welcomed the soldiers, to counter-revolutionary operations. In essence it signalled the start of an army offensive against the Nationalist community in general and the IRA in particular – and some concerned voices, suggested that Northern Ireland might now become a ‘training ground’ for the development of repressive techniques and equipment.

In 1975 the London listings magazine Time Out obtained a copy of the Army’s Land Operations manual and published extracts in its ‘Seven Days’ section:

‘We have recently looked at a copy of the Army Land Operations manual … The manual, a loose-leaf text of over 300 pages outlines the attitude of the British Army towards social unrest and in minute detail describes the Army’s choice of responses to it. The manual is marked restricted and as such covered by the Official Secrets Act. But since that Act is now so discredited and since the information contained in the manual can be of no military aid to any enemy, we have decided to publish parts of it, believing it vital that the political issues it raises are open to public debate.

The manual shows clearly that the Army regards its operations in Ireland as counter-revolutionary … This will come as no surprise to Ireland watchers, but is contrary to the Army’s press-handout image which portrays its role in Ireland as that of keeping the peace between two bigoted factions.’ [Time Out, 10-16 Jan. 1975].

Time Out had already given details of army training, which included a statement from Terry, a deserter on the run, who had told the magazine about his time in the British Army:

‘We’ve all been through riot training as part of our normal training – it was a bit of fun at the time. One half of us pretended to be Irish or the miners – or whoever was on strike at the time – and the other half would just charge into them. We’d think, “Today we’ll really get those strikers, or those Irish.” We really thought like that.’ [Time Out, 7-13 April 1972].

 

Propaganda & Conflict

A knowledge of Land Operations is crucial to any assessment of the British Army’s role in Northern Ireland, but the top brass and the politicians wanted to keep the contents of the manual secret. Consequently, hidden behind the Official Secrets Act, it was hardly ever mentioned in the British media – denying the British people knowledge of the ideology and strategy behind their soldiers’ training and actions. As stated in its introduction, the manual had drawn on the Army’s experiences in previous campaigns:

‘Between the end of World War II and 1st January 1969, Britain’s forces have had to undertake a wide variety of military commitments and only in Europe, after the formation of NATO, has there been any real stability. Fifty-three of these commitments have been of the counter-revolutionary type, with only Korea and the short Suez campaign falling outside this category.’ [Land Operations Volume III – Counter Revolutionary Operations, Ministry of Defence 29th Aug. 1969].

In particular, the manual drew on the lessons the army had learned in its colonial wars from 1945, in places like Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus and Aden. From now on Land Operations was revised regularly to include the lessons learned in Northern Ireland, where the Nationalist community and the IRA was now identified as ‘the enemy.’ Following a long established tradition the army then started to prepare its soldiers for this counter-revolutionary task – and the minds of the young soldiers were indoctrinated by briefings, both verbal and written.

In the early days of the conflict the Sunday Times Insight Team examined a publication given to soldiers just before a tour of duty:

‘The Army rapidly produced a booklet; called “Notes on Northern Ireland,” with the praiseworthy aim of giving its men some idea what the trouble was all about … The booklet printed in full what purported to be the oath of the IRA’s political wing Sinn Fein. As a case-study in psychosis, it deserves reprinting:
“I swear by Almighty God … by the Blessed Virgin Mary … by her tears and wailings … by the blessed Rosary and Holy Beads … to fight until we die, wading in the fields of Red Gore of the Saxon Tyrants and Murderers of the Glorious Cause of Nationality, and if spared, to fight until there is not a single vestige and a space for a footpath left to tell that the Holy Soil of Ireland was trodden on by the Saxon Tyrants and the murderers, and moreover, when the English Protestant Robbers and Beasts in Ireland shall be driven into the sea like the swine that Jesus Christ caused to be drowned, we shall embark for, and take, England, root out every vestige of the accursed Blood of the Heretics, Adulterers and Murderers of Henry VIII and possess ourselves of the treasures of the Beasts that have so long kept our Beloved Isle of Saints … in bondage … and we shall not give up the conquest until we have our Holy Father complete ruler of the British Isles … so help me God.”

The interesting point is that the oath was never taken by members of Sinn Fein. Sinn Fein, indeed, had no oath of any kind. The version the Army got dated from 1918, when it was forged by a group of over-heated Unionists. It has since appeared regularly in Loyalist Ulster news-sheets, most recently in Paisley’s Protestant Telegraph. It bears exactly the same relation to reality as the Protocols of the Elders of Zion – indeed, in its constant dwelling on blood, it has much in common with the Protocols. As a document, therefore, it tells one nothing about Sinn Fein, though quite a lot about the impulses to violence in Unionism.’ [Ulster, by the Sunday Times Insight Team, Penguin Special 1972].

This question might have been asked: How did this blatant bit of fabrication find its way into a British Army publication, issued to young soldiers just before a tour of duty? One can envisage, however, how it might have influenced their outlook and attitude. That it was used is proof that the MoD and army were intent on filling the heads of their soldiers with propaganda. During this period W. Sellick, a soldier in the first battalion Royal Green Jackets, was among the rising numbers of British troops being sent to Northern Ireland. He remembers arriving at the Belfast Mulhouse barracks in 1971:

‘My first encounter … was when a mobile patrol came under nail bomb attack, and the patrol lifted a man who they thought might have been the thrower. I was watching the company TV when he was dragged into the camp. He was shown to all the others in the TV room.

He was then taken into the passageway and was repeatedly hit in the stomach and balls with rifle butts. Then the rest of the soldiers joined in with fists and boots. He then had his fingers broken by a corporal who jumped on them while two others held his arms out. All this happened within about ten minutes of him being dragged in.
Another instance was while I was on a foot patrol in the Catholic area of Belfast. We encountered a small group of kids who began to throw bottles and so on … and as usual the army over-reacted. Before long there was a rather larger crowd. After a while there were a few shots fired at the army and I was ordered to search, with two others, some back alleyways.

A boy of about 16 was stopped in an alleyway by an NCO who was pointing his rifle at him and telling the boy that he was going to kill him. He kept asking the boy – who by this time had a dark patch down his jeans and was shaking a lot – what it felt like to know that you’re going to die any moment. The NCO kept this up for about five minutes, then told the boy to go away (in different words, of course).

The boy went to his father, who went to the commanding officer that same day – who instantly denied everything.’ [Socialist Worker, 14th Aug. 1976].

 

The Army Offensive

After the discredited RUC was withdrawn from use to be retrained and rearmed, the soldiers became the British state’s only force for ‘law and order’ in Northern Ireland. Using Land Operations as their blueprint, with sections on ‘The Threat’ and ‘Principles for the Conduct of Counter Revolutionary Operations’ and details of how psychological operations, military actions and political initiatives must be co-ordinated, they set to work. Under commanders like Kitson, all of this could now be acted out on the streets in Northern Ireland. So, given carte blanche by Westminster and egged on by the Unionists in Stormont, the army gradually embarked on a series of aggressive operations.

These actions, which included the Falls Curfew 1970, Internment 1971, Bloody Sunday 1972 and Operation Motorman 1972, quickly turned Northern Ireland into a zone of on-going conflict. These hostile acts, however, did not cow the Nationalists and instead only bred a violent resistance. The Sunday Times Insight Team reported that after the Falls Curfew: ‘In the months that followed, recruitment to the Provisionals [IRA] was dizzily fast: the movement grew from fewer than a hundred activists in May-June to nearly 800 by December.’ [Ulster, by the Sunday Times Insight Team, Penguin Special 1972].

Westminster had ordered internment after it had been demanded by the Unionist Government at Stormont. The weeks after it was implemented saw a sharp rise in protests and violent resistance. Some of the soldiers on the ground, who had to face this backlash, developed strong views against internment and some of these were outlined in the regimental magazine of the Royal Marines’ 45 Commando:

‘The British Army, as the instrument of internment, has become the object of Catholic animosity. Since that day the street battles, countless explosions, migrations from mixed areas and cold-blooded killings have done little to reassure us that internment would, by the removal of the gunner, provide a return to a semblance of law and order, a basis for a political solution to Ulster’s problems.

Ironically it appears to have produced the opposite effect:

‘the Catholic population of Northern Ireland is now even more alienated and hope that Catholics and Protestants could live in harmony is even more remote… Fortunately 45’s stay in this depressing and unhappy country is a short one. The recent shootings of British soldiers during the past week and the continuing explosions make it evident that internment was quite inefficacious. It has, in fact, increased terrorist activity, perhaps boosted IRA recruitment, polarised further the Catholic and Protestant communities and reduced the ranks of the much needed Catholic moderates. In a worsening situation it is difficult to imagine a solution.’ [Reprinted in Pig in the Middle – the Army in Northern Ireland by Desmond Hamill, Methuen Ltd, London 1985].

The magazine’s editor, an officer who believed the article reflected the feelings of many soldiers, was hauled over the coals by the Under-Secretary for the Navy for publishing this view. There had also been an on-going debate in Nationalist areas about if they should they continue their civil rights struggle by peaceful political means? Or resort to using violent resistance? Bloody Sunday, after 13 demonstrators were shot dead by soldiers of the Parachute Regiment in Derry, resolved this discussion in favour of the latter. The day after Bloody Sunday there were long queues of local people, outside the Sinn Fein office in Derry – and they all wanted to join the IRA. British politicians and the Army top brass, however, did not change course. Instead, they actually increased the repression by launching Operation Motorman against the resistance in Nationalists areas and then built a series of army forts in the heart of these now conquered territories.

The forts were ugly structures, surrounded by a high corrugated-iron fence, and topped with barbed wire, with look-out posts at regular intervals. There was constant danger of attacks, from snipers and petrol and mortar bombs. Inside, the troops were cooped-up in overcrowded and unsanitary living accommodation. In this hostile and alienating situation, one of the only ways for soldiers to relieve their frustrations was to take it out on the ‘enemy’ outside. In tandem, the undercover or ‘dirty,’ war became especially important, with ‘counter-gangs’ and collusion being used extensively. Psychological warfare techniques and manipulation of the media, including censorship, also assumed great importance. Despite this – or perhaps more likely because of it – resistance continued to increase.

With the British Government and media still hailing the troops as ‘peacekeepers,’ some soldiers liked this more aggressive role. Others just wanted to survive their tour of duty and they kept their heads down, obeyed orders and did not ask any awkward questions. A few, like Royal Marine Chris Byrne, who was stationed in North Belfast, started to have doubts:

‘I was sent to the North the day after my 18th birthday … I was stationed in Tactical HQ as an orderly for a period. Anyone arrested and all suspects were brought in there for screening. My room where I slept was right next door to the interrogation room and every night you’d hear people coming in and getting roughed up, their heads being banged against the walls, screaming and everything. I was more annoyed at losing my sleep than anything else at the time …

I saw lots of blokes who had been given a real hammering. One of the first things I saw when I arrived there was a little room called “The Box.” It was about 10 feet by 10 feet with a table and chair in it – and it was covered in blood. Other blokes said – “It’s just from blokes who get a working over.” There were pictures in the Intelligence Room of blokes propped up between two marines, really smashed to pulp…

When I was there I didn’t understand the situation, but I tried to keep my mind open. I was willing to listen. I used to read the Irish News. I was one of the few people who read it. Then the CO banned it because it started reporting incidents of my unit beating people up. I complained and then people began to accuse me of being a sympathiser – in a joking way – but on occasions people got a bit serious. At times I was threatened physically by people who were frustrated with it all and saw me as a bit sympathetic to the other side. But I wasn’t – I was just against killing from any quarter.’ [Chris Byrne, ex-Royal Marine, British Soldiers Speak Out On Ireland, Information On Ireland 1978].

 

Dissenting Soldiers

Most soldiers went to Northern Ireland believing they would be doing a worthwhile job, but once there many, just like Chris Byrne, became disillusioned by the reality. Captain Mike Biggs, who left the army as a conscientious objector because of his experiences in Northern Ireland, was interviewed on BRM Radio in Birmingham by presenter Ed Doolan:

Ed Doolan: Former army captain Mike Biggs caused quite a stir when he wanted to leave the army. I’m going to ask Mike to give us his story. Mike, now you went over to Ireland when?
Mike Biggs: Back in June 1973 and I stayed until September 1973.

Ed Doolan: Take me through those months and what happened to you as a person and what you decided to do.
Mike Biggs: Perhaps I should say that I went out there feeling I was a peace-keeper, I was part of a peace-keeping force. Through my own experience, through the patrolling on the streets, I suddenly realised that I couldn’t see myself as a peace-keeper – just through the reaction from the community and the way we were patrolling a certain area.

Ed Doolan: Now you’d better expand on that reaction from the community.
Mike Biggs: I said I thought I was a peace-keeper and I approached members of the community – basically people of my own age, who I thought might have a similar interest – and the suspicion and antagonism with which they greeted me, because I was there in army uniform and with a weapon – there was no way that they could believe me when I said, ‘Look, I really do want to know what you’re at.’ The uniform and the weapon told them something otherwise.

Ed Doolan: Was that irrespective of the religion and background of the people you were talking to?
Mike Biggs: Well, in Newry where I was, it’s a predominantly Roman Catholic area, so you have to say that most of the people I came into contact with would have been Catholics. In Newry I also saw that rather than peace-keeping between the Catholics and the small Protestant community, we were pushing a wedge through, which was furthering the division between the two communities. I could see that we were actually polarising them.

Ed Doolan: How were you doing that?
Mike Biggs: The Protestants certainly associated strongly with the army. They gave us all the goodies, they came to us, they saw us quite often. A patrol in a Protestant estate was always a vehicle one and was always considered an easy ride. Whereas in the Catholic estates, in particular in Derrybeg – we were there very frequently on foot and on patrol, and certainly the attitude adopted by the patrol was a far more no-nonsense attitude, a very hard-line one, which reflected once again the attitude that was instilled into us – to be very suspicious of the Catholics because they are the people who are likely to harbour the IRA, and they are the people who are likely to give you trouble. I went out to Northern Ireland thinking that would be the case. What I gained from my experience there was that I questioned whether their antagonism was because we were patrolling their areas so frequently, because we certainly were. We were there day and night incessantly.

Ed Doolan: What about the attitude of you and your mates when you were patrolling? You have been quoted as saying that you didn’t think that you as the army behaved particularly well towards the population.
Mike Biggs: Once again it’s this peace-keeping myth. I saw us as occupying an area and I think our presence there, without naming specific incidents, was a harassing one. Because the local populace could be searched, they could have their houses searched at any time. And so there was the physical presence of us being there, being occupied physically, and also psychologically, so that people wouldn’t do certain things because of the army’s presence there. Quite often there was no real concrete evidence that the houses we searched, or the people we searched, were harbourers of the IRA people or of any kind of information. We were seeking out information on anybody, on as many people as possible.

Ed Doolan: At random?
Mike Biggs: No systematically. Going through streets so that we’d know which houses we’d checked recently, the details of the people, how many people there were in the family, where they worked, what they were doing … and each battalion that goes out there builds up a very systematic checkout on all the people. [Full text in Voices For Withdrawal, Information On Ireland 1980].

Later on, in the mid-80s, Tony Parker interviewed a number of serving soldiers for his book Soldier Soldier. A young 2nd-lieutenant, then on a tour of duty in Derry, told Parker:

‘I’ve only just come to Londonderry and I think it really is, it’s a really shitty job like sewer cleaning. I think about my own home town, and try to imagine myself going round with a platoon in the streets at night, knocking on the doors of people’s houses and demanding to be let in to search them. I can’t imagine doing that with people in my own home town. I can’t imagine living in my own home town and people coming and doing that to us. I reckon it’s a pretty shitty job, I really do.’ [Soldier Soldier, by Tony Parker, Heinemann 1985].

Later on, a more senior officer, a major, said to Parker: ‘Last week I had to write to the parents of one of my lads and tell them he’d been killed. I told them he was a soldier, he died for his country, and he died in a most honourable situation as a member of a peace-keeping force, doing his best for all the people of this country. But I don’t know what I’m supposed to say in letters like that, what I’m supposed to write. We all know there’s no solution to this fucking problem and the best thing we can do is go away.’[Soldier Soldier, by Tony Parker, Heinemann 1985]

Even officers from some of the most prestigious regiments became disillusioned, like ex-Captain Morgan-Grenville who retired from the British Army after a five-year career with the Coldstream Guards. Acting as his unit’s operations officer he completed a tour of duty stationed in the South Armagh village of Forkhill. After retiring he was interviewed by David McKittrick, then London editor of the Irish Times:

‘The former captain is adamant that half or more officers share his view that a planned withdrawal of troops should be carried out. “Fifty or sixty per cent of serving officers thought along the same lines,” he told me. “I don’t think you would find a brigadier or a general who would publicly say that – it would be more than his career was worth. But you would certainly find many junior officers of that opinion. When they get back to England they tend to forget about the problem, so the numbers for withdrawal would drop slightly. But while we were over there, even the most conservative minded officer – and I belonged to a conservative-minded regiment – could be heard muttering ‘What the hell are we doing here, let’s get out.’ From junior lieutenants aged 19 and fresh out of Sandhurst to grizzled lieutenant-colonels, they thought likewise.”

Mr. Morgan-Grenville said his regiment was very concerned to ensure that its soldiers should not feel their job in the North was pointless. “We spent a lot of time trying to explain the history of Ireland to the men, trying to dress up our own role so it looked as though they weren’t risking their lives for a futile cause. But among thinking officers there was a very strong sense of futility and pointlessness, and a lack of positive morale”.’ [Irish Times, 8th March 1984].

 

The Training Ground

Throughout the period of conflict, the troops were being given an increasingly more intensive period of training before their tours of duty. To aid this, ‘Tin City’ training areas were built in army base areas in Britain and across the world. These mock-up Irish townships were seen as a vital final training centre – to prepare soldiers for the projected close quarter fighting in Northern Ireland. And, as had been predicted, by the mid-70s Northern Ireland had become a testing ground for troop tactics and the production of systems and weapons for social control. In 1978, the Irish Times reported on the profits to be made from these developments: ‘Earlier this year (April 5th) over £200 millions worth of defence communications equipment was sold by British firms to Saudi Arabia. The systems will be mainly for use in internal security and the installation will be monitored by the British Ministry of Defence. The system absorbs refinements developed “on the ground” in Northern Ireland.’ The report continued:

‘During May of last year the British Ministry of Defence sold equipment and services to the Shah of Iran to the value of £200 million. And a proportion of that sum was for anti-terrorist and counter-terrorist expertise and equipment. The personnel of half-a-dozen anti-terrorist agencies have been on liaison or “secondment” tours of duty in the North, as have the boffins and the product-testers of a wide range of espionage equipment. When we read of Britain’s Special Air Service involvement in the rescue of hostages at Mogadishu, that is but an accidental spin-off which Britain’s anti-terrorist industry has been quietly garnishing for years.

