Judging Dannatt

Ian C

As a supporter of both the Afghanistan and Iraq invasion and with a son who has served recently in the latter, Dannatt is breath of frsh air.

The stiff upper lip (and the overt 'brown nose' politics played by Mike Jackson) of the correct way for someone in his role to play it, his conroversial staements have been a wake up call.

Nothing was getting through to the idiot in No 10. He has done us all a favour even if he was a bit 'naughty' to have done it.

Both invasions had good reasons that were badly managed by the politicians ordering them. The military paid that price with unnecessary loss of life and limb and with its reputation. They needed to kick back.

David

"an Armed Forces Day, now celebrated across Britain."

Whuh?

Drakes Drum.

The "gruff and popular General Jackson" never spoke out in the manner of General Dannatt.

Only after retirement did that man speak out!

I know which man I would rather follow and it aint the 'gruff and popular Jackson'!

You say, "Though General Dannatt was on occasion too outspoken for my liking" Goodness me, A General who places the well being of his troops before his own career!
What we need is more people like Dannatt running the bloody country. COME BACK CROMWELL the Country needs you!!

Rhoda Klapp

When the government gives the Army a mission without the nmeans to carry it out, and it looks as if the Army will be seriously damaged by it, and objections made through the proper channels are ignored for political reasons by a set of chancers not fit to lick the boots of the lowest private soldier, what is he supposed to do but speak out? Not keep quiet in public like Jackson and Guthrie and all the other political generals.

The Woodster

Surely, it will be difficult for Labour to "go after" Dannatt as he was their appointment. It's not as if they wouldn't have had sufficient knowledge of him before the appointment. Then again, owning up to their own incompetencies has never been their strongpoint.

The Bellman

Mr Korski: '... Few people knew what to expect...' You mean 'few ignorant journalists, technocratic wonks or lazy party hacks knew what to expect'.

For those of us in the Army, particularly those who served under his command, we knew exactly what we'd be getting: a quiet, thoughtful, honest commander with strong Christian convictions, utter integrity and a healthy indifference to his media profile. This, as you suggest, in sharp and welcome contrast to his predecessors (with the possible exception of Lord Guthrie).

In common with many hacks, you fail to make appropriate distinction between 'political' and 'party political'. You have forgotten the concept of loyal or constructive opposition. This government simply cannot conceive that any who disagrees with them is not conducting a partisan battle. McSnotty is the prime example of this pathology. So he and his lickspittles rush to condemn criticism as 'playing politics', knowing - or hoping - that this will intimidate them into submission. Not so our man. General Dannatt has every right to raise objections to stupid or wrong-headed policy where it endangers his soldiers, and he has been doing this throughout his tenure. A hundred years ago, he could influence via the multitude of 'establishment' connections so senior an officer would have. Only the means has changed, not the ends: the press is the only medium to which these thugs listen; so that is how, in the last resort, he must engage them.

And this at least has the benefit of being somewhat apolitical, in a way that sidling up to opposition politicians, or lobbying union leaders, would not.

As to whether his comments on Islamism 'jarred in many quarters', he only voiced in a more fluent manner the concerns of the majority of the population in whose service he has spent his carrer. The fact that so utterly uncontroversial a point should attract such comment illustrates the extent to which political leadership has failed to even think honestly, let alone deal with, this urgent problem. People would rather attack it is 'inappropriate' than attempt to challenge its accuracy. That's your failing, not General Dannatt's.

john miller

Fair comment, but I think what illustrates why people like the General behave to Labour politicians as they do, is the Telegraph headline "Labour ministers plan reputation trashing of Army chief General Sir Richard Dannatt".

In General Sir Richard's mind, it may be a toss up which is worse, dealing with the Taliban or dealing with the government. Labour,as we have repeatedly said on this site, smear, bully and blackmail you if you disagree with them. For an anonymous Labour source (aren't they always this cowardly?) to suggest they will "go after" Sir Richard just shows what he's had to deal with.

Labour don't really care about the Armed Forces. Five ministers in four years? Is that some kind of a joke?

