'Mad Mitch' and His Tribal Law
- Episode aired Nov 19, 2004
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Rebellion and retribution in Aden.Rebellion and retribution in Aden.Rebellion and retribution in Aden.
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Paid to be right, not polite
The producers who launched News at Ten could hardly have dreamed that their opening edition would start with the first-ever TV interview with a British battalion commander, broadcast live from the battlefield.
But it was just their good luck that Colin Mitchell of the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders felt that his planned invasion of Aden Crater should be promoted to the viewers at home in a positive light, to balance the official government line, which he saw as appeasement of armed thugs who had just gunned down twenty-two infantry, including three of his own men.
Across on the other channel, however, the BBC was fast developing into the Labour-voting freemasonry we know so well, and it is they who decided to feature Mitch as one of their Empire Warriors - 'empire' being a dirty word at Broadcasting House.
But if you find yourself wanting to champion either of the two terrorist groups who were competing to drive the British out of Aden, you need to know that one of them (the National Liberation Front) did indeed inherit what became South Yemen, and took it back to the sand as one of the world's few officially failed states, where it remains to this day. So Mitch's 'tribal law' needs to be viewed against the sort of tribal law currently prevailing in that godforsaken zone that cannot really be called a nation at all.
The film packs a lot into its one-hour span, with vintage mono newsreel alternating with scenes of combat, vividly fabricated in colour. The sole survivor of the massacre gives us a philosophical view of the incident (it drove him to religion), three of the Jocks have their say, generally pro-Mitch, and predictably a young reporter at the time, later controller of BBC1, comes out against, along with government minister Denis Healey, so brilliant, so misguided. As always, propaganda has to be peeled away eventually, so we hear the second-in-command discreetly admitting that Mitch pretended not to hear the order that came over the radio to abort the mission, an SAS veteran reveals that the invasion almost led to a friendly-fire incident, while a cavalry officer testifies that some of the accusations of looting were not just a smear.
But soldiering does need its theatrical side, and ageing televiewers are not likely to forget the night when six hundred men in khaki drill and bright glengarries marched into an ancient volcanic crater, to the skirl of the pipes, as the last act in a long imperial story that was surely not altogether ignoble.
But it was just their good luck that Colin Mitchell of the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders felt that his planned invasion of Aden Crater should be promoted to the viewers at home in a positive light, to balance the official government line, which he saw as appeasement of armed thugs who had just gunned down twenty-two infantry, including three of his own men.
Across on the other channel, however, the BBC was fast developing into the Labour-voting freemasonry we know so well, and it is they who decided to feature Mitch as one of their Empire Warriors - 'empire' being a dirty word at Broadcasting House.
But if you find yourself wanting to champion either of the two terrorist groups who were competing to drive the British out of Aden, you need to know that one of them (the National Liberation Front) did indeed inherit what became South Yemen, and took it back to the sand as one of the world's few officially failed states, where it remains to this day. So Mitch's 'tribal law' needs to be viewed against the sort of tribal law currently prevailing in that godforsaken zone that cannot really be called a nation at all.
The film packs a lot into its one-hour span, with vintage mono newsreel alternating with scenes of combat, vividly fabricated in colour. The sole survivor of the massacre gives us a philosophical view of the incident (it drove him to religion), three of the Jocks have their say, generally pro-Mitch, and predictably a young reporter at the time, later controller of BBC1, comes out against, along with government minister Denis Healey, so brilliant, so misguided. As always, propaganda has to be peeled away eventually, so we hear the second-in-command discreetly admitting that Mitch pretended not to hear the order that came over the radio to abort the mission, an SAS veteran reveals that the invasion almost led to a friendly-fire incident, while a cavalry officer testifies that some of the accusations of looting were not just a smear.
But soldiering does need its theatrical side, and ageing televiewers are not likely to forget the night when six hundred men in khaki drill and bright glengarries marched into an ancient volcanic crater, to the skirl of the pipes, as the last act in a long imperial story that was surely not altogether ignoble.
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- Goingbegging
- Nov 16, 2017
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