Dear Editor,
So Sergeant A got life for killing one of the enemy (it was referred to as murder).
What a filthy travesty of justice for one of our brave troops, whatever do his fellow marines think of this punishment handed down to one of their own.
As a regular soldier, I was attached to the Royal Marine commando on two occasions, both times on active service.
They are second to none, they are trained to kill. The marines and the paras are, on most occasions, the ones up front and given the most dangerous operations.
Seeing close friends injured and killed twists the brain on the best of people. You learn to hate the enemy, and everything they stand for. That hate stays with you for years.
My own father served for nearly six years in the Far East fighting the Japanese.
When he joined up, my mother tells me he was a loving, quite docile man. He returned a totally broken and very violent man.
I understand that he tried to kill his own RSM. Once home, at night, he would be found on many occasions under the bed shouting for reinforcements or whatever. Once back to civilian life, I am sure he would have killed anyone at the drop of a hat; he was a huge man and most people avoided him.
He never once discussed what he had seen or done. The sad thing is that no treatment was offered to returning troops in those days. Many atrocities were committed far worse than Sergeant A’s in Korea, Vietnam, and other places of conflict.
My father, thankfully, after a few years, returned virtually to normal but never quite as I stated earlier. These guys learn to hate and they looked at the enemy no different than they would an injured animal. This Marine should be hospitalised, treated and respected as one of our guardians. His sentence is just a sordid political move.
What would Winston Churchill have thought of this sentence …
John Hawker
By email
