The 5th Column

Popping the myth

THE MYTH that the British media is impartial has been blown apart again by the annual parade of newscasters, reporters, chat show hosts, TV entertainers and Jeremy Clarkson sporting Poppies in honour of the British armed forces' Remembrance Sunday this weekend.

The Poppy, the seasonal high-profile fundraiser of the British Legion ex-services organisation, is worn by many as a mark of respect to those who have died in the First World War and the Second World War. But it also represents all those British forces who have been killed or wounded or are still on active service in imperialist adventures since then, including the war in Ireland.

The British Legion website says that it provides "financial, social and emotional support to millions who have served AND ARE CURRENTLY SERVING [our emphasis] in the Armed Forces, and their dependants".

If Britons want to wear the Poppy in memory of their dead then that should be respected, as should the right of Irish republicans and nationalists to wear the Easter Lily to honour those who have died in the cause of Irish freedom.

But will we see Jeremy Clarkson or Sky TV's Rupert Murdoch, UTV and BBC have guests or presenters wearing the Easter Lily as a sign of parity of esteem?

Paper tiger

ANDREW NEIL, a bigwig in the British media, announced on his BBC show, The Week in Politics, that three Black Watch soldiers killed in action had been "murdered".

A strange description by the Poppy-wearing editor for the killing by enