Royal Marines

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Tuesday 28th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

My Lords, it gives me the greatest pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Judd, who gives so much to your Lordships’ House and always speaks so well.

It is always a pleasure for me to talk about the Royal Marines. My parent regiment is the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, and after World War II we came even closer together. During that gloomy moment, when “Prince of Wales” and “Repulse” were sunk, those Royal Marines that got ashore, escaped and were saved were sent as reinforcements to my battalion, which was fighting on the Malayan Peninsula. The liaison and friendship has lasted. We swap an officer between us every year and we get on rather well

I make no bones about it: I hold the British politician responsible for allowing this continuing dismantling of the armed services, and one day I may hold them culpable. We are not prepared, we are not in the best of shape, and we have, I am sad to say, a Government who are always tinkering downwards. They talk about what will arrive, but even the keels of the ships are not down, certainly the submarines are not being made at the moment, and there is a lot more—armoured vehicles and goodness knows what.

I am worried about a reinforcing calamity. If we get medium to large casualties we will have a big problem reinforcing units. Let me give an example of what used to happen. In an hour-and-a-half in Korea, my regiment lost about 30 killed and 70 wounded. The system was geared at that time to get battle-trained reinforcements to units as quickly as possible. In 36 hours we were reinforced by six officers and 100 battle-trained men and once more we became a battalion worth watching. Today if you were to take 200, 300, 500 or 1,000 men from the Royal Marines, if they took heavy or medium casualties there would be no chance of reinforcements.

You do not build a Royal Marine or a soldier overnight, or in a week, or in a month. He is almost built at one year and might be really useful in 18 months. It is no good saying we will find some soldiers or marines to reinforce. It would be bad news if the marines had to take medium or heavy casualties.

The noble Lord, Lord Burnett, has already mentioned that the military relies on the Royal Marines to perform well with the Special Boat Service. The difficulty is that if you start cutting you dilute the product. The lake of selection becomes a rather muddy pond. If anything goes wrong or there is any diminution of the Royal Marines, I see great trouble in keeping up the strength of the SBS, which is a component and a large chunk of the special forces of our country. There is great danger.

I am not having a go at the Minister. The noble Earl is regarded as something rather special in your Lordships’ House. We like him and have affection for him. Perhaps I may explain it in an old soldier’s way: I would happily share a slit trench with him. He may never have been in one before and may never have had his hair parted by a bullet, but I know that he would fight like a good officer and be a marvellous companion. However, I blame his Government at the moment. The noble Earl, Lord Attlee, and the noble Lord, Lord Robathan, are quite right: we have thrown British taxpayers’ money like confetti to various Governments and it is time we looked after ourselves first.

Armed Forces Bill

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Thursday 3rd March 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord West of Spithead]

We have gone down the route of the coronial system. As Plato said, only the dead see the end of war. Sadly, I am afraid that at some stage we will be in a war when we lose thousands of people, and I have no idea how the system will work at that stage or what the thought processes are about that.

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

Just to give noble Lords an example of an incident that might have involved an inquest and lessons learnt, in Korea, in an hour and a half, my battalion lost about—I am giving approximate figures as I do not remember them—probably nearly 30 dead and slightly more than 70 wounded. The reason was that during the battle, when we called for air support, we got some excellent American pilots, but they bombed us with napalm, instead of the enemy. We would call that “blue on blue” today, and you would have an investigation. Of course, it encouraged the enemy, who were the North Koreans at that time, to put in a counterattack, so we really had a very unpleasant time for a couple of hours. In those days, when we had a good number of soldiers, we had a reinforcement system, at the back of the Korean peninsula and in Japan, that sent you, within 24 hours, fully battle -trained soldiers to replace them—and we got about 100 or 110 good new soldiers.

Today, someone would want to have an inquest about why we were bombed. The chaps made a mistake, we had all those casualties—what use is an inquest? You have to get on with the battle. Lessons learnt—well yes, we can learn a lesson in 20 minutes about how to improve on what went wrong. In those early days of close air support, it was a lengthy process—not like today, when it is almost instantaneous. The military is the first to make amends for, and take decisions about, what went wrong and put that right. I do not see how a coroner with no military experience looking at that disaster would have helped at all. You must get on with the war.

