"The Circle" can VC recipient.

[Pies4shaw]

^ As others have already pointed out, the "criticism of these soldiers" is coming from other "these soldiers". There is nothing to be defensive about, in this instance, unless one wants to pick a side randomly. Such regiments are full of highly-trained, very capable people who take on appalling tasks in circumstances of extraordinary difficulty - and those with ordinary human feelings likely end up deeply traumatised in many cases. Most of them serve with great distinction, as your father will have done. Almost none of them are accused of war crimes by their colleagues.

[David]

Roberts-Smith loses his defamation case:

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... me-murders

Ben Roberts-Smith VC murdered unarmed civilians while serving in the Australian military in Afghanistan, a federal court judge has found.

Justice Anthony Besanko found that, on the balance of probabilities, Roberts-Smith, Australia’s most decorated living soldier, kicked a handcuffed prisoner off a cliff in Darwan in 2012 before ordering a subordinate Australian soldier to shoot the injured man dead.

And in 2009, Roberts-Smith ordered the execution of an elderly man found hiding in a tunnel in a bombed-out compound codenamed “Whiskey 108”, as well as murdering a disabled man with a prosthetic leg during the same mission, using a para machine gun.

The only pity is that he doesn't (yet?) face any other consequences for what he did.

[Pies4shaw]

Ben is a genuine hero. They don't give away VCs for anything but the highest level of valour.

A lot can change in a decade.

[David]

This is a good piece on the fallout from the case and what all this means:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... s-of-anzac

For well over a century Australian military personnel have been committing serious crimes on foreign battlefields. The 2020 Brereton report into alleged war crimes by Australian special forces in Afghanistan carefully contextualised its findings against contemporary soldiers on foreign operations. It highlighted that from Australia’s colonial adventurism in the Boer war and through the first world war, into battles in Europe and the Pacific in world war two and into Vietnam and beyond, Australian soldiers had been involved in many unlawful killings.

It’s not something you’ll learn about when you look at the dioramas and other displays chronicling Australia’s martial history at our national secular shrine, the Australian War Memorial. You’ll learn about enemy atrocities, to be sure. But the Australian combatant is largely lionised.

And none more so, of course, than the disgraced Roberts-Smith, two portraits of whom hang in pride of place. One measures an immodest, imposing 1.6m by 2.2m and features him in a combat pose as if about to fire a handgun. Pistol grip, it is titled. Michael Zavros painted a hero who, the artist said, when asked to adopt a fighting stance, “went to this whole other mode. He was suddenly this other creature and I immediately saw all these other things. It showed me what he is capable of … it was just there in this flash.”

Pistol grip asks: do we get the heroes we deserve or those we create?

[stui magpie]

Whatever tool wrote that piece is in dire need of an enema.

[David]

What did he get wrong? I think he's absolutely right about the untouchability of soldiers and the myths that have served to excuse brutality. Indeed, that's one of the precise reasons I wrote what I did on the first page of this thread a decade ago, before any of us (including me) had any idea about the kind of person Roberts-Smith was. It's the glorification of soldiers that's the problem.

[watt price tully]

What did he get wrong? I think he's absolutely right about the untouchability of soldiers and the myths that have served to excuse brutality. Indeed, that's one of the precise reasons I wrote what I did on the first page of this thread a decade ago, before any of us (including me) had any idea about the kind of person Roberts-Smith was. It's the glorification of soldiers that's the problem.

There’s nothing at all wrong with the article indeed nail hit head. I don’t see anything controversial whatsoever. At the same time the majority of SAS soldiers are decent hard working soldiers asked to do awful work. The journalists Nick McKenzie and Chris Masters said as much.

That type of work is going to attract narcissistic alpha psychopaths and in some respects that’s what you want doing that type of work (within limits of course).

[watt price tully]

The narcissistic psychopath Ben Roberts Smith has brought great shame to Australian soldiers and the armed forces. Needs to be stripped of his Victoria Cross immediately.

[watt price tully]

https://chaser.com.au/general-news/ben- ... f-a-cliff/

https://theshovel.com.au/2023/06/01/koc ... announced/

[pietillidie]

I spotted this today and recalled the thread.

I guess that clears that up.

Skids, don't worry, I would never hold his ill work against the many genuine and genuinely brave folks performing a thankless task. I have the same protective approach to police, social workers and anyone doing a thankless task. Far more businesspeople also fall into this category than many realise.

[stui magpie]

What did he get wrong? I think he's absolutely right about the untouchability of soldiers and the myths that have served to excuse brutality. Indeed, that's one of the precise reasons I wrote what I did on the first page of this thread a decade ago, before any of us (including me) had any idea about the kind of person Roberts-Smith was. It's the glorification of soldiers that's the problem.

No, you have the same problem with the Police. Soldiers aren't glorified or untouchable, most get far less credit or plaudits than they deserve.

One bloke going rogue should not taint the others who, as WPT said, do a bloody hard job. A job that requires them to risk their own life and routinely take others. Just to be able to do that requires a serious emotional switch. This is a judgement on one man, not the entire armed services.

[think positive]

What did he get wrong? I think he's absolutely right about the untouchability of soldiers and the myths that have served to excuse brutality. Indeed, that's one of the precise reasons I wrote what I did on the first page of this thread a decade ago, before any of us (including me) had any idea about the kind of person Roberts-Smith was. It's the glorification of soldiers that's the problem.

No, you have the same problem with the Police. Soldiers aren't glorified or untouchable, most get far less credit or plaudits than they deserve.

One bloke going rogue should not taint the others who, as WPT said, do a bloody hard job. A job that requires them to risk their own life and routinely take others. Just to be able to do that requires a serious emotional switch. This is a judgement on one man, not the entire armed services.

this

[watt price tully]

Congratulations to the courageous journalists and brave soldiers who chose to speak up despite the pressure not to.

I’m just waiting for the Murdoch Press to label this “woke”

[David]

[think positive]

I don’t believe you respect authority at all