Griffin branded 'despicable' for attacks on Army top brass

Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry VC, with General Sir Mike Jackson

Former generals warn that far-right party is attempting to 'hijack' the armed forces

Racist insults made by the BNP against Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry, the black Victoria Cross holder, was a driving factor behind General Sir Mike Jackson, the former head of the Army, making a stand against the far-right party.

Gen Jackson is among a group of distinguished former military leaders who have warned against the extremists attempting to “hijack” the reputation of the armed forces “for their dubious ends”. The General told The Independent: “I heard complaints that the BNP were being extremely offensive about Johnson Beharry, I looked into it, and found out that was indeed the case. I thought it was pretty appalling that a brave man like that should be insulted in this way.

“The BNP claim that they have a better relationship with the armed forces than other parties. But their behaviour shows that they don’t understand the armed forces at all. The fine men and women who serve so courageously are not like the BNP. They are decent people who appreciate and honour the sacrifices made by their comrades.”

Yesterday another senior former officer, Major General Julian Thompson, the highly decorated former commander of the Royal Marines, also speaking to The Independent, said: “The BNP trying to exploit the good name of our forces is pretty monstrous and the fight against this must continue. The fact that they had been maligning Johnson Beharry is dreadful.”

General Sir Richard Dannatt, the recently departed head of the Army, Lord Guthrie of Craigebank, a former Chief of Defence Staff, and Major General Patrick Cordingley, commander of the Desert Rats in the Gulf War, were among the others who signed the letter as part of Stolen Honour, a campaign by the military against the BNP’s attempt to exploit them.

Their view that the far-right groups was “fundamentally at odds” with values of the British military was supported by veterans like Simon Weston, who was severely injured while serving in the Falklands, and the writer and former SAS member Andy McNab, who condemned the BNP’s use of images of the armed forces in election materials.

Mr Weston said: “I find it appalling to think that they can take the dignity and the honour and the respect with which those people treated their service and their uniform, and align it to the horrors and desires of these people.” Mr McNab added: “What it’s doing is abusing and taking advantage of what our troops are doing in both Iraq and continuously in Afghanistan.”

Lance Corporal Beharry, whose family comes from Grenada in the Caribbean, received his VC in 2005 after twice saving lives of comrades under intense enemy fire in Iraq. On the first occasion his Warrior armoured vehicle was hit by rocket propelled grenades during an ambush. He pulled other soliders clear of the burning wreckage despite a bullet going through his helmet. He went back to duty and a week later drove an armoured vehicle through fire, while seriously injured, saving the lives of others.

In its website the BNP declared that Lance Corporal Beharry was an “immigrant” who had benefited from “ positive discrimination by a PC mad government”. What he had done was nothing more than “routine” said the message , continuing "All he did was drive away very fast from a combat zone. . . to safety, as have hundreds and hundreds of other British soldiers."

Veterans groups have complained that the BNP have been selling full-size replica VCs, and other medals for valour. Under military rules, only armed forces heroes who have won the decorations in combat - or their widows and widowers - are allowed to wear them. However, the Ministry of Defence said selling the replicas was not illegal.

BNP leader Nick Griffin insisted yesterday that his party has support among the military. He added. "The generals might not because some of these generals are now in the pockets of the Conservative Party, who used to be able to take Armed Forces votes for granted but now cannot.”

Independent

BNP exploits plight of former soldiers

The decorated SAS veteran Andy McNab has condemned the British National Party after it tried to associate itself with his heroism by auctioning two signed copies of his books to raise money for Help for Heroes, a charity that helps wounded soldiers.

“I was sick to the stomach,” stated McNab, whose works include Bravo Two Zero, when he was told about the BNP stunt. “I served with men of all colours and from many nationalities. They were all equal to me. That’s what the army teaches you. Nick Griffin thinks differently…I’ve asked for my books back. Because I don’t want anything to help the BNP promote their poisonous politics of segregation and hatred.”

This is not the BNP’s only attempt recently to link itself to armed forces charities. The Huddersfield branch of the Royal British Legion (RBL) recently accepted money raised by a BNP supporter, seemingly in contravention of its own strictly non-political stance.

The RBL had originally refused to accept the money from Rachel Firth, who spent 24 hours in a cardboard box to highlight the plight of ex-service personnel forced to sleep rough after leaving the Armed Forces. Firth said she would divide the money equally between the RBL and the BNP.
The rejection angered Robert Walker, a BNP member who organises the Poppy Appeal for the charity in Golcar. He tried to pile on the pressure by stating that he had already agreed to accept the money and that the Golcar branch was happy with this.

