Monday - March 15, 2010

BATTLING BRITS IN AFGHANISTAN ….

Nothing for me to add here except to say these fellows are damn good and uphold a long and proud military tradition. They are better and braver then many who are representing them. 

Inside Afghanistan: the sniper’s tale

Heathcliff O’Malley (camera) and David Ferrarotto
Published: 12:30PM GMT 15 Mar 2010

As part of The Telegraph’s series of videos looking at life for the British Army in Afghanistan, we hear from a sniper whose daily challenge is to kill before he is killed.

Telegraph photojournalist Heathcliff O’Malley spent two weeks embedded with British troops in Helmand, Afghanistan.

In this exclusive series, he shows what life is really like on the ground for the 10,000 soldiers serving in the country.

SOURCE

Posted by peiper     on 03/15/2010 at 01:22 PM   
Filed Under: • Battling Brits • Guns and Gun Control • Military • Muslims • UK • War-Stories •  
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   Sunday - March 07, 2010

RAF helicoptor pilot shot between the eyes by Taliban flies 20 to safety … England expects ….

I am buried today in work and frustration caused by AT&T.  Must change over all addresses and make copies of stuff and, yadda,yadda.

It almost seems as though the kids at ATT don’t seem to be aware that there are folks overseas who have (and pay) for their services. With 50 minute wait times and two weeks already spent trying and failing to get anywhere, I guess I’m about to close my ATT account after 10 years.  Hate to do that coz generally their tech support for some things can not be faulted.  But I guess all good things must come to an end. My worry now is that they’ll continue to charge us and it’ll be just as tough getting through again. You can’t believe the nightmare.  For example, their email tells us we had till the end of march.  But someone on the phone said oh no.  March 8 is the deadline but someone else said .. NO. March 15 is the deadline.  Bah. Grumble.  I give up! It just isn’t worth it trying to get anywhere with them anymore.  And oh yeah, to make thing worse yet, they have incorrect instructions on their migration site that they aren’t even aware of. And no way to inform them.  Tried it. And forget emails. What a bad joke that is.  I’ve tried writing every place I could find an email for and have received not one reply in two weeks of trying.

I feel pretty stupid complaining about that considering what this awesome RAF pilot has done.  OK he didn’t have many choices it’s true but hey. These guys are to be admired and honored.  What they are going through is NO WALK IN THE PARK!

I hadn’t intended to post today due to all the above mentioned stuff, but ran across this. This is my only post for today.

An RAF helicopter pilot who was shot between the eyes by a Taliban bullet still managed to fly all 20 passengers to safety.

The Chinook flown by Flight Lieutenant Ian Fortune, 28, was brought in to pick up casualties during a firefight between American and Afghanistan forces and heavily armed rebels near Garmsir in Helmand Province, said a report in The Sun.

The pilot was told it was too dangerous to land and circled the landing area. The Chinook came under fire after eventually landing - which continued as casualties were loaded on board - and Flt Lt Fortune was hit by a Taliban bullet as he took off.

The shot hit the rail on the front of his helmet which is normally used to attach night vision goggles.
It penetrated his helmet hitting him between the eyes and causing severe bleeding.

Further bullets hit the helicopter’s’s controls damaging the stabilisation system.  Despite this Flt Lt Fortune was able to fly for eight minutes before landing at Camp Bastion.

This was the first time a pilot has been shot while in the air during the Afghanistan war.
Mike Brewer, a television presenter who was on board filming a documentary at the time, said: “The courage and heroism of the pilot was beyond belief.”

RAF TO THE RESCUE

Posted by peiper     on 03/07/2010 at 08:51 AM   
Filed Under: • Battling Brits • Heroes • UK • War On Terror • War-Stories •  
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   Monday - November 23, 2009

Amazing aerial images taken by daring Allied pilots on secret missions during WW 2

These are only two of MANY aerial photos and text available HERE

See that link for some truly amazing photos.

Some interesting things to post and will, but no energy for a lot again today.  Bah. Cold rebound, feel better but just washed out.
Got a call from someone with an accent you could cut with a knife, call center in Scotland, confirming that someone will call and an ins. adjuster will call to let us know when they can visit our house re. the still leaky roof but they don’t know when that call will be. Today? Tomoro? Wed? In my lifetime?
Meanwhile, hard driving rain yesterday, last night, and again today.

From Colditz to D-Day:

Amazing aerial images taken by daring Allied pilots on secret missions during World War II

By David Wilkes
Last updated at 9:53 AM on 23rd November 2009

The detail is astonishing. At first it looks like just another castle surrounded by tiny houses and neat fields. But zooming in on the courtyard one can see figures milling around.

They are in fact Allied officers being held in the notorious German PoW camp of Colditz and the photograph is one from an archive of aerial photographs taken by airmen - sometimes flying as low as 50ft - during secret reconnaissance missions in World War II.
Until now the pictures have been kept behind closed doors. But they are revealed to the public for the first time today via the internet amid a painstaking cataloguing process.

In another image, precise as a hole punch through a sheet of paper, craters surround a Nazi doodlebug factory in an extraordinary photograph showing the devastation wreaked by an Allied bombing raid.

The date is September 2, 1944 and the place Peenemunde, a village on the Baltic, where the terrifying weapons Adolf Hitler hoped would win the war for Germany were designed and tested.
Others in the collection convey the human suffering experienced amid the fighting, including rare shots of a Nazi slave labour camp and of the landings on D-Day.

Alan Williams, manager of the National Collection of Aerial Photography which houses the photos, said: ‘The archive literally shows the world at war.’
Long before the days of Google Earth, the highly skilled airmen who took them flew alone, by day and night, in unarmed Spitfires relying on their wits as they risked their lives to capture the images on their plane-mounted cameras

Sometimes their planes were painted pink, as the unusual colour proved very good at hiding the aircraft against a background of low cloud. For high altitude missions, the planes were painted a dark shade of blue.

But often they still found themselves targeted by anti-aircraft missiles. Hundreds of them never returned home.
Those that did brought with them photos vital to the war effort.

Expert photographic interpreters studied the pictures using optical instruments such as stereoscopes to view them in 3D to build up detailed information for intelligence reports and models used in military planning for operations such as the D-Day landings.

The ‘detective’ teams, who were headquartered in a stately home in Buckinghamshire at RAF Medmenham - MI4’s Allied Central Interpretation Unit - included Oxbridge academics, geographers and archaeologists.

