I can't for the life of me understand why they're even thinking of sending him there.
Not particularly because he is third in line to the throne - whatever that may mean to people these days - but simply because it's likely to make ALL of our people down there even more of a target than they already are. They may as well get targets printed up on the back of every British Army uniform!
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Didn't stop the Royals that served in the Falklands and other conflicts
As much as I'm in favour of equality sending him to Iraq makes him a target for every mad jihadist in Iraq and beyond and increases the danger not just to him but to anyone serving alongside him. The sensible thing is to not take him.
Imagine if one of us were in the Army, and we get called up to Iraq. Our parents kick up a stink and we're not allowed to go. Do you think the Army would let that go? Would they 'eck. We'd be court martialled....
If the Royals want to appear more like one of us, then they take the full responsibilty that Lt Joe Bloggs would....
But sending him out there of all places could just make things worse. I mean, those b***tards will be trying to kidnap soldiers left right and centre in the hope that one of them might be him. Imagine the proganda coup that would be, parading him on TV (and God knows what else - these guys don't take hostages in order to trade and get something in return).
If that did happen people would be questioning what he was doing there in the first place. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
Would you want to serve next to him? I think it was daft even proposing that he should go to Iraq as it puts the blokes under his command under a much increased risk which is not right. It's unfortunate that he wants to play soldiers and is not allowed to but I'd rather one sulking prince than three dead service personell because he was associated with them.
Maybe it could work in a good way too, in that it would attract the insurgents into one area, making it easier to take them down?
He thinks its a game. Everyone I know who has gone to Iraq/Afghanistan says they would rather not have to go back as they are both hell holes. And these are tough, hard men. Not a rosy cheeked bod out of Sandhurst.
Maybe it could work in a good way too, in that it would attract the insurgents into one area, making it easier to take them down?[/quote]
yeah, good idea...all we need now is some other idiots to patrol with him as targets to make it look realistic to those insurgents...
I vote for Simon Jordan - he'd make a great target.
Here, here
Would be funny if he was a victim of American friendly fire.
I daresay the compromise is that he will go and spend his time there chained to a desk or at the very least stuck in the compound. The MOD will find a nice quiet area for him to patrol around in front of the cameras once or twice but that will be it.
Surely that will draw the insurgents to the compound with their mortars etc, and it wasn't that long ago that a suicide bomber struck within the 'secure' green zone within Baghdads Parliament building....
IMO, I don't think there's anything they can do now to avoid embarrassment, except putting him on the front line....
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Perhaps paint the royal coat of arms on the side of his tank?
yeah, good idea...all we need now is some other idiots to patrol with him as targets to make it look realistic to those insurgents...[/cite][/quote][cite]
I vote for Simon Jordan - he'd make a great target.[/cite][/quote]
i think you'll find that the use of agent orange in a war situation has been banned under the terms of the geneva convention...
bbc
Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll all get taken hostage permanently.
That's got to be the right decision. So what if he's upset about it - I don't give a monkeys about the spoilt little tosspot. But what I do care about is the rest of our lot out there. It's a difficult enough (and thankless) job they're doing as it is, without some hooray turning up and making them even more of a target.
Well done to whoever made the decision. It's nice to know that common sense does sometimes prevail. Now, any chance of the judge banging up Tango man for blatantly wasting the courts time?
I mean, what was the point of letting him join up in the first place if he was never going to be allowed to serve in action and was only going to be allowed to play toy soldiers?
I understand about the risk to his fellow soldiers, that's fair enough, but why allow him to join in the first place? The risk in any combat, Iraq or wherever, would be that the enemy would target him for PR purposes so they should probably not allow any of the Saxe-Coburgs to join the forces in the future.
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Because he's unemployable anywhere else, not particularly intelligent and at the time he joined the army it looked like the Iraq thing was going to be over pretty quickly, so while the Iraq what if situation came up it wasn't taken that seriously. It's the right decision but kudos to him for wanting to go. Perhaps they should have deployed him to an army base in the Middle East in Kuwait or something to get him near the action but not part of it.
There was also the question that the paparazzi were going to be stalking him out there too...