What, specifically, have been the military advantages to Britain of the Northern situation? Primarily, an actual role for an Army which at 172,000 (land forces of 1970) was being drastically run down until the IRA revived it during the 1970s. Subsidiary benefits included an accelerated development of materials and equipment during the ’70s, geared specifically to urban disturbances, street surveillance, limited local response in riot control – the hardware and software of reaction, from night sights to miniature, unmanned helicopters for street and area surveillance. Add computer storage of intelligence input and you are naming the kind of industrial expertise most countries of the world now have a use for.’ [Irish Times, 27th April 1978].

The Arms Trade is one of the few world markets where Britain can still claim to be a leading seller. In 1993, the Minister of State for Defence Procurement, Jonathan Aitken, told the House of Commons:

‘Britain’s defence exports for 1992 were £4.5 billion, representing 20% of the world market. Those were record figures. In the month of January 1993, British companies won orders in the middle and far-east with a value approaching that of our world-wide defence exports for the whole of 1992, so we now expect that 1993 will be another record-breaking year. We regard this as a satisfactory contribution to the economy.’[Hansard, 9th Feb. 1993].

In that same year, 1993, the Labour MP, Tony Benn, issued this statement:

‘I asked the House of Commons research department to calculate the total cost of the [Northern Ireland] emergency and, at current prices, the cost of the war has been £14.5 billion.’[Statewatch, Nov.-Dec. 1993].

It was clear that while Irish people and British soldiers were dying in Northern Ireland and arms firms made huge profits from this new technology of repression, British taxpayers were paying vast sums for the on-going conflict. The subvention to Northern Ireland alone was running in the billions (this was the figure for public spending in NI over and above what NI raised itself in taxes). This figure included the costs of the police and prisons, but did not include the costs of the Army. The cost of the Northern Ireland commitment for the British Army was estimated for 1993 to be £405.6 million. Also in 1992 and 1993 two IRA bombs in the City of London caused damage estimated to be approaching £1.8 billion.

The Army top brass, however, had not been slow to realise that soldiers continually involved in a real, if limited, war could become some of the ‘best trained’ in the world. As reported in The Times, many senior officers could see the benefits of using Northern Ireland as a training ground:

‘When soldiers moved on to the streets of Northern Ireland in August 1969, Lt-Gen Sir Ian Freeland, General Officer Commanding in the province, gloomily predicted they would be there for 10 years. He thought he was erring on the side of pessimism. But he also foresaw hidden benefits for the new model army, recreated after the end of National Service, in that respect he displayed more prescience … Northern Ireland has given several generations of officers and NCOs the experience of commanding troops in action. Lieutenant-colonels, in their late thirties, responsible for the safety of 500 men in, say, West Belfast or the dangerous border country round Bessbrook Mill, have matured as battalion commanders in the province.

The details might be specific to Northern Ireland. But the lessons have a wider application – which found full expression seven years ago in the Falklands. The proficiency of those who landed at San Carlos owed much to their experience in Ulster. The battles for Port Stanley and Goose Green were partly won in Belfast and Londonderry … The hiss of an incoming bullet in the Falls probably trains a soldier more quickly and efficiently than two weeks in a classroom at the School of Infantry, as senior officers privately acknowledge.

… A new generation of young men have grown up with no memory of life before 1969. To them the Army has always been in Ulster. The Army has thus become not only one of the world’s most experienced in countering terrorism but one whose fighting edge has been finely honed.’ [The Times, 8th Aug. 1989, by Henry Stanhope].

Given all that was happening in Northern Ireland, you would have thought that in our Parliament a high level of concern would undoubtedly be being expressed about this issue. In 1992 an ex-Tory MP, Matthew Parris, wrote in the magazine Spectator about his time at Westminster during the conflict:

‘In seven years as a government backbencher I do not think I encountered more than a handful of MPs on either side who cared much what happened to Ulster … Most of the rest of us went along, more or less, with the policy of Her Majesty’s Government, whatever that was – “not giving in to the men of violence” or something. But we tended to find, when Ireland was debated, that we had other things to do … And so it was that, though from the day I entered Parliament I never had the slightest doubt that Britain both must and eventually will disengage from Ulster, I never said so.’ [Spectator, 25th Jan. 1992].

 

The Vietnam Syndrome 

While opinion polls showed that the majority of the British people, despite decades of propaganda about Northern Ireland, wanted to see the withdrawal of their soldiers, the inability of Westminster politicians to break from a Unionist agenda meant them continuing to send young soldiers out onto the streets of Belfast, Derry and country areas like Crossmaglen. In the face of mounting casualties, even from the early days it became evident that many of the soldiers were becoming fed up with their role in Northern Ireland.

In April 1974, Christopher Dobson – ‘With the troops in Ulster’s ugly world of terrorism’ – had filed this report in the Sunday Telegraph: ‘To walk along Belfast’s Royal Avenue today is like walking in the past – along Ledra Street in Nicosia when Eoka’s murderers were at work. Venturing into the Bogside in Derry is like taking a patrol into Aden’s Crater district, and dropping by helicopter into a border fort is like visiting a fire-base in Vietnam.’ Under the heading – ANGER OF ARMY THAT FEELS BETRAYED – Dobson continued:

‘So far more than 200 British soldiers have been killed while many more have been maimed. The soldiers’ work is hard, their pay is low and more often than not they receive curses instead of thanks from the people for whom they are dying. 

There can be no surprise therefore that the average soldier is thoroughly fed up with Ireland and everything to do with it. But what surprised me was the extent and depth of the bitterness that exists among the troops, some of whom are on their fifth tour of duty in Ulster.

I met a section who had just returned from an “Eagle patrol” – lifted in by helicopter to set a snap road block. They were tired, dirty and remarkably frank. I said to them: “Tell me what it is all about.” Their officers were present and I believe that they were also surprised at the depth of feeling that the troops displayed.

Soldiers are expected to grumble, but these men genuinely felt that they were being misused and ill-treated. Their complaints ranged over pay, excessively long hours, of being “forgotten,” and in particular the inability of “the bloody politicians” to settle the appalling mess in which the soldiers found themselves targets of both sides.

… Just as the American soldiers in Vietnam used to divide their existence between “the Nam” and “the World” so do the British soldiers in Ulster, with only the world outside seeming real while they lead a surrealistic existence in an unreal world punctured by the brutal reality of bombs and bullets.

They feel that the people outside cannot understand this strange world of theirs and they feel cut off, forgotten. The impression they have is of people in safe England, so very close, watching their television sets, seeing the explosions and the bodies, saying, “How terrible,” and then turning to something really interesting like the price of petrol.’ [Sunday Telegraph, 7th April 1974].

The early years of the conflict in Northern Ireland had coincided with the latter years of the Vietnam War. In the US Oliver Stone, a Vietnam veteran, made a series of films about the American involvement in Vietnam. In the Guardian, the journalist Martin Woollacott wrote about Stone:

‘This idea of an America fighting itself is at the heart of his vision of Vietnam. The corruption of American society, in his argument, was such that an immoral government started a bad war and a degenerate middle class pushed the burden of fighting it off on to the poor and the ignorant. They, in turn, filled with anger at the way in which they had been abused, turned their rage on the Vietnamese.’ [Guardian, 18th Jan. 1994].

Clearly, much of Stone’s view of the American / Vietnam situation was finding an echo in Britain’s policy on Northern Ireland.

I joined the army at sixteen years-of-age in 1960 and I entered that decade respecting and trusting the establishment. Gradually, I began to question them – and then I laughed at them, opposed them and wanted to see them replaced. As a soldier I had served in a then passive Northern Ireland for a few months in 1968, just before I had bought myself out of the army. I then came to London to help organise the anti-Vietnam War demonstrations, which I had attended while still a soldier. After the situation in Ireland exploded in late 1969, I was involved with Irish civil rights and anti-internment groups. Then in late 1973 I was one of the people who founded the Troops Out Movement (TOM). A number of Northern Ireland veterans, who had left the army because they did not agree with the conflict, joined or worked with the TOM – including several of those quoted in this article. We had an informal ex-soldiers section and marched on ‘troops out’ demonstrations behind an ‘Ex-soldiers Against the War in Ireland’ banner.

While I was still serving, in 1967, I remember being influenced by the actions taken by Muhammad Ali, the then US and World Heavyweight Boxing champion. He had received his draft order for Vietnam, but Ali refused to go and this led to his arrest, trial and conviction for draft evasion. This is what he said to explain his actions:
‘Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go ten thousand miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights?

‘No, I am not going ten thousand miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end. I have been warned that to take such a stand would put my prestige in jeopardy and could cause me to lose millions of dollars which should accrue to me as the champion. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is right here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality…’

Thirty years previously, just before the start of the Second World War, Bertolt Brecht, a play-write who opposed the Nazis, wrote a series of poems and satires about the German Army that included the following:

Those at the top say comradeship
Reigns in the army.
The truth of this is seen
In the cookhouse.
In their hearts should be
The selfsame courage. But
On their plates
Are two kinds of rations.

When it comes to marching many do not know
That their enemy is marching at their head.
The voice which gives them their orders
Is their enemy’s voice and
The man who speaks of the enemy
Is the enemy himself.

In the foreword to Operation BANNER General Sir Mike Jackson stated that:

‘The immediate tactical lessons of Operation BANNER have already been exported elsewhere, with considerable success. Operations in the Balkans, Sierra Leone, East Timor, Afghanistan and Iraq have already demonstrated both the particular techniques and the levels of expertise learnt through hard experience, both on the streets and in the fields of Northern Ireland.’

In Operation Banner, however, it is also admitted that when the army started its activities the IRA was a small, almost moribund, organisation. But never is the question asked: Did the aggressive activities of the army help spark conflict and create violent opposition? Instead, the top brass claim their repressive tactics are a great success and, in conjunction with the ruling politicians, export them around the world for use in new conflicts.

Surely veterans are better served by standing with the likes of Ali, in opposition to these wars, and with Brecht, who pointed out who our true enemy is – than with any of our present day political and military leaders and the spin-doctors they employ to write fiction about their reasons for launching wars and their justifications afterwards. In Northern Ireland it was the aggressive actions of the army that helped create a conflict. Since then, in many other places, the politicians and the top brass have done the same thing over and over again.

Aly Renwick served with the British Army in Thailand during the war in Vietnam, he is a member of Veterans For Peace UK

Please sign the following petition;

https://www.change.org/p/philip-hammond-mp-sign-the-united-nations-resolution-on-depleted-uranium-weapons

I would like to thank you all for signing this petition. Depleted uranium has contaminated Iraq since the first Gulf War, this contamination increased during the invasion of 2003 and subsequent occupation. Reports from doctors about significant rises in birth defects and cancers are being ignored. The US’s refusal to say where they fired the weapons is making clean-up and health assistance impossible. It is imperative that we stand up and hold our governments to account on this issue. They must stop blocking international action on the environmental contamination in Iraq.

I will be handing in the petition to Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond on Friday 28 November. I will be joined by the Campaign Against Depleted Uranium and members of Veterans For Peace, it would be great if you could join us too.

Friday 28 November,
1400hrs ,
FCO Main Building, King Charles Street, London, SW1A 2AH.

We only have two days left to get as many signatures as possible on the petition to show the FCO just how strongly UK citizens feel about the damage in Iraq that has been done in our name. Please share it on your social media networks and email. If we all get two more people to sign we will have more than 10,000 signatures.

I hope you will be able to make it on Friday. If not, pictures will be posted on CADU’s social media.

Peace

Ben Griffin
Coordinator
Veterans For Peace UK

Updates will be posted on this Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/events/663823847072523/?ref=22

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ukCADU

Twitter: @CADU_UK

Germany, Austria and Italy are standing together in the middle of a pub when Serbia bumps into Austria and spills Austria’s pint.

Austria demands Serbia buy it a complete new suit because there are splashes on its trouser leg.

Germany expresses its support for Austria’s point of view.

Britain recommends that everyone calm down a bit, (whilst working out who is the biggest threat to the power of the British Empire. Ed)

Serbia points out that it can’t afford a whole suit, but offers to pay for the cleaning of Austria’s trousers.

Russia and Serbia look at Austria.

Austria asks Serbia who it’s looking at.

Russia suggests that Austria should leave its little brother alone.

Austria inquires as to whose army will assist Russia in compelling it to do so.

Germany appeals to Britain that France has been looking at it, and that this is sufficiently out of order that Britain should not intervene.

Britain replies that France can look at who it wants to, that Britain is looking at Germany, too, and what is Germany going to do about it?

Germany tells Russia to stop looking at Austria, or Germany will render Russia incapable of such action.

Britain and France ask Germany whether it’s looking at Belgium.

Turkey and Germany go off into a corner and whisper. When they come back, Turkey makes a show of not looking at anyone.

Germany rolls up its sleeves, looks at France, and punches Belgium.

France and Britain punch Germany.

Austria punches Russia.

Germany punches Britain and France with one hand and Russia with the other.

Russia throws a punch at Germany, but misses and nearly falls over.

Japan calls over from the other side of the room that it’s on Britain’s side, but stays there.

Turkey punches Russia in the back of the head when Russia isn’t looking.

Britain and France tell Turkey that’s not on and once they’ve sorted Germany out Turkey’s next.

Italy surprises everyone by punching Austria.

Australia and New Zealand punch Turkey, and gets punched back. There are no hard feelings though because Britain made them do it.

France gets thrown through a plate glass window, but gets back up and carries on fighting.

Russia gets thrown through another one, gets knocked out, suffers brain damage, and wakes up with a complete personality change.

Italy throws a punch at Austria and misses, but Austria falls over anyway. Italy raises both fists in the air and runs round the room chanting.

America waits till Germany is about to fall over from sustained punching from Britain and France, then walks over and smashes it with a barstool, then pretends it won the fight all by itself.

By now all the chairs are broken and the big mirror over the bar is shattered.

Britain, France and America agree that Germany threw the first punch, so the whole thing is Germany’s fault.

While Germany is still unconscious, they go through its pockets, steal its wallet, and buy drinks for all their friends.

This article was sent in by Garry Harriman, author unknown.

Monday 24 November 2014,
1230 HRS

Old Palace Yard,
NR Houses of Parliament,
London
SW1P 3JY

New Campaign Calls for the Release of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo

24 November 2014 marks the 13th anniversary of the capture of Shaker Aamer, a legal British resident with a British wife and four British children, by bounty hunters in Afghanistan, where he had travelled to provide humanitarian aid.

Mr. Aamer arrived in Guantánamo on 14 February 2002, the day his youngest son was born, and he is still held, even though he has twice been approved for release by the US authorities – under President Bush in 2007 and under President Obama in 2009 – and the British government has been calling for his return since 2007.

The reasons for Mr. Aamer’s ongoing imprisonment have never been adequately explained, but an independent medical expert recently confirmed that he has serious physical ailments and mental health issues as a result of his long imprisonment without charge or trial.

Any further delay is unacceptable, especially as, yesterday, five Guantánamo prisoners cleared for release (from Yemen and Tunisia) were given new homes in Georgia and Slovakia, while Shaker Aamer, who could easily be returned to the UK, is still held.

The ‘We Stand With Shaker’ campaign is encouraging celebrities and members of the public worldwide to take part in our photo campaign, to educate the public about Mr. Aamer’s plight, and to put pressure on the British government to demand his immediate release.

Please come along, in orange jumpsuits if possible, and with signs saying “I Stand With Shaker” to show your support!

For further information;
Joanne MacInnes, campaign co-ordinator: +44 (0)7867 553580
Andy Worthington, campaign director: standwithshaker@gmail.com

The stories of Harry Roberts & the ‘Black Panther’
By Aly Renwick

Throughout past centuries British soldiers were engaged in many conflicts overseas. After wars, the streets back home were usually filled with discharged veterans. Many were wounded, either physically or psychologically, who the authorities did very little to help. Others were feared, being quick to fly into rages and liable to use violence. All the ex-soldiers received little reward for their service, or disabilities, and Henry Mayhew, who wrote many articles about the poor, described some of these veterans from the Crimea War:

‘The first, or soldier proper, has all the evidence of drill and barrack life about him; the eye that always ‘fronts’ the person he addresses; the spare habit, high cheekbones, regulation whisker, stiff chin … He carries his papers with him, and when he has been wounded or seen service, is modest and retiring as to his share of glory …

The second sort of soldier-beggar is one of the most dangerous and violent mendicants. Untameable even by regimental discipline, insubordinate by nature, he has been thrust out from the army to prey on society … and is dangerous to meet with after dark on a lonely road …’

One hundred-and-ten years later, in the 1966/67 soccer season, gangs of youths in football grounds up and down England, used the following jingle to taunt the police who faced them on the terraces:

Harry Roberts – he’s our man,
He shoots cops – bang, bang, bang.

Roberts had always been a bit of a tearaway, having left school early after already getting a conviction for handling stolen goods. In 1956, on release from borstal, where he served a 19-month sentence, he was called up for National Service. Ten years later, on a sunny afternoon, two weeks after England had won the football World Cup, news broke that three policemen had been shot dead on a West London street, just a few miles from Wembley Stadium. Two men were quickly arrested and a search undertaken for the third man, who was known to have started the shooting and killed two of the policemen.
After a three-month manhunt, described as the biggest ever launched in Britain, Harry Roberts was caught hiding in a wood near Bishop’s Stortford. He had been living rough in a camouflaged hide made of wood and plastic bags. To evade the police he had used survival skills, which were taught to him while in the army:

‘He … joined the Rifle Brigade, becoming a marksman and a lance corporal and served in Malaya during the emergency; jungle training and guerrilla warfare taught him much and hardened him.’
[The Murders of the Black Museum 1870 – 1970, by Gordon Honeycombe, Bloomsbury Books 1992].

