Currently, over 2,000 British servicemen are under official investigation for alleged abuses committed in Iraq and Afghanistan, a situation that the UK’s most senior officer recently attributed to sheer prejudice against the military on the part of government officials who see terrorists as freedom fighters. Agreeing with this analysis, Richard Kemp notes that many of these investigations have turned up nothing, and that “if there were any foundation to accusations of abuse on this scale, it would amount to a wholesale breakdown of military order and control.” He also points out that this anti-military campaign, waged by “unscrupulous, politically motivated lawyers” with the cooperation of vindictive Afghans and Iraqis, has important implications for the U.S. and Israel:
If powerful members of the British government establishment can turn on their own servicemen and undermine their national defenses, then it is hardly surprising that they would also be prepared to turn on a friendly country and its armed forces in furtherance of their mendacious objectives.
A pro-Arab and anti-Israel lobby has dominated the British Foreign Office since even before the birth of the Jewish state. But [the existence of anti-military prejudice] sheds further light on the unjust attacks against Israel’s defensive campaigns in Gaza and the West Bank, as well as false accusations over settlements and so-called occupation policies emanating from parts of the British government.
This is also highly dangerous. As well as directly inciting terrorists to further violence against Israel, it encourages the Palestinian leadership in its demands for statehood without negotiation, which in turn also inflames violence and helps perpetuate the conflict.
Although many of the actions of the Obama administration have had a deleterious effect on America’s armed forces, we have not yet seen a legal campaign on a comparable scale in the United States. Hopefully any such attempt would be blocked in a nation that seems to support and value its armed forces far more than does any European country. But Americans must watch out for it. What occurs on one side of the Atlantic sooner or later creeps across to the other.
Read more on Gatestone: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9181/british-military