Reflections of a Citizen-Soldier
Rorke Adrift is a graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, has served on operations in Afghanistan, and holds a degree in international relations.
Following the publishing of consecutive public letters by French and then American general officers on their lack of faith in their respective regimes, I, as a military officer, felt compelled to embark upon some introspection of my own. In the Western tradition, the armed forces are apolitical, and must necessarily remain so in order to prevent the abuse of military power toward the civilian political domain; a function well demonstrated by the history and demise in 306 A.D. of the Praetorian Guard. The United States military has also inherited this tradition of political neutrality:
“Retired generals and admirals normally do not engage in political actions, but the situation facing our nation today is dire and we must speak out in order to be faithful to our oath to support and defend the Constitution of the US against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”- Flags Officers 4 America
It was in deliberate recognition rather than ignorance of this convention of political neutrality, that the American open letter was penned. Although the individuals who answer the call and join their nation’s armed forces do so for their own reasons, it is nevertheless very common for those who choose to serve to do so out of a sense of duty to their country. Men and women generally join and then stay in the armed forces because they care about where they are from, and believe in the organisation they have joined. Unlike the conscripted service of the past, the modern citizen military of professional volunteers all consent to serve. Much like ballot participation, to voluntarily serve is a civically beneficial act. Therefore, the volunteer who serves is probably the sort of citizen who also takes a sincere interest in the political goings-on of their nation. As war is a continuation of politics by other means, the military and politics remain intimately connected despite their mandated separation, as do the respective obligations of the citizen-soldier. When the citizen-soldier is faced with this dichotomy of obligations, what must they do? They do as follows:
“We are facing threats greater than at any other time since our country was founded, aside from China, many of these threats flow directly from policy positions and actions of our own government. It is critical that the threats to our national security be brought to the attention of the American people and that is the main purpose of the letter. To remain silent would be a dereliction of duty.” - Major General (Retired), Joe Arbuckle, United States Army
The duty to which Arbuckle alludes is the insurance policy of a nation, underwritten by the flesh and bone of its military personnel. This voluntary duty endures long after a person’s military service obligation. It would be remarkable to find someone of any commendable military service who does not take this duty seriously, but not unprecedented. The citizen-soldier may be compelled to act when dealing with this potential contradiction of demands, of military service, and of politics. In 2009, US Army soldier Bowe Bergdahl, wandered off into the Afghan wilderness, and was not seen for five years until his return via a Taliban/US Army prisoner exchange. Bergdahl did so after becoming disillusioned by the purpose and morality of his military service. In the UK, Lance Corporal Ahmed Al-Babati of the Royal Signals abandoned his apolitical mandate on 24th August 2020 in order to protest UK involvement in his native country of Yemen. Assuming he joined the British Army in good faith, for Al-Babati the demands of military service and politics proved irreconcilable. “I joined the army in 2017 and took an oath to protect and serve this country, not to be part of a corrupt government that continues to arm and support terrorism.” Al-Babati was arrested and detained by the Royal Military Police following nine hours and thirty minutes of protest.
Should politics and service obligations prove irreconcilable, even in an extreme case such as Bowe Bergahl, the solution is simple; discipline and/or discharge. Such individuals are straightforwardly dealt with, and pose only a minute threat to the military or political establishment. However, should such persons number in the hundreds, or even thousands, the implications become more grave. The Flag Officers 4 America letter has just 124 signatures, most of which hung up the uniform long ago. Fewer signatures have previously altered the course of world history. Just 56 delegates signed the United States Declaration of Independence, and even fewer signed the Magna Carta at just 25. Meanwhile in France, those willing to break the convention of neutrality number two hundred and fifty thousand.
