We can sit here scoring points off each other all day, which is not my intention at all. If you are an ex-squaddie, which from you profile you appear to be surely all the little inconsistancies don’t add up to intelligent scrutiny.Circumstantial evidence is still evidence?
The point about bedfords was the QLR did not use them! The pictures are claimed to be of the QLR on patrol. Not 14 sigs etc, and I agree there will be bedfords in theatre, that was not the point. The supposed soldier in question says they used the same trucks all the time and that was in the back of one. Well they are not bedfords in the QLR. So how can it be in the back of a QLR truck? The question has been asked and the mirror cannot answer it satisfactorily. Some of the other points I think are crap as well but too much is just not right for this to convice me they are anything other than faked/staged.
At least we agree that it is something that has all gone horribly wrong. I find it difficult to believe this sort of bahaviour can take place without more people being aware of it and taking action.
Anyway moving on I see the boys over on the other board have made it into todays Times on the subject.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...097504,00.html it also raises wider questions about the Military, morale and funding etc
Excerpt of the full article. Copyright Libby Purves/ The Times etc…
The soldiers’ own voices, mournful and ashamed, are the last set which I would offer you. If the first voice said “Westerners abuse Arabs” and the second “Armies are brutal”, the soldiers’ voice has a simpler message: “Men are fallible.” If you follow the army rumour website (arrse.co.uk) it is usually full of wicked jokes and gung-ho cynicism: my favourite strand was the evil suggestion that overseas personnel, who at an election may name any UK constituency as their likely base, should name Sedgefield and get the PM out. When the American abuse pictures appeared, there was indignation and the occasional laddish joke: one long thoughtful posting ends “. . . and to add insult to injury, the bird who is tormenting them is a right moose”. But this week, with the British pictures out, the tone is quieter, heavy with disgust and shame. Listen:
“Really hope it isn’t true . . . thank God Mike Jackson didn’t talk a load of crap, spin it and blame the media . . . ****e happens in any walk of life, I would like to think we are better than that . . . bad apple . . . absolutely stomach churning, heads need to roll right the way up the chain of command if this is true . . . I hope all those involved get beasted out of sight . . . whether these prisoners are murderers, terrorists or not, those in charge had a duty of care . . . we are meant to be a disciplined force not a bunch of cowboys . . . why didn’t the guy with the camera stop it happening? . . . .**** this, I’m going for a morose beer somewhere.”
Of all the cries — Westerners hate Arabs, all war is wrong, armies are beasts — I prefer that soldier’s simple conclusion. ****e happens. Men are fallible. We struggle to be better. May the Muslim world, please God or Allah, have the grace to believe that.
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