Malaya, at that time, was producing over a third of the world’s natural rubber and it, along with tin, accounted for three quarters of that country’s exports. The war was about keeping these in the hands of British businessmen.
Sixty-six years ago on 11th December 1948, just after the start of the ‘Malayan Emergency,’ men of the Scots Guards were ordered to round up civilians on a plantation near Batang Kali and separate the men from the women and children. That evening one of the male unarmed villagers was killed by the soldiers and the next day 23 others were murdered by them. One of the victims was found headless. [See ‘Anniversary of the massacre at Batang Kali’ on VFP posts]
In 1952, a speech by Gerald Templer, the British High Commissioner of Malaya, had been broadcast in Australia. Templer, who later was appointed Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1955, told his radio audience: ‘The hard core of communists in this country are fanatics and must be, and will be, exterminated.’ [The Ambiguities of Power – British Foreign Policy Since 1945, by Mark Curtis, Zed Books 1995]. British Army units then started to keep score boards of CTs (Communist Terrorists) killed. A National Serviceman described how units who had killed ‘CTs’ used to bring the bodies back for identification. After a bit, they brought back the heads only:

‘As Private Houchin walked past me, I noticed he was carrying a large, round object, wrapped in a poncho, on his back. He usually had a ready smile, but this time he looked a bit grim and, when I asked him what he was carrying, he just said, “A head.” I couldn’t believe it, so he explained. It seems that the bodies were proving so difficult to carry that the lieutenant had ordered the Ibans to chop the heads off, so that just the heads could be brought out of the jungle as evidence. The Ibans … had refused this grisly task, so the lieutenant had ordered some of his men to do it. Poor Private Houchin seemed full up with emotion, so I went to have a word with Lieutenant Surtees.
When I got near to Surtees, I saw that the other lieutenant was with him, and they seemed to be discussing the very issue … so I just hung around within earshot. … I heard Surtees tell him that such actions would give the men nervous breakdowns. As far as Houchin was concerned he was right, for he was the man who was to cry out in his sleep.’ [Rex Flowers, who served with the Lincolnshire Regiment, told in Six Campaigns – National Servicemen at War 1948-1960, edited by Adrian Walker, Leo Cooper 1993].

In his book, The Malayan Emergency, Robert Jackson quoted a young British officer who had been involved in the fighting: ‘We were shooting people. We were killing them. … This was raw savage success. It was butchery. It was horror.’ Many of the soldiers were National Servicemen, and Jackson went on to state about them:

‘But, like seasoned jungle veterans, they became accustomed to it. They coped, and coped very well, and boys of 19 emerged from the jungle as men with leadership experience that would carry them through any experience they might encounter on their return to civilian life.’ [The Malayan Emergency: The Commonwealth’s War 1948 – 1966, by Robert Jackson, Routlidge 1991].

While this might have happened for some veterans, for others, like Roberts, it clearly did not. He was taught other, far worse, things.
In early 1993, after serving twenty-six years of a life sentence, the news leaked out that Roberts was being considered for parole. Police groups said Roberts should never be released and the Guardian journalist Nick Davies visited him in Dartmoor Prison – where Roberts told Davies about the police shootings:

‘We were professional criminals. We don’t react the same way as ordinary people. The police aren’t like real people to us. They’re strangers, they’re the enemy. And you don’t feel remorse for killing a stranger. I do feel sorry for what we did to their families. I do. But it’s like people I killed in Malaya when I was in the army. You don’t feel remorse.’ [Guardian, 2nd Feb. 1993].

Harry Roberts admitted to killing at least four people in Malaya and he told another veteran prisoner in jail that he had gotten into trouble with his army superiors for refusing to shoot another defenceless civilian. When he was demobbed from the army, his wife Margaret had said about him: ‘He seemed bitter, and talked about killing and the fear of battle and the danger … He seemed to have become slightly ruthless and much more tough.’ [Guardian, 2nd Feb. 1993].

At the end of 1974, in another part of England, this time the midlands and the north, the police were chasing a robber who had carried out a series of raids on post offices. The descriptions of the mystery man were always the same: army camouflage suit, black plimsolls, white gloves and covering his face was a black hood, across which a visor-like slash had been cut for eye holes. Nicknamed the ‘Black Panther’, the man was always armed with a pistol and a sawn-off shotgun. The robberies had netted him some £20,000, but he had left 3 men dead and others badly injured. In early 1975, the ‘Black Panther’ was to commit the crime that would bring him nationwide notoriety. He kidnapped 17-year-old Lesley Whittle, intending to ransom her for £50,000. But his victim met a horrible death. Lesley Whittle’s body was found tied up and naked, in the ventilating area of a sewer system. Around her neck was a noose of wire with which her kidnapper had secured her to an iron ladder. A huge manhunt was launched, but it was not until the end of 1975 that the ‘Black Panther’ was unmasked and captured.

Donald Nappy had been born in Morley, near Bradford, in 1936. After being taunted at school as ‘Dirty Nappy’, in later life he changed his name to Neilson. A neighbour said Neilson was: ‘Rather secretive …He looked every inch a part-time paratrooper. We called him “Castro” because he always wore battledress and marched down the street.’ [More Murders of the Black Museum 1835 – 1985, by Gordon Honeycombe, Arrow Books 1994]. In early 1955, Neilson, then 19 years old, had been called up for his National Service. Afterwards he stated: ‘I enjoyed my time in the Army. But I never admitted owt about it … It’s possible to be afraid and at the same time to enjoy oneself.’ For most of his time in the army Neilson was involved in colonial conflicts. He served his term of National Service with the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry:

‘His two years in the Army shaped his life, giving him interests and excitements unknown before: the peculiar pleasure of jungle warfare and survival skills, of the power of weapons, of fitness and self-reliance. He relished the hide-and-seek thrills of security patrols, dealing with Mau Mau gangs on Mount Kenya, EOKA guerrillas in Cyprus, and Arab nationalists in Aden. A fellow soldier, who had served in Kenya, said: “After Morley it was a bit like paradise. The sun was always shining … I wouldn’t look any further than Kenya to work out how Nappy [Neilson] learned the tricks of his trade … In a way it’s not surprising that one of our number used his training for illegal purposes in later life”.’ [More Murders of the Black Museum 1835 – 1985, by Gordon Honeycombe, Arrow Books 1994].

All countries who sent men to fight in foreign wars experienced difficulties with some of their returning troops. Colonial conflicts, especially, were usually dirty and brutal affairs and often morally corrupting for those caught up in them. Most National Servicemen sent to Kenya experienced killings, like these soldiers who found a hut in a ‘prohibited area’ and waited in ambush inside:

‘As the Mau Mau bent over to come in, he [one of the other soldiers] opened up with the Bren gun. The weight of the bullets pushed the Mau Mau back; but when [he] stopped firing, of course, with the momentum, the Mau Mau started to come in again. So [he] shot him again. When we saw him the next morning, oh God! he was shot to pieces; but … they could still hear him moaning out there after they’d actually shot him. The corporal said to the rifleman to go out and finish him off. This little lad, a Londoner, he … went out there and put the actual muzzle of the rifle on his forehead and pulled the trigger; but the next morning … we saw he’d actually shot him in the throat, he was shaking so much. He would have been dead, anyway; he had his kidneys hanging out – you imagine, half a magazine of Bren.
… in the Aberdare Forest you were allowed to shoot any black man – if he’s black, you shoot him because he’s Mau Mau – it was a prohibited area.’ [Ron Hawkes, who served with the Royal Irish Fusiliers, told in Six Campaigns – National Servicemen at War 1948-1960, edited by Adrian Walker, Leo Cooper 1993].

Some young soldiers, like Neilson, called up for National Service, trained and indoctrinated for combat against ‘terrorists’ and then thrust into the middle of a colonial conflict, would find their later life dominated by their brutalising experiences:

‘He spent six months in Kenya altogether. Those six months probably had a greater influence on what was to become of him than any other period of his life. They began with an intensive period of jungle warfare training, when he was taught how to fight with the rubber-stocked, short-barrelled .303 jungle rifle British troops in Kenya were issued with, and which bear a striking resemblance to sawn-off shotguns, and how to operate as a completely independent unit.
The tactics of the British were to cut off the terrorist supplies of food by preventing them from reaching the lowland farms of the white settlers which had been their main source of supply hitherto, and to harass and harry them in the forests … Nappy [Neilson] learned racialism and there were apparently other lessons to be learned too.
… Few national servicemen can have served in so many trouble spots as Nappy [Neilson] did in his two years with the Queen, or seen so much action. It was perhaps an experience he never really recovered from …’ [The Black Panther Story, by Steven Valentine, New English Library 1976].

The ‘Black Panther,’ ex-soldier and colonial war veteran Donald Neilson, received life sentences for each of four murders, plus 61 years for kidnapping. Thirty-five years after being jailed Neilson died in prison in 2011. Three years later the media reacted with shock and horror at the news that Harry Roberts was to be released after serving 47 years – and suggested that the 78 year-old prisoner should stay locked up and the key thrown away. If the politicians who had started those wars and sent Roberts and Neilson into those colonial conflicts were to be locked up too, perhaps one might agree. In 1966, after the three policemen had been shot dead at Shepherd’s Bush, the Daily Mail had expressed its outrage at the shootings in an editorial:

‘In Britain the policeman is still the walking sign which says that a society has reached and takes for granted a certain stable normality of public order and decency … That is why the death of a policeman by violence is felt so deeply by us all. The deaths of the three men at Shepherd’s Bush, senselessly and deliberately gunned down on the job of maintaining that order and decency, come as a frightful shock that seems to rock the very earth. A dazed incredulity is followed by the realisation that order is not to be taken for granted. The jungle is still there. There are still wild beasts in it to be controlled.’
[Daily Mail, 13th Aug. 1966].

The actual connection with the jungle was that it was there, in Malaya and Kenya, that Roberts and Nielson had learned to kill for Queen and Country. On that fateful day in 1966 in Shepherd’s Bush the relatively civilised face of law and order at home, in the form of the unarmed London bobby, had met the uncivilised face of British colonial law and order, in the form of ex-soldier Harry Roberts. Brutalised by his experiences in Malaya, Roberts had brought that war home. The result was three dead policemen.
In 1942, George Orwell wrote an essay about Rudyard Kipling at a time when our maps were still full of the red of empire. Describing Kipling as ‘the prophet of British imperialism in its expansionist phase’, Orwell then attacked Kipling’s jingoistic pro-imperialism. Later, however, Orwell made the following observation:

‘We all live by robbing Asiatic coolies, and those of us who are “enlightened” all maintain that those coolies ought to be set free; but our standard of living, and hence our “enlightenment,” demands that the robbery shall continue. A humanitarian is always a hypocrite, and Kipling’s understanding of this is perhaps the central secret of his power to create telling phrases. It would be difficult to hit off the one-eyed pacifism of the English in fewer words than in the phrase, “making mock of uniforms that guard you while you sleep.” It is true that Kipling does not understand the economic aspects of the relationship between the highbrow and the Blimp. He does not see that the map is painted red chiefly in order that the coolie may be exploited. Instead of the coolie he sees the Indian Civil Servant; but even on that plane his grasp of function, of who protects whom, is very sound. He sees clearly that men can only be highly civilised while other men, inevitably less civilised, are there to guard and feed them.’ [Horizon, Feb. 1942].

The wars from 1945, that Roberts and Neilson fought in to guard and feed us, occurred during the run-down of Empire. They were about preserving – or at least keeping safe – British economic and strategic interests in the remnants of Empire. Places like Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus and Aden, where British troops killed and were killed – and whose brutal events constitute a hidden history to most British people. After service in Britain’s colonial wars, few veterans were debriefed or received any preparation for re-entry back into civilian life. Back home, the result for Roberts’s and Neilson’s victims was death and mayhem, while the convicted veterans ended up serving long prison sentences. In all of this, one fact has been proved time after time after time, that when our government sends our young soldiers into brutal wars in far off lands, some of them, returning as veterans, will bring the ruthlessness and violence of those conflicts home.

Aly Renwick served with the British Army in Thailand during the Vietnam War.

 

Thursday 11 December 2014

12:00hrs – 19:15hrs

Royal Shakespeare Theatre,
Waterside,
Stratford-upon-Avon,
Warwickshire,
CV37 6BB

Gus Hales & Vince Chittock will be leafleting prior to the matinee and evening performance of the Royal Shakespeare Companies production of the Christmas Truce, it is the intention to attend the matinee performance post leafleting, then leaflet the evening performance. All welcome to join us, seeing the play is optional. VFP Hoodies please if possible. This event is in response to the sentimentality of the Sainsbury’s television commercial.

On Christmas Day 1914 British and German troops stopped fighting,
put down their weapons and united in a spirit of true brotherhood to
sing songs, exchange gifts and play football.

The soldiers were eventually ordered back into their trenches and
few survived to see the end of the war. The reality is that the war
dragged on for a further four years with an additional bloody cost
of millions of deaths and shattered lives.

Members of Veterans for Peace UK have dutifully served in theatres
of war from the D-Day landings to Afghanistan and Iraq. We exist to
foster the spirit of those who stopped fighting and put down their
weapons on Christmas Day 1914.

veteransforpeace.org.uk
veteransforpeaceuk@gmail.com
facebook.com/veteransforpeace.org.uk

Email: gushales@hotmail.co.uk for more info

Vincent Burke singing On Remembrance Day. Vincent kindly performed for VFP UK at our Remembrance gathering.

War-Weary Veterans Hold Alternative Remembrance Sunday Event

By Georgina Ryall

11/11/2014

WE MUST wear a poppy in November. Whether it’s a footballer walking onto a pitch, or a journalist reading the headlines, it is asked that no one be exempt from sporting this symbol.

It is the time of year when people put politics aside to commemorate the immeasurable human cost of continuous wars since 1914. However this year, a group of veterans have chosen to recognise the victims of war in an alternative way.

Veterans for Peace (VFP) are a UK based group of former military men and women who campaign for the abolition of, ‘war as an instrument of national policy’.

The organisation demand ‘justice for all those affected by war’. Which would extend to include the high number of military who take their own lives, the countless civilians now dead, injured or displaced as well as the victims of extraordinary rendition who have been subject to torture in prisons from Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay.

With the national remembrance commemorations leaving an increasing taste of hypocrisy in some of these veterans’ mouths, many choose to wear a white poppy if they choose to wear one at all.

This year VFP held their own Remembrance Sunday commemoration at The Cenotaph, the place where a few hours prior, leading politicians and members of the royal family led the national two minutes silence.

This is only the second time they have held this event and it saw veterans from wars ranging from Malaya to Iraq.

With their supporters in tow they walked sombrely through Whitehall to lay a wreath of white flowers under a banner with the plea, ‘Never Again’.

Members of the veterans group also wore jumpers with the revered WWI veteran, Harry Patch’s famous quote on the back: ‘War is organised murder, and nothing else’.

Despite the anti-war message however, the influence of military procedure remains steady in the members. None more so than in its founder, the whistleblowing former SAS soldier, Ben Griffin, known for taking the stage at the Oxford Union to tell why he will no longer ‘fight for Queen and country’.

The day before the Sunday commemorations, Mr Griffin carried out a meeting with soldierly vigour to go over VFP’s plans for the upcoming remembrance event. Each aspect of their commemoration is strategic, from the procession’s formation as they march through Whitehall to an even spread of the best singing voices for when they break into Pete Seeger’s, ‘Where Have All The Flowers Gone’.

Mr Griffin is adamant that Remembrance Sunday is a day of reflection, not protest. As such, any members sporting placards or megaphones will be swiftly stamped on by their support stewards.

He added, “And one wrong photo or one wrong word to the press and someone will be getting a phone call.”

He smiles. The room laughs. But no one wants that phone call.

What sets the group apart from similar pacifist organisations such as the Peace Pledge Union or the Quakers is that they all criticise the government’s war policies from a position of having seen the horrors first-hand.

Joe Glenton, 32, was imprisoned for nine months after exercising his right to conscientiously object to returning to fight in Afghanistan. He is now an author, activist and key member of VFP.

 

He said, “This is the powerful thing about veterans for peace; we are veterans. We’ve chewed the dirt and dodged the rockets, are you going to bloody tell me to wear a poppy? I’m a veteran, I’ll decide.”

Speaking about his time in Afghanistan he said, “Due to my developing political views and to some extent my PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) I refused to go back. I went through the chain of command but that wasn’t recognised, so I added to the other 23,000 guys who’ve gone AWOL (absent without leave) since Iraq.

“This led to being court martialled and eventually all the main charges were dropped but they still stung me with a nine-month prison sentence of which I served five months.”

Mr Glenton is a critic of the ‘glorification’ of the national remembrance commemorations. However he admits it is a heated topic even amongst his fellow members.

He said, “We have guys who are WWII veterans and veterans of the wars of colonisation who wear the red poppy and are very proud but these are people whose dads were in the First World War when the poppy had a kind of angry, insurgent feel, a symbol of anger that so many people had died.”

He added, “But for the war on terror generation it’s quite different. They feel that the red poppy has been hijacked and been taken very far away from its origins.

“My own personal view? I don’t think big business should be involved in the poppy appeal at all, particularly not arms companies who make money out of wars.”

Mr Glenton is referring to some of the poppy appeal’s sponsors such as aerospace company Lockheed Martin UK, who between developing war heads and ballistic missiles also sponsored this year’s ‘Poppyrocks Ball’ hosted by the Royal British Legion.

Criticisms of the poppy appeal range from over sentimentality at best to propaganda at worst but these claims are dampened somewhat when discovering just how much money the Royal British Legion needs to raise for the after care of former military and their families.

The RBL claim they need to make £40m from this year’s poppy appeal to carry out their much needed welfare work. While their forecast report for 2005- 2020 shows the troublingly ‘deep pocket of need among veterans and their families’.

The charity’s research concluded that within the adult ex-service community 3.88 million report a net household income of less than £10,000 per annum. More than half of the surviving ex-service community have a long-term illness or disability and in the 16-44 age group, the number of mental health disorders is three times that of non-military people of the same age.

