Crocodile Tears or Real Concern

[rov1100]

Once again our leaders utter their usual sympathetic tributes for the 6 soldiers who died in their patrol vehicle. Do they really care or are they just going through the motions? Every year they attend the centotaph with the Queen as though this is sufficient to ease any guilty concience.

If they had real concern would they not attend the funerals to see how their families grieve?

[DTCwordfan]

Come off it, they would be spending all their time in funeral parlours......

Course they care - they also have to balance the tragic cost of this viz terrorism in the UK - the attack on London wasn't that long ago but it seems many forget that an other horrendous atrocities around the world that AL Qaeda et al have made. Remember 9-11 still outweighs the allied losses considerably, never mind the rest.

[welshlibranr]

no they would never do that!..........soldiers are just numbers to them!......Sad, but true!.........

[jackthehat]

The families wouldn't necessarily want a private farewell to be hijacked by the attendant media-circus that would accompany any of the Politicos who came to pay their respects.

[exdc]

"If they had real concern would they not attend the funerals to see how their families grieve"

Good point Rov

The families wouldn't necessarily want a private farewell to be hijacked by the attendant media-circus that would accompany any of the Politicos

Good point JTH

[DTCwordfan]

To some extent that is true....one does budget death - you even do it in a major construction project and hope/pray that the numbers do not come in. It hurts on the latter and I would think it does on the Government - otherwise they are not human.

Do we have any ex politicians or Generals/Brigadiers etc on here who can comment on this?

[Philtaz]

Care? Politicians? As if! If they cared they wouldn't continually ask them to carry out such difficult tasks with an ever dwindling budget.

There was an oft used saying when I was in HM Forces that still rings true to this very day and probably always will:

“We the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful. We have done so much, with so little, for so long, we are now qualified to do anything, with nothing.”

[seadogg]

I think they are sincere. Apart from sympathetic feelings hey will be aware of the value of a trained soldier.

It seems that the weakness of the present strategy is that it is based on training the Afghanis to maintain security when British and allied troops inevitably leave and the omens are not good given the time frame.

[rov1100]

Well said Welshlibranr you took the words out of my mouth. Praising up the servicemen heroic deeds and then throwing them on the sh!t heap after they become injured and have to leave the forces.

[Prudie]

Whatever your views on the wrongs or rights of being over there and whether the Govt should take the blame, remember our brave armed forces are proud to be doing their duty and to a large part accept the risks. After all theyr'e not conscripted.

[andy-hughes]

I listened to some stats about the number of people killed by terrorism throughout the EU last year, and terrorists arrested, and the numbers were miniscule! I know that any terrorism is to be avoided, but all that has happened is that the Taliban has shifted operations over the border into Pakistan, and the Secretary Of State for Defence was on Radio 4 tonight claiming that as a victory!

The notion that you can stop terrorism by military force is farcical - and the re-emergence of the Taliban when the allied troops leave, will repeat history which is what they did when Russia pulled its troops out.

All the Taliban need to do is wait for us to go home, they don't have to go anywhere, they are already home.

To address the Question - it is not possible for our leaders to sound sincere with their sympathies, but that is both the nature of detachment which is required to do what they do, combined with the knowledge that these people have basically died for a futile cause - and that is the biggest tragedy of all.

[Everhelpful]

If the Government cared why are they closing all the "Remploy" Factories? Staff there are mainly Ex-Servicemen who have no chance of other employment.

[welshlibranr]

rov1100, my son wanted to join the Army at 16, I said 'no way' he was annoyed with me, but he wanted to join the Signals, and they wanted him to join the Royal Welsh!..........cannon fodder!...........no way!........he thanks me now!............

[237SJ]

<<I listened to some stats about the number of people killed by terrorism thoughout the EU last year and terrorists arrested, and the numbers are miniscule>> Don`t you think that has something to do with the fact that our brave troops (and intelligence people) in Afganistan and other such places are doing their job?

[The-HouseHusband]

Being Ex-Forces pensioned off due to injury I can say for sure that all that comes out of this and the last Government are crocodile tears, if they had any real concern they would have never sent our lads out there. It is easier to hunt terrorists on your own soil rather than chasing ghosts across barren waste lands.
I can assure you though that the last thing any family want is a politician attending the funeral of their loved ones. He would probably find himself face down under the coffin as it is lowered into the grave or strapped to the coffin as it enters the furnace in the crematorium! Squaddies are not very forgiving of those that send you to sh*t holes while they make your pension pot smaller by the minute.

[maggiebee]

Don't think you can put "Government" and "care" in the same sentence.

[The-HouseHusband]

You can if it involves the closure of CARE Homes and CARE Facilities

[andy-hughes]

237SJ - no i think if the Taliban, or any terrorist organisation wishes to bomb anywhere in the world, they simply go ahead and do so. The fact that they don't at the moment is far less to do with a military invasion to force democracy on their country, than the fact that there are simply an extremely small minority of terrorists of any sort in the world.

The notion that milirary force will stop terrorism is as ludicrous as Bish's famous expression 'War On Terror'. You can't wage ware against idealists, you might as well wage war on sunshine.

The way to avoid extremist Muslim action is by education and dialogue - finding out why they regard the west as the infidel, and seeing if points of view cannot be altered over time.

I don't think you will disuade a Muslim who hates Westerners that he is wrong by giving him a Western gun barrel to stare down in his own back yard.

[237SJ]

The Taliban don`t tend to bomb places in the rest of the world but there are people in the UK (and elsewhere) who are disjointed sympathisers and they go to places like Pakistan and Afganistan to consolidate and train in terrorism tactics and I do believe that the military offensive on those countries has had some impact as far as counteracting that threat.

[andy-hughes]

237SJ - I'd love to believe you are right, but whereas it takes a nation's armed forces to create a futile misled and ill-thought invasion of another country, it takes only one fanatic who is willing to die, and the right equipment to make a bomb, to create havoc and misery right here in the UK.

How does one ever prevent the other?

[emmie]

i suspect they do care and probably deeply, but as been pointed out no one wants the media circus that would develop if they were to attend a funeral, and besides how many could they go to, as they have been endless. Better for the politicians to find a resolution to extricate Britain from these conflicts by whatever means. The families themselves i am sure wouldn't want the politicians there, for the same reason, media have no place at a these private family funerals.