Author: Kev

Governor of Oruzgan, Assadullah Hamdam, says three men and a woman were killed when SAS troops went after the Taliban killers of a special forces soldier. Short answer. Tell the Taliban not to hide behind woman and children. Long answer. It is extremely unfortunate and no Aussie soldier would wish for it to happen but until we can manage to stop the Taliban involving civilians then it will happen; again and again. The Governor had urged Australian troops to be more cautious when targeting Taliban fighters, Sky said, including consulting with villagers. That’ll work! “Excuse me Mr Villager, we want your authority to go into the village and capture a Taliban terrorist”. “Sure thing”, he replies. “Just give us time to arrange for his escape”. Or worse; “Sure thing, just give us and the Taliban time to set up an ambush” The ADF are investigating the incident, and rightly so, but the problem is an old one and won’t go away in a hurray. So long as we review our battle procedures and Rules of Engagement to ensure we are not unduly risking civilian lives then we have done all we can. Other than that we can only continue to attack the Taliban and work to eventually isolate them from the civilian population sufficiently enough to destroy them. The last thing anyone should do is think poorly of the SAS. They have a very difficult job to do and are doing it magnificently, notwithstanding civilian casualties.

SPECIAL Air Service troopers and their families say they have been warned theyface new debts this week because of overpayments, amid continued confusion over army bungling of their pay.

Defence Minister Joel Fitzgibbon has called in independent auditors to examine army pay systems, admitting he does not know whether to believe assurances from army chiefs they have stopped docking soldiers’ pay packets after a dispute about overpayment.

Accusing the Army Chiefs of lying and sending in Auditors to prove it is a big call. I’m the first to admit the Army makes errors but I doubt very much whether the Army Chiefs would strive to hide the fact of subordinate incompetence or clerical ineptitude, particularly when Ministers and politicians are looking for someone to take the ‘hospital pass’. I personally know some of them and I do know they would not lie to a Minister of the crown to save their own career if they themselves had defaulted. As soon as the matter was raised in the House and become public knowledge the Army would have pulled out all stops to abide by a Ministerial Direction. If there was one. The Generals would have spoken severely to subordinates and ranks down the chain would have audited their procedures and had them verified. The SASR have been flogged and with frequent operational rotations they are left with little time back in Australia to requalify for their skills allowances or, in fact, qualify for new ones. They are the guys being disadvantaged and it should be fixed NOW with some leeway afforded the veteran. After all it is difficult to re- qualify for para allowance when you are busy fighting on the ground The immediate problem is troopers coming back from rotation and electing discharge. Their final pay calculation is a major part of their discharge or super payments and has the potential to cost them serious money and all they are guilty of his serving their country. The whole situation should have been interred four or five months ago but like the mythical Pheonix, it keep rising from the ashes of failed promises. As if all that isn’t bad enough we now have a Defence Minister calling Army Generals liars. Good luck with your future relationships with the Military Joel but in the meantime you would be well advised to fight like hell for the diggers and when in doubt maybe some ex gratio payments could be in order. After all your government is throwing money at everybody else that looks like a voter so why not give some to those demonstrably deserve it.