The Royal British Legion has called for further investment in these matters and has also asked for a strategy on the culture of misuse of alcohol in the armed forces. Many soldiers cite alcohol abuse as a part of their difficult transition into home life. It is also thought to relate to the number of ex-servicemen and women currently lining UK prisons which could be at a much higher rate than government statistics previously showed.

A Ministry of Defence spokesperson responded to these matters by saying, “There is no quick fix to reduce alcohol misuse in the Armed Forces. We are taking action by educating personnel on the dangers of alcohol misuse to help them make informed decisions.”

They also told of a £7.2m investment to improve mental health services available to veterans.

Sadly, this still leaves a substantial hole in the funds needed, the burden of which falls at the door of charities such as the Royal British Legion, whose poppy appeal brought in almost a third of their annual revenue in 2013.

Mr Glenton, while appreciating that military personnel’s needs must be met does not believe that it should be a case of charitable burden and is critical of attempts to, ‘neo-liberalise care’.

He explained, “This isn’t new. When guys came back from the war after 1918 it was often the case that it was charities paying for care rather than government. Charities also run as big business and they can present care in a way that buys into the idea of the military as a force for good.”

While the veterans at VFP range in their political views they are united in wanting to increase public awareness of the costs of war.

Scots Guards veteran, turned spoken word artist, Michael John Pike (Spike), turned to substance abuse and narrowly avoided prison after his term in Northern Ireland at the height of the troubles in 1981.

Spike said, “I’m pretty much laying my ghosts now but for many, many years I was consumed with a pathological hatred of anything Irish or anything Republican, I couldn’t even look at a flag.”

He now wants to warn young, would-be soldiers of what lies ahead for them and one way Veterans for Peace do this is by visiting schools.

This is a bid to counteract the many military recruitment drives which also take place in schools around the UK, particularly in the most disadvantaged areas.

Curbing any overly graphic detail, children watch open mouthed as members of VFP tell them what it’s like to, ‘go and kick a family’s door in, in Iraq’ or, ‘what its actually like to be occupying someone else’s country’.

Spike has since turned things around and his booming voice was the one chosen to pierce the silence at the cenotaph on Sunday. He performed his poem, War Machine, where he criticises, ‘those men that wear suits and talk about God demanding the people wave flags and applaud’.

This group echo a wider feeling of war-weariness in the U.K and judging by the spectator support Veterans for Peace received this Sunday, will only be growing in size.

Because as one of their supporters, Vincent Burke, points out in his centenary remembrance day song:

‘If 2015 is a year without war, it will be the first in 100 years.’

Thank you to all supporters who followed us to The Cenotaph and helped us with the singing. We couldn’t have done it without you.

Thanks to Shaun Dey and Guy Smallman of Reelnews for the excellent film and pictures

Thanks to Mick Haggerty for another flawless recital of The Last Post

For an externally written report about the weekend click HERE

For anyone hesitating to attend this coming weekends Veterans For Peace Remembrance events, I would like to share a few words on the importance of activism or getting involved, however minor or important you may feel this is.

For many years I have been concerned at the high suicide rates and the treatment of former servicemen who present themselves as having what the medical profession calls PTSD. Over the years I have been asked to talk to medical students on the traumatic consequences of armed conflict both for soldiers and civilians, wives and families. In addition I have written many letters to most of the mental health related organisations emphasising the point that it is no good just throwing anti-depressants at those who have had insight into the true nature of warfare and its miserable consequences. I kept repeating to anyone prepared to listen that “waking up is not depression, and that anti-depressants are merely designed to put you back to sleep”. I thought my activism regarding this subject had run it’s course and there was nothing more to be said.

Then out of the blue in June this year I received a request from the College of Mental Health Pharmacy asking if I would give the opening presentation at the Annual International Psychiatric Pharmacy Conference. At last after many years I felt my repetitive bleating’s had been heard. So today, in front of the big players in this field I will be addressing this conference of Doctors, Psychiatrists, Pharmacists, Mental Health Practitioners and other associated professions. Hopefully if the message gets home we can avoid another sad loss.

The point I am trying to make is ‘GET ACTIVE.’ However, insignificant or trivial you may think your contribution is. It’s the drip drip that fills the pot, and the results might not appear obvious. So get the message out there; a letter to your local council, a solo protest, an attendance at a local meeting, a solitary vigil or attending a march, whatever it is just do it, and more importantly let other members know, so that you become an example for others to get involved.

It has always impressed me how (for the short time I have been aware of VFP) the likes of Jim Radford got the message out at the Albert hall, Ben Griffin at the Oxford Union and I recently attended an event with other VFP members at Queens University Belfast. Obviously all the events members undertake will not be as high profile as these, but they are all important, all valid, it just takes effort. Therefore, if you are wavering over this weekends attendance, go for it, stand in solidarity if you can with other VFP members and supporters and lets show these war mongering hawks that they are not going to get away with it for much longer. Peace and happiness to everyone and I look forward to making new friends this weekend.

Gus Hales served with the British Army in Northern Ireland and the Falklands, he is now a member of Veterans For Peace and contributed to this article.

The West Side Boys – “known for wearing bizarre clothing – women’s wigs and flip-flops are favourites – and being almost perpetually drunk – Not hesitant about opening fire” BBC.

Finding our way through a complicated story

This poem below was written following an interview on ABC TV (Australia) with Retired Colonel Tim Collins, who left the Royal Irish Regiment and the British Army very critical of the war in Iraq, the occupation and the ‘war on terror’.  Col Tim Collins, a friend of Tim Spicer, seeks employment in what he knows best.  The connections with the war in Iraq and the ‘war on terror’ are intriguing. At the same time, I was a student of Peace and Conflict at University of Queensland. I was learning UN Peacekeeping from Alex Bellamy, who was the first to explain the official version of Operation Barras. Students were told that Operation Barras was the textbook example of Peace Enforcement Operations, the British military at its best. Then I did some of my own research and modified his story.

I heard that, “The Westside Boys were not a pushover, they fought very hard”. That phrase stuck in my head. Why were they not a pushover? How did they know? This explained the significant force deployed. The British were taking no chances. So determined to erase all trace of the group, “… it became clear that Barras involved a second, more controversial component: the complete destruction of the West Side Boys as a fighting force.” (Daily Mail)

1. The story of British Colonel Tim Collins includes his role in the war in Iraq, the occupation and the ‘war on terror’ and leads to questions about his friendship with Lt Col Tim Spicer, who was the head of mercenary company, Aegis Defense Services and lucrative government contracts. Spicer also had connections with Sierra Leone, Papua New Guinea and the Pentagon.
2. Collins was given a British SLR in Sierra Leone which turned out to be one of those used in Londonderry on Bloody Sunday, 1972. The rifle was found in the possession of Sierra Leone’s murderous West Side Boys. So, how did this African criminal/terrorist group get possession of it?
3. The story then goes back to Bloody Sunday, 1972. It was a day of shame for the British government, as 14 Bogside residents were shot dead in Londonderry by a specially inserted force 1 Para with lethal orders to kill civilians. Amidst the deceit and lies of the Inquiry by Lord Widgery into the incident, and later Lord Saville’s Inquiry. Many years passed before the British government of David Cameron officially admitted fault and apologised to the people of Ulster. Official claims were made that the SLRs could not be presented as evidence, since they had been destroyed.
4. The SLRs were not destroyed. They were secretly shipped off to Sierra Leone and supplied to the West Side Boys.
5. Furthermore, not for the first or last time, the British SAS was used to train the West Side Boys in guerilla warfare without the perverse purpose of this mission being exposed to the British public or media.
6. These events led to Operation Barras, on 11 September 2000. A total of 272 Service personnel were involved, including 100 men of D Squadron 22 SAS, a unit from the Royal Marines’ Special Boat Service and 110 soldiers from the 1st Battalion The Parachute Regiment. There were several Royal Navy ships, helicopters and jets. Why all this force to see off a few drunken criminals/terrorists? The British Army was not taking chances because they knew the West Side Boys were a force to be reckoned with.
7. The SAS took 4-5 hours mopping up, killing every last one of the armed group and disposing of some of the bodies off-site. It was a cover-up of the previous operation.
8. This story has everyone from Colonel Cambodia to Tony Blair. The lessons of this story point to rigorous rules about arms trading and secret sponsorship of armed non-state actors. It is not the kind of development aid that Africa needs. Nor is it appropriate to treat part of the UK in the same way as Britain once ruled Kenya and Malaya under counterinsurgency warfare.

The Provenance of the Gun by Willy Bach
 

Most times no one can tell
The money trail
The secret deals
The strange alliances
Counter intuitive patronage
Of powerful states
Resource extraction
Arms insertion
Private armies
Militia mayhem

How covert leads
Inexorably
To cover-up
And how
A crisp clear
Londonderry
January afternoon
In 1972
Took out
Michael Kelly
And a dozen more

Kept from forensic scrutiny
1 Para’s shameful 29 SLRs
With too much history
There was nothing to be
Proud of on that day*
And grieving Bogside families
Tasted the lethality
Of SLRs
Objective contempt
Their disappearance
Supposed destruction
Conveyor belt to new tasks
In tropical forestry

The West Side Boys
Wearing bizarre clothing
Women’s wigs and flip-flops
Being almost perpetually drunk
Not a pushover
As they say
In military circles
Those who know
Through close familiarity
And training
‘Colonel Cambodia’
A murderous joke
Brigadier ‘Papa’ Bomb Blast
Firm in Masiaka
Occra Hills
Specialists in rape and pillage
Well equipped from the outside

The people who brought us
Pol Pot Osama Saddam
Augusto Pinochet
Lovingly bestowed
The kind of development aid
For Africa awash
Swimming in Kalashnikovs
Burnt villages
A handful of diamonds
Without hands

And so it came to pass
As the saying goes
Operation Barras
11 September 2000
The provenance of the gun
Brought an ‘unexpected’ trophy
SLR with Londonderry
Bogside serial number
A guilty secret
Inadvertently boasted
Its experience in slaughter
For Michael Kelly
Here’s a toast to
‘Colonel Cambodia’
Electric purple wigs
Bloody hands
Delirious laughter
Conflict entrepreneurs
And bragging Irishmen

Dedicated to my friend and fellow poet Tim Collins (not the Colonel)

Willy Bach served with the British Army in Thailand in support of the war in Vietnam. He is now a member of Veterans For Peace UK

On the 23rd of October 8 members of Veterans For Peace UK started a 4 day journey across the North of Ireland/Northern Ireland in order to meet with people and organisations drawn from communities which our group had previously been deployed against as soldiers. Our aim was to gain a greater understanding of the conflict we had been involved in and to reach out to former enemies. Here are the personal recollections of the veterans who attended the trip

Gus Hales; I felt a great deal of anxiety and trepidation in my involvement with this process, were we being set up? What levels of animosity would we receive? Will this be a one sided account? What’s the point it’s all in the past? All legitimate questions that I kept asking myself over and over again, so much so that I nearly withdrew from the trip the night before departure. However, the reality was that I found a community desperate to tell their story, which made involvement easier, there was nothing to defend, but just to listen and be a witness to the other narrative without BBC and tabloid interference. To put this into perspective, can anyone imagine what it felt like to be a former engineer paratrooper standing in an area of Derry/Londonderry where members of the British army had wounded or killed 28 civil rights marchers. Likewise can you imagine what it must have been like for the first time to be telling that account to a group like us. Nonetheless, there wasn’t a trace of animosity or hatred, only an overwhelming sense of wanting to right an injustice, but isn’t that always the cry of those who feel justice hasn’t been served? We moved on to further meetings at other locations, and the story repeated itself. One meeting became quite tense and fraught as a Belfast lady vocally explained how the British government killed her brother and she cannot get justice. However, that tension fell away when I was able to explain that my brother was killed by the British government and I cannot get justice either, a seminal moment for the rest of the meeting. Later on that day we met Patrick Magee and Jo Berry at a private gathering, which I can only describe as quite incredible.

Les Gibbons; I was first in NI 38 years ago, that time it was a four month tour (1975/6) to Crossmaglen in South Armagh. I was pretty naive and trusting then, not long 18 years old; though unclear why the military, and why I particularly was there. All I knew was the state/BBC rhetoric about making NI safer and bringing an end to the Troubles. This time around our VFP alternative trip was oh so different. We saw the history of Ireland’s troubled years explained and unfold in the street murals, in the graveyard tour, the museums, memorial plaques, and plainly from the people we met. We heard about the civil rights campaign, massacres, inequality and internment, of striving for political not criminal status in prisons, of canny warring and hunger strikes till death, of long repeat imprisonments, endurance, hardship and finally the work that has been done toward the building of a sustainable peace. What was so good for me was to hear personal accounts and peoples’ rationales for their perspectives, it builds empathy and is personally for those who want to work for peace. In sum I feel I learnt a lot, so… if you are a NI veteran I would recommend you consider returning to share your story and hear others in a spirit of openness – hate is but a thought emanating perhaps from fear.

Kieran Devlin; It was evident from greeting the VFP members at the airport that we had so much in common and we instantly seemed to hit it off with one another that you would be forgiven for thinking that we had all served together whilst in the armed forces. The camaraderie and comradeship was visible from the beginning to the end of the visit and for me, personally, I can say that I made a number of new friends as a direct result of this trip. Meeting with the Nationalist and Republican Community, ex-Prisoners and combatants was a very humbling experience for me. Despite the fact that I was born and bred in Northern Ireland, the Nationalist and or Republican narrative is not widely known nor accepted by the wider Unionist and Loyalist Communities. There seems to be a belief that to accept, or even listen to the Nationalist and or Republican story, would be an admission of guilt or defeat. This quite clearly is not the case. In all the discussions not once was a finger of blame pointed, it was far more mature than that. This was about telling our own stories and vice versa. What was very apparent was just how much all participants were getting from this type of interaction. The message we got back from the Nationalist and Republican community was very clear; the war is over and now is the time to build the peace..To conclude, I have a personal desire for peace building to continue with the Nationalist and Republican Community as I live here and bring my children up in this part of the world. It is my desire to show the wider community and politicians that putting the hand of friendship out is not a sign of weakness but rather a sign of strength and courage. I have had my eyes opened as to the progressive attitudes within the wider Nationalist and Republican family and I hope that message will permeate through to all sections of our community, for the good of us all

Stuart Griffiths; The recent VFPUK visit was the fourth time I have returned to Northern Ireland since I served there as a British Paratrooper. But despite this I still felt nervous, which I think was probably down to the loss of anonymity that goes with travelling in a large group. On arrival I met my fellow veterans at the airport and in no time we were whisked off on a car journey to Derry/Londonderry, which I have never previously visited, although I have wanted to throughout my life. While in the Maiden City it was great to hear the different narratives drawn from the Nationalist/Republican community because it gave me access to a human face that I had only previously seen from the ‘other side of the fence’. Next stop was Belfast, again it was great to be taken round and to hear the Nationalist history of the city from such knowledgeable guides. On a personal note, I would have liked to have seen more of the murals in west Belfast, but I understand there was plenty programmed in for the four day trip, a lot to get through with lots of meetings. Nonetheless, it was great to talk about our own personal experiences without having to glorify events and to describe the reality of what was going on in our heads at the time. For me the final trip to South Armagh was amazing, because it was always a place associated with intense fear for a British squaddie. Consequently, walking around Crossmaglen was a cathartic experience for me and many (I feel) who once served there and seeing my mobile phone change to a Republic of Ireland Mobile phone company only proved the point of being so close to the border.

Ben Griffin; I joined the Parachute Regiment in March 1997 and first deployed to Northern Ireland in December of 1998 after the Good Friday Agreement had been voted for in a referendum. Most of the older soldiers within 2 Para had been on numerous tours. We did not believe that the IRA ceasefire would last and we were told that many republicans had quit PIRA and joined the dissident groups. My company was based in Armagh City and we operated as an Ops company, mostly patrolling in South Armagh and public order operations in Portadown. We operated as if nothing had changed. I spent hours out on patrol anticipating contact with the IRA and ready to open fire. During 8 years in the British Army I deployed three times to Northern Ireland spending almost a year and a half there. I never once thought about how our presence affected the people who lived there. Last weekend I travelled with a group of Veterans For Peace to Northern Ireland. We met with the families of people killed on Bloody Sunday, local politicians, community groups and former Republican prisoners in Derry, Belfast and South Armagh. We were taken on tours of the areas we had served in and heard stories of massacres, raids, internment, hunger strikes and harassment. We told our own stories of why we had joined the army, how we were trained and what we had done on operations. It was a humbling experience. I was impressed by the political organising within the communities we visited and also the solidarity shown by those communities for other oppressed people. There was a warmth in the meetings, a willingness from both sides to try and understand the others perspective and I hope this will lead to longer term relationships with the groups we met.

Lee Lavis; As a member of the Staffordshire Regiment I completed a six month tour of Fermanagh in 1992 and a two year residential posting between February 1994 and 1996. Six months in to this second tour I was witness to the jubilation that resulted from the IRAs announcement of a ceasefire and the commencement of negotiations aimed at bringing an end to the cycle of Anglo- Irish violence that had blighted the island of Ireland for centuries. I have to admit that my immediate reaction to the announcement was one of disbelief because in common with my fellow soldiers I genuinely believed the IRA were simply taking a break from hostilities. Nonetheless, I subsequently left the army and settled in Belfast, which led to my voting yes in the 1998 referendum that ratified the Good Friday Agreement. My decision to remain in Belfast also meant that I have been in a position to witness the North of Ireland’s/Northern Ireland’s attempts to transition from a divided society to one seeking to transform itself in the wake of conflict.Initially I did little more than vote in the aforementioned referendum, but over time I began to feel that I have a responsibility to use my experience as a soldier who had been deployed to the North of Ireland/Northern Ireland in order to contribute to this transition. It was this realisation that ultimately led me to become a participant in VFP UKs ‘A Different Kind of Tour: Finding Understanding Through Dialogue’; as I am of the firm opinion that the building of peace can only be achieved through the development of communicative mechanisms, which recognise and transcend differences in culture, lived experience, and ideological beliefs.Finally, from personal experience I know there are some people out there who would criticise our willingness to engage with individuals and organisations they continue to see as the ‘other side’. However, although not proscriptive my response to such criticism is perfectly reflected in the following quote: “History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again”.

