Caithness Armed Forces Day

This week’s Caithness Courier reported on local events in advance of the countrywide Armed Forces Day on 27 June.

A joint-parade by the Pipes and Drums of the Highlanders, 4th Battalion the Royal Regiment of Scotland (4 SCOTS) and Highland Youth Pipe Band included Pipe Major Martin Macdonald from Thurso. Although I am aware of both full-time and TA personnel from Caithness who have been stationed to Iraq and Afghanistan, I am not aware of any who have been killed or injured. Thankfully.

AFD is aimed at redressing some of the balance over recent years which has seen members of the armed forces portrayed as passive victims and not individuals who made conscious decisions to join an organization which was known to be involved in armed action, and in which injury or worst was always a possibility.

I am also thinking of the likes of those who describe the “Iraqi resistence” which was then targetting British soldiers (as well as Iraqi civilians) as “writing their names in the stars” and then ingratiate themselves with grieving family members of certain dead soldiers. Or who, in their books, describe foreign contractors and non-journalists in Iraq as “legitimate targets for acts of resistance” (presumably, this would not include have included Margaret Hassan, but maybe did include Ken Bigley).

But, I digress. The most recent funeral I have seen of a British soldier was of Sapper Jordan Rossi, killed whilst clearing ordnance near Sangin, Helmand Province on 23 May 2009.