This what Bliar and his band of incompetent political gutter snipes have done to the career of a fine officer, who’s past record and contemporary performance in a hugely difficult operational theatre should have been proudly held up as an inspiration to all in our Nation.
Stalled career of high flier
Steven Morris
The Guardian, Thursday February 15, 2007
Three years ago, Colonel Jorge Mendonca MBE was a soldier going places, and fast. In 2003 he had led the 1st Battalion the Queen's Lancashire Regiment with distinction as it tried to help with the rebuilding of Basra after the war. Almost every day the unit's 620 men faced riots, looting, armed robbery, smuggling, kidnapping, shootings, bombings and grenade attacks.
They were meant to win the hearts and minds of the people of Basra but conditions for the citizens were terrible, with fuel, electricity and even food and drinking water in short supply. In the searing heat tensions often bubbled over.
There were many bad days but the worst was when they lost a popular colleague, Captain Dai Jones, 29, a newlywed who was blown up by a roadside bomb. During the prosecution it was claimed that this death might have been one of the reasons why Col Mendonca's men treated the Iraqi detainees so badly.
On his return Col Mendonca, 43, was awarded the distinguished service order for the skill with which he led his men. At the ceremony the Queen told him that she had heard good things about his battalion. Typically Col Mendonca said he considered the award was not for him but for the whole battalion.
He also spoke passionately in a local newspaper interview about the suffering of some of the people he and his soldiers were there to help. "I have a two-year-old and a one-year-old son and to see people the same size as my older boy with nothing on from the waist down, absolutely filthy and running around in sewage and rubbish covered streets, is heartbreaking.
"It is hugely rewarding and challenging," he went on, "to make a success of it and give the children a better future."
After returning from Iraq he was given an important post at the Permanent Joint Headquarters in Northwood and in time he was expected to make brigadier.
Hugh Eaton, a now-retired lieutenant colonel who was also in Basra in 2003, said: "He was the man universally considered as being the best commanding officer [of a battalion] by some way."
Col Mendonca, 43, could not speak openly after he was charged. But his wife, Louise, said he had been treated appallingly and claimed the damage being done to the army was "irreparable". In a newspaper article she wrote: "The moment Col Jorge Mendonca, DSO, MBE steps into the dock he will leave behind a truly broken organisation."
Colleagues said he now wants to get his stalled career back on track. The fear for him is that his legal ordeal may make that very difficult.