Kenny Williams; I`m very proud to be a member of veterans for peace. In 1989 I spent six months in South Armagh as an infantry soldier and from 1992 a further three years based at Ebrington barracks and Fort George in Derry/Londonderry (the longest operational tour a British army battalion had completed since the second world war). During these two tours I was personally involved in many incidents all of which shock me to the core so the visit was a very big deal for me. I was very nervous during the last week before the trip, as the reality of what we were all about to do was sinking in. Ben rang us all the day before we all depart for Belfast to see if things were ok and I remember saying “Are we nuts?” “Mate, my wife is saying just pay Ben for the flight and leave it”. However, Ben reassured me that a Belfast based member of VFPUK had been in constant contact with a range of local partners who were all united in their wish to meet us. In response I took a deep breath and told Ben “I`m in”. As I got off the aircraft at Belfast I was met by Kieran, one of our members who lives in Northern Ireland then the rest of the group turned up a few at a time on various flights. At this point we were introduced to a local Youth Worker and a Legacy and Engagement Officer who together put me and the group at ease with the words “you have got nothing to worry about lads, your all safe and very welcome”. During the next four days I met some truly inspiring people who listened to me as I told my story as to how I as a soldier had been trained to believe every single member of the North’s Nationalist/Republican population were my “enemy”. I could recount many a memorable recollection from the subsequent exchanges, but the forthcoming Reel News film will speak volumes so I don`t want to spoil it by waffling on.

Mike Pike; In 1981 I was deployed to Belfast as a Scots Guardsman for a 10 month period that coincided with the Hunger Strikes. As a result of this experience for many years I carried a hatred for Irish Nationalists and Republicans. However, in recent times I have changed as a person because my understanding of the North of Ireland’s/Northern Ireland’s euphemistically named Troubles” is no longer founded solely subjective experience.As part of this personal journey I travelled to the North of Ireland/Northern Ireland in August of this year, so VFPUKs ‘A different kind of tour: Finding understanding through dialogue’ felt like I was returning to visit old friends. In common with that first visit I got to share my recollections with people who as a soldier I had been told were the enemy. I can tell you that to listen to their stories reaffirmed for me how much we have in common. In fact, I would say that if I had found myself in the shoes of the Nationalist/Republican population there is a good chance I would have reacted with outrage and hostility towards the British state.

---

We would like to thank the Anne Lindh Foundation, Coiste and associated bodies, Free Derry Tours, Free Derry Museum, Interaction Belfast, Building Bridges for Peace, Queen’s University of Belfast, Ti Chulainn Cultural Activity Centre, Falls Community Council and Reel News for their unstinting support, and or contribution to an itinerary that was both challenging and rewarding.

 

 

Schools will condition you
The church will condemn you
The law will sentence you
And Royalty will seduce you
The Civil service controls you
The media will defame you
While the military will crush you
All this is the Establishment
Who will readily dismiss you

Gus Hales served in the British Army in Northern Ireland and The Flaklands, he is now a member of VFP UK

I feel a bit of an affinity with this singer and songwriter, not just because we both support peace but also for the reason that like me he was born in the Scottish Lowlands and in September 1944. We both left school at the start of the 60s aged sixteen, but while I joined the army, Bogle worked as a labourer, clerk and barman. He also played in a skiffle and rock band, before he became known as a folk singer and songwriter. In 1969 Bogle emigrated to Australia and has lived there ever since.

Several of his most famous songs are about the futility of war and the loss that comes with conflict. The most prominent of these in Australia was “And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda.” Written in 1971 this song tells of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) experience fighting in the Battle of Gallipoli. Eric Bogle tells how five years later he came to write “No Man’s Land”: This is a song called “No Man’s Land”… or “The Green Fields of France” it was known in Ireland…It’s a song that was written about the military cemeteries in Flanders and Northern France. In 1976, my wife and I went to three or four of these military cemeteries and saw all the young soldiers buried there. 
 And… couple of months later, I wrote a song called “No Man’s Land,” which is asking questions of a dead soldier…

No Man’s Land

Well, how’d you do, Private Willie McBride,
D’you mind if I sit down here by your graveside?
I’ll rest for a while in the warm summer sun,
Been walking all day, Lord, and I’m nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the glorious fallen in 1916,
I hope you died quick and I hope you died ‘clean,’
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?

CHORUS:

Did they beat the drum slowly, did they sound the fife lowly?
Did the rifles fire o’er ye as they lowered ye down?
Did the bugles sing “The Last Post” in chorus?
Did the pipes play the “Floo’ers o’ the Forest”?

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
And, though you died back in 1916,
To that loyal heart are you forever nineteen?
Or are you a stranger, without even a name,
Forever enshrined behind some glass pane,
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained,
And fading to yellow in a brown leather frame?

Well, the sun’s shining down on these green fields of France;

The warm wind blows gently, the red poppies dance.

The trenches have vanished long under the plough;

No gas and no barbed wire, no guns firing now.

But here in this graveyard it’s still No Man’s Land;

The countless white crosses in mute witness stand

To man’s blind indifference to his fellow man.

And a whole generation who were butchered and damned.

And I can’t help but wonder now, Willie McBride,

Do all those who lie here know why they died?

Did you really believe them when they told you “the cause?”
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?

Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,

The killing, the dying, it was all done in vain,

For Willie McBride, it’s all happened again,

And again, and again, and again, and again.

Bogle’s lyrics at the end of the chorus refers to the traditional Scottish song “Flowers of the Forest,” or “Floo’ers o’ the Forest,” which was written after the Battle of Flodden Field in 1513. Pipers will usually only play the tune at funerals or commemorations, because it is so strongly associated with loss in battle. In Ireland many well-known folk groups, including The Clancy Brothers, The Fureys and The Chieftains, recorded this song. In Northern Ireland the song is sung by both Republicans / Nationalists and Loyalists / Unionists. The former because they see it as an anti-British establishment war song and the latter because in the graveyards in France there is a grave for a Private William McBride, who fought with the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers.
Before bad weather had brought a halt to the Somme offensive on 18th November 1916 the British and French attack had gained only12 kilometres of ground, but resulted in “420,000 estimated” British casualties – and the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers had lost more than half their strength. So, to Loyalists / Unionists the song symbolically recognises their ‘blood sacrifice’ for the British Crown in the First World War.
In fact it has been discovered that 19 men named McBride, either W, Willie or William, died in the First World War – all of Irish extraction. So now, as we look back over 100 years to the start of the ‘Great War,’ it is good to see that this song, and one of the previous songs on our VFP website ‘Where Have All the Flowers Gone,’ have contributed to peace and brought a measure of reconciliation to a still troubled and divided Ireland. The songs have also had a similar impact across the world, having been sung by many other groups and individuals. With ‘No Man’s Land’ this including a version recorded by Hannes Wader in Germany as “Es ist an der Zeit” (It is the Time).

Aly Renwick served with the British Army in Thailand during the War in Vietnam. He is now a member of VFP UK. If you have a review of an anti-war song please send it in to veteransforpeaceuk@gmail.com

 

 

A Different Kind of Tour: Finding Understanding Through Dialogue

Following discussion at the Veterans For Peace UK (VFP UK) 2014 annual conference it was decided that since a large section of our membership had played a role as combatants during the British military’s 38 year operational deployment to Northern Ireland, we should investigate a means of making a positive contribution to the ongoing development of the post conflict landscape.

The form this contribution has ultimately taken is ‘A Different Kind of Tour: Finding Understanding Through Dialogue’ which will see 8 members of VFP UK commence a 4 day journey across Northern Ireland  in order to have dialogue with a range of people and groups who are drawn from communities to which the VFP UK group had previously been deployed as soldiers.

This visit has potential for the generation of greater understanding, because up until this moment contact between members of non ‘Home service’ British army units and the communities they were sent to ‘police’ has been restricted to the efforts of a few isolated individuals. As such, ‘A Different Kind of Tour: Finding Understanding Through Dialogue’ also represents something of a landmark moment in Northern Ireland’s post conflict process of healing. That others agree with both elements of this assessment can be ascertained from the generous support of  the diverse group of organisations who have made it possible to create an itinerary that will be challenging but rewarding for all involved.

Part of this itinerary will be a public panel discussion ‘Poppy wars, commemoration and political division: Remembrance and conflict from WW I to today’ that will take place at the Canada Room of Queen’s University, Belfast at 1900 on the 24th of October. This event will feature two members of VFPUK and will be followed by an opportunity for the audience to informally interact with the remaining 6 members of the group. For those who can’t make Belfast there will be updates throughout our journey on the Veterans for Peace Facebook and Twitter pages.

Lee Lavis is a former British Infantryman and a member of Veterans For Peace UK.

Christ’s olive hands hung limp to sides
Where, freshly torn,
Life hung in tender, stinking loops
My friend had shot this Jesus,

From behind, as he ran from the
Bazaar scene of his crime,
Bullet bouncing through buttock,
From spine,

To spill his soul from his stomach
In folds
Mixed up with manhood amongst
His crimson robes.

I have asked him while,
And often since,
We bore him calmly sleeping
To the bower of the Pinzer,

Why then, as I stood cover,
His hand fell from behind upon my knee
Because I closed the hatch
To hide his shattered dignity.

His hand fell from behind upon my knee
So I, late,
Went fussing with the tailgate
A slow repentant Pilate.

His hand fell from behind upon my knee
As he passed and whispered:
I, Like you, was a man
Set under authority

Clem Boland served with the British Army in Afghanistan.

Dave Lupton is a member of Veterans For Peace UK. You can see more of his work at http://www.crippencartoons.co.uk

Dave Lupton is a member of Veterans For Peace UK. You can see more of his work at http://www.crippencartoons.co.uk

Dave Lupton is a member of Veterans For Peace UK. You can see more of his work at http://www.crippencartoons.co.uk

On Monday September 29th I was privileged to be at Belfast City Hall to witness the ‘Pieces of the Past’ Project publicly unveil a book of 118 excerpts from 97 oral history interviews which were collected between 2012 and 2014, from people whose lives had in some way converged with Northern Ireland’s euphemistically named ‘Troubles’. It has to be conceded that every year there are hundreds of books written about the Troubles and a reasonable number of those are oral histories, but I am of the opinion that ‘Living Through the Conflict’ stands out for a number of reasons.

Firstly, there is the composition of the partnership behind the publication; Falls Community Council, Shankhill Women’s Centre, EPIC (former Loyalist prisoners), Forbairt Feirste (Irish language agency), Charter NI (East Belfast Regeneration), Fáilte Feirste Thiar (West Belfast Tourism), West Belfast Taxi Association and the Shankhill Area Social History/ SASH group. Anyone with even a tiny amount of knowledge with regard to Belfast’s cultural geography would recognise this as a partnership that spans the city’s Unionist/Loyalist and Nationalist/Republican working class demographic, which is significant when you consider these communities are amongst those that suffered the greatest direct impact of the Northern Ireland conflict and associated sectional division in the three decades after 1969.

Consequently, the task of gathering and then encompassing an equally inclusive range of first person narratives (including 2 members of Veterans For Peace UK) within the pages of one publication can be described as a stand out achievement because it has required every stakeholder to develop and invest trust where very little previously existed. How successfully this has been achieved is reflected in a confident and brave editorial decision to present the interview excerpts without interpretation or any overreaching context. Although I would hasten to add that the skill with which this has been done means the decision does not impinge on the number of themes and analogies that can be discerned from the pages of the publication.

Furthermore, the achievement in bringing this about is greatly magnified when you consider ‘Living Through the Conflict’  essentially introduces an oral history collection composing 100 hours of audio recordings and 2000 pages of transcripts, which in line with the inclusive nature of the Pieces of the Past project are all deposited together in a publicly accessible electronic archive called Dúchas (the Irish word for ‘heritage’ or ‘the experiences that make us what we are’). This is in addition to the concurrent organisation of events which have allowed the projects diverse constituents and the wider public to discuss challenging topics in a way that is respectful of differing viewpoints.

In sum, ‘Living Through the Conflict’ is an invaluable and enlightening addition to existing historiography, as well as something that stands out as a remarkable testament to the commitment, leadership and courage shown by all those who have contributed to a project that affirms the experience of individuals affected by the conflict, promotes cross community understanding and leaves a permanent legacy for the future generations who will ultimately shape the post conflict landscape of my adopted home.

Lee Lavis is a member of Veterans for Peace UK who settled in Belfast after completing a roulement and residential tour of Northern Ireland/ the North of Ireland as an infantry soldier during the early 90s.

During the First World War, a then undivided India was ruled by Britain and the country contributed 1,105,000 personnel to serve under the British flag. Many Indians volunteered, but the British authorities had required more men. They considered introducing conscription, but instead ordered Indian officials to produce a quota of men or risk losing their jobs. Indian soldiers fought in France, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Aden, East Africa, Gallipoli and Salonika. They were awarded 9,200 decorations, including 11 VCs, and over 60,000 of them died in the fighting. Indians at home bought War Bonds and sent 170,000 animals and 3,700,000 tons of stores and supplies to the war.

Just 17 years before the start of the ‘Great War’, in 1897, Queen Victoria had been applauded by large crowds in London as she travelled from her palace to St Paul’s Cathedral to celebrate her jubilee. Accompanying her in the vast procession were soldiers from all parts of the Empire. Reporting this event, the Daily Mail commented on the troops:

White men, yellow men, brown men, black men, every colour, every continent, every race, every speech – and all in arms for the British Empire and the British Queen. Up they came, more and more, new types, new realms, at every couple of yards, an anthropological museum – a living gazetteer of the British Empire. With them came their English officers, whom they obey and follow like children. And you began to understand, as never before, what the Empire amounts to … that all these people are working, not simply under us, but with us – we send out a boy here and a boy there, and the boy takes hold of the savages of the part he comes to, and teaches them to march and shoot as he tells them, to obey him and believe in him and die for him and the Queen. [Daily Mail, 23rd June 1897].

Not everyone, however, shared the Mail’s attitude towards the Empire. In Ireland and India opposition was building up and challenging British rule – which responded with repressive legislation and military force. At the end of the First World War many Indians had expected positive moves towards ‘self-governing institutions’ as a reward for the men and money they had supplied for Britain’s war in far off places. Instead, new repressive measures were introduced. In 1919, twenty-two years after Victoria’s jubilee parade and 5 months after the end of the ‘Great War’, outraged people across India joined mass protests against the coercive Rowlatt Act, which brought in internment without trial and introduced no-jury courts for political trials.

In the city of Amritsar some of Britain’s troops of empire entered the Jallianwala Bagh, a garden enclosed by high walls, and started firing into the mass of Indian people who were taking part in a peaceful protest meeting. The order to fire was given by Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer and was carried out by 50 riflemen of his Sikh and Gurkha soldiers. They continued shooting for over ten minutes, firing 1,650 rounds directly into the crowd. Many of the heavy bullets passed through the bodies of their first victims to claim others beyond. When the firing had ceased thousands of men, women and children lay dead or wounded.

A century before, during the British conquest of India, the Gurkhas of Nepal had been defeated after a period of bloody conflict with the East India Company. Impressed by the Gurkhas’ fighting qualities, the company, following the British tradition of employing the ‘martial races’ it had defeated, secured the rights to raise battalions of Gurkhas for their forces in India. During the ‘Indian Mutiny’, of all the native troops it was the Gurkhas who proved to be the most loyal and dependable. Indeed, the Gurkhas loyalty to British interests was so highly rated that after Indian independence, while most native troops joined the Indian army, Britain ensured that some Gurkha battalions would stay within the British Army.

Nepal, an independent state between north-east India and Tibet, continues to supply soldiers for Britain. Famed for their stealth and silent killing techniques, these Gurkha troops have subsequently been used to protect British interests in other parts of empire. In 1974 when Gurkhas were sent to reinforce the British sovereign base areas in Cyprus, local papers objected to the ‘Mercenaries in Her Majesty’s uniform.’ At that time there were 6,500 Gurkhas serving in the British Army.

With nearly half the population living below the poverty line, the money earned by Gurkhas serving as British soldiers was Nepal’s largest source of foreign currency. However, sympathy for the economic reasons that were a factor in why so many men from Nepal joined the British Army, should not blind us to the role the Gurkhas were happy to play for their English masters. After taking part in the Amritsar killings some Gurkha soldiers gloatingly told a British official, ‘Sahib, while it lasted it was splendid: we fired every round we had.’

Brigadier-General Dyer, who ordered his troops to open fire on the crowd at Amritsar, said that: ‘For me the battlefield of France or Amritsar is the same.’ However, while Dyer clearly saw his military actions as part of a war, Indian independence activists who were captured knew they would not be treated as PoWs. At the end of the ‘Indian Mutiny’ the British authorities had established a penal colony on the remote Andaman Islands in the Bay of Bengal. After 4 years, 3,500 prisoners out of  8,000 transported to the islands had been killed or had died from fever because of the unsanitary conditions.

For the next 80 years the brutal prison regime attempted to break the will of a constant stream of Indian political prisoners by subjecting them to forced labour, torture, executions and medical experiments. The prison was finally closed after the deaths of several prisoners during a hunger strike in 1937. Mohandas ‘Mahatma’ Gandhi, one of the leaders of the movement for Indian independence, sent the prisoners a telegram saying: ‘… TRYING BEST TO SECURE RELIEF FOR YOU’ and a wave of support swept across India forcing the authorities to repatriate the prisoners and close the prison.

After the Amritsar Massacre the Indian National Congress had purchased the Jallianwala Bagh to ensure the victims would be remembered. On the site is recorded these words:

 

THIS PLACE IS SATURATED WITH THE

BLOOD OF ABOUT TWO THOUSAND HINDU,

SIKH AND MUSLIM PATRIOTS WHO WERE

MARTYRED IN A NON-VIOLENT STRUGGLE

TO FREE INDIA FROM BRITISH DOMINATION.

GENERAL DYER OF THE BRITISH ARMY

OPENED FIRE ON UNARMED PEOPLE.

JALLIANWALA BAGH IS THUS AN

EVERLASTING SYMBOL OF NON-VIOLENT

AND PEACEFUL STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM

OF INDIAN PEOPLE AND THE GROSS

TYRANNY OF THE BRITISH.