The laudably robust stance of the RBL soon softened, however, and within days of the row hitting the pages of the Huddersfield Examiner the RBL had agreed to accept the cash on the grounds that the donation was not made on a political basis and that Firth “is an individual raising funds for her favoured causes and wants to split those funds between the causes. We have no problem with this.”

The BNP has also targeted FEBA – a military term meaning “Forward Edge of Battle Area” – a financially hard-up veterans’ charity based in Lanarkshire.

FEBA, which does not receive government funding and relies on donations, was approached by BNP activists in Glasgow, who offered to raise £50,000 to help keep a drop-in centre open. Tommy Moffat, FEBA’s founder and a former Queen’s Own Highlander, said he rejected the offer but told the press that he may now have no alternative but to accept the money if the charity is to continue operating, after a number of grants allegedly promised by the Ministry of Defence failed to materialise. The MOD denied his claim, saying it had only offered FEBA a team of experts to help the charity obtain grants.

Gary Raikes, the BNP’s Scotland organiser, met Moffat at the charity’s Glasgow drop-in centre and immediately posted photographs of the two men shaking hands on the BNP website to boast about how the BNP was coming to the aid of veterans. Moffat conceded he had already accepted £3,000 to help with the rent as well as a delivery of radiators from the Scottish BNP activist Walter Hamilton, though he denied he knew Hamilton was a BNP activist at the time.

“It was only later that he told us he worked for the BNP,” Moffat said, “What were we supposed to do? We had nothing. We were sitting with no heating and it was freezing.” The story on the BNP website appeared to imply that it was Moffat who contacted the BNP for assistance, however.

Trying to recruit serving soldiers and ex-servicemen has played a growing part in BNP strategy in recent years, signalled by the heavy promotion in 2007 and early 2008 of its front group the Association of British Ex-Service Personnel (ABEX), now defunct again. Of greater importance has been its use of the predicament of ex-servicemen for political purposes that has seen the party target areas such as Catterick for its propaganda drives. More recently BNP activists in Wales have tried to gain mileage out of the plight of vulnerable veterans by campaigning under the name “Soldiers Off Our Streets”.

Griffin’s public attitude to Britain’s armed forces has changed since a few years ago. During the 1990s an article appeared in The Rune, an antisemitic magazine Griffin edited, praising the Waffen-SS as “no worse” than any other army. The Waffen-SS were of course condemned as part of a “criminal organisation” at the Nuremberg Trials. Griffin, however, believed the Waffen-SS was praiseworthy for its “courage and sacrifices”.

Hope not hate

Andy McNab goes after the BNP

Andy McNab has told the BNP, “give me my books back”.

The ultimatum comes after Nick Griffin announced that signed copies of Brute Force and Seven Troop would be auctioned to raise money for Help for Heroes.

McNab – ex-SAS hardman, Gulf War veteran and best-selling author – told Nothing British, “When someone called me to say that the BNP was using one of my books in a publicity stunt, I was sick to the stomach. I served with men of all colours and from many nationalities. They were all equal to me. That’s what the army teaches you. Nick Griffin thinks differently. He thinks the British Army should be for whites-only. He thinks heroes like Johnson Beharry, our only living VC, should be sent back to Grenada.

“He doesn’t understand that what makes the British Army great, and what makes this country great. It’s the way we draw together people from all around the world and give them ideals worth believing in: tolerance, fairness, decency, looking out for the little guy. It’s the British way of doing things. That’s why I’ve asked for my books back. Because I don’t want anything to help the BNP promote their poisonous politics of segregation and hatred.”

Biographical note:

Andy McNab joined the infantry in 1976 as a boy soldier. In 1984 he was badged as a member of 22 SAS Regiment. He served in B Squadron 22 SAS for ten years and worked on both covert and overt special operations worldwide, including anti-terrorist and anti-drug operations in the Middle and Far East, South and Central America and Northern Ireland.

In the Gulf War, McNab commanded the famous Bravo Two Zero patrol, an eight man patrol tasked with destroying underground communication links between Baghdad and north-west Iraq and with finding and destroying mobile Scud missile launchers. McNab was held for six weeks and was relentlessly and savagely tortured. By the time he was released he was suffering from nerve damage to both hands, a dislocated shoulder, kidney and liver damage and had contracted hepatitis. After six months of medical treatment he was back on active service.

Awarded both the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) and Military Medal (MM) during his military career, McNab was the British Army’s most highly decorated serving soldier when he finally left the SAS in February 1993.

Andy McNab has written about his experiences in the SAS in two bestselling books, Bravo Two Zero (1993) and Immediate Action (1995). Bravo Two Zero is the highest selling war book of all time and has sold over 1.7 million copies in the UK.

McNab is the author of seven fast action thrillers, highly acclaimed for their authenticity and all Sunday Times bestsellers.

Nothing British

(Thanks to BB for the heads-up)