Posted by peiper     on 11/23/2009 at 06:34 AM   
Filed Under: • Art-Photography • Battling Brits • OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT • Science-Technology • UK • War-Stories •  
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   Sunday - November 22, 2009

THE LUCKIEST SOLDIER ALIVE ….. MUST READ AND SEE …

Boy, do I feel like a wuss complaining about my insignificant little nothing cold .....

The Lt. mistakingly says Nov. 26 in the video.  But the actual date is Oct. 26.

British Army officer, Lieutenant Paddy Rice, has been described as “the luckiest soldier in Afghanistan” after surviving being shot by a Taliban sniper.


By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent, Nad e’Ali, Afghanistan
Published: 6:30AM GMT 22 Nov 2009

Lieutenant Paddy Rice of the 1st battalion Grenadier Guards was wounded in the back and neck while on duty in central Helmand.

The bullet struck the officer just beneath his left shoulder blade, then travelled inside his back and up to his neck, where it left his body, passed his right ear before blasting a hole through his helmet.

After being injured, Lt Rice, who was serving with the battalion’s Inkerman Company, was flown by a Medical Emergency Response Team Chinook helicopter from his base to Camp Bastion, where his wounds were cleaned and left open for three days before being stitched under general anaesthetic.

The 25-year-old Guard’s Officer was offered the chance of recuperating from his wound in the UK but refused and is now back serving with his platoon on the front line in the Nad e’Ali area of central Helmand.

The drama unfolded on the afternoon of October 26th, while Lt Rice was on the roof of British base known as Compound 23 in the Chah-e’Anjir area of central Helmand.

The soldier was dressed in his body armour and helmet and was in a kneeling position when he was spotted by a Taliban fighter who opened fire through a “murder hole” – in a mud wall.

He said: “I climbed on to the roof of the Compound 23, where my soldiers and I were based, and was trying to move a radio into a sangar (defensive bunker). It was an exposed position so I was wearing my body armour and helmet. I then felt a thump in the back of my back, as though I had been kicked, and I knew immediately I had been shot.”

The bullet passed through his body, slicing open Lt Rice’s back and leaving an eight inch long gash running diagonally from his shoulder blade to an area just beneath his skull.

He continued: “I put my hand up to the back of my head and I could see blood and I think I said something to my platoon sergeant, Gert Botha, such as “I’ve been shot”.

“I was helped down from the roof and I radioed company headquarters, gave contact report (a message informing others that there has been an enemy attack), and said “there is one casualty and it’s me – I’ve been shot”. I wasn’t panicking I had considered how I might react if I was shot or injured but because everything seemed to be functioning normally I think I realised I would be OK.

“I know that I was very lucky to escape with what is actually a flesh wound, albeit a nasty one. If I had been looking up the bullet would have hit the back of my head and that would have been a different story.”

Compound 23 is one of several locations which surround Patrol Base Shahzad, the main British base in Chah-e’Anjir. The base and the satellite locations provide a security bubble around the district centre, which allows Afghans to trade in the bazaar and children to go to school without fear of intimidation by the Taliban.

But while the Afghans can carry on with their lives without interference, the British compounds are being attacked virtually every day by insurgents.

On arriving at the base where Lt Rice had been shot, medics were surprised at the calmness shown by the officer, who was sitting down smoking a cigarette when they arrived at his base.

An hour after being shot, Lt Rice was able to contact his father and give him the news. He continued: “It was quite a surreal telephone call. But it was far better that I told him that I had been shot in the neck and was OK rather than someone else.”

Lt Rice was flown back to Camp Bastion, the main British base in Helmand, where he was given further medical treatment and three days after being injured, he received 29 stitches.

The officer also called his girlfriend in Clapham, south west London, who was shopping in a supermarket when he broke the news.

Lt Rice added: “She was a bit upset and startled to hear me saying that I had been shot while she was buying her supper but after I reassured her that I was fine she relaxed a bit. She knows that this is the job I want to do, she has known that since we met – she is very understanding.”

Captain James Swanston, the second-in-command of Inkerman Company, Grenadier Guards, who was in charge of the operations room at the time of the attack said that if the bullet had been a millimetre either side of where it struck Lt Rice would have either been killed or seriously injured.

He said: “When you hear that someone has been shot you expect the worst. But when the medics arrived, Paddy was sitting down smoking a cigarette. He showed great calmness.”

IN HIS OWN WORDS

Posted by peiper     on 11/22/2009 at 04:45 AM   
Filed Under: • Battling Brits • Military • UK • War-Stories •  
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   Thursday - November 05, 2009

A singular and sad day for Brit military literally stabbed in the back. Is it time to go?

A day or two ago posted an article on the death of a bomb disposal soldier who was on his last days tour.  He was btw, a local fellow from our area, and so naturally there’s a bit more news and background on him.

Well, yesterday a group of Brit soldiers were murdered in an attack by what authorities are saying was a Taliban mole.  They were unarmed at the time having just returned from a patrol and took off their flak jackets and helmets and gathered for cold drinks and tea in what should have been a safe compound.

Not available on line and even if it were, are the photos and description of exactly what and how it happened have had a great impact in hard copy that just can’t be reproduced on line.

No point in my relating the entire story.  It’s all here in these two articles.  The question I have is, are we failing?  Are we, that is America and England and what few allies we may have, spitting into the wind?  Are we trying to seriously nation build and create a democracy in a place that will NEVER be ready or accepting of such notions?  And btw ...  just what sort of ‘democracy’ are we trying to implant?  Are we going to teach them pc as well? 

Look, I am not a military strategist.  I see history and I see results.  I might respect the fighting ability of the foe or at least try not to underestimate their ability to hit back in ways that work for them.  But I don’t understand how we’re making things safer for the west by fighting tribes in some god forsaken shit hole populated by life forms that are barely human.  If we need to destroy them fine. Then why can’t we just nuke the whole area?  We killed an awful lot of innocent people in WW2 without wanting to.  But we damn well won a war we HAD to win.  Them or us, and them lost! Period.

Surely with tighter border controls (the will has to be there) and increased security and a shoot to kill policy by security services, surely we can avoid terrorist attacks on our soil without spending lives in Afghanistan.  ????  I’m not saying I’m correct in that, but I am asking the question.

Of course, safeguarding our homeland would mean killing (literally) off the traitors and 5th columnists among us.  Until that’s seen to people, we’re just spinning our wheels and wasting good young lives.