 

A decade after the massacre Gandhi visited England and was asked for his view on ‘Western civilization’. He replied: ‘I think it would be a good idea’.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday 9 November 2014

1330 HRS

Whitehall Place, London

Facebook Event Page

On Remembrance Sunday, Veterans For Peace UK will walk to The Cenotaph under the banner “NEVER AGAIN”.

We will hold a ceremony at The Cenotaph to remember all of those killed in war including civilians and enemy soldiers. 

Supporters of VFP UK are invited and encouraged to follow us to The Cenotaph.

Timings

1330 hrs Meet at Whitehall Place

1400 hrs Form up at Whitehall place

1410 hrs Move off from Whitehall Place

1415 hrs Arrive at The Cenotaph and carry out the ceremony.

1430 hrs Depart from The Cenotaph

1435 hrs Arrive back at Whitehall Place

1500 hrs Disperse from Whitehall Place

The Ceremony

VFP UK enter the enclosure and line up facing the Cenotaph.

The song “Where Have All The Flowers Gone”  will be sung, followers are encouraged to join in.
(Lyrics at the bottom of this page).

The poem “The Cenotaph” will be read

The Wreath will be laid.

The Last Post.

One minutes silence.

Reveille

VFP will move off out of the enclosure and back towards Whitehall Place.

Dress

VFP Members – VFP UK Hoody, Shirt, Black Tie, Dark Trousers, Dark Shoes. Poppy (White / Red / Both / None).

Followers – As if you are attending a funeral.

Equipment

Never Again Banner – To be carried by two VFP members at the front.

Wreath – To consist of 90% White Poppies and 10% Red to mark the huge proportion of civilians killed in modern warfare.

VFP UK Banner – To be carried by two VFP members at the rear and before the followers.

Media

Only the designated film-makers Shaun Dey and Guy Smallman can enter the enclosure of The Cenotaph.

VFP Members will not be conducting interviews on the day.

Instructions for Followers

All are invited to follow us to The Cenotaph.

Followers are not to enter the enclosure of The Cenotaph.

No banners, placards or megaphones are to be carried by those following VFP UK.

Dress must be smart / sombre as if you are attending a funeral.

All attending agree to conform to the VFP UK Statement of Nonviolence

Where Have All The Flowers Gone?

Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the flowers gone?
Young girls picked them everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the young girls gone, long time passing?
Where have all the young girls gone, long time ago?
Where have all the young girls gone?
Gone to young men everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the young men gone, long time passing?
Where have all the young men gone, long time ago?
Where have all the young men gone?
Gone for soldiers everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the soldiers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the soldiers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the soldiers gone?
Gone to graveyards, everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the graveyards gone, long time passing?
Where have all the graveyards gone, long time ago?
Where have all the graveyards gone?
Gone to flowers, everyone
When will we ever learn?
When will we ever learn?

For the tune click here for a version sung by Joan Baez.

Dave Lupton is a member of Veterans For Peace UK. You can see more of his work at http://www.crippencartoons.co.uk

Dave Lupton is a member of Veterans For Peace UK. You can see more of his work at http://www.crippencartoons.co.uk

SATURDAY 8 NOVEMBER 2014
1200 TO 1600 HRS

FRIENDS HOUSE
EUSTON ROAD
LONDON

Veterans For Peace and supporters held a Remembrance Gathering in preparation for our ceremony at The Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday.

This was the largest gathering of VFP members in the UK so far.

A briefing for the Ceremony at The Cenotaph was given

Rehearsals for the following day took place

Premier of the film made by Real News of the  VFP UK solidarity trip to Northern Ireland

Veterans For Peace members panel.

VFP UK Merchendise was available to purchase.

Forces Watch and Veterans For Peace UK

Monday 3 November 2014

1900 hrs

Housmans Books
5 Caledonian Road
Kings Cross
London

Facebook Event Page

In the run up to Remembrance Sunday Forces Watch and VFP UK invite you to an evening of performance, discussion and music;

Steve Pratt – “About the Making of a Dangerous Individual”

Book Launch – “Spectacle, Reality, Resistance: Confronting a culture of militarism” by David Gee and published by Forces Watch

Jim Radford and Walter Heaton – Anti War Songs

 

Steve Pratt is an artist and former SAS soldier.  “About the Making of a Dangerous Individual” is a powerful spoken word performance based on Steve’s childhood, service in the army and afterwards. The performance is backed by an atmospheric solo guitar.

In his new book, ‘Spectacle, Reality, Resistance: Confronting a culture of militarism’, published by ForcesWatch, David Gee takes a fresh look at a culture of militarism in Britain, exploring these dynamics – distance, romance, control – in three essays, accompanied by three shorter pieces about the cultural treatment of war and resistance to the government’s increasingly prodigious efforts to regain control of the story we tell ourselves about war. David Gee will be joined by Ben Griffin of Veterans For Peace to explore what the public act of remembrance has become and how we can challenge the militarism it represents. Copies of the book will be available for purchase.

Jim Radford is the youngest surviving veteran of D-Day and has been active in the peace movement for over 50 years. Jim will tell stories and sing songs inspired by his experience in the Royal Navy and the peace movement. Jim is a member of Veterans For Peace.

Walter Heaton served with the British Army in Malaya and was active in the civil rights movement in Northern Ireland. Walter will tell stories and sing a few songs inspired by his experiences.

Entry is free, donations to Forces Watch and Veterans For Peace appreciated.

 

 

 

Carl Sandburg (1878-1967), the 
American poet and writer, supported the black civil rights movement in the US and was the first white man to be honored by the NAACP with their Silver Plaque Award, proclaiming him to be a “major prophet of civil rights in our time.” Before that, in 1936 Sandburg had his poem, “The People, Yes,” published. In this extract Sandburg foresaw the potential devastation of a second and possibly a third world war:

The First World War came and its cost was laid on the people.
The second world war — the third — what will be the cost.
And will it repay the people for what they pay?
The little girl saw her first troop parade and asked,
‘What are those?’
‘Soldiers.’
‘What are soldiers?’
‘They are for war. They fight and each tries to kill as many of the other side as he can.’
The girl held still and studied.
‘Do you know … I know something?’
‘Yes, what is it you know?’
‘Sometime they’ll give a war and nobody will come.’

In 1963, 27 years and many wars later, Buffy Sainte-Marie, who was a star of the emerging folk scene in the 60s, wrote “Universal Soldier” after witnessing wounded American soldiers returning from Vietnam. Donovan had a hit with the song in Britain in 1965 and it became an anthem of the movement for peace in Vietnam. She said that the song was “About individual responsibility for war and how the old feudal thinking kills us all.”

Universal Soldier

He’s five foot two and he’s six feet four
He fights with missiles and with spears
He’s all of thirty-one and he’s only seventeen
Been a soldier for a thousand years

He’s a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain
A Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew
And he knows he shouldn’t kill and he knows he always will
Kill you for me my friend and me for you

And he’s fighting for Canada
He’s fighting for France, he’s fighting for the U.S.A.
And he’s fighting for the Russians
And he’s fighting for Japan
And he thinks we’ll put an end to war this way

And he’s fighting for Democracy, he’s fighting for the Reds
He says “It’s for the peace of all”
He’s the one who must decide, who’s to live and who’s to die
And he never sees the writing on the wall

But without him,
 how would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone
He’s the one who gives his body as a weapon of the war
And without him all this killing can’t go on

He’s the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame
His orders come from far away no more
They come from here and there and you and me
And brothers can’t you see
This is not the way we put the end to war

Buffy Sainte-Marie is a Cree Indian and many of her songs, like “Now That the Buffalo’s Gone,” promote a Native American point of view. When I was serving in West Germany in the 60s I bought her “It’s My Way” album, which contained the tracks “Universal Soldier” and “Now That the Buffalo’s Gone.” I took the LP with me when I was posted back to Tidworth and I used to play the “Universal Soldier” track as loud as I could inside our barracks. The song lives on and Jake Bugg now does a great version of it.

Buffy Sainte-Marie talked about her motivation for writing Universal Soldier: “I wanted it to get people out of their classrooms and onto their feet. But certain things I have to say are pitched at too high a level to bring any lasting benefit to as many people as I would like to bring it to. If I have something of myself that gets me off, that’s brought me through hard times and that refreshes and nourishes me, what good does it do if I’m not smart enough to get it to the people? And I don’t mean only the people who are like me, I mean all the people. That’s communication. There’s no sense being a closet genius. It doesn’t do me any good to keep the medicine in the bottle.”

Aly Renwick served with the British Army in Thailand during the War in Vietnam. He is now a member of VFP UK. If you have a review of an anti-war song please send it in to veteransforpeaceuk@gmail.com

 

The last two weeks have been distressing. Jacob David George took his own life as a result of moral injuries sustained in Afghanistan. It pains me to think of the darkness that must have engulfed Jacob to push him across that final line. This week our parliament has voted to involve the UK in a new round of Iraqi blood-letting. For our Chicken-Hawk politicians to vote to pour more petrol on the fire we started is a punch in the face to all of us who served in Iraq and who witnessed that bullshit first hand,

We are directly responsible for the situation in Iraq. After the Gulf War of 1990/1 our war on Iraq continued. We carried out a decade of bombing and siege warfare that led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi’s. In 2003 we prosecuted an illegal invasion of Iraq during which a huge amount of infrastructure was destroyed, we then dismantled the civil service and military. During the occupation which followed we took a society in which Sunni and Shia lived together and manipulated division to murderous effect, hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed and tortured, whole swathes of residential areas were destroyed. During and since that occupation we have propped up a sectarian government who’s policies have marginalised and alienated the Sunni’s to the point of armed rebellion.

I served in Iraq (Baghdad) in 2005. I was involved in blasting my way into peoples homes with explosives. Once inside we would drag the people out of their beds and split them up. Women and children would be held at gunpoint whilst the males were interrogated. My task at this point would be to ransack the home taking money, computers phones, paperwork and weapons (it was usual at that time for Iraqi families to have weapons for personal security). Once the interrogations were finished we would drag all the males out of the home cuffed and hooded and take them back to our base where they would face further interrogation before being handed over to be tortured. I will never forget the looks from the people in those homes, especially the children, as we carried out those “operations”. I often wonder what happened to the young boys who witnessed the humiliation of their fathers. How could we blame them if they now fight with ISIS?

The be-headings carried out by ISIS were disgusting, but the primary aim was provocation. They were designed to elicit a response from the west. What ISIS craves most is confrontation with the west to raise there credibility and boost recruitment. The rational response to these acts of terror would be for the UK and US Governments to issue travel warnings to their citizens, don’t go to Iraq and Syria. Despite what our politicians say ISIS does not pose an existential threat to the UK. What can be predicted is what the CIA calls blow-back, attacks provoked by our own action in the middle east  (9/11 and 7/7 are examples of blow-back). The depressing thing about blow-back is that just as in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya the majority of casualties are civilians.

If you listen to our Chicken-Hawk Foreign Secretary Hammond you will hear him state that the RAF is required to participate in this new Iraq war because they are capable of “precision air-strikes”. Does he seriously expect us to believe that US and French aircrews do not have the same capabilities? Precision weapons are limited by the intelligence available. During my time in Iraq we had access to a huge intelligence gathering operation yet still on most raids we would not find who we were looking for. That didn’t matter because whoever we did find would be detained as an insurgent anyway. Post interrogation it was assessed that only 10% of the people we captured were involved in the insurgency. Over the intervening years it has become standard procedure to claim that any males of military age killed by coalition forces are insurgents or terrorists. The point is that it doesn’t matter how accurate our bombs are or how skilled our Special Forces are, if the intelligence is duff civilians will be harmed. Since the US began this new round of air-strikes dozens of civilians have been killed, dozens of homes destroyed and the Iraqi Army has reported that 73 of their soldiers have been killed. 

David Cameron can’t stop bragging about the prowess of British Forces yet the track record post 9/11 is damning. Defeated in Basrah, replaced by the USMC in Helmand and then we come to Libya. In 2011 the UK alongside other NATO members launched an air-war on Libya. This war has been held up as an example of British military success by the Chicken-Hawk Hammond. What he failed to mention is that as a result of our action Libya is now a failed state with Islamists in charge of Tripoli. Is this his future vision for Iraq?

It is beyond belief that whilst our newspapers are full of horror stories about ISIS our politicians are bragging about how our new coalition includes Saudi Arabia. This is the country which pushes Wahhabi doctrine throughout the world whilst Saudi nationals are major financial contributors to countless Jihadi groups including ISIS. In August of this year whilst the western media focused on the execution of three journalists the Saudis executed on average a person a day.

At times like these it can be difficult to know what to do, it seems that the establishment have all of the cards in their hands. Now is the time for us to double our efforts, we may not be able to stop this new war in Iraq but we must hold the line and begin to push back. We must confront the warmongers at every opportunity.

Song – See It Through by Ryan Harvey

Ben Griffin served with the British Army and is now a member of VFP UK

This morning VFP UK member Duncan Parker wrote to his MP to ask her to think about the consequences of voting for military action in Iraq. His letter and her response are below.

VFP encourages all members and supporters to write to their MP on this issue. If they are going to vote yes we have a right to know why.

 

Thursday 25 September 2014 10:50hrs

Dear Alison Seabeck MP

I am writing to you to express my concerns about the likely military action in Iraq (and potentially Syria) by the United Kingdom against the Islamic State.

In general terms, military action is an irrational and immoral response to political disputes. Irrational because the consequences can never be predicted and, as recent history has taught us, almost never turn out the way that was intended. It is also immoral because the consequences for non-combatants are horrific and both life changing and lifelong and these usually outweigh the benefits of the original military action. I note that as I write five civilians are reported to have been killed overnight by just one set of US airstrikes.

As a former serviceman who served in the Iraq war in 2003 I have seen war, and specifically war in Iraq, more closely than most Members of Parliament. I recall with sadness events where non-combatants were severely injured or killed by British munitions and remember at the time going through a thought process of rationalising these incidents as unfortunate but the type of things that happen in war. I find this particularly disturbing to recall now as one incident involved the violent death of five toddlers and another the loss of both arms of a young father with three very young children who clearly he would never be able to hold again.

I write this to ask that you think clearly about the consequences of voting for military action and do not put the very real likely outcome of civilian deaths and severe injuries to the back of your mind as, if you vote for this action, you will bear a degree of personal responsibility for any such incidents that occur.

From my own experience in Iraq, I also understand that the situation there is extremely complex and impossible to understand if only viewed from a standard Western paradigm. Ban Ki Moon, the UN Secretary General, yesterday rightly pointed out that while bombs kill terrorists, good governance kills terrorism. In Iraq, the Islamic State is receiving support from large elements of the local population who feel disenfranchised from the government of Iraq and also appears to have received, at a minimum tacit, support from some local nations. Military action is likely to provide a short term solution of killing IS combatants but a longer term result of creating a generation of martyrs and new Muslim combatants from all over the world with a desire to combat the West wherever they can in the world, as well as destroying any remaining infrastructure in parts of Iraq or Syria. It is clear that the current policies of the West regarding military action towards this part of the world which has been ongoing for well over a decade are not working.

The answer to this situation is more likely to be found in a political response and international development aid and support for the local populations to find a local solution to what is a regional dispute. My feeling is that short-sightedness, a lack of willingness to look at other options and the political hegemony of Western society is yet again sleepwalking us into another long period of avoidable and likely unsuccessful military action and instability.

I ask you please to carefully consider what I have written and to think outside the constraints of the standard US-led response and to realise that there are alternatives which will not have the same severe consequences for the world. I would also ask that with an issue of such consequence that you please show moral courage, conscience and independent thought and do not tow the party political line. Please on this occasion vote against military action.

Thank you for my considering my views.

Duncan Parker, Member of  Veterans For Peace UK

 

Thursday 25 September 2014 11:07:32hrs

Subject: RE: Vote on military action in Iraq

The points you make are valid ones and this cannot be purely a military solution. Ed Miliband was actually very clear that this is about diplomatic, political and humanitarian effort as well.  We do need, in my view, to act now to prevent the expansion of ISIL on the ground because the pressure of refugees fleeing ahead of their advance is placing unbelievable pressures on neighbouring countries which in turn leads to problems for those governments which are not the most stable. Targeted attacks on the terror groups and their sources of funding and arms are in my view legitimate. The world has as you point out waded into conflict without thinking things through but we have equally stood by in the past, or left it too late and appeasement can be disastrous.

This isn’t a decision which anyone takes lightly.

Appreciate you writing

Alison

Last week “bicycle ridin, banjo pickin, peace rambling hillbilly from Ouachita Mountains of Arkansas” Jacob David George died as a result of moral injuries sustained in Afghanistan. Jacob joined the US Army before the attacks of 9/11. He served three tours of Afghanistan (2001, 2002, 2003/4) and came back a changed man. He said that after witnessing wholesale slaughter and picking through body parts he was affected by Post Traumatic Stress. He understood that to be profoundly affected by war was not a disorder. Jacob often talked about the moral component of PTS, the trauma caused by taking part in or witnessing events that are contrary to your very being. This is different to the PTSD of the military psychiatrist who is interested in events that put the individuals own life in danger. This is the opposite, it is trauma caused by harming others. Jacob advocated for healing rituals and ceremonies to come to terms with the trauma of war. He talked about the need to heal the soul as well as the brain. He described throwing his medals back to the US Government during the 2012 NATO protests in Chicago as the most therapeutic thing he had done. The following is a poem written by Jacob that he later turned into a song.

Support the Troops

“We just Need to support the troops” is what they tell me well,
This is from a troop so listen carefully,
What we Need are teachers who understand the history of this country,
What we Need is a decent living wage, so people ain’t cold and hungry,
What we Need is bicycle infrastructure spanning this beauteous nation.

What we Need are more trees and less play stations,
What we Need is a justice system that seeks the truth,
What we Need are more books and less boots,
What we Need is love for every woman and man,
From southern Louisiana to the mountains of Afghanistan.

Now, it’s true the troops need support,
The support to come home,
They need treatment and jobs and love for the soul,
See, war ain’t no good for the human condition,
I lost a piece of who I was on every single mission,
And I’m tellin’ you, don’t thank me for what I’ve done,
Give me a big hug and let me know we’re not gonna let this happen again,
Because we support the troops and we’re gonna bring these wars to an end.