Unlike most of the Anglosphere, France comes from a revolutionary tradition. Among Western nations, France also holds the accolade of the most recent coup d’état in 1961. It is a national characteristic that France has a more volatile populace owing to the bloody origins of La Republique, therefore it is only fitting that the invective of the French letter is less reserved than their American counterparts. Despite military personnel being forbidden to express partisan views, a quarter of a million French soldiers, including those of general rank, expressed their concerns to the public via open letter in the magazine Valeurs Actuelles:
“... Agissez, Mesdames et Messieurs... Il ne s’agit pas de prolonger vos mandats ou d’en conquérir d’autres. Il s’agit de la survie de notre pays, de votre pays!”
“... Take action, Ladies and Gentlemen... It's not about extending your mandates or winning new ones. It’s about the survival of our country, of your country! ”
For the signatories of the French letter it is not a partisan issue, but an existential crisis. Only time will tell how the French Republic will react to this military objection to their national political trajectory. A rift has occurred between the armed forces of France, and the government to whom it answers. Should this rift grow sufficiently large, the coup of 1961 may yet repeat itself. Politics must heed the reaction of the armed forces, so long as they remain composed of citizen-soldiers. The delicate dance between political and military power must be done. Between these two power bases which perpetually hold one another to account, accord must be found; failure to do so will likely result in one vanquishing the other, and with disastrous consequences.
So what does this mean for the UK? Much of the government direction has been to the displeasure of the wider British soldier-citizenry. In addition to damaging morale, and thereby undermining combat effectiveness (which is the ultimate measure of an armed force), the 2019 recruitment campaign, "Snowflakes Your Army Needs You" attracted widespread ridicule. The soldier depicted claims he had “no idea his image would be used” with the snowflake tagline, and left the British Army soon after the £1.5M advertisement campaign. In response, a parody poster began circulating on British military related social media pages. Featuring the Victoria Cross winner Joshua Leakey, nothing highlights more starkly the extreme disconnect between the UK government’s version of what the military should be, and UK armed forces’ own self image.
Another recruiting campaign further highlights the rift between popular perception of the British Army, and what their government thinks it ought to be. The video shows a British soldier, of the Muslim faith, halting a patrol in order to pray while his colleagues idly look on; the video was disliked at a ratio of 6:1. This is unsurprising, for in addition to the sustained campaign of Islamist terror throughout the West, the British Army has spent 20 years campaigning largely against Islamic extremists. Now the British Army expects to recruit from the very demographic they have battled against, for more British Muslims join ISIS than the British Army. In addition, two thirds of British Muslims would not tell the police if they knew someone who was involved in Syrian terrorism.
The unfortunate truth is that Muslims in the UK are more likely to fight against, rather than for, the country to which they ostensibly belong. When surveyed, 52% of the British public agreed with the statement “Islam is not compatible with British values.” So long as British values remain incompatible with joining ISIS, or criminalising homosexuality, to an extent they are right. Given that most of the British public, and by extension the soldier-citizens of the British Army are aware of this clash of values, incidents such as Tommy Robinson’s reception by a spontaneous crowd of cheering soldiers become all the more predictable.
In the 2021 New Years Honours List, a young Captain was awarded the MBE for establishing the Defence Rastafari Network. There are currently fewer than 100 Rastas in the British Army, approximately 0.1% of the service. There are around 5000 Rastas in England and Wales, approximately 0.08% of the population. Another Senior Non-Commissioned Officer was awarded for their role in the Defence LGBT+ Network, and the Cardiff Pride Parade. Instead of using honours such as the MBE to highlight conspicuous contributions to the service, the British Army instead uses them to pander to niche woke interest groups. Our national symbol of military leadership, the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, was illuminated in pride colours, and flew the Pride Flag in place of the Union Flag, from the same mast which hosts the Royal Standard on the sovereign’s frequent visits. The British Army has allowed woke iconography to occupy the places that have since time immemorial been reserved for only the most revered national symbols. The trappings of woke ideology have become as exalted as the nation itself. The MoD’s Diversity & Inclusion (read woke) budget is not publically available, but with the director earning £110,000, as much as a one star general, their portfolio is most likely in the tens of millions. Following the recent suicide of a female Sandhurst cadet, one wanders if the army was not prolifically squandering time and resources on woke nonsense, more assets might be available to mitigate such tragedies. A recent publication from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst states:
“I had not considered feminism a leadership issue before, but if leadership is truly about enabling others to succeed, then feminism is critical.” - Centre For Army Leadership - The Army Needs More Feminists
The army does not need more feminists, nor is feminism a critical issue. What the army critically needs is more well equipped, highly trained, and professional soldiers. Instead, the British Army’s leadership appear to believe Her Majesty’s prospective enemies will be more effectively defeated should her soldiers adopt the correct opinions. So far, attempts by officers to convince working class soldiers from northern England of their white privilege have not gone down well. Use of the word “lads” has been prohibited. In a recent video tweet pledging herself to #IDAHOBIT, Colonel Claire Phillips looks more like the subject of a hostage situation than a willing woke acolyte. Like many senior military officers, I suppose she believes going along with such woke initiatives will safeguard her career progression. Meanwhile, the Royal Navy prepare to celebrate International Asexual Day.
