The MoD’s failure of duty
Sir: Charles Moore berates Oxford deputy coroner Andrew Walker for upbraiding officialdom in the matter of the death of Para Corporal Mark Wright, deeming such criticism of the military establishment to be ‘outrageous’ (The Spectator’s Notes, 25 October).
The fact is that Tony Blair launched our armed forces into five wars in six years. Of the two ongoing conflicts, Iraq has lasted longer than the second world war and Afghanistan is more ferocious than Korea. When any government does this it takes on a very serious duty of care.
That duty involves an absolute obligation that the men sent out to fight will have equipment sufficient in both quality and quantity to enable them to do the job and stay alive if possible. Investigating this government’s discharge of that duty of care, my colleagues on the Cameron Commission into the breaking of the Military Covenant were shocked to discover it had been treated at the highest level with an indifference bordering on contempt.
The duty of care stretches from the soldier on the ground up through the higher ranks but it inevitably comes back to the Ministry tasked with equipping him, and the Treasury — because every piece of kit has to be bought and paid for. Cpl Wright spent five hours in agony waiting in vain for a British casevac helicopter that never came, while his colleagues could not communicate with radios that are, frankly, complete rubbish.
There is nothing occult about helicopters and radios that work. They are available on purchase. Our coalition allies all have them. Our lads die for lack of them. It is axiomatic that you cannot launch five wars on a peacetime budget. It is also no secret that appeal after appeal to the Treasury under Gordon Brown for the release of emergency funds to meet an emergency situation were met with terse refusal while billions were frittered elsewhere.
You want ‘outrageous’ Charles? It is there, staring you in the face.
Frederick Forsyth
Hertford
On Mumbai and martinis
Sir: Christopher Booker is right (Letters, 1 November) — inhabitants of Bombay who refer to their city as ‘Mumbai’ are spoken of by the teeming majority who don’t as ‘Mumbaikers’ in tones halfway between sympathy and contempt.
On another subject in the same issue, Sinclair McKay understandably focuses on the Bond connection for his analysis of a good dry martini. But Luis Buñuel surely had it right: ‘Connoisseurs who like their martinis very dry suggest simply allowing a ray of sunlight to shine through a bottle of Noilly Prat before it hits the bottle of gin.’ I believe Dali’s ‘Last Supper’ illustrates his point.
Mark Revelle
By email
A woman of influence
Sir: The article by Paul Johnson asking ‘Should a widowed mother aged 13 be a saint?’ (And another thing, 6 September) was brought to my attention recently and it was with some concern that I read this potted history of Margaret Beaufort. This is a sublime example of an eclectic approach to history which totally ignores the ambitions of this woman. Johnson states she wasn’t ‘pushy’ and did not try to influence her son when he became king. It seems strange, then, that the ambassadors of Spain and Venice regarded her as having great influence with the king. She dominated her son’s court where protocol seemed to be her special prerogative, and she certainly did not wile away her final years living the simple life at Woking as Johnson would have us believe.
The suggestion that she was lucky ‘not to have her head chopped off’ by Richard III shows a clear lack of knowledge about this king, who did not go around decapitating the ladies, unlike his great nephew. King Richard was, in fact, very lenient towards her. After taking a prominent role in his coronation only weeks before, Margaret began plotting against Richard, and her half-brother, John Welles, was one of the first lords to rise against Richard in the autumn of 1483. Richard did confiscate her lands, but gave them to her husband.
There is no argument that in later life Margaret became extremely pious, but her charitable work is in itself a demonstration of her wealth and power. At Christ’s College, the Master, fellows and scholars were all to be her nominees for the rest of her life.
Wendy Moorhen
Research Officer, Richard III Society, London SW1
Homage to Goldfinger
Sir: While generally panning Quantum of Solace, Deborah Ross complains that the film ‘doesn’t even give itself the odd, knowing wink. No Speedos, no plays on martinis being shaken not stirred, no Omega moments…’ (Arts, 1 November). Well, what did she think the oil-covered lovely on the bed was then? Or hasn’t she ever seen Goldfinger?
J.C.H. Mounsey
London SW13
A subtle study
Sir: No one would, as Edward Norman has done (Books, 1 November), treat Rowan Williams’s Dostoevsky — Language, Faith and Fiction as a (defective) theological treatise, except for reasons of his own. Norman is well known for seeing nothing good in the modern Church of England, and has taken another opportunity to air his views.
From the review, who would realise what a different kind of study the Archbishop produced? During a sabbatical, I suspect, he has with considerable scholarship thrown light on Dostoevsky’s development of the novel to probe the deepest things in life, including human motivations and the way faith influences thought and behaviour. In doing this he adds new insights to our understanding of the author himself, building on the work of previous authorities. His own modest disclaimer should not be taken as a reason for not including him among them.
Brian Newey
Warborough, Oxfordshire
Don’t brand Brand
Sir: Rod Liddle is quite within his rights to argue that he doesn’t find Russell Brand funny (‘The real lesson is: the public don’t like Jonathan Ross or Russell Brand’, 1 November). But to argue he is not popular is absurd. His Radio 2 show has been top of the iTunes download chart for several months. His autobiography has sold 600,000 copies. His stand-up tours sell out, and have won him awards for best stand-up from Time Out and the British Comedy Awards, and a place in Channel 4’s list of the greatest ever stand-ups.
I and plenty of my friends adore the radio show — an amazing two-hour weekly tour de force of comic improvisation, like listening to Eddie Izzard or Lenny Bruce at the height of their powers. He is the funniest person in Britain at the moment, though perhaps we’ve now succeeded in packing him off to America.
Anyone who actually listens to the radio show (as Liddle obviously doesn’t) would know that Russell Brand is also a very kind-hearted and likeable person, and not a ‘sadistic torturer of the elderly’, as another of your regular contributors, Charles Moore, put it with his customary bluster on the Today show. What we are seeing now is a witch-hunt led by the worst elements of the British media which, for some reason (envy?), Liddle has decided to join.
Face it, Rod, you’re not as big as him because you’re not as talented.
Julian Evans
By email
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