Those Brit soldiers that were killed were done in by someone trusted by them. He was a policeman, as I understand it.  Brits have been training the police there as have we (USA).  These (from all I have read here) are not the most trustworthy ppl on the planet.  They are easily bribed and loyalty shifts from one paymaster to another with some frequency.  Ppl in that part of the world have something approaching ‘loyalty’ but it’s to the tribe they come from. Not the govt. they currently work for.

On the one hand, pulling out of Afghanistan sends a message to terrorists everywhere.  We’ll go away if you do this sort of thing a lot.
On the other hand, is that place or its life forms worth the price?  Will we gain anything long term to make it worthwhile?  If we did nuke em, who’d oppose us except our own 5th col.? Yeah, the euros would jump up and down and come up with some kind of anti American slogan. Scew em. Challenge them to a war and see how they stand. 

Patrick Cockburn: Deaths bring whole Afghan strategy into question

Analysis

Thursday, 5 November 2009

I was in an office in Kabul this summer being lectured by a mid-ranking official about the successful work of the government. “Completely off the record, what do you really think of this government?” I asked him, not expecting a very interesting reply.

“So long as you promise not to reveal my identity, I can tell you that this government is made up of killers and crooks,” answered the official with scarcely a pause. He gave some examples of government-inspired killings and corruption.

In this tradition of carefully calculated treachery, the shooting dead of five British soldiers by an Afghan policeman operating with them is hardly surprising. Afghan leaders have long been notorious for concealing their true loyalties and changing sides. But the potential political consequences are very serious. The US and British strategy to build up the Afghan security forces to as many as 400,000 may prove impossible because the state is too weak and too poor and commands the loyalty of too few Afghans.

The reputation of Afghans for always defeating their enemies is based in part on the speed with which they join the winner. The Taliban advances in the 1990s were notable less for military victories than local warlords defecting to them after receiving a large bribe. In the US war to overthrow the Taliban in 2001, the same process went into reverse as the CIA bought off the same warlords who then sent their men home without a fight.

Nor is this the first time that Western forces have been turned on by their Afghan colleagues. In Kunduz province north of Kabul earlier this summer, a policeman shot eight of his colleagues and turned his police post over to the Taliban. An American military trainer was shot and wounded by one of the men he was training when he drank water in front of them when they were fasting during Ramadan.

The shaky loyalty of the Afghan police and, to a lesser extent, the army to their own government undermines US and British plans to hold the line against the Taliban while a strong local security force is built up. US political leaders speak of a force of 240,000 soldiers and 160,000 police to be trained in the next few years. In reality, though, nobody knows the current size of the Afghan security forces.

The army is supposedly 90,000 strong, but this figure may be grossly over-stated. “My educated guess is that such an army simply does not exist,” writes Ann Jones, an American specialist on Afghanistan. “I knew men who repeatedly went through ANA [Afghan National Army] training to get the promised Kalashnikov and the pay. Then they went home for a while and often returned some weeks later to enlist under a different name.”

Even so, the reputation of the army among ordinary Afghans is much better than that of the police. Some of these are paid a pittance for a very dangerous job. They are often stationed in vulnerable outposts and checkpoints. Their training is frequently almost non-existent. Before the presidential election in August, policemen being trained by a US security firm who had been receiving eight weeks’ training saw this reduced to three weeks, so they could be sent to guard polling stations in southern Afghanistan.

More senior policemen can make money through aiding drug smugglers. General Aminullah Amarkhail, the former head of security at Kabul airport, who was sacked for his success in arresting heroin smugglers, says that the profits are such that jobs are bought and sold for large sums. “You have to pay $10,000 [£6,000] in bribes to get a job as a district police chief,” he says, “and up to $150,000 to get a job as chief of police anywhere on the border – because there you can make a lot of money.”

SOURCE

British soldiers murdered in Afghanistan by Taliban assassin: Killer back with us and safe, say insurgents

By DAVID WILLIAMS, IAN DRURY and LIZ HAZELTON
Last updated at 1:02 PM on 05th November 2009
Five British soldiers killed in Afghan attack named by MoD

UN announces temporary withdrawal of 600 staff due to security concerns
Manhunt continues for killer who fled on motorbike in wake of shooting

Taliban insurgents today claimed that the Afghan policeman who murdered five British soldiers was back with them and ‘safe’.

The assassin, identified as a man called Gulbaddin, had fled the scene of slaughter on a motorbike after the attack on Tuesday.
But despite a desperate search involving British special forces, MI6 officers and surveillance drones there has been no trace of him since.

If true, the Taliban’s claim would confirm suspicions Gulbaddin fled the area using well-trod drugs smuggling routes established by insurgents.
Back in Britain, Gordon Brown is under mounting pressure to withdraw troops from Afghanistan in the wake of the attack.

As government policy on the war-torn region was savaged by all sides, Downing Street announced that the Prime Minister would make a ‘major speech’ on the issue tomorrow.

There was no immediate information about its contents but sources do not believe it signals any change in policy.
Two former Labour ministers and a series of bereaved families have called for an end to the UK’s military involvement after the soldiers were cut down in a hail of machine gun fire.

Six others were seriously injured in the attack by a man they trusted as they relaxed and drank tea in a compound.

Former defence minister Peter Kilfoyle declared ‘enough is enough’, adding: ‘It is time we should bring our troops home from what is an impossible task.’

COMPLETE STORY HERE

Posted by peiper     on 11/05/2009 at 08:16 AM   
Filed Under: • Terrorists • UK • War On Terror • War-Stories •  
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   Monday - November 02, 2009

KILLED ON THE VERY LAST DAY OF HIS TOUR IN AFGHANISTAN ….

Bad enough these brave young kids are dying and being maimed. That’s always a damn sad thing.
But somehow, to die on your last day of the tour .... I don’t know.  Something seems extra sad about that. Especially when you consider the lives this one Battling Brit saved.
I truly am nothing but upset and very depressed reading this.  Wish I hadn’t.  But then, hell.  Every time I see the reports I feel bad. Which means almost every day because there isn’t any way to avoid it.  And I shouldn’t avoid it anyway.  Neither should my fellow Americans.  These are the kids dying along side our guys.  Just as brave, just as young, just as sad.

Bomb expert who saved ‘countless lives’ killed in Afghanistan
One of the Army’s most prolific bomb disposal experts who saved “countless lives” has been killed on the last day of his operational tour, the Ministry of Defence has disclosed.

By Thomas Harding, Defence Correspondent
Published: 2:00PM GMT 02 Nov 2009

Despite “staring death in the face on a daily basis” Staff Sgt Olaf “Oz” Schmid continued to defuse bombs in Sangin, the most lethal town for IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices) in Helmand province.

