With the talk of moving troops reminded me...
Just before the ground war started and the troops needed to be moved quickly, HQ BFME discussed the issue, obviously not knowing this had already been discussed by AA . They spoke to the Kiwis who were geared up for this by putting pallets down to make a flat floor then putting ratchet strops across the floor in rows. The troops emplaned sat down facing the rear and held onto the strops.
All well and good but OC UKMAMS Wg Cdr (R******d M*****l), decided that this was not good enough and decided that the RAF were to do the same except the strop was to go over the thighs of the troops and tightened to provide a form of restraint.....!!
When someone asked which side the Wg Cdr was on as what he was proposing was liable to break the legs of every soldier on board, he backed down.
This was the same OC UKMAMS who wrote a 2 page letter to all MAMS in Riyadh, telling us we had to abide by H&S at all times and it was our duty to remove ourselves from any potential dangerous situations. Seeing as I was reading it with my respirator following another Scud alert, I said I wanted to go home as per the OCs letter.
I got told to read on and in the last paragraph, he said that being in the RAF we might find ourselves in situations where we had to just carry on as the mission came first. A complete waste of paper and time in sending the letters but the Wg Cdr's a@ was covered I suppose.