A toast to unsung heroes

We were talking about war, the desert and God. In the early Seventies, one of our number, Christopher James, had been involved in serious fighting in the struggles to stop Yemeni-backed communist insurgents from destabilising Oman. Christopher was happy to pay tribute to everyone else, but evasive about his own service in the SAS. That savage little war of peace witnessed much unsung gallantry, not least by one of the most under-decorated soldiers in military history: Sgt Talaiasi Labalaba, also SAS. In 1972, he won a battle by firing a 25 pounder as if it had been a rifle (it normally needs a crew of three or four). Hit repeatedly, he persevered as if he had struck a deal with the god of battles: do not take me until the day is won. It was a clear VC. Because of political constraints, he ended up with a posthumous mention in dispatches. Somehow, that seems to symbolise the Heath government.

Christopher spent many a night under the desert stars, hundreds of miles from artificial light. He said that it felt like looking into the universe and that it commanded faith: a bleak and fierce monotheistic faith, which could easily accommodate a God of battles, but would have no use for polychrome statuary or intercessionary saints. ‘Thou overmasters me, God!… I kiss my hand to the stars.’ In Christopher’s judgment, you had to experience the god of the great desert to come to terms with Islam. Only then would you understand the frustration and the sense of inadequacy gnawing at many modern Muslims. They know how their faith was shaped; in austerity. Many of them find it easy to conclude that it has been squandered in fleshpots and whorehouses — western whorehouses at that.