The soldier, described as a man of “extreme courage”, was killed instantly as he attempted to make safe a bomb left in the town.

He is the third IED Disposal soldier to be killed in the last year as the Taliban increase their bombing campaign against the British force.

Among the great skill and courage in the ordnance disposal teams S/Sgt Schmid, 30, was marked as the “best of the best” defusing 64 of the estimated 1,200 IEDs found by British troops this year.

As well as taking part in Operation Panther’s Claw, a major assault on a Taliban stronghold, he found 31 IEDs during a single operation to clear a road near Sangin in August.

Following his death on Saturday his wife Christina said her husband had been “cruelly murdered on his last day of a relentless 5 month tour”.

“The pain of losing him is overwhelming. I take comfort knowing he saved countless lives with his hard work.”

Lt Col Robert Thomson, commanding officer of the 2Bn The Rifles, who recently returned from Afghanistan, described S/Sgt Schmid “simply the bravest and most courageous man I have ever met”.

“Under relentless IED and small arms attacks he stood taller than the tallest.

“He saved lives in 2 RIFLES time after time and for that he will retain a very special place in every heart of every Rifleman in our extraordinary battle group.”

In one 24 hour operation clearing possibly the most dangerous route in Afghanistan known as Pharmacy Road, he found 31 IEDs.

Lieutenant Colonel Gareth Bex, the commanding officer of the counter-IED task force, said many soldiers in Helmand owed their lives to S/Sgt Shmid’s “gallant actions”.

“The tag ‘legend’ is frequently bestowed nowadays but in his case it is rightly justified - SSgt Schmid was a legend. His courage was not displayed in a fleeting moment of time; he stared death in the face on a daily basis. His sacrifice will never be forgotten.”

He added that the soldier “takes his rightful place” alongside other bomb disposal experts who had been killed - Warrant Officer O’Donnell, who was awarded the George Medal and bar and Capt Dan Shepherd, who died during Operation Panther’s Claw.

The soldier, born in Truro Cornwall, also took part in Operation Panther’s Claw this summer which saw a bloody death told as British troops cleared Taliban strongholds ahead of the flawed presidential elections. S/Sgt Schmid, who worked in a High Threat Operator role sometimes alongside special forces, secured 11 finds of bomb making equipment many of them during the operation.

“SSgt Oz Schmid was a man of extreme courage who revelled in this the most challenging and dangerous of environments,” said his colleague Major Tim Gould.

His actions are likely to make him a strong candidate for a gallantry award, defence experts have said.

The total British lives lost in Afghanistan now stands at 224 with 87 lost this year alone.

SOURCE

Posted by peiper     on 11/02/2009 at 11:47 AM   
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   Thursday - October 15, 2009

Italy blamed for deaths of French troops.  Careful, it might not be true. Problem is …

We really don’t know who to believe.  If true it paints a pretty bad picture of how that war is being managed. Or maybe it isn’t being managed among the Italians.  ??  Don’t wanna be too fast on the trigger here.
The fact that this is tomorrows paper is bad enough.

Italy blamed for deaths of French troops after ‘hushing up bribes paid to Taliban’

By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 4:27 PM on 15th October 2009

Italy’s secret services have been accused of paying the Taliban thousands of dollars to keep an area in Afghanistan controlled by the Italians safe.

Rome was also accused of hushing up the bribes, keeping them secret from Nato allies - meaning that when France took over the same area, Paris misread the security situation there.

Shortly afterwards, ten French soldiers were killed in a shock ambush that had massive political repercussions in Paris.

Today Italy’s defence minister slammed the report, printed in the Times newspaper, as ‘rubbish’.

Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s office called the report ‘completely groundless’.

The Times reported that Italy had paid ‘tens of thousands of dollars’ to Taliban commanders and warlords in the Surobi district, east of the capital, Kabul.

The newspaper cites Western military officials, including high-ranking officers at Nato accused Rome of failing to inform its allies, misleading the French, who took over the Surobi district in mid-2008, into thinking the area was quiet and safe.

Then, the French contingent was hit with the ambush. It was one of the single biggest losses of life suffered by Nato forces in Afghanistan.
Nato spokesman James Appathurai and French government officials refused to comment on the report.

‘The Berlusconi government has never authorized nor has it allowed any form of payment toward members of the Taliban insurgence,’ a statement by the premier’s office said.

It says it does not know of any such payment by the previous government.

Berlusconi won elections in April 2008, replacing a centre-left government headed by Romano Prodi.

The statement noted that in the first half of last year the Italian contingent suffered several attacks, including in the Surobi district where one soldier was killed in February 2008.

Defenve Minister Ignazio La Russa fired back at the Times, saying the newspaper ‘collects rubbish’.

In an interview with Corriere della Sera, La Russa said that in the summer of 2008 ‘I had been minister for a short time, I’ve never received news from the secret services of payment to the chiefs of the Taliban.’

La Russa said that a benevolent attitude toward the Italians who serve in Afghanistan is due to ‘the behavior of our military, which is very different compared to that of other contingents’.

‘They have always showed they are close to the people and they get the same in return,’ La Russa said of the Italian soldiers.

‘To connect all of this with the death of the French soldiers ... seems an absurdity to me.’

Italy has about 2,800 soldiers stationed in Herat and in the capital of Kabul.

SOURCE

Posted by peiper     on 10/15/2009 at 12:00 PM   
Filed Under: • Euro-Peons • War-Stories •  
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   Tuesday - October 13, 2009

More about Sickles

Ok, I stole this video from Theo’s today ...






But isn’t the music lovely? It’s called Ashokan Farewell, by Jay Unger. It was the theme music from the Ken Burns Civil War mini-series.




So I bought a copy of James Hessler’s Sickles At Gettysburg after my post last week, and I’ve been reading it whenever I’ve had a chance. The author looks at tons of information, and winds up with a middle of the road opinion: Sickles, a man with a dark and inglorious past, was NOT the big hero of that battle as he spent 50 years trying to convince everyone. Yet he was also NOT the big screw up that his detractors have painted him as. My take at this point in my reading is this: had Sickles not extended the Union line, Lee and Longstreet’s battle plan would have gone off without a hitch, and the entire Army of the Potomac could have either been a) completely surrounded and wiped out on Cemetery Ridge, or b) encapsulated and held in that position while a major part of the Confederate Army did an end run around them to the south and marched on Washington DC. And won the war. So Sickles’ action prompted the main battle into being, and made everyone change their plans on the fly, which altered everything. He thought that the elevated ground in the Peach Orchard was high enough that Confederate artillery placed their would destroy the Union lines on the Ridge. It really wasn’t, but Lee and Longstreet had the same thought, and that was the move they were going for. Sickles’ “misunderstanding” kept that bit of ground out of their control until quite late in the afternoon of July 2nd, at which point it became worthless. You can’t aim cannons very well in the dark. Not in those days.