Not satisfied with converting just soldiers to wokeism, the Ministry of Defence is also targeting your children. The Army Cadet Force, a youth organisation, advocates for the use of preferred pronouns. The MoD’s publication Guide for Parents of LGBT+ Children features the transgender flag flying over MoD Main Building, and also encourages parents to use their children’s preferred pronouns. It also states:
“...transgender children are the same as any other children.” - Ministry of Defence
Almost half of transgenders attempt suicide, and only 11 percent have not contemplated it. Compare this to the mainstream UK population, where according to the ONS suicide deaths peak at 27 per 100,000 for adults, or 0.027%. For children they are even lower at 0.4 per 100,000, or 0.0004%. Therefore, transgender children are one hundred and twenty thousand times more likely to kill themselves than the mainstream child population. Per capita, gender reassignment surgery is a greater risk to life than military operations in Afghanistan. Would you support your children engaging in something more deadly than going to a war zone? - Because the MoD would, and their useful guide can now help you do so.
The MoD’s Guide for Parents of LGBT+ Children also endorses Mermaids, a UK transgender charity. Mermaids’ CEO Susie Green took her daughter to Thailand for gender reassignment surgery, making her the youngest person in the world to undergo the irreversible procedure. The British Army’s highest ranking transgender, Captain Hannah Graf, was awarded the MBE in 2019. Graf has since retired from the army, and is now a patron of Mermaids. The cult of wokeness directs the Army’s recruitment, awards, honours, training, and doctrine; it has taken hold at the executive level. In an after dinner speech, the recently knighted Commander Home Command told a room full of mostly young, mostly male, mostly newly commissioned officers:
“The British Army is too pale, male, and stale.” - Lieutenant General Sir Tyrone Richard Urch KBE
Sir Urch, if that is truly how you feel then I invite you to lead by example (as your officer training should compel you) and resign. The British Army will be less pale, male, and stale without you.
The British armed forces’s efforts to appease feminists, push LGBT+ ideology, mandate unconscious bias training, promote “race networks”, and a host of other woke practices, are all at a total tangent to providing UK defence capabilities - which should be the main effort of the British armed forces. Instead of targeting recruits based on what god they worship, whose genitals they prefer, or their race, should we not instead recruit people for their character? Those who aspire to develop such traits as hard bastard, with courage, determination, initiative, camaraderie, sacrifice, fitness, irrepressible non-PC sense of humour and sheer bloody mindedness in the face of mortal danger, should always find a welcome home in the armed forces. If the reader remains unconvinced, I challenge you to imagine a platoon of gender non-conforming snowflakes storming machine gun positions, or selflessly exposing themselves to enemy fire in order to evacuate a casualty in desperate need of life saving medical treatment.
