Brown is absent yet again.

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/arti cle-1175351/Exit-Iraq-British-troops-honour-17 9-fallen-comrades-prepare-fly-home.html

Why wasn't Brown at this service to honour the 179 British personnel killed during the six-year conflict in Iraq? No as can be seen in this article, he is busy attending another photo call outside No 10 with the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Wouldn't it have been better for Brown to have postponed last weeks visit to Pakistan & Afghanistan, attended this service and carried out his meeting with the Iraqi PM all during the same visit to this area?

It is also interesting to note that in the interests of PC the Daily Mail thought it necessary to highlight the fact, that there was a British servicewoman at a service held at the memorial wall also a British servicewoman observes a minute's silence.

Isn't all this so very patronising to women?

[jake-the-peg]

I think the Mail has the largest proportional female readership of any UK Daily newspaper.

So it's not surprising they'll work any possible female angle.

I don't know if it's patronising.

You might also ask why no member of the Royal family were there and cast aspersions about why they didn't honour the troops fighting for them

But you didn't did you?

Why was that?

[anotheoldgit]

Yes you are quite right jake, I agree they should send a member of the family to these ceremonies, but then you get into the argument of the Royals not getting involved in politics.

But having said this, they are quick to be the leading figures in the November hypocritical ceremony in Whitehall. But then I suppose it gives their chest full of medals and smart uniforms an annual airing.

Incidentally, Mrs Thatcher wrote a letter of condolence, personally to every British family who lost someone in the Falkland conflict.

[Quinlad]

It would have been nice. But he does have more important things to do than carry out ceromonial duties.

I'd much rather he was meeting the Iraqi PM and (attempting) to get things done than attending a service.

[craft1948]

he hasn't got time for things like that aog.....he's too busy saving the world....

[jake-the-peg]

Don't suppose she wrote to every Falklander appologising for withdrawing their right of abode in the UK shortly before the Argentinian invasion?

While we're talking about hypocrasy

[anotheoldgit]

Why do you always try to be objectionable jake?

You might as well have said why didn't she write to every parent for stopping free school milk?

I tried to meet you half way in my last answer, by proving I wasn't a outright Royalist, since you had previously had a dig at me for not mentioning the Royals.

While we're talking about hypocrasy it is spelt hypocrisy.

There you have got me being objectionable now.

[anotheoldgit]

an outright Royalist, even.

[paraffin]

aog:

"Wouldn't it have been better etc etc etc...."

Why don't you apply to be his diary secretary?

[anotheoldgit]

If I was looking for a job paraffin, I would look for a job which offered much longer job security.

[jake-the-peg]

I think you rather started it by making out that Gordon Brown had somehow snubbed the British forces by not attending this ceremony personally.

And that argument about Royals and politics doesn't really hold much water when you have the third in line to the throne manning a machine gun in Afghanistan

I am though slightly surprised at finding myself in agreement with you about the armistice day "celebrations".

However as you brought up the Falklands, let's not forget that prior to 1982 these people, along with the those in Hong Kong and elsewhere had just been unceremonously stripped of the right of abode in the UK.

6 months later they were plucky heroes resisting foreign invasion and much flag waving ensued.

It's the way with wars, we like to reinvent the history surrounding them to play out a particular view and cast ourselves in a particular role.

In time these myths become reality in our minds.


Take the one of Churchill in the wilderness as the sole voice warning of fascist aggression.

If that's true why did 32,000 men sign up to the international brigades to fight Franco in Spain?

But we've pretty much written the International brigades out of the story because of their somewhat communist views which became awkward in the cold war.

[Gromit]

It is also interesting to note that in the interests of PC the Daily Mail thought it necessary to highlight the fact, that there was a British servicewoman at a service...

AOG, I wonder if you can guess what these women have in common (Clue: Nothing to do with PC)

Staff Sergeant Denise Rose, 34, of Liverpool. Royal Military Police.
Flight Lieutenant Sarah-Jayne Mulvihill, 32, of Canterbury. 28 (Army Co-operation) Squadron RAF.
Staff Sergeant Sharron Elliott, 34, of Ipswich. Intelligence Corps.
Second Lieutenant Joanna Yorke Dyer, 24, of Yeovil. 2nd Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment.
Private Eleanor Dlugosz, 19, of Southampton. Royal Army Medical Corps.
Trooper Kristen Turton, 27, of Grimsby. The Queen's Royal Lancers.
Lance Corporal Sarah Holmes 26, of Wantage, Oxfordshire. 29 Postal Courier and Movement Regiment.

If it wasn't that your comments were borne out of ignorance, I would think they were shameful.