You can play a lot of what-ifs with Gettysburg. What if Sickles had actually had some military training? Well, then maybe on his march north east into Gettysburg he would have seen the value of the Round Tops, and positioned his artillery and more of his troops there. [ Only maybe, because nobody else on either side realized it either! Ok, both Meade and Hancock wanted the left flank covered, but occupying those hills was so important that they should have said such explicitly, and they didn’t ] Based from there he could have extended his lines at least partway to the south end of Cemetery Ridge, leaving a hole that VI Corps could have filled. The bloody mayhem in the Peach Orchard, the Devil’s Den, and the Wheat Field would never have occurred; with cannons on those commanding heights, he could have destroyed Longstreet’s troops before they ever got near the battlefield or got their own artillery into range. Not only that, but putting the big guns up there would have provided flanking fire all the way up to the south edge of town, which means Pickett’s Charge would have been reduced to Pickett’s Stumble in a very very short time.

Hessler did a really good job with this book. I recommend it. I’m at the point in the book where the post-battle recriminations and investigations are underway, and Sickles is painting himself as The Hero, playing politics and ghostwriting letters under the pseudonym Historicus. It’s a dirty tale that I never knew about.

Another dirty tale that Hessler pointed out is that Sickles may have been the guy who effectively lost the battle of Chancellorsville a couple months before Gettysburg, since he was the voice of authority that said the rebs were retreating, when in fact they were taking a road that lead away from the front lines and then back around to the Union’s right flank. Oops.

A comment by the author on the purpose of this book:

I want the book to accomplish 5 things:

1) Produce something that Civil War enthusiasts will enjoy reading and referencing.

2) I’m a “Day 2 guy” and to really understand that day, you have to understand Sickles’ actions.

3) I also wanted to understand why he moved forward. What seems like an increasing number of Gettysburg studies ascribe some pretty sinister motives behind his move to the Peach Orchard (he supposedly wanted to be President, or he did it simply because he hated Meade, etc.) I think when you examine the baggage that comes before Gettysburg, and then the chain of events on the morning of July 2, it becomes alot less “sinister” and more explainable. That doesn’t have to mean that Sickles was right, but it can give a little balance to his historical image by giving some more rational reasons for his actions.

4) I basically just wanted to know more about this guy because like Chris said, he sure had an interesting life.

5) Produce something that Civil War enthusiasts will enjoy reading and referencing. (Hey, I already used that one!)

The bottom line is: the book obviously doesn’t support everything he does, but tries to see him as a real (and really interesting) person with alot of flaws but maybe not the monster that some Gettysburg students have been conditioned to expect.

I think Hessler has achieved his goals quite nicely.

Posted by Drew458     on 10/13/2009 at 12:39 PM   
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   Saturday - October 03, 2009

A fallen hero and the story of what befell the rest of his comrades in 1 Platoon.

BATTLING BRITS is not a figure of speech ppl.

I caught this late today, only minutes ago.  I have to say the way the Mail presented this really brings home what these fellows are all about.
And at the same time, it also pisses me off big time to know these heroes are being stabbed in the back.  I just can not add anything to this.
It speaks for itself.

A fallen hero and the story of what befell the rest of his comrades in 1 Platoon

By Richard Pendlebury
Last updated at 8:34 AM on 03rd October 2009

This week, hundreds of people lined the streets of Wootton Bassett to give the town’s traditional salute to a fallen hero as another British serviceman was repatriated from Afghanistan in a Union Jack draped coffin.

Corporal Michael Lockett, 29, was the most highly decorated British soldier to die in the battle against the Taliban. His body had been flown back to Britain to nearby RAF Lyneham, Wiltshire, and a fly-past was staged before a private ceremony for his family.

Corporal Lockett, a father of three, was the first holder of the Military Cross to be killed in the war and had received the honour last year from the Queen for his ‘absolutely exceptional leadership and supreme courage’ in a clash with the Taliban in Helmand.

He had rescued wounded comrades and recovered bodies of fallen pals despite heavy enemy fire in a three-hour firefight.

On the eve of battle he posed for this remarkable photograph. To the regiment, it has always been an emblematic and proud picture; a portrait of young warriors who were supreme heroes under fire.

Yet in the past fortnight the photograph has also - perhaps inevitably - come to reflect war’s growing human cost.

This band of brothers is 1 Platoon of A Company, 2nd Battalion The Mercian Regiment (Worcesters and Foresters).

Shortly after the picture was taken in 2007, in the Afghan province of Helmand, they fought one of the bloodiest engagements of the conflict.

One night, the platoon was ambushed by a strong Taliban force. In the subsequent firefight, two Mercians were killed and seven wounded, two seriously.

Sergeant Craig Brelsford lost his life (and won a posthumous Military Cross) trying to retrieve the body of Private Johan Botha, which the Taliban were attempting to drag away. Others kept trying.

Corporal Lockett directed their efforts on that night in September. He is the soldier standing on the far left of the photograph; one of the most popular of Mercians.

But the war has continued longer and proved bloodier than then expected. Two years after surviving the ambush, ‘Locky’ was killed, on September 21.

He was nearing the end of his third tour and was the 217th British serviceman to die in Afghanistan since 2001.

But what of his comrades-in-arms in the picture? War brought the platoon together. It also tore them apart. Here are their stories…

This is important BMEWS.  Go to the link below since I can’t seem to post the photos cleanly here.  Don’t know why.  There are two photos and one of them explains the following.  In trying to reduce the pix for this post, the photos just didn’t work. When left at original size, they seemed to overwhelm the page.

1 Michael Lockett. Then aged 27, from Angus. Vowed never to leave any of his men behind on the battlefield and did not. The body of colleague Private Botha was recovered from the Taliban and other wounded British soldiers saved. Promoted to sergeant. Received his MC from the Queen at Buckingham Palace. Killed on September 21.

2 Private ‘Ginge’ Jones. Territorial Army soldier from Hastings, East Sussex. Now studying military history at university.

