Speaking Out
2006-10-17
Sorry for being a little slow on this one: I was away for the weekend and spent a long drive on Friday hearing about this on the radio. In Friday's Daily Mail, which I didn't read, General Sir Richard Dannatt said various things about the UK's presence in Iraq, later revised dramatically for a hasty press release. BBC News summarises the former and quotes the latter.
There are two (or more) ways of looking at it. One the one hand, he's right: a military presence trying to rebuild a nation we helped trash has a tough job keeping the balance between being the solution and being the problem, and the sooner they can get the job done and get out the better. But then, he describes himself as a soldier at the same time as speaking out against his orders. You could argue that he's just as bound to instructions from his political masters as anyone below him is bound to their orders, and from anyone else in the army a public statement questioning orders would probably be considered insubordination.
The apparent disagreement between policy makers and those who know how to get the work done highlights an underlying issue democracy (namely that the people who get voted into jobs generally don't know how best to do them), but I'm not going to argue that at the moment. What is a little concerning is that the head of the army made a statement so open to misinterpretation (giving him benefit of the doubt that it was in fact misinterpreted), encouraging people to agree with him or with the government. The relationship between the government and the armed forces ideally isn't an 'us and them' affair.
The 'revised' statement (a clarification, if you will) is good. It describes issues that the occupation has without suggesting a disagreement with government policy, and it would have been a really good statement to have made in the first place, in my opinion. As for the previous version, it's great that he's prepared to speak out, but I can't help but feel that the way in which he did was a little careless.
Mind you, even the original interview isn't all that daring a position. The media will report what it thinks it heard, not necessarily what you said.
There are two (or more) ways of looking at it. One the one hand, he's right: a military presence trying to rebuild a nation we helped trash has a tough job keeping the balance between being the solution and being the problem, and the sooner they can get the job done and get out the better. But then, he describes himself as a soldier at the same time as speaking out against his orders. You could argue that he's just as bound to instructions from his political masters as anyone below him is bound to their orders, and from anyone else in the army a public statement questioning orders would probably be considered insubordination.
The apparent disagreement between policy makers and those who know how to get the work done highlights an underlying issue democracy (namely that the people who get voted into jobs generally don't know how best to do them), but I'm not going to argue that at the moment. What is a little concerning is that the head of the army made a statement so open to misinterpretation (giving him benefit of the doubt that it was in fact misinterpreted), encouraging people to agree with him or with the government. The relationship between the government and the armed forces ideally isn't an 'us and them' affair.
The 'revised' statement (a clarification, if you will) is good. It describes issues that the occupation has without suggesting a disagreement with government policy, and it would have been a really good statement to have made in the first place, in my opinion. As for the previous version, it's great that he's prepared to speak out, but I can't help but feel that the way in which he did was a little careless.
Mind you, even the original interview isn't all that daring a position. The media will report what it thinks it heard, not necessarily what you said.
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