This current trend of woke management and PR decisions concerning the armed forces has not been without retort. Military related social media pages such as Fill Your Boots, act through the power of memes as a proxy soldier’s union. A brief browse of the page gives you an approximation of vernacular military opinion:
Such retort is also not limited to unruly other ranks. In response to the introduction of women into close combat roles, Colonel Richard Kemp controversially spoke out stating:
“Putting women on the front line is dangerous PC meddling. We will pay for it in blood”
Another retired SAS Colonel Tim Collins, of Iraq War eve-of-battle speech fame, described the initiative as a “politically correct extravagance.” Further reflecting the general attitude held by the British Army’s soldier-citizenry toward woke culture, four soldiers from The Parachute Regiment were filmed in Afghanistan using Jeremy Corbyn’s likeness for target practice, with the caption “Happy with that”. Jeremy Corbyn himself stated he was “shocked”. In response to the video, then Brigadier Nick Perry, former Commander 16 Air Assault Brigade stated:
“The army is, and always will be, a totally apolitical organisation.”
From the remaining British generals and admirals that have yet to convert to wokeism, out of either self preservation and/or career interest, there is no letter. However, there is a quietly raging battle for the institutional soul of our armed forces. Despite Nick Perry’s assertion that the British Army is apolitical, it would appear the military has instead become an acutely politicised organisation. This is not because of the actions of the soldier-citizens who compose the rank and file, but due to extensive government meddling, and enforcement of wokeism by the executive strata. The conditions that have developed the lingering possibility of coups d’états in the Republic of France and now the United States of America, are also at play in the United Kingdom. So long as the enforcement of woke doctrine on the British armed forces continues to persist, we creep ever closer.
God Save The Queen
Rorke Adrift
References:
1. Valeurs Actuelles:
https://www.valeursactuelles.com/societe/exclusif-signez-la-nouvelle-tribune-des-militaires/
2. Flag Officers 4 America:
https://img1.wsimg.com/blobby/go/fb7c7bd8-097d-4e2f-8f12-3442d151b57d/downloads/2021
3. Wikipedia. Dissolution of the Praetorian Guard:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praetorian_Guard#Dissolution
4. Liberty Fund. Clausewitz:
https://oll.libertyfund.org/page/clausewitz-war-as-politics-by-other-means
5. Politico. Major General (Retired) Joe Arbuckle:
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/05/11/retired-brass-biden-election-487374
6. CBS. Bowe Bergdahl:
https://www.cbsnews.com/bowe-bergdahl/
7. Youtube. Sky News. Taliban/US Army Prisoner Exchange:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kDFGbk1ExM
8. Muslim News. LCpl Al-Babati Protest:
https://muslimnews.co.uk/newspaper/top-stories/38914-2/
9. Instagram. LCpl Al-Babati Arrest:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CER91OZpD8l/
10. Youtube. British Pathé. 1961 Algiers Putsch:
11. Creative Review. Snowflakes Your Army Needs You:
https://www.creativereview.co.uk/snowflakes-your-army-needs-you-says-new-karmarama-campaign/
12. Metro. Soldier quits army after “snowflake” advert:
https://metro.co.uk/2019/01/06/soldier-quit-army-face-used-snowflake-advert-8314549/
13. Karmarama. British Army “snowflake” campaign:
https://www.karmarama.com/the-british-army/
14. Facebook. Hard Bastards, The Parachute Regiment Needs You!:
https://m.facebook.com/War1982/photos/a.386533698173580/1769659883194281/?type=3&source=57
15. BBC. 20 years of UK presence in Afghanistan:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-56770570
16. Guardian. More British Muslims join ISIS than the British Army:
17. New York Times. Poll of British Muslims:
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/15/world/europe/poll-british-muslims.html
18. BBC. “Islam is not compatible with British values.”:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-36346886