3 Corporal Ben Umney, 25. A section commander from Chesterfield. During an ambush, a bullet pierced his helmet but not his skull, stunning him. Has just left the Army after 11 years service. Now runs his own plumbing business.

4 Corporal Lee ‘Al’ Hodson from Worcester. On active service again in Helmand.

5 Private Matthew Farr from the West Midlands. Promoted to lance corporal. Returned to active service in Helmand.

6 Lance Corporal Jonathan McEwan, 27, from Retford, Nottinghamshire. On active service again in Helmand.

7 Christopher Bell, 20, from Redditch. Left the Army last year.

8 Lance Corporal Lee Weston. Shot and wounded in the shoulder during the night ambush. Has now left the Army and is a qualified mechanic.

9 Lance Corporal Wayne Russen, 24, from Redditch. Avoided the ambush, having been injured in an attack a few days before. Has since left the Army and is looking for work.

10 Private Kyle Drury, 22. Temporarily blinded by phosphorous during ambush and shot in chest, but was saved by his body armour as bullets deflected off his radio. Since promoted to lance corporal and still in the Army.

11 Private ‘Trout’ Stout, 20, from Nottingham. On active service again in Helmand.

12 Private Latham, 20, from Nottingham. Since promoted to lance corporal. Back on the Helmand frontline.

13 Private Luke Cole, 24, from Wolverhampton. Territorial Army reservist. Shot and wounded in initial ambush, but refused morphine treatment and continued to fire at Taliban and tend to even more seriously hurt colleague Private Cooper.

Shot again, through hip and stomach, before being evacuated several hours later. Awarded the Military Cross for his bravery. Permanently disabled by leg wound, he has spent time in a wheelchair and can no longer run. Unable to return to his former job of fork-lift truck engineer.

Currently retraining at specialist college for the disabled.

14 Private Sam Cooper, 18, from Chesterfield. Youngest soldier in regiment. Shot in head and suffered brain damage in the ambush, which affects his speech and one side of his body. Treated at Headley Court rehabilitation centre.

15 Private Daniel Hammer, 19, from the West Midlands. On active service again in Helmand.

16 Lieutenant Simon Cupples, 25, from Chesterfield. Officer in command of the platoon during ambush. At times, was less than 20 metres from Taliban lines as he fought to remove his men from the ‘killing zone’.

Awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross, second only to the Victoria Cross. Now promoted to Captain and second in command of A (Grenadier) Company, 2 Mercians.

17 Privater Ben Johnson, 23. Temporarily blinded by phosphorus during the night ambush. Still serving. Has been on active service again in Helmand.

18 Private Matthew Carling, 21, from Derby. Left the Army last year.

19 Private ‘Dunc’ Dunkley, from Nottingham. No longer in the Army.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1217810/Pictured-A-fallen-hero-story-befell-rest-comrades-1-Platoon.html#ixzz0St7JbIJC

Posted by peiper     on 10/03/2009 at 10:28 AM   
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   Thursday - October 01, 2009

New Sickles Biography

• corrupt politician, part of the NY Democrat Machine


• free spending party boy who wasted a fortune


• misappropriating funds early in his political career


• knocked up an underage girl


• murderer who entered the first “temporary insanity” plea and got away with it


• war hero most famous for his screw up, which nearly lost the most important battle of the war


• lied about his military record for the next 50 years


• multiple affairs while married


• two term Congressman most famous for creating a national park that honors him


• misappropriating funds late in his political career


• moved out on his wife and son and had a long term affair with his housekeeper late in life


• died penniless


• remembered mainly as a hero, mourned by tens of thousands

That morning, Meade ordered Sickles to anchor the left end of Cemetery Ridge which included Little Round Top. Meade and the Union high command were centering their line on Cemetery Hill (the hook in the fish hook), but were concerned that their flanks were vulnerable. For that reason, it was Hancock on the evening of July 1 who had ordered part of Henry Slocum’s 12th Corps to occupy Little Round Top. The morning of July 2, Meade wanted the 12th Corps reunited on the Federal right at Culp’s Hill. So he ordered Sickles to take the position occupied by the 12th Corps and hold down the left end of Cemetery Ridge, including Little Round Top. Meade sent his son and aide, Captain George Meade, out to ensure that Sickles was in position. But Sickles would not come out of his tent to talk to George Jr. and instead had the Third Corps artillery chief tell Captain Meade that Sickles was confused over his position. Trouble was brewing on the Federal left.

Sickles made several efforts to communicate his uncertainty.  At 11:00, Sickles went to Meade’s headquarters and requests assistance in posting his troops. Meade declined to go, but gave Henry Hunt permission to accompany Sickles on a review of the terrain. Meade later claimed that he had absolutely no idea that Sickles harbored doubts about his position. Sickles then informed Hunt that he wanted to move his corps forward to a line that is, at its peak, was nearly ½ mile in front of Cemetery Ridge, running from Devils Den to the Peach Orchard and Emmitsburg Road.

The primary disadvantage of Sickles’ position was that the Third Corps was too far in advance of Meade’s army to receive support. Meade’s reinforcements had to cover ½ mile of open ground and Sickles negated Meade’s interior lines. The essentially straight line along Cemetery Ridge, which Meade intended Sickles to occupy, was approximately 1,600 yards in length. Sickles’s Third Corps had roughly 10,675 effectives and he would later claim that he lacked sufficient strength to man Meade’s front. Yet the new position covered a front that was nearly twice as long; approximately 3,500 yards. Despite his efforts to refuse them, his flanks were in the air.

One of the biggest criticisms directed at Sickles was that by moving forward he abandoned Little Round Top--- viewed by many as the key to the Union left because it was the highest defensible point in the immediate vicinity. Not a problem for Sickles because over the next 50 years he would repeatedly lie and say that he did occupy Little Round Top and supervised the placement of reinforcements up there!

Historian James Hessler has a new book out, the first new biography on Dan Sickles in over 50 years. Love the title too; it’s so 19th century:

Sickles at Gettysburg: The Controversial Civil War General Who Committed Murder, Abandoned Little Round Top, and Declared Himself the Hero of Gettysburg, by licensed battlefield guide James Hessler, is the most deeply-researched, full-length biography to appear on this remarkable American icon. And it is long overdue.

No individual who fought at Gettysburg was more controversial, both personally and professionally, than Major General Daniel E. Sickles. By 1863, Sickles was notorious as a disgraced former Congressman who murdered his wife’s lover on the streets of Washington and used America’s first temporary insanity defense to escape justice. With his political career in ruins, Sickles used his connections with President Lincoln to obtain a prominent command in the Army of the Potomac’s Third Corps-despite having no military experience. At Gettysburg, he openly disobeyed orders in one of the most controversial decisions in military history.