Blair came up with, even for him, a stunning piece of hypocrisy, by announcing the dead in Parliament at the same time that he was part of the problem.

And as for his Christianity, is that worse than Blair? Lying about his beliefs in office, hinting that he might be a Catholic when he needed to calm the Church down over abortion and adoption centres and finally converting after he was kicked out so that he could tell the Pope how to run the Church. How would someone like Sir Richard be able to deal with someone like Blair? And don't even get me started on the honest bloke with the moral compass...

I need to go and have a lie down in a darkened room.

Florence Nightingale

General Dannatt's job is to care for his troops --not to brown-nose a Govt. which has been blatantly neglectful of their safety and welfare, or give succour to Islamic fundamentalists who would seek to destroy us.
The smear campaign has already started against General Dannatt but I doubt the public will be taken in by it.

Jock

"For an Army Chief to criticise the government as openly as he did seemed out of place in a democracy like Britain’s"

Perhaps it is the culture and behaviour of this Labour government which should be characterised as seeming out of place in a democracy like Britain's?

Whatever - the more Labour seek to rubbish Dannatt, the greater will be the esteem in which the public hold him.

Chuck Unsworth

Well, it's time the gloves were off. True, Dannatt may not always have been particularly circumspect, but so what? The trouble is that politicians seem to believe they have the right to control everything that others do and say. This Government has spent huge amounts of time efort and our money on manipulating the media and information. The media have been entirely subservient. It has now come back to bite with a vengeance.

You may not like the fact that Dannatt chooses to speak out. But if he does not, who will? Is it really the position that Dannatt should hold his peace whilst his troops are being killed and maimed - as a direct result of earlier (and scandalous) decisions by Brown et al? Should Dannatt simply stand watching? Those who advocate that he should are complicit in these deaths and injuries. They are morally bereft.

Even if Dannatt was party to these decisions (and that is remarkably doubtful) he is at least indicating that things must change, and change right now. That is an honourable stance.

And Brown's position? Well everything is going swimmingly, apparently. It has even got to the point where Brown doesn't bother reading out a list of eight names this week (men who have died whilst carrying out his policies) during PMQs. This loathsome man is beneath contempt.

I'll be very interested to see what Jock Stirrup does - if anything at all. So far he's toed the party line - with a vengeance.

Michael Taylor

James Kirkup's piece in the DT, upon which this blog is based, was a disgrace. When will journalists like Kirkup acknowledge that their willingness to quote, at length, the poison dripping from 'senior Labour sources', or 'one minister' or 'a Labour source' enables these odious creeps in their wickedness. When dealing with Labour's smearers, liars, bullies and creeps, the rule should be simple: No attribution, no quote, no story.

Continuing, even now, to enable them to lie, bully, smear etc behind the cowardly and convenient anonymity which Kirkup et al grants them is a disservice not just to Dannat and all the rest of Labour's victims, but also to the readers (and subscribers) of the DT, and to the British public.

Name the names, and to hell with unsourced 'journalism'.

Kevyn Bodman

He should have been sacked for his public questioning of government policy on military involvement in Iraq.

I think UK military presence in Iraq is wrong, and what the General said was more or less right,and he should have been saying that kind of thing in private. But in a democracy, where the military is subordinate to civilian, political will it is not for serving officers to express dissent in public.

I think there might be an opposing view on this, maybe from one of the regulars who has in the past supported the idea of a military coup?

Short the UK

I'm glad he is spitting nails.

The neo-con elite (New Labour & Tories) conned us into Iraq. Went against history and common sense and took us into Afghanistan/Pashtunistan.

I look forward, in vain, to some soul searching amongst the Neo-Cons who got it so badly wrong and have blood on their consciences.

It is sad to see so many intelligent people get this completely wrong. But I see clever people do stupid things in the stock market everyday.

Common sense rules. Smarty pants is so apt!!!

Steve.W

Here's a judgement on Dannatt -

http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2009/07/saintly-dannatt.html

pete-s

The statements surrounding Dannatt, do not make sense. Dannatt says he has a shopping list, why has he not had this before? McDoom and gov say that local commanders have got all they requested.

