Seems to me a certain senior RAF officer is a lot more than half in love with easeful death… provided it’s someone else’s.
Meet General Sir Anthony Cecil Hogmanay Melchett VC KCB DSO, Air Vice-Marshal David Allan Walker OBE MVO FRAeS:
RAF pilots asked to consider suicide flight
Lee Glendinning
Tuesday April 3, 2007
The GuardianA senior RAF officer asked fighter pilots whether they would consider suicide missions as a last resort to stop terrorists if their weapons had failed or they had run out of ammunition.
During a training exercise, Air Vice-Marshal David Walker put it to newly qualified pilots that they should think of flying suicide missions in a “worst case scenario” when a terrorist attack was imminent.
The head of the RAF’s elite One Group who is in operational control of Typhoon, Tornado, Jaguar and Harrier fighters and bombers, is reported to have asked the pilots: “Would you think it unreasonable if I ordered you to fly your aircraft into the ground in order to destroy a vehicle carrying a Taliban or al-Qaida commander?”
According to reports in today’s Sun, he told them they knew when they signed up that they would have to risk their lives.
The Ministry of Defence last night confirmed that the training exercise had taken place but stressed it was a hypothetical question to provoke thoughts as to what pilots would do if they were confronted with a situation in which they might die.
[…]
“The idea of officers ordering personnel to commit suicide is disgusting,” an unnamed officer told the Sun.
Another said: “His idea of leadership is to suggest that it is within his power to authorise the first example of an ordered kamikaze attack in the RAF’s 89-year history. He is subtly suggesting that if he wished he could order anyone in his command to die.”
It’s one thing to put your life at risk but it’s quite another to have a senior officer say he’d kill you on a whim. It’s a situation Walker’ll never face though: he’s too busy yukking it up at guest nights with royalty, celebrity and the Red Arrows. All that ceremonial Master of the Royal Household stuff to see to, doncherknow.
It’s hard work, just like the field of military expertise that led Air Vice Marshal Walker to reach the eminent heights from which he now pontificates to fighting women and men – administration:
Air Vice-Marshal David Allan Walker OBE MVO FRAeS has been Master of the Household of the Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom since 2005.
He was born 14 July 1956, and educated at the City of London School, and the University of Birmingham (BSc, 1977). He joined the Royal Air Force in 1974, and served in the Administration Branch. He is a MIPD and staff qualified (qs).
[…]
Walker became an Air Commodore in 1998 and was appointed Director Corporate Communications (RAF), 1998–2001, and later was Director Personnel Policy (RAF) then Personnel Training Policy 2001–2003..
So. He’s a professional suckup to royalty, policy wonk and spin merchant. The most serious danger he’s been in in his life was probably at a No 10 dinner party. If this is the calibre of officer in charge the UK forces truly are fucked.