19. Ipsos Mori. A Review of Survey Research on Muslims in Great Britain:
20. British Army. 2021 New Years Honours List:
https://www.army.mod.uk/news-and-events/news/2020/12/the-new-year-honours-list-2021/
21. British Army. Rastafarians in the British Army:
https://apply.army.mod.uk/what-we-offer/what-we-stand-for/faith
22. BBC. Rastafarians in England and Wales:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/rastafari/ataglance/glance
23. British Army. Army LGBT+ Network:
24. Independent. Royal Military Academy Sandhurst Pride Illuminations:
25. Pink News. 300 British Army bases fly the Pride flag:
26. Spectator. Ministry of Defence hires diversity boss for £110,000 per year:
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/wanted-mod-diversity-boss-110-000-a-year
27. Telegraph. Sandhurst Officer Cadet found dead:
28. British Army. The Army Needs More Feminists:
29. Economist. Black Lives Matter and the British Army’s Culture War:
https://www.economist.com/britain/2020/07/18/black-lives-matter-and-the-british-armys-culture-war
30. Metro. Soldiers prohibited from using the word “lads”:
31. Twitter. Colonel Claire Phillips CBE Army LGBT+ Network :
https://twitter.com/ArmyLGBT/status/1394382205514919948?s=20
32. Twitter. Royal Navy International Asexual Day:
https://twitter.com/RNCompass/status/1379410132199690241?s=20
33. Twitter. Army Cadet Force advocate for preferred pronouns:
https://twitter.com/ArmyCdtsINSPIRE/status/1395756846036787204?s=20
34. Ministry of Defence. Guidance for Parents of LGBT+ children:
35. Stonewall. Transgender suicide statistics:
https://www.stonewall.org.uk/sites/default/files/trans_stats.pdf
36. ONS. England and Wales suicide statistics:
37. UK Government. Number of personnel deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001:
38. UK Government. Casualty statistics in Afghanistan:
https://www.gov.uk/government/fields-of-operation/afghanistan
39. Guardian. Mermaids CEO takers her child to Thailand for gender reassignment surgery:
40. BBC. Captain Hannah Graf is awarded an MBE:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-48616344
41. jakeandhannahgraf.com. Former Captain Hannah is a patron of Mermaids:
https://www.jakeandhannahgraf.com/about
42. Ministry of Defence. JSP 887 Diversity Inclusion & Social Conduct:
43. Ministry of Defence. Race & Cultural Network:
https://des.mod.uk/careers/our-people/multi-cultural-community/
44. Instagram. Fill Your Boots:
https://www.instagram.com/fybuk/?hl=en
45. Telegraph. Colonel Richard Kemp: “Putting women on the front line is dangerous PC meddling”:
46. Youtube. Colonel Tim Collins’ Iraq eve of battle speech:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpdeNcH1H8A&ab_channel=andywalker
47. Independent. Colonel Tim Collins on women in the infantry:
48. Guardian. Paras shoot at Jeremy Corbyn posters:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/apr/03/video-british-troops-firing-jeremy-corbyn-poster
49. The Times. Jeremy Corbyn is “Shocked”:
50. BBC. Brigadier Nick Perry: “Army will always be an apolitical organisation.”:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47798717
Images:
1. Instagram. LCpl Al Babati Royal Signals detained by Royal Military Police:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CER91OZpD8l/
2. Creative Review. Snowflake recruiting poster:
https://creativereview.imgix.net/content/uploads/2019/01/Your-Army-Needs-You-and-Your-Compassion.jpg
3. Facebook. Hard Bastards, The Parachute Regiment needs you!:
https://m.facebook.com/War1982/photos/a.386533698173580/1769659883194281/?type=3&source=57
4. Youtube. British Army Jobs. Keeping The Faith:
5. UK Government. Transgender flag flies above Ministry of Defence Main building:
6. Ministry of Defence. Guide for Parents of LGBT+ Children:
7. Twitter. Col Claire Phillips pledges herself to #IDAHOBIT:
https://twitter.com/ArmyLGBT/status/1394354667665117184
8. Instagram. Fill Your Boots:
https://www.instagram.com/fybuk/?hl=en
9. Guardian. Paras shoot at Jeremy Corbyn posters:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/apr/03/video-british-troops-firing-jeremy-corbyn-poster
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