Clearly these statements are at odds, especially as Dannatt's shopping list appears to be surveillance equipment to fight IEDs. Well if they have not been asking for equipment like this for years then something is very wrong.

As I said the statements from all sides do not add up, will Dannatt spill the truth soon as it will never come from McDoom.

Malcolm

Unlike most of his predecessors Gen. Dannett spoke up for the troops under his command. Someone has had to counter the destruction of the military covenant. If they won't listen to him in private then I have absolutely no problem with him going public. No doubt he will be well and truly smeared by NuLiebour for doing so, but alongside him these ministerial non-entities are mere pygmies.

Titus Aduxas

If I, as a soldier, was putting my life on the line, I'd want Dannatt standing up for me rather than Gordon Brown.

I could turn my back on Dannatt and know that it was being protected. If I turned my back on Brown, I'd get a knife in it.

Don't knock Dannatt for being the champion of the British armed forces. Politicians make political decisions - which, as we are seeing, cost human lives. Dannatt would prefer to avoid those unnecessary deaths and if he has to make life uncomfortable for a few politicians, to do it, then so be it.

pharbitis

'For an Army Chief to criticise the government as openly as he did seemed out of place in a democracy like Britain’s.' ....Perhaps you can explain what you mean.

I don't agree he went too far - he probably didn't go far enough in exposing the incompetence, ignorance and anti-military bias which lies at the heart of MOD and this contemptible govt. Our politicos are impervious to criticism from most quarters yet General Dannatt has pricked their hides. Good!
I don't suppose this deeply honourable and courageous man is exactly quaking in his desert boots at the thought of Brown's backroom bruisers lining up to snipe at him. It demonstrates how vindictive, out of touch and unfit to govern this putrid govt is and the first shot it fires will be in its own foot.
And who believes anything Brown and his sordid minions say anyway?
Well Done General Dannatt!

Vulture

Have you ever actually met the man you are pontificating about Korski? Your over-lengthy posts are both tedious and ill-informed. You criticise Dannatt for speaking out in defence of the men he is paid to lead and represent. Personally, I would rather have one of him than a thousand career politicans. Your idiotic remarks reveal you as a Liebour apologist and you don't really belong in the Coffee House.

Henry Rogers

"...Though General Dannatt was on occasion too outspoken for my liking......

DK,

Leading soldiers, taking reponsibility for their lives and trying to win wars with inadequate resources aren't quite the same things as international bureaucracy and political journalism.

Arguably we'd all be a lot safer today if more people in senior positions were prepared to take the risk of speaking out when doing so seems necessary to avert folly. If political leaders don't like what they hear they can always sack the speaker. In due course we, the voters, will decide whose advice we prefer.

JohnAnt

Since when did we have a government that cannot be criticised for deliberate but mistaken policies by non-political heads of department?
The way this government has allowed islamist bullies to subvert entire cities is a disgrace. Should that too remain unchecked?
The problem with General Dannatt is that he shows up time-serving civil servants - and the usless Opposition - for the craven lickspittles they are.

John Law

Being trashed by trash? I don't think it will work.

Hysteria

pretty clear support (17:1 I make it) on this blog so far.

I think Bellman's last paragraph is the most significant.

Victor, NW Kent

"For an Army Chief to criticise the government as openly as he did seemed out of place in a democracy like Britain’s"

The operative word is democracy. Mr Korski, you seem not to understand what it means - it includes the right to free speech. I see that you have no objection to the other highly-placed officers who parrot the government line. Can General Dannatt only speak on military affairs if he follows the government line? - why bother? just let experts like John Reid and Bob Ainsworth speak for the armed forces. Is it is only their opinions that we need to hear, not those of soldiers in the theatre of war?

Brown and his minions are being deceitful [but not deceptive] when they talk twaddle about helicopters, troop reinforcements, NATO "allies", armoured vehicles and so on.

TomTom

Frankly the military in Britain has been supine for far too long. Had they had more influence in the 1920s we might not have needed to destroy ourselves fighting the Wehrmacht.