The noble Earl was right to talk about what happens when a chap you have with you and who is your responsibility is killed. As the noble Lord, Lord West, said, you write to his mother, father, wife, daughter and whoever there is, and I am not sure that you write just a little—you write quite a lot. Those are the hardest letters to write of any kind. When everyone else is having a night’s sleep, you are up all night writing those letters—it is not just one. The commanding officer will write and so will his platoon or company commander. The wretched widow, mother or whoever gets two or three letters. On the whole, because you must explain how and why the son was killed, you write rather fully. You write in your own hand. When there are 30 of those letters to write, that is quite difficult. Do not tell me that the odd tear does not come down from the officer writing them.

Inquests play into the hands of the opposition nine times out of 10. On lessons learnt, nobody learns them quicker than the Army, Navy or Air Force.

[Lord Touhig]

My Lords, I will be brief. This debate is very important and shows that there has been a degree of overlap between inquests into the death of an individual and inquiries into perhaps wider problems that have arisen in conflict.

I spent 27 years working in newspapers and publishing before entering the House of Commons. I know only too well from my time as a young journalist covering inquests how important they were to a grieving family who had sometimes lost a loved one in the most tragic circumstances. With that experience of observing, I am not sure that inquests brought closure to a family coming to terms with a sudden and unexpected death but I have no doubt that they contributed to a sense of healing and understanding that the family was desperate for—an understanding of what happened and why some tragic death occurred to a son, daughter, husband or wife.

To no other group is that more important than to service families. A service family worries and frets as soon as its loved ones are sent on deployment somewhere in the world to defend Britain’s interests. We all agree that we have a duty of care to those who serve in our Armed Forces but we also have a duty of care to the families of those who serve. The noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, made clear that this is a probing amendment, really seeking to find out more about the present way in which these things operate. That is important and this is a step in the direction. It is fully supported on this side.

Armed Forces Bill

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2016 Grand Committee

In summary, I do not believe that it is necessary for the Bill to be amended and I hope that the noble Lord will agree to reflect on what I have said and, for now, to withdraw his amendment.

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

Perhaps I may remind your Lordships that when we were in a committee trying to put all three manuals of service law into one manual, many of us were worried that we were removing the power of the commanding officer in a number of instances. We were all thankful that the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig, sat in on just about every sitting of the committee. We saw the demeaning of a commanding officer taking place in some of the discussions.

There is no doubt that there is a certain wish among many politicians to civilianise the military, and I have been worried about that in one or two things that have been said today. If you do not think that a commanding officer is doing his job properly, then, as the Minister said, you lay more and more on him so that he does do his job properly. I myself dealt with a case where I was very perturbed by what was happening. I merely picked up the telephone and asked the special investigation services and the Military Police to be in my office at 10 o’clock the next morning, and the whole thing was sorted out.

I ask noble Lords to be very careful before more powers are taken away and the position of the commanding officer is demeaned. I put it that a commanding officer can do his job, and if the military do not think he is doing it properly, certain things that the noble Earl has described can be put in place.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, legally everyone has a commanding officer; someone somewhere is the commanding officer. The Minister said that commanding officers are given training. I agree that they are given a significant amount of training and that they have a significant amount of experience. The problem is that the powers of a commanding officer can be delegated to someone who has not had that training. Their commanding officer might be only a major and might be deployed to a desert island. That has happened to me. When I deployed on Operation TELIC, my commanding officer was the commanding officer of 1 UK Armoured Division and Signal Regiment. I never met him; I did not know him from Adam. I would suggest that many soldiers do not know their commanding officers from Adam because they normally deal with their officer commanding.

The Committee needs to understand the difficulties faced by a junior serviceman. In these situations they are often making a complaint about someone who is their immediate superior, and perhaps even in their chain of command. They might rustle up the courage to make a complaint, but when they find themselves being interviewed by the company sergeant major, who they might in any case have an issue with for other reasons, they may quickly withdraw the allegation even though it is well founded. I have to say that I am not absolutely convinced by the Minister’s response and we shall need to return to this issue at a later stage.

Commonwealth War Graves Commission

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Monday 22nd June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

My Lords, I look to Asia in my short speech. I thank the noble Lord for initiating the debate.