No single action dictated the battlefield strategies of George Meade and Robert E. Lee more than Sickles’ unauthorized advance to the Peach Orchard, and the mythic defense of Little Round Top might have occurred quite differently were it not for General Sickles. Fighting heroically, Sickles lost his leg on the field and thereafter worked to remove General Meade from command of the army. Sickles spent the remainder of his checkered life declaring himself the true hero of Gettysburg.

Although he nearly lost the battle, Sickles was one of the earliest guardians of the battlefield when he returned to Congress, created Gettysburg National Military Park, and helped preserve the field for future generations. But Dan Sickles was never far from scandal. He was eventually removed from the New York Monument Commission and nearly went to jail for misappropriation of funds.

Hessler’s book is a balanced and entertaining account of Sickles’ colorful life. Civil War enthusiasts who want to understand General Sickles’ scandalous life, Gettysburg’s battlefield strategies, the in-fighting within the Army of the Potomac, and the development of today’s National Park will find Sickles at Gettysburg a must-read.

This looks like a great read. And an excellent gift for anyone interested in military history.

Posted by Drew458     on 10/01/2009 at 11:30 AM   
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EU SAYS GEORGIA STARTED WAR WITH RUSSIA BUT, AND JAPAN HAS MEIN KAMPF COMIC BOOK

A couple of interesting News Briefs caught my eye.  One I understand, Mein Kampf.  One I don’t.

I suppose using a comic book to teach history isn’t new. For some, it might be the only way or at least the easiest way, to learn a subject.
So ok. Mein Kampf the comic book could be seen as instructional.

Sales of a comic version of Adolf Hitler’s notorious political tract Mein Kampf have become a hit in Japan.
By Danielle Demetriou in Tokyo

The manga book describes both Hitler’s autobiography and his infamous Nazi manifesto in the unlikely form of easy-to-read comic pictures and captions.
Since it was published in Japan last November, its popularity has soared, with sales of more than 45,000.

The book, which forms part of a series on world classics turned into manga, covers a range of aspects of Hitler’s life, from his childhood to the formation of his political party.

Its success in Japan has reportedly ignited a debate in Germany about whether the ban on the work imposed since 1945 should be overturned.
The current copyright of the book within Germany lies in the hands of the finance ministry of the state of Bavaria which will not reproduce it out of respect to the relatives of those who suffered during Hitler’s regime.

Japanese publishers East Press are no strangers to tapping into the trend of bringing political tracts into the 21st century: the current series also includes a popular manga version of Karl Marx’s seminal anti-capitalist tome Das Kapital.

Manga enjoys a soaring popularity in Japan, with its most high-profile fans including the former prime minister Taro Aso.

Along with Nazism and anti-capitalism, there are few topics that are regarded as sacred from being transformed into manga. Previous issues tackled range from delicate Japanese-Chinese relations to the spread of bird flu.|

SOURCE

H/T Inventorspot.com for the photo used. More on the subject here as well : INVENTORSPOT.COM

Here’s just a brief overview. See the link for all of it.  One of the reasons I even bothered about it to begin with, was because the EU seems to be giving with one hand and taking with another.

If as the EU says, and they do say, that Georgia started the war with Russia, then how can they be critical of the Russians who the EU says were attacked, for invading Georgia?  Well that’s what they’re saying.  In other words, do not in any circumstances defend yourself.  ?? Oh wait. I just got it. Silly me.

Maybe what the EU was waiting for, was for the Russians to issue an Anti Social Behavior Order (ASBO) on the Georgians. Of course. That’s it.

EU blames Georgia for starting war with Russia

Georgia “illegally” started last year’s war with Russia but Moscow then “violated” international law by invading its neighbour in response to the attack, a European Union report has found.

By Bruno Waterfield
Published: 4:17PM BST 30 Sep 2009

An EU investigation into the roots of last August’s conflict has reserved its harshest criticism for Georgia’s military assault on the breakaway region of South Ossetia and its capital Tskhinvali.

“Open hostilities began with a large-scale Georgian military operation against the town of Tskhinvali and the surrounding areas, launched in the night of 7 to 8 August 2008, the report concluded.

“There is the question of whether the use of force by Georgia in South Ossetia was justifiable under international law. It was not.”

SOURCE FOR THE REST CLICK HERE

Posted by peiper     on 10/01/2009 at 09:15 AM   
Filed Under: • Euro-Peons • EU Pin Heads • War-Stories •  
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   Friday - September 25, 2009

BATTLE SCARRED AND PROUD …. JUST ONE BRIT SOLDIER. ONE OF VERY MANY.

This was in the morning paper and I’m glad in a way that I could find it on line and share it with my American countrymen and women.

Americans see quite a number of our own I’m sure.  I very much doubt we see and hear anything at all about this brave young people who are bleeding alongside us. 
We MUST NOT ignore or forget them.  Sure, we have problems of our own and there are an awful lot of unhappy, grieving American families as well.
I hate the idea of so many young lives lost forever in all the countries losing their young who are fighting the malignancy that is militant islam.
But from time to time, especially since I’m living here among them, I have a need to share these folks I call Battling Brits.  Americans need to see them so we understand and appreciate that although their numbers are smaller then ours, their blood runs just as free.

Why this picture fills me with awe, pride… and fury
By Bel Mooney
25th September 2009

Fusilier Tom James, who was injured by the same blast that killed Fusilier Shaun Bush, arrives at his funeral.

Just the sight of yesterday’s Daily Mail lying on my doormat was enough to start the tears.

There was the picture of Fusilier Tom James so terribly injured, his right arm lost in a savage Taliban bomb blast.

He had struggled from his hospital bed, donning uniform to attend the funeral of the comrade who was fatally wounded beside him. No pain, nor fear, would stop him honouring his mate.

The night before, like many, I had watched the almost-unbearably moving BBC documentary, Wounded, which told the stories of 19-year-old Andy Allen and 24-year-old Tom Neathway, also horrifically injured in Afghanistan.

No one who witnessed the agony of these once superbly-fit young men learning how to walk on ‘stubbies’ (short artificial limbs) could ever forget the sight.

When Andy was first allowed the longed-for visit home to Belfast, we saw one or two people in his enthusiastic welcoming committee look away in sudden, emotional horror at the first glimpse of the young man who had lost both legs and had feared he would never regain his sight.