It was politicians like Ramsay MacDonald who sold us out until he disappeared in 1935...and it is the role of Military Commanders to protect the Nation whilst elected politicians tend to their plasma TVs and flipping homes.

Chris Rose

I agree with Ian C, Dannatt has been a breath of fresh air and I am most grateful for all he has done on the nation's behalf.

If we are going to send troops into battle, we must do far more to support them than this government has ever done. As seen from Downing Street our troops have been out of sight and out of mind.

cuffleyburgers

I hope that the govt will go after Dannat and that he will respond by leading a glorious revolution.

We could do with more Dannats running the govt and civil service, and best place I can think of for McMoralCompass and the cabinet is , mm difficult one this, how about lashed to the sides of snatch landrovers as anti IED protection?

Lions Roar

The moral issue here is that our troops do require the correct equipment and it has not been available to them due to poor planning from the outset, I therefore agree that our soldiers have been under pressure to perform a task with little modern equipment and should have our deepest respect.

General Dannatt regardless of his religion is aware of the difficulties our service men face however urgency is priority and much needs to be discussed and resolved as soon as possible and hopefully it will.

Rhoda Klapp

Steve W points out the other side of Dannatt. Although Dr North at eureferendum is a harsh critic, he does point out the problem with the procurement process. Basically the Army and the other services want to be equipped to fight a conventional war. The Warsaw act on the North German Plain, the Republican Guard in Iraq. They want to preserve their share of the pie for kit devoted to this kind of war. Not counter-insurgency, which they regard as a diversion. That's why they were slow to order mine-protected vehicles (even though we have lost many soldiers to mines/IEDs since 1945 in all the co-in campaigns, of which there have been many.) Dannatt can rightly be criticized in his perfomance here. None of that criticism, IMHO, can be applied to his speaking for the army in this political dogfight.

Joe T

Surely threaening to go after the head of the Army is treasonous & i bet they wouldn't be prepared to go after him in his choice of theatre

Hawkeye

@The Bellman - well said! Very well said!

George

Another view of Dannatt esp. in comparison to Mike Jackson. http://www.mattwardman.com/blog/2009/07/14/why-general-dannatt-is-not-all-the-press-thinks-he-is-a-guest-post-by-julian-kavanagh/

bill

New Labour have treated the forces like dirt. British Service Chiefs should have spoken out years ago. So good for Dannatt. As for Korski, yet another forgettable contribution.

John Thomas

What! A leader of the army having (non-closet) Christian values ... publicly expressing them ... not even ("Liberal") Christian revisionism (like A. Blair)! Horrors! Off to the gulag with him, p d q!

C Powell

@ Yhe Bellman: agree totally with your final para.

General Dannatt was quite right to say what he did about Islamism. It is no more than what Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has said (see, for instance, his eloquent book "The Home We Build Together").

It is no use the Government trying to justify our presence in Afghanistan by saying it is needed to stop terror on the streets of Britain when at the same time it is doing nothing to fight terrorism and its ideology here in Britain and, indeed, has done far too much to allow Islamism to take root here. The truth is that Labour are failing to defend us from both our enemies abroad and within the country.

Full steam ahead for Labour's smear operation

Gen Sir Mike Jackson was too close to New Labour and taken in by Blair's ever increasing thirst for more and more wars. Dannatt is an honourable man. The Tories could do with his type to balance out the metropolitan elites. Labour have always hated the Forces. BTW Gen Sir Lord Guthrie has been very very outspoken, against Brown personally, in the last few days.

Full steam ahead for Labour's smear operation

Gen Sir Mike Jackson was too close to New Labour and taken in by Blair's ever increasing thirst for more and more wars. Dannatt is an honourable man. The Tories could do with his type to balance out the metropolitan elites. Labour have always hated the Forces. BTW Gen Sir Lord Guthrie has been very very outspoken, against Brown personally, in the last few days.