In Burma the Army was nearly a million. It had men of every religion in the world and of none and who spoke some 30 different languages, which was quite a problem. It was totally integrated with the air forces who came from Britain, India, Canada and America. They fought together, trained together, carried each other’s wounded and died together. It was agreed that they would all be buried together in one cemetery down in Rangoon. You experience a very poignant and great feeling when you go into this cemetery. Hindus and Sikhs, of course, cremate but their names go up on the memorial. Muslims bury, Christians bury and Jews bury.

If you switch quickly to Kohima in Assam, you will find among the Muslim graves two stars of David commemorating two Jewish officers of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. There is a lesson there for the people of Dewsbury or anywhere else in this country— this is not multiculturalism with ghettos but total integration.

The second thing about the war graves concerns the people who visit them. I took an old lady to Kohima who had never left England or flown. Her husband—a sergeant—had been killed. I took her into the cemetery with one of my sons and said to her, “Don’t stand beside the headstone and the burial place of your beloved husband; sit on the grass. You can sit here for two or three hours or all night if you want. My son and I will stay with you”. The point of this is that, when she eventually got up three hours later, she was a completely different woman. She was in her 80s. Her eyes were bright and she had been crying. I heard her say—perhaps I should not repeat this but it was so moving—“Darling, I am sorry it has taken me 25 years to get here to see you”. But she was alive again. The effect of visits of widows, parents, whoever is absolutely vital: please let us keep this up.

I get fed up with the three-minute speech limit we have in this House. We really must improve our technique. This is the second debate where I have only been allowed to speak about something vitally important for three minutes. The Front Bench ought to have a damn good look at themselves.

Gurkhas: Anniversary

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bilimoria, for the chance of a debate about Nepal and the Gurkhas. He mentioned that he particularly wished to raise the issue of the Gurkha Welfare Trust. Noble Lords have done that. One thing should be known at the start, which is that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been extremely good to a number of military charities, and the Gurkha Brigade has done well by them.

The amount of money required to put Nepal straight is very great. One or two noble Lords have said that the Government must tell us exactly what is happening. I am rather sad that there has not been a general call within the country to get volunteers from the many Gurkhas who live here. Apparently there are a lot of unemployed Gurkhas around Aldershot and other places, and I would have thought they could be got together to volunteer for some form of pioneer company to go out to Nepal and do some work to help put the place straight.

Politically, we want to be very careful. China is not being pleasant to the Tibetans, and I have a feeling that Nepal is in their sights, long term, as well. As the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, said, it is about time some of the British Government got out to Nepal to assess the situation and make some firm judgments about how we can stand by Nepal and help it.

Noble Lords have heard about the Gurkhas’ courage. I speak as one who was a Gurkha. I had to work very hard to have the same courage. The Gurkha is also very generous about other people who are brave. In the great old Indian Army, it was not just Gurkhas. The great martial tribes of India, which still join its Army, be they Rajputs, Punjabi Musulmans or Maratha —you can go on—all have great histories of courage. The Gurkha is generous. He is even generous to a brave enemy. We all hated the Japanese, who were not a pleasant enemy, but no one is rude about the courage—the vicious courage—of a Japanese solider. The Gurkha would pay due tribute to his enemy.

I feel that the Government are not doing sufficient at the moment to really get to grips with the situation. Like the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Stamford, I was very suspicious over that Chinook incident. There was something funny about it—maybe the Maoist Government and the Russians. A number of people I have spoken to who have been bravely rescued said that it was by Russian helicopters and Russian pilots.

I think something is going on in Nepal. It is not well administered. After this awful earthquake, people have been putting their hands in their pockets and giving money that should go towards relief and that sort of thing. The trust also has its problems: veterans’ houses destroyed while medical centres, hospitals and old people’s homes put up by the trust have all disappeared. The British Government should take some interest in this.

Not only is the Gurkha brave but he is very flexible, inquisitive and not stupid. If I may just tell noble Lords a lovely little story from before World War II, some recruits had come down from the hills and, as their training and induction took place, they started to be educated. For the first time in their lives, they were suddenly shown a thing called a book and told, “If you read one of these, you will learn many things”. A recruit picked one up, looked at it and twisted it around. He said to the instructor, “I don’t quite understand about this book but you tell me one day I’m going to do this thing—‘read’ it. I’ve opened it and I want to know, do I read the white or the black?”. I call that rather intelligent questioning, when you look at the situation.