It struck me as a powerful metaphor that he should so long to see, whereas so many of us have turned away from the unbearable reality of war.

That is why yesterday’s Mail front page was so important, and why Wounded was compulsory viewing.

It may well be that the Ministry of Defence might prefer the British public not to be made so acutely aware of the horrors of the war in Afghanistan.

We’ve all read the statistics - the numbers of those who have given their lives in the brutal conflict in a pitiless faraway land. Yet none of us really knows the numbers of wounded, or the extent of their injuries. It’s been kept hidden.

READ MORE HERE

Sometimes I do wonder if the media and even our blog sites, are correct in recognizing so publicly the heroes as we do. Does it play into the hands of the enemy?  Are they happy to see photos such as this?  Are we giving aid and comfort, or at least comfort anyway, by telling their stories and showing the pix?  On one hand I want to say thank you and I appreciate your bravery. I can’t do what you have done. And then I wonder if the enemy is also watching and surfing and enjoying the pain.

Posted by peiper     on 09/25/2009 at 11:13 AM   
Filed Under: • Heroes • Military • UK • War On Terror • War-Stories •  
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   Tuesday - September 15, 2009

US forces kill al-Qaeda mastermind in Somalia. GOOD! Scratch one Rat Bastard

I sure do hope he saw it coming and hurt like hell before the end. Only sorry our side couldn’t have found the rat sooner. But you know the saying, better late .............

I am ALWAYS PROUD of our guys and Brits as well, when they carry off something like this.  OK, often times mistakes are made but these are OUR folks and I’ll never join the ‘crucify’ when things go wrong crowd.  That’s death and life.  And it is WAR damn it. Just a different kind and fought a different way.  Pitty the poor Brits who turned on one of theirs over the torture thing, just for being aware of what Americans “might” have been doing.  Hope no civilian law suits result over this violation of the rat-bastard’s uman rights.

American special forces killed a key suspect linked to the 2002 bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel on Kenya’s coast, reports said.

At least two helicopters strafed the car said to be carrying Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan and then landed to collect his body and that of another man in the car who died.

There were reports that two wounded men were also picked up by the helicopter teams.

All were linked to the hardline al-Shabaab movement, which is said to have links to al-Qaeda and which now controls most of southern Somalia.

Forces from the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command were involved in Monday’s raid in Barawe district, 150 miles south of Mogadishu, two US military sources anonymously told The Associated Press.

One source told Reuters that Nabhan’s body had been taken into police custody, but US officials in Washington refused to comment on “any alleged operation in Somalia”.

But if it is confirmed that US troops were in the helicopters, it would be the first time American boots have been on Somali soil since the infamous “Black Hawk Down” debacle of 1993.

Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, 28, has featured on the FBI’s most wanted list since he was linked to a truck bombing of an Israeli hotel on Kenya’s coast in 2002. Ten Kenyans and three Israelis died.

Nabhan is also believed to have been involved in the failed attempt to use a rocket-propelled grenade to down a holiday jet as it took off from Kenya’s Mombasa airport carrying mostly Israeli tourists later the same day.

The authorities in Kenya also regard him as a suspect in two attacks on US embassies in the region in 1998.

“There is a lot of conflicting information coming from the area,” a Western diplomat familiar with Somalia said in Nairobi, capital of neighbouring Kenya.

“But it does seem that at least two choppers, were involved in an incident earlier today.” The US has in recent years carried out a series of missile raids aimed at killing senior members of al-Shabaab.

In May last year, US warplanes killed the then-leader of al-Shabaab and al-Qaeda’s top man in the country, Afghan-trained Aden Hashi Ayro, in an attack on the central town of Dusamareb.

Under Ayro, al Shabaab had adopted Iraq-style tactics, including assassinations, roadside bombs and suicide bombings.

TELEGRAPH

Posted by peiper     on 09/15/2009 at 06:26 AM   
Filed Under: • Muslims • Terrorists • War On Terror • War-Stories •  
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   Thursday - September 10, 2009

Hero who saved 30 lives by tackling suicide bomber. Routine stuff for battling Brits.

Well, maybe not so routine.  This is one one brave act and the guy is surely a genuine hero in a world of few. Certainly none among the political class.
Anyway, this soldier has carried on the long tradition of his service.
Well done sir.

Hero squaddie who saved 30 lives by rugby-tackling suicide bomber to get military cross

By Daily Mail Reporter

A Royal Marine is to be awarded a Military Cross after saving up to 30 lives by ‘rugby-tackling’ a suicide bomber.

Sergeant Noel Connolly was serving in Afghanistan last November when a bomber rode towards his troop on a motorbike packed with 150lb of explosives.

Sgt Connolly dived on the bomber, grabbed him by the shirt and hauled him from the bike before he was able to detonate the explosives.

But the modest 41-year-old from Manchester insisted he ‘wasn’t brave’ and even tried to keep the feat a secret from his family.

He said:  ‘I was near the school when I caught a fleeting glimpse of a motorbike. I told all my lads to expect a bomber.

‘The motorcyclist looked lost. He turned the bike around up the track and came back.

‘I grabbed two lads and went to intercept him. I had no idea if he was the bomber. The only way of finding out was to challenge him.’

The sergeant then stepped into the road and ordered the man to stop.

‘He stalled the bike and started pushing it away from us. He stopped, straddled it and turned to face us,’ he said. ‘As I got to within 10 metres, there was a loud crack from halfway down the bike.

‘That’s when I saw a small toggle switch had been fitted to his handlebars. As soon as he went for the toggle again I rushed him. I grabbed him by the front of his shirt and hauled him off.’

The motorbike’s frame was found to contain 154lb of explosive. The bomber was handed to police and later jailed for 18 years.

But Sgt Connolly, who serves with 3 Commando Brigade, insisted: ‘’I’m not brave. Someone had to stop him.’
mary connolly

He played down his heroics so much that he did not even tell his family. Then, when the story emerged, he begged his sister not to tell their 81-year-old mother, Mary.

The award is expected to be announced tomorrow with other recipients of honours for gallantry and meritorious service.

A Ministry of Defence spokesman said most of the Operational Honours and Awards list are predominantly from the 3 Commando Brigade Task Force that deployed to Afghanistan in 2008, but it also includes others involved in operations in Iraq and in the UK.

SOURCE

Posted by peiper     on 09/10/2009 at 07:30 AM   
Filed Under: • Heroes • UK • War-Stories •  
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Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:

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