Mirtha Tidville

General Dannatt has I`m sure made many mistakes whilst in post. But what he had done has raised the profile of our Armed Forces, made the people of this country take note of them again, and engendered a love and respect for our forces that was lacking in the past. As a result of his plain and daring comments he is now hugely respected and yes loved,by the ordinary folk of this country. If the Liebour Mp`s et al think he is fair game and throw their teddies out of the cot ( and thats usually how the socialists work) it will backfire on them with even less managing to hold on to their miserable seats.........comforting thought..

Verity

C Powell - Yes indeed.

Craig Alexander

General Dannatt is a breath of fresh air. His predecessor (ugliest man in NATO) allowed himself to be played by the pols - to what I trust and hope is his resounding shame.

From the Friday when he stood on the steps of MoD Main Building - a few days into the job - and held an impromptu press confernence, including the statement that "we are doing more harm than good in Iraq" he has been a hero to soldiers; in a world where the word "hero" is at risk of devaluation through over-use, General Dannatt is a true hero.

That the PM (it has been alleged) personally intervened to prevent General Dannatts promotion to CDS is a sufficient expressino of how much of an irritant CGS has been - and long may that continue.

General Richards (the incoming CGS) has a large pair of shoes to fill: I can only hope that he follows General Dannatts line rather than becoming a copy of UMIN.

Note: In the interests of disclosure of interest, I'm a former soldier.

Alf Tupper C.R.O.F.

Labour insiders are going to 'go after him'?

Last time I heard that sort of talk it led to a brief scuffle behind the slop shed after double geography.

Pathetic bastards.

Dog Snob

Short the UK

"Went against history and common sense and took us into Afghanistan/Pashtunistan."

Correction: the Taliban and our sense of survival took us there.

Again someone trundles out the old mythologies which read history as if it were astrology.

That was then and this is now.

Frank P

"General Richards (the incoming CGS) has a large pair of shoes to fill: I can only hope that he follows General Dannatt's line rather than becoming a copy of UMIN."

Craig A:

It's not General Dannat’s shoes he needs to fill, it's his jock strap (and I don't mean Jock Stirrup). In the case of Dannatt, you don't get many cantaloupes like that to the pound, so that may be difficult. What General Sir Richard really needs to do is march into Downing Street with a posse and evict the lot of them, then take over until a general election can be held, asap.. Go for it General! If ever there was a time for a popular putsch this is it. And the Queen could then award you the Elizabeth Medal for service to Queen & Country and for having the biggest balls since Wellington.

The only problem thereafter would be what to do with the ousted usurpers that were discharged into the corridors of power from the belly of the Trojan Horse called Blair twelve years ago. A spell in the Tower of London followed by a few heads dangled from a wire across the Thames would be my solution. Thieving, conniving, treacherous bastards! Never in the history of this country has the office of Prime Minister been sullied as badly as by this cretin and the plotters of his cabal.

Nicholas

Brown warrants the coup that Wilson deserved but unfortunately never got. In the present circumstances, between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, Britain could do worse than have a military man of Christian conscience, integrity and proven leadership directing an interim, emergency government to get us through the post-New Labour trauma and to prosecute the fraudsters, traitors and war criminals as they deserve.

The historical precedents in Britain of lawful rebellions which have terminated rotten and useless regimes on behalf of worthier values and in the interests of the people should give all true Britons hope.

I urge the military hierarchy to think in historical terms and not to allow modern convention to be a presumptive shield for the evil and treacherous swine currently holding power. Extraordinary times require extraordinary actions and the gang of cretinous gangsters besmirching our parliament and destroying our longest and most trusted institutions pose the greatest threat to our nation and to our people.

logdon

Cpowell

Agree absolutely.

On one of the other postings on Dannat I aired my view in detail.

And I think that the bulk of Britain feels the same but are not allowed to say it.

Funny kind of democracy we've sleepwalked into.