There is none better to be with than a Gurkha. Training and fighting is a pretty serious business but, take it from me, it is fun being with the Gurkhas. Please also take it from my father who, at a place called Sari Bair in Gallipoli, first met the Indian Army—a brigade of three or four Gurkha regiments and King George’s Own Sikhs, with Punjabi, Musulman and Sikh gunners all fighting as one. They got higher up the ridge—they could see over it at one point—than any other British, Australian, New Zealand or French unit. They were decimated. In my father’s own platoon of the Warwickshire Regiment, of about 40 men, 27 were killed and everyone else wounded except for two. He himself was severely wounded but he always said, “If I can get through this, I want to transfer to the Indian Army and be a Gurkha”. I can tell noble Lords that his son felt much the same in World War II.

Al-Sweady Inquiry Report

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

I agree entirely with my noble friend. There is no provision for the sponsoring department to recover costs incurred during a public inquiry. However, in light of the inquiry’s findings and the claimant’s disclosure failure, I assure my noble friend that we intend to appeal a costs order in the stayed judicial review, with a view to recovering some of the costs of that litigation.

[Viscount Slim (CB)]

My Lords, I ask noble Lords to think carefully and—as you always do—sensibly about this business of tactical questioning. This could have been an action with a wider content in the overall Iraqi plan. Further down the road or within 24 hours another major ambush such as this may have been contemplated, was being prepared for and would take place. Therefore, the immediate tactical questioning was very important to discover whether the incident was isolated or part of a larger plan. One has to be severe in the questioning, and there are ways of doing that, harsh and not so harsh—they could be offered a cigarette, for example, but there is no need to go into details. But it is vital to find out if there is more to come, immediately.

Therefore, when you use tactical questioning, which is not deep interrogation, minds should allow for this up to a certain period. The Ministry of Defence has now defined what can take place immediately after the battle, which is for the good and necessary for the future. If the Iraqis had captured nine of our soldiers, we would not have nine soldiers to speak to today and it would have been a slow process of death. It is worth remembering these things.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I am assured that there is now a clear policy on tactical questioning and interrogation. This policy has been in place since 2005. The policies were separated in 2010 to emphasise the distinction between the two disciplines. They were further revised in 2012 to incorporate recommendations from the Baha Mousa inquiry and have been reviewed following the Court of Appeal judgment on the Hussein case.

Obviously, as the noble Viscount said, I cannot go into details of interrogation, but again I have spoken to a large number of service men and women about this subject, which interests me a lot, and I have visited military police. I accept that we still have many lessons to learn from noble Lords with a lot of experience in this and I am always ready to hear whatever advice they may have.

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

My Lords, as, I suspect, one of the few ex-NCOs here, I feel considerably outgunned by one or two of the contributions.

[Viscount Slim]

In World War II, we all joined up as private soldiers and the lucky ones later perhaps became officers, which was extra responsibility. I myself was an unpaid lance-corporal.

[Lord Snape]

Well, like the noble Viscount, my father joined up in World War II and became an NCO. I was fortunate enough to join the Armed Forces during a period of peacetime. What I was attempting to put to the Minister was that I believe that no other army in the world could behave with the restraint shown by the British Army, particularly after incidents such as the Danny Boy incident.

As for the report’s conclusions about ill treatment, does the Minister agree that the question of inadequate food and sleep would apply to the soldiers as much as to the detainees? On the question of Public Interest Lawyers, is the Minister aware that Mr Shiner made his reputation by attacking members of the police force, largely unsuccessfully for many years, before moving on to trawling round the battlefield looking for people prepared to make allegations against the British Armed Forces?

Reserve Forces

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Wednesday 3rd July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I repeat that I am confident. As I understand it, retention in the reserves, particularly the Army reserves, is very much higher than in the regulars. I do not have the figures in front of me, but I was told before I came into the Chamber that retention in the reserves is considerably higher than in the regulars. I can write to my noble and learned friend with the figures.