In the USA 22 veterans kill themselves every day. In 2012 more UK soldiers and veterans killed themselves than were killed in Afghanistan. In the USA 30% of veterans have considered suicide. More veterans of the Falklands War have committed suicide than were killed in action. The suicide rate among veterans in the USA is double that of the civilian rate. These statements are controversial not because they overestimate the problem but because these figures do not include the veterans who drink themselves to death. The veterans who no longer care for their own well being and drive cars into trees or the veterans who die homeless on the streets. To admit the scale of the problem would be an admission that war is harmful to those who take part in it long after returning home.

In memory of Jacob David George and in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the USA please consider donating to the Jacob George Celebration of Life Fund which will help pay for a celebration/memorial event on Sunday 5 October in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

RIP Brother.

 

Where Have All The Flowers Gone? – Pete Seeger

Peter “Pete” Seeger was an American folk singer and political activist, who died early in 2014. He wrote this song in 1955 at the height of the Cold War. It has been an anthem for many peace and anti-war movements ever since – especially for those who opposed the Vietnam War. The song was used more recently to support the peace process in Northern Ireland. This version by Irish musicians Tommy Sands and Delores Keane, Bosnian cellist Vedran Smailovic and a chorus of Protestant and Catholic school children accompanied many of the peace negotiations and meetings. This is a simple and powerful song about the futility of war. It describes the cycle of life: Flowers grow in the fields; Young girls pick the flowers; The young girls marry; Their husbands become soldiers; The soldiers are killed in wars and are buried in graveyards; The graveyards become fields of flowers. The song suggests that war is futile and we keep making the same mistakes – in life and with our endless wars. And the song keeps asking the question: “When will they ever learn?” At the end “they” changes to “we,” because the question concerns us all.

Where Have All The Flowers Gone?

Where have all the flowers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the flowers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the flowers gone?
Young girls picked them everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the young girls gone, long time passing?
Where have all the young girls gone, long time ago?
Where have all the young girls gone?
Gone to young men everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the young men gone, long time passing?
Where have all the young men gone, long time ago?
Where have all the young men gone?
Gone for soldiers everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the soldiers gone, long time passing?
Where have all the soldiers gone, long time ago?
Where have all the soldiers gone?
Gone to graveyards, everyone
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Where have all the graveyards gone, long time passing?
Where have all the graveyards gone, long time ago?
Where have all the graveyards gone?
Gone to flowers, everyone
When will we ever learn?
When will we ever learn?

I first heard this song during Easter in 1968 (on the CND Aldermaston march while still a soldier) and the crowds of people on the march were singing Where Have All The Flowers Gone? Five months later, after a short period of service in Northern Ireland, I bought myself out of the army. After my discharge I went to London to live, so I could help to organise the anti-Vietnam War protests and again this song was often sung on these demonstrations. After the song became such a powerful voice for peace Pete Seeger described how he came to write Where Have All The Flowers Gone ? –  “I had been reading a long novel called  “And Quiet Flows the Don” about the Don River in Russia and the Cossacks who lived along it in the 19th century. It describes the Cossack soldiers galloping off to join the Czar’s army, singing as they go. Three lines from a song are quoted in the book: ‘Where are the flowers? The girls plucked them / Where are the girls? They’re all married / Where are the men? They’re all in the army.’ I never got around to looking up the song, but I wrote down those three lines. Later, in an airplane, I was dozing, and it occurred to me that the line ‘long time passing’ which I had also written in a notebook would sing well. Then I thought, ‘When will we ever learn.’ Suddenly, within 20 minutes, I had a song. There were just three verses. I Scotch-taped the song to a microphone and sang it at Oberlin College. This was in 1955.”

Aly Renwick served with the British Army in Thailand during the Vietnam War, he is a member of VFP UK.

Sunday 21 September. 
11am to 5pm,
Free for All on the Library Field
Llwyn Isaf.

Sunday 21 September is World Peace Day and will be marked in Wrexham this year, as in previous years, by a ‘Free for All’ event in town during the day, a free live gig in the evening and a Schools Peace Day (on Monday 22 September). All events are organised by a network of groups and individuals coming together as Wrexham Peace Day Group and are designed to be inclusive and open to everyone. In particular, there will be no selling – everything offered on the day has been donated and is free of charge.

Wrexham Peace Day Group member Genny Bove said:

“As the west is gearing up for more military intervention in countries from Iraq to Ukraine, Peace Day is a worldwide call for all countries and peoples to acknowledge that violence breeds violence, that peace cannot be achieved through warfare, and to seek peaceful and just solutions through negotiation, mutual respect and understanding. Peace begins at home and Wrexham’s Peace Days are all about peace building through community co-operation.”

Everyone is invited to bring vegetarian food to share for the Peace Picnic and things they no longer need for the Free Stall.

A Kundalini Yoga session will run from 11am until midday.
At midday, there will be a peace circle ceremony followed by a peace service for those of all faiths and none.
Members of Wrexham Community Choir will then kick off an afternoon of live music, with acts including Heal the Last Stand, Tiny Wooden Angels, Y Gogs, Michelle Murphy & daughter, Jessica Ball, Ellie Larke and with poetry from Sophie McKeand. All performers are offering their services free of charge.
There will also be children’s activities, a popcorn stall, bike powered fruit smoothies, massage and storytelling, all free of charge.

 

Sunday 21 September, 
from 8pm.
Free evening gig at Saith Seren

Saith Seren will host the Peace Day ‘after show party’. Free entry to see bands including: Skin Tight Poncho, Heartbeat Wunderbar, Mandola Hangover and Modern King.

 

Monday 22 September, 
10am to 2.30pm
Schools Peace Day at St. Christopher’s School

This is the third year that a dedicated Peace Day will be held at St. Christopher’s Community School in Hightown, with children from at least seven other local schools attending. A team of workshop leaders and volunteers will offer a wide range of activities on the theme of peace. Topics offered this year include conscientious objectors in WWI, the lives of children in Afghanistan, how the military engages with young people, peace malas, massage in schools, dealing with negative feelings, Sikh seva, singing, poetry, art and craft.

Coleg Cambria will also be taking part in this year’s Peace Day, with Maya Evans from Voices for Creative Non-Violence speaking with students in Wrexham on Monday about the lives of women in Afghanistan.

 

More information: peacedaywrexham@yahoo.co.uk or call 07938 619825.

 

During the First World War, the casualties suffered on even a single day could be enormous – and a system had to be put in place to deal with the injured. There was a great expansion of medical facilities and in the British Army area in France the number of medical officers increased from 200 to over 10,000.

Clearing stations were set up just behind the front lines with base hospitals to the rear and a further move back to the more extensive medical facilities in Britain, if that proved necessary.While humanitarian concern for the wounded motivated many of the doctors and nurses, there was another reason for the vast expansion of the medical network. During the great battles, high numbers of casualties reduced fighting units to a skeleton, depleting armies and rendering them impotent.

The military command required an efficient system for clearing the badly wounded from the front and quickly treating those with lesser injuries, to ensure their speedy return to the trenches. In the British Army, senior officers tended to regard any sign of weakness among their troops as cowardice. So, ordinary soldiers were on the receiving end of harsh discipline and military courts when they were unable to function as soldiers due to mental stress.

Soldiers soon learnt to recognise the type of wounds that would ensure their evacuation from the horror of the front for good. To have a ‘Blighty one’ was regarded by many men as preferable to staying on in the trenches. Those that did stay on often became cynical, nihilistic and a little bit crazy. Hanging On The Old Barbed Wire, sung here by Chumbawamba, was written by soldiers in the trenches. Designed to be sung whilst marching, the song is one of many showing the ordinary soldier’s dissent and disgust at the war and also at the inequalities within the army system.

Hanging On The Old Barbed Wire

If you want to find the general
I know where he is
I know where he is
I know where he is
If you want to find the general
I know where he is
He’s pinning another medal on his chest
I saw him, I saw him
Pinning another medal on his chest
Pinning another medal on his chest

If you want to find the colonel
I know where he is
I know where he is
I know where he is
If you want to find the colonel
I know where he is
He’s sitting in comfort stuffing his bloody gut
I saw him, I saw him
Sitting in comfort stuffing his bloody gut

If you want to find the sergeant
I know where he is
I know where he is
I know where he is
If you want to find the sergeant
I know where he is
He’s drinking all the company rum
I saw him, I saw him
Drinking all the company rum
Drinking all the company rum

If you want to find the private
I know where he is
I know where he is
I know where he is
If you want to find the private
I know where he is
He’s hanging on the old barbed wire
I saw him, I saw him
Hanging on the old barbed wire
Hanging on the old barbed wire

By the end of the war, some 80,000 front-line troops had been treated for various types of psychological breakdowns, which became known as ‘shell shock’. At first, it was thought that the cause of shell shock lay in gases escaping from exploding shells. Others thought that shock waves from the explosions were responsible. Daniel Pick examined these theories in his book, War Machine – The Rationalisation of Slaughter in the Modern Age:

‘For conventional medico-psychiatry, the First World War disturbances presented real diagnostic difficulties: how to make sense of this ‘no man’s land’ of illness, which seemed to negate commonly held beliefs about valour and masculinity, and to defy the prevailing organic models of insanity and its aetiology? The idea that the shellshocked were all hereditary degenerates or that their condition could be put down to the commotional effects of exploding shells on the central nervous system proved increasingly unsustainable.

Yet shellshock could not be explained away as malingering. It blurred the distinctions between neurosis and insanity – and it was a crisis on a massive scale. According to one account in 1916, shellshock cases constituted up to 40 per cent of the casualties from heavy fighting zones; more alarmingly still, officers seemed especially prone to it. Army statistics revealed that officers were more than twice as likely to suffer from mental breakdown on the battlefield as men of the ranks.’
[From – War Machine – The Rationalisation of Slaughter in the Modern Age by Daniel Pick, Yale University Press 1993].

This song was chosen by Aly Renwick who served with the Royal Engineers in Thailand and is a member of Veterans For Peace.

Sergeant, Where’s Mine? – Billy Connelly

On June 3rd 1974, the Daily Mirror, which claimed ‘Europe’s biggest daily sale,’ stated about Northern Ireland that: ‘Britain must face the most sombre option of all – to pull out the troops and abandon sovereignty.’ A few days previously the London Evening Standard had carried the headline, ‘Ulster: Back-bencher makes a startling claim – HALF LABOUR MPs WANT TO PULL OUT.’ In the face of mounting casualties, it was also evident that many of the soldiers were fed up with their role in Northern Ireland. More than 200 British soldiers had been killed and many more maimed.

Also in 1974, Christopher Dobson – ‘With the troops in Ulster’s ugly world of terrorism’- had filed this report in the Sunday Telegraph [7th April 1974]: ‘To walk along Belfast’s Royal Avenue today is like walking in the past – along Ledra Street in Nicosia when Eoka’s murderers were at work. Venturing into the Bogside in Derry is like taking a patrol into Aden’s Crater district, and dropping by helicopter into a border fort is like visiting a fire-base in Vietnam’. Under the heading – ‘ANGER OF ARMY THAT FEELS BETRAYED’ – Dobson continued:

‘… There can be no surprise therefore that the average soldier is thoroughly fed up with Ireland and everything to do with it. But what surprised me was the extent and depth of the bitterness that exists among the troops, some of whom are on their fifth tour of duty in Ulster.

… Soldiers are expected to grumble, but these men genuinely felt that they were being misused and ill-treated. Their complaints ranged over pay, excessively long hours, of being “forgotten”, and in particular the inability of “the bloody politicians” to settle the appalling mess in which the soldiers found themselves …’

It was also in 1974, that Billy Connolly released his ‘Cop Yer Whack for This’ Album, which included the track ‘I’m Asking You Sergeant, Where’s Mine’ (later shortened to ‘Sergeant, Where’s Mine?’) Inspired by The Troubles in Northern Ireland, it is told from the point of view of a wounded soldier and makes ironic reference to British Army recruitment advertisements of the era that showed recruits having a grand time in exotic places and enjoying such activities as skiing.

Sergeant, Where’s Mine?

I’m lying in bed, I’m in room 26
Thinking on things that I’ve done
Like drinking with squaddies and bulling my boots
And counting the medals I’ve won.
These hospital wards are all drab looking joints
But the ceilings as much as I see
It could dae with a wee touch of paper or paint
But then again mebbe that’s me.

Chorus [once after first verse, three times after second verse]
Oh sergeant is this the adventure you meant
When I put my name doon on the line
All that talk of computers and sunshine and skis
Oh I’m asking you sergeant where’s mine?

I’ve a brother in Partick with long curly hair
When I joined up he said I was daft
He says shooting strangers just wasnae his game
That brother of mine isnae saft.
But I can put up with most things I’ve done in my time
I can even put up with the pain
But what do you do with a gun in your hand
When you’re faced with a hundred odd wains?

Before he became a star, Billy Connolly had joined the Territorial Army, while working in a shipyard. He therefore understood the impulses that could draw working class youngsters into joining the army. On ‘Cop Yer Whack for This’ he introduced ‘Sergeant Where’s Mine’ by stating: ‘I wrote this song a wee while ago after seeing a documentary on television. It was about Ulster and the children in Ulster, being in a terrible state with the war being on, and the soldiers in Ulster, being in a terrible state trying to cope with the kids and fight a war that they don’t know what it’s all about. After I saw it, about a fortnight later I was walking along Sauchiehall Street and I came to the Army Information place. I was looking in the window – you know, where all these young guys join the Army – and there was all these pictures of computers and discotheques and things, and soldiers enjoying themselves, but there was nae deed bodies in the window. And I thought, O Aye. So this is a wee song I wrote after seeing these things.’

This song was chosen by Aly Renwick who served with the Royal Engineers in Thailand and is a member of Veterans For Peace.

McCafferty – The Dubliners

The most subversive song ever sung by British soldiers?

During the middle years of the 19th century soldiers in the British Army were subject to poor living conditions and harsh punishments. While flogging was the most feared punishment for soldiers, the ultimate penalty was execution; usually after a court-martial and by firing squad. Both floggings and firing squads were meant to frighten and intimidate other soldiers and these punishments took place surrounded by elaborate ceremonies with the other soldiers ordered to parade and witness the scene. In a few instances the wrongdoer was handed over to the civil courts. One such case was that of Patrick M’Caffrey, an 18 year-old Irish recruit to the Cornwall Light Infantry in 1860. His story gave rise to the most sung, and perhaps the most subversive, song ever written about a soldier in the British Army. The soldier’s name appeared in a variety of spellings and recent versions of the song were called McCafferty:

McCafferty

When I was 18 years of age,
Into the British Army I did engage;
I left my home with the good intent
To join the forty-second regiment.

To Fullwood Barracks then I did go,
To serve my time in that depot.
From troubles then I was never free;
My captain took a great dislike to me.

When posted out on guard one day,
Some soldiers’ children came along to play;
From the officers’ mess my captain came
And ordered me to take their names.

I took one name instead of three,
On neglect of duty, they then charged me;
Ten days’ CB with loss of pay,
For doing my duty – the opposite way.

With a loaded rifle I did prepare,
To shoot my captain on the barrack square;
It was my captain I meant to kill,
But I shot my colonel against my will.

At Liverpool Assizes then I stood,
I held my courage as best I could;
But the judge he says McCafferty,
Go prepare yourself for eternity.

Well I had no father to take my part,
Nor loving mother to break her heart;
I had but one friend, and a girl was she;
Who’d have laid down her life for McCafferty.

So come all you officers and NCO’s,
Take some advice from one who knows,
It was only lies and a tyranny,
That made a martyr of poor McCafferty.

While containing slight inaccuracies, like naming the regiment as the 42nd rather than the actual 32nd, the song tells the basic story. M’Caffrey must have been a remarkably good shot; his one bullet fired at Captain Hanham killed both him and Colonel Crofton, who was walking alongside Hanham on the barrack square. On Saturday, 11 January 1862 in front of a crowd estimated at 30,000 to 40,000 M’Caffrey was hanged outside of Kirkdale Gaol, in Liverpool. The crowd were clearly on his side and yelled and hissed at the public executioner Calcraft.

Fellow squadies were also sympathetic to M’Caffrey, because they too suffered under the harsh discipline and petty harassment that had led to the soldier’s actions and tragic end. The song has been sung ever since, in various versions, by soldiers in the army – even though it is thought to be a chargeable offence to be caught singing it.

I remember learning the words to this song in 1967 on late night buses back to the Tidworth Garrison after drinking sessions in nearby Salisbury. I was told the song could only be sung when there was nobody [in authority] around. The authorities’ dislike for McCafferty was probably compounded by the song being set to the same tune as The Croppy Boy, an Irish rebel ballad that commemorated the crop-haired United Irish supporters of the French Revolution.

This song was chosen by Aly Renwick who served with the Royal Engineers in Thailand and is a member of Veterans For Peace.

On September the 1st 2014, this years list of service personnel, that have died on duty during the previous twelve months was unveiled at the National Arboretum. This year there will be seventeen new names carved into the Portland stone panels, apparently the least since 1948. If the current world situation and the associated Western belligerent and bellicose rhetoric is indicating anything, it’s the fact that the arboretum stone masons are set to be very busy people indeed.

However, these panels will make no mention of those other victims, those that will remain anonymous, those on the other end of the drone and intensive rocket and bombing attacks, those that simply disappeared and those we call the enemy. The wall will not include the names of those former servicemen who died by their own hand, whose lives had become to painful to bare, in addition the wall will not include the names of those former servicemen who have taken the slow suicide option of self destruction through the use of drugs, drink or freezing to death, homeless, on the streets of our towns and cities.

I have direct experience of this selective process of whose name does and doesn’t go on the wall. In 1975 my brother was serving in the Royal Navy’s Far East fleet on the nuclear submarine repair ship HMS Forth, operating in the South China sea. There was an ‘incident’ with a damaged submarine, he came back to the UK and was sent to the Royal Marsden hospital for a body scan, ten months later he was dead from an osteosarcoma of the spine, a cancer normally associated with exposure to radiation. I wrote to the National Arboretum with the intention of getting his name added to the wall. After some months delay, and letters to and from the school of Naval Medicine, I received a reply stating that my brothers death was not related to his service, but due to a childhood illness. Interesting to note that Lord Mountbatten’s name appears on the memorial even though he was not a serviceman at the time of his death, or that his death was related to service.  There are currently fifteen thousand plus names on the memorial wall and space for a further fifteen thousand, which beggars the question “What future wars do the mongers have on their agenda?”  