Bruce Finch

As a former Naval Officer with combat experience in three operational theatres I can say that General Dannatt has been a true leader with lots of integrity and moral courage. DK is talking nonsense about being outspoken. Clearly DK has never been sent off to war with inadequate kit, underfunded and undermined by the type of low life advisers, who would n't have a chance of getting a job in business or the military, that surround GB. The current situation is a national disgrace. Fighting wars with British men and women making the ultimate sacrifice, which journalists of course don't have to, needs full commitment. Dannatt would be guilty of dereliction of duty if he didn't point this out in public since the Downing Street mafia clearly don't listen to advice and it is not their people who being killed. Bravo Dannatt. Blair would not have dared to sack Dannatt in the middle of a war and to suggest that he would is nonsense. The airwaves are full of support to Dannatt indicating that the people of the UK value their armed forces even if Nu Lab and a few journalists (without any expertise in the matter) do not.

Verity

Frank P, I don't know whether you ever read Devil's Kitchen, but for extreme circumstances he favours what he calls "air tap-dancing from lamp posts" for some miscreants.

Nicholas, an outstanding post. I couldn't add a thought or a word.

B Clarke

What a shower of slimy 'Something You Tread On' in the Street Labour Ministers are. All Proto-Communists and Pretend-Marxists. Petty minded Jobsworth who hold the UK electorate, and our Armed Service with contmept.

If they (Labour), only knew how much contempt people hold our ZanuLab Governemnt in. Brown and Pals are living in a fantasy Island world. the sooner they are removed from office the better. They have done enough damage to the UK economy and society, just like all previous Labour administrations have done.

Ed Grove

Given that Cameron promises to be as useless as Brown, if not worse (pro-EU, pro-Turkey-in-the-EU, pro-immigration, pro-appeasing-mohammedanism) I have came to the conclusion that a coup by the army would be the best thing that could happen to Britain. Dannatt for PM ?

Moira

Just what 'democacy' is the General supposed to criticising (according to Mr Korski)? Does he mean the one with the unelected PM, Mr Brown, and the unelected,and ennobled Mr Mandelson, not to mention a further six unelected Cabinet members? I hope Major Dannatt continues to give both soldiers and public more of his kind of democratic discussion.

logdon

Labour now briefing against Dannatt?

Upset that their little apple cart of spin has been tipped over by someone who actually knows what he's talking about?

Compare his care and compassion for his troops with this shameless lying ex communist chancer whose only 'care and compassion' is for his own political skin.

The polarisation between an honourable military man and the vapid hollowness of an ex Minister of Defence who in the grand tradition of our Labour politicians reaches for the lie just as naturally as drawing breath.

The culture of lying is now so embedded that truth is merely today's headline. A malleable narrative to be used and exploited in any way they think will fool us. Now those headlines are becoming unrelentingly hostile, it's about turn and the lying turns against that also.

This is the stark difference. This is precisely why we had the expenses scandal. This is why Brown has steamrollered democracy by poisoning the Lords with placemen to enact his will in Parliament.

The sense of privileged entitlement, both to stuff their pockets with our money and remain in office is so entrenched that, as we’ve seen by the reactions of astonishment from politicians caught on the take that we have to consider how much contempt as a nation we can actually stand.

That that contempt for us actually extends to our armed forces is illustrated quite starkly by that enfant terrible of the political class, Peter Hitchens who as usual, nails it in one.

"Words that will haunt Reid forever

‘Doctor’ John Reid, the ex-Communist former Defence Secretary, is cross about being mocked for saying our troops would leave Afghanistan without a shot being fired. He moans: ‘I never at any stage expressed the hope, expectation, promise or pledge that we would leave Afghanistan without firing a shot.’

Really?

Channel 4 News has unearthed his original words, spoken in Kabul on April 23, 2006: ‘We’re in the south to help and protect the Afghan people to reconstruct their economy and democracy. We would be perfectly happy to leave in three years’ time without firing one shot.’ Time’s up. And, given how many people have died, I think ‘Doctor’ Reid has little to complain about."

Nicholas

Brilliant post logdon and you have managed to nail that git of gits Reid in one.

The military, like the police have already done, but with more honourable intention should abandon the convention of not criticising the government or engaging overtly in politics. See themselves as a liberating force for good, because that is what we need here.