[Viscount Slim]

My Lords, the noble Lord is aware that the business community has culled and fined its companies in the matter of strength and management to get through this very difficult economic stage. As a number of noble Lords have mentioned, some sort of reward is essential for those companies which are taking part. I will say a little more bluntly that perhaps some tax benefit or some exemption from certain company taxes should be given to companies which fulfil the deal. Giving away one chap today in a company, particularly in a small to medium-sized company, is a considerable sacrifice, and I believe that Her Majesty’s Government have not fully thought through the rewards for the business community.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I can assure the noble Viscount that nothing is off the table. We are open to any suggestions. As for his proposal for a tax benefit, I will run it by the Treasury. It is certainly a very good suggestion. We seek an open relationship with employers tailored to meet the needs of different sizes and types of employers, based on mutual benefit. That will include working together to credit the skills and the training that reservists gain during service with recognised civilian qualifications, and the area that the noble Viscount mentioned.

Armed Forces: Army Basing Plan

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Slim]

The Minister made mention of training areas. To train an army properly with its ground-air support, great dedication must be given to the hours of darkness and night training. This always causes consternation among local government, various bodies and nearby inhabitants. What are the Government doing to ensure that night training is not sanctioned in any way in its most modern form today so that our military can consider and take part in proper night training within the United Kingdom? If we do not allow constant night training of our Regular Forces and Reserve Forces of all three services, we will not have much of an Army.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, it is my understanding that a good deal of night training takes place in different training areas, such as Salisbury Plain, Otterburn in Northumberland and in Wales. We hope to keep the NATO training area in Germany after we move the rest of the Army out. Troops go to Alberta, Canada, for night training and to other countries, of which the noble Viscount is aware, including jungle training in Brunei.

Afghanistan

Viscount Slim Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Slim]

My Lords, I would first like to thank the noble Lord for his great kindness in keeping your Lordships appraised of matters of defence and the meetings that he has within the MoD. This is a new development and it is much appreciated by everybody in your Lordships’ House.

I would like now to come down on to the ground and talk for two seconds or so about this land line. In a withdrawal, people become very defensively minded. I myself have been in one or two. It is vital that we keep the offensive spirit going during this period. Many attractive items will go out on the land line which the Taliban would like to get their hands on. The same goes for Bastion. Therefore it is not only defence of the convoy, but a proper offensive force that is going to disrupt any attack at all that is made. In Afghanistan, even in the old days, when there is a very attractive target those who are disagreeing among the tribes can come together. They might well think of this. In this event, one would be dealing not with the couple of dozen who were infiltrating into Bastion. The force levels of the Taliban—and there are quite a number waiting—would give us something to think about. The offensive spirit has to be maintained to disrupt the problem as it comes. I hope that, in planning the withdrawal, the ground air support that the army needs so much will not be thinned out to a state where it is not at full strength and in support of our forces. Withdrawal is very difficult and dangerous. The best way to handle it is not to be defensive-minded all the time and to retain a proper offensive force.

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, I thank the noble Viscount for his kind words about the briefings. These are two-way briefings. I learn a lot from noble Lords who have a lot of experience, like the noble Viscount, of Afghanistan and other areas. Certainly I, my officials and the military who attend these briefings have learnt a great deal. I am very grateful for what the noble Viscount said.

The noble Viscount made a very important point about the drawdown of equipment. We have had a number of discussions about that. We are on the case. I can assure the noble Viscount that it will be properly defended. There will be ground air support and whatever else is necessary to make sure that we get these attractive bits of kit out.

Armed Forces: Long-Term Care

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Wednesday 19th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, there will be a Statement on Afghanistan later. I will be briefed for that and should be able to answer the noble Lord’s question then.

[Viscount Slim]

My Lords, the noble Lord is aware that a number of wounded and sick servicemen have fallen out of the net and live rough in our cities. The coalition Government have decided to remove, and make redundant any minute now, some 25,000 servicemen. The numbers who will fall out of the net will increase. What is required is a national plan to bring these people back into the fold, involving the Ministry of Defence, other departments and the National Health Service, as the noble Lord, Lord Empey, said. What are the MoD’s plans to cater for this?

[Lord Astor of Hever]

My Lords, most veterans, including the seriously wounded, make a successful transition to civilian life and require little if any assistance after service. The MoD is working very closely with other government departments, the devolved Administrations and voluntary and community sector organisations to address all issues faced by ex-service offenders and homeless veterans.