So this wall is a wall of shame, an epitaph to the folly of war and the duplicitous selective filtering of whose names appear and those that don’t, coupled with what Wilfred Owen called the old lie ‘Dulce et Decorum Est  Pro Patria Mori’ ( How sweet and right to die for one’s country). But we have been here before, as Siegfried Sassoon so aptly describes his revulsion in the poem “On Passing the New Menin Gate”

On Passing The New Menin Gate

Who will remember, passing through this Gate,
the unheroic dead who fed the guns?
Who shall absolve the foulness of their fate,-
Those doomed, conscripted, unvictorious ones?

Crudely renewed, the Salient holds its own.
Paid are its dim defenders by this pomp;
Paid, with a pile of peace-complacent stone,
The armies who endured that sullen swamp.

Here was the world’s worst wound. And here with pride
‘Their name liveth for ever’, the Gateway claims.
Was ever an immolation so belied
as these intolerably nameless names?
Well might the Dead who struggled in the slime
Rise and deride this sepulchre of crime.
A phrase that has always brought up a degree of revulsion in myself, is that ludicrous and asinine statement found on many war memorials “Our Glorious Dead”. My experience from the Falklands War gave me the direct knowledge that there is nothing glorious about being ripped apart by artillery fire or burning to death from phosphorous grenades and then being hastily buried in a water logged hole, only to be dug up some months later and reinterred with all the pomp of a military funeral. There is nothing glorious about consoling a grieving mother who gave birth and nurtured her only son for the first sixteen years of his life, then stands shocked and bemused as his coffin is slowly lowered into the ground. There is nothing glorious about seeing a father frantically running for help cradling his bomb victim injured child, desperate for medical attention as the child’s life ebbs away.
 
If Britain has been good at anything since the outbreak of World War1 it has been the construction of war cemeteries and the associated memorials. No doubt for anyone who has been to Northern France and the Flanders area of Belgium, they are very serene, beautifully kept, peaceful places, but I am always reminded of Le Ly’s soliloquy in Oliver Stones anti Vietnam war movie Heaven and Earth, as she returns home to the bombed out North Vietnamese village of her birth and walks through the grave yard. “IF WAR BRINGS ANYTHING, IT’S CEMETERIES AND THERE ARE NO ENEMIES IN CEMETERIES”.

Gus Hales is a veteran of the Falklands War and a member of Veterans For Peace UK

Protesting the NATO Summit, Saturday 30^th August 2014, Newport.

This weekend members of Veterans For Peace joined thousands of activists in Newport, South Wales to protest the NATO summit being held next week. Here is what some of them had to say.

Stuart Griffiths a veteran of the conflict in Northern Ireland said “Yet again it was yet another peaceful demonstration but as usual the police presence was over the top ‘because of national security’ its seems that nowadays security is far greater than perosnal freedom and what Gus Hales mentioned seemed to echo true about slipping further and further into an ‘Orwellian State’. Now all we can do is make a stand – and I’m proud to make that stand with Veterans For Peace”

Gus Hales a veteran of the Falklands War said “This two day summit and its pampering and security of the NATO elite, is costing a staggering 50million pounds. The county of Glamorgan has become a prison for the people of South Wales and the fear factor is epitomised by raising of the national security alert and the presence of seven NATO warships harboured in Cardiff Bay.

“If this summit had to take place, then why couldn’t it have been held on an aircraft carrier mid Atlantic ocean. Or maybe on a one way trip to the international space station. How much longer before the general population wake up to the fact that NATO is Now an Arms Trading Organisation or could it just be that NATO is Now A Terrorist Operation designed to subjugate the people into believing that war is once again a viable and credible option to the worlds problems.”

Ant Heaford a veteran of the War in Afghanistan said “This peaceful pre-summit protest was a success in every way, uniting many different causes under one banner, Stop NATO’s War Mongering!

“We gathered around midday at the town’s civic centre, where we were entertained by some of the most passionate voices of the valley’s – Cardiff Reds Choir. Had they sung ‘Men of Harlech’ it would have been reminiscent of the movie ‘Zulu’ – people from all walks of life united against seemingly insurmountable odds.

“Facing those ‘insurmountable odds’ had led me to wonder ‘what is the point?’ and I was on the verge of throwing the towel in before I’d even left home. I could not be more glad that I didn’t. Any doubts I had were dispelled within the first half hour as person after person saw the Veterans For Peace banner and came to thank us personally for our presence and efforts. It was incredibly moving and very humbling as I realised the importance so many people place on VFP within the peace movement.

“The march set off at 2p.m. with good humor that lasted until the end. The Police presence was low key, cheerful and even helpful – in a lovely touch they even colour coordinated their uniform accessories to our VFP hoodies!

“The route took us on a well paced tour of the city centre – local Newportians we passed only expressed support, and were without complaint to the obvious disruption of their Saturday. Ending with some brief yet inspiring speeches (preaching to the converted!) the march and rally were finished in a little over two hours, making me realize the greatest effort involved in the whole day was principally the decision to go.

“So what was it that caused my change of heart as I had waivered? It was our Gus, both knowingly & unwittingly. His excellent preparation meant the journey was hassle free, the driving shared and was a great chance to introduce ourselves before arriving. The second and maybe unintentional prompt for me was my chance viewing of his Christ Church, Port Stanley reading. I won’t try to surmise it but will only ask anyone who is wavering in their resolve to watch it. It was and remains an awe inspiring act of selfless courage.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Steve Pratt served in the British Army on operations in Dhofar and Northern Ireland. He is an artist and a member of Veterans For Peace UK.

A ring of steel has been thrown around the Welsh Cities of Newport and Cardiff as this coming week Wales plays host to the NATO summit, at the Celtic Manor Hotel and Leisure resort Newport. During this summit Cardiff castle will hold a champagne banquet while food bank queues mount in the rest of the city. Ten thousand police are being drafted in, to police what is expected to be Wales largest ever protest. This doesn’t include private security

No doubt this summit, to be attended by Barack Obama, will discuss the current situation in the Ukraine and who else the Americans and its cohorts, including the UK, can bomb in the next twelve months.  We vote these people in and we hand over our power to them. Then they fence themselves off and stick two fingers up at us, whilst indulging in boundless hedonism and decadence.

Tomorrow I will be travelling down to Newport from Nuneaton by car, then a train into Newport from Pontypool in order to attend the Newport no NATO march anyone is free to join me and welcome to stay over in Nuneaton for an early depart tomorrow. I will be representing Veterans For Peace.

I was born 54 years ago in Douglaston Stables, Milngavie, which is a place just outside Glasgow. I have two older sisters, Evelyn and Denise and a younger sister, Christine, she’s only 18 months younger than me. And my younger brother Derek who came six years after I was born. So there were five of us. My mum was originally from Glasgow. She was from Yoker. My mum is an incredibly strong woman. She was a grafter, a feminist and she cleaned bars and was a chamber maid and when she got to the age of forty she was ‘ah I’m fed up cleaning out men’s toilets. I’m better than this.’ So she became a nurse at the age of forty. My father is English and he comes from a large family in Quorn in Leicestershire. My dad was from mining stock. His father died when he was six years old of coal dust on the lungs. He was in the navy when he met my mother; he was based up in Rosyth. And he met my mum and they quickly got married and he stayed in Scotland since. So he put up with a fair bit of racial abuse being English, when being English in Glasgow was not the best thing to be in the 50’s and 60’s.

I joined the Scots Guards and I finished my basic training in February, March 1981. The Scots Guards were based in Alexander Barracks near Aldergrove airport. And they would go and do two week stints in Belfast. The Markets, Ardoyne, Newlodge, Falls, Divis, Unity all the republican areas. And of course the hunger strike kicked off at that time. So that meant we were in the city a lot more because they swamped Ireland, Northern Ireland, with British soldiers. The clock was ticking. Bobby Sands was on hunger strike for sixty-six days. We went on leave before he died and the tension was building. So I went on leave and I was doing the dishes at home and my dad came in and said ‘are you alright son?’ And I said ‘The shits going to hit the fan Dad, I can’t go back.’. He said ‘Son you’ve got to go back. You cannot run away you know.’ And of course I went back but that journey from Glasgow to Belfast was so depressing. It’s a half hour drive from Milngavie to the airport. My brother was in the back of the car, my dad was driving. I couldn’t even look at them. I’d look out the window. Black clouds. It was awful. But when you got to the airport and you saw a couple of the boys you began to loosen up a wee bit. Because we were all the same. You could see the big black clouds over everybody’s heads as we were coming back from two weeks of madness, of spending loads of money and getting drunk. Back to reality but this time the reality was different. Bobby Sands was dead.

Coming to Belfast I was in no way prepared for the level of hatred towards me. And I took that very personally. After my initial Northern Ireland training which is separate from your basic training I was sent out with a bunch of Fusiliers just to break me in gently. Well it wasn’t gently at all. We were walking the streets. They pulled a car over. ‘Right search the car.’ So I’m like looking around and things and he said ‘no search it.’ And this family, kids in the back, wife in the passenger seat and the guy and they were glaring at me. And they were pulling panels off doors, and into the boot and pulling up everything. And I’ve never done this before. And the looks I was getting from this women and these kids and this man. I just did not enjoy that at all.

Very, very quickly you put your barriers up and you became as hate filled as they were towards us. They stopped being people to me. They were the enemy. They hated us. Kids, grannies, even dogs. You’re not talking one or two. Massive communities, thousands of people despised us. That was hard to take. I was expecting a few individuals. A few hundred. But half a million?

Spike Pike served with the Scots Guards in Northern Ireland, he is a member of Veterans For Peace UK

 

Saturday 30 August 2014

Newport Civic Centre Car Park.

Meet from 1200 hrs 

March leaves Car Park at 1400 hrs

Dress – VFP Hoody

Look for the VFP Flag.

Veterans For Peace will be joining the No Nato march in Newport South Wales on Saturday.

Email veteransforpeaceuk@gmail.com to link up with other VFP going to the protest.

19 September to 7 October 2014.

Private View: Friday 19 September 6pm to 8pm.

‘Stuart is a unique photographer as he shows us army life, not from an
embedded viewpoint (like so many images around war), but direct from his
experience of being there as he was a soldier himself.’  Magnum photographer Martin Parr.
Stuart Griffiths began taking photographs when he was a young soldier on
patrol in West Belfast in the late 1980s, carrying a ‘sure-shot’ instamatic
camera in his chest-webbing alongside 120 rounds, water bottles and
field dressings. CLOSER is the culmination of his complete work to date and
will be shown at Sussex Coast College, Hastings, from 19 September until 7
October 2014.

This is the first time that the entire show, including artworks, has been
exhibited in the South East region. The show includes candid photos of army
life taken in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s during Stuarts’ time serving in the
Parachute Regiment in Northern Ireland; an installation of his illustrated and
highly personal Xeroxed letters home; and large-scale colour photographs of
socially-excluded veterans, accompanied by Luke Seomore and Joseph Bull’s
documentary film Isolation (2009), which charts the making of these images.

Commenting on the exhibition, Stuart said: ‘I began making these
photographs as a response to my personal feelings towards war. This was
long before charities started using cuddly teddy bears as a way of making
serious injuries acceptable to the masses. I wanted to show the horror of war
and its aftermath and realised early on that it was the young people that
carried the worst scars of all. To me, when I began working on CLOSER, it
was to be a visual protest against war; now the work is complete, I still feel the
same way. Bringing the show back to Hastings is like CLOSER has
completed its very own tour of duty and this is the homecoming.’

Stuart will be available at the private view on Friday 19 September from
6.00-8.00pm to sign copies of his memoir Pigs’ Disco.

Stuart served in The Parachute Regiment and is a member of VFP UK

My name is Spike Pike, an ex-soldier who did a tour of Belfast in 1981 at the time of the hunger strike. I am now a member of Veterans for Peace. This is about my journey towards reconciliation and peace. It started at the Veterans for Peace UK Annual General Meeting where I met Lee Lavis who was speaking about his work in Belfast. When he had finished he asked, are there any questions? My hand shot up and I said, ‘I’d like to work with you.’ The ball was rolling.

Day 1 -Thursday 7th August

I had driven to Glasgow the previous day as that’s how the journey would have been in 1981, Glasgow to Belfast. I was hoping to recreate the same feelings I had then, it worked. My dad used to drive me to the airport back then, but unfortunately he’s too old to drive now. So I’d arranged for my sister-in-law Dee to take me. An hour before Dee arrived my guts were in knots. I was pacing about my parents house, I felt very anxious. Dee arrived and off we went. I was more relaxed and was chatting to Dee about how it was in 1981. Talking and a couple of really bad jokes from Dee lightened my mood. By the time I got to Glasgow airport, I was fine.

The flight from Glasgow to Belfast took 40 minutes. In 1981… 40 minutes from being at home with your family to the hate-filled streets of Belfast, 40 minutes, that’s how it was. I was met at Belfast airport by Lee, we made the bus journey into town. I started to see the flags, mostly Loyalist and then a few Republican. It all started coming back to me.

It was straight to Lee’s flat then off to a talk by Jo Berry and Pat Magee. Jo’s father was killed by the Brighton bomb. Pat had planted the bomb. This was powerful. Two people from opposite tribes had chosen to come together, Jo wanted to understand why? What were the circumstances that drove Pat, a member of the IRA to take out the entire British government? Maggie Thatcher’s government. I was sitting listening to a man saying to a woman, ‘I killed your father’ and for her to respond in a calm and loving manner was quite something. Lee and I were asked to go (backstage) for some food and refreshments. Jo asked me if I would speak to a guy called, let’s call him Mr A, whose father was shot and killed by a British soldier 40 years ago and he had never spoken to a soldier or former soldier since. We were introduced. Now I had never experienced this situation before, we locked eyes as we spoke and there was tension. Fortunately Lee has had this experience many times and quickly diffused the situation. Lee spoke with Mr A for maybe an hour. I spoke to several people including Pat. Now I have never spoken to a member of the IRA or former member of the IRA without seeing them as the enemy. There was a time the very mention of the IRA would have sent me into a rage. To me, they were scum, murderers, even the Irish flag would evoke such rage. This was different. I was talking to a human being. A human face had been put on the enemy, like Pat, Jo’s father became a person, not the enemy.

That was my first night in Belfast.

Day 2 – Friday 8th August

We went along to a museum; there was a talk about the role of Irish regiments in the first and second world wars. I was reminded of a play I’d seen earlier this year, Raising Lazarus, by poet Kat Francois and the role West Indian soldiers had played in both wars. Seems both Irish and West Indian regiments were treated as badly and not getting any recognition. I met a woman called Bernadette whose father was killed in a sectarian shooting early on in the troubles. She was a wonderfully compassionate woman. It’s quite humbling that people I’ve met who have suffered personal loss have rejected bitterness as a coping mechanism. Later that day, I was interviewed at length for an oral history project by Claire Hackett of the Falls Road Community Council. This interview will be placed in an archive that will record the history of the Northern Ireland conflict in West Belfast. I find it very refreshing that the Nationalist community wish to include the experiences of former British soldiers. At one point re-living and talking about my experience I got quite emotional.

Day 3 – Saturday 10th August

Another excellent and interesting day. We met a former republican prisoner, Danny, who now works as a youth development officer. We met at the foot of Divis flats on the Falls Road. Once a very dangerous place for British soldiers. Danny gave me a brief history of the Republican movement going back to the late 1800’s. His energy and knowledge was compelling, he spoke very matter of fact and with no trace of bitterness or anger. We toured various Republican areas. Danny was a first class guide and there was so much to take in. We reached the Ardoyne area where there is still on-going tension between the two communities regarding Loyalists marching past Twadell Avenue. Lee and I crossed over the road to the Loyalist side (apparently not the done thing!). We were quickly approached by an angry man who demanded to know who we were. Once we explained who and why we were there he relaxed a bit and gave us a run-down on the situation. We thanked him and made our way back across the road. Considering the history of the place, maybe crossing the boundary was not the best thing to do; I mean people have been shot for that.

Final day – Sunday 11th August

Went to Derry/Londonderry. After an artery hardening breakfast, courtesy of Lee, and with Kieran at the wheel, off we went. Derry/Londonderry was not what I had imagined. It was a lovely town, somewhat quiet compared to Belfast, but it was Sunday afternoon. We visited the Free Derry museum, where I met Jean whose brother had been shot and killed on Bloody Sunday. She was a lovely woman; she spoke of the pain for all concerned, even expressing compassion for one of the soldiers at the tribunal. We then met Fiona Gallagher. Her brother was shot and killed while taking a bus ride home from town. She too was full of compassion for all victims of the troubles. I have met so many people that have experienced the pain of loss, the same people that wish for peace.

Summary

What did I get from my trip? Well, a greater understanding of why it all kicked off in 1969. Why were the folk in Catholic areas denied basic rights, decent homes, proper jobs? Why were they treated like second-class citizens? So many ‘Why’s? Now in 2014, it’s so much better, but there is still a long, long way to go. I’m not naïve enough to think all Republicans would greet me with open arms, far from it, there are still a few who would see me as a ‘uniform’, the ‘enemy.’ Of that, I have no doubt. But what I saw was people and groups within the Republican areas that are driving the peace process, that are pushing for a lasting peace. The trip was exhausting and very rewarding. I felt humbled and blessed to meet so many amazing people.

I’d like to thank, Jo Berry; Pat Magee; Claire Hackett; Fiona Gallagher; Danny, Jean, Kieran and most of all Lee for making this whole experience possible.

Much love and respect to all, I’ll leave you with this poem.

No Man’s Land

In no man’s land we’ll be as one
No need to fight or kill
In no man’s land there are no kings
Or rich man’s gut to fill
So when the guns at last go silent
And the drums no longer beat
When we awaken to our madness
In no man’s land we’ll meet

Spike served in the Scots Guards, he is a street poet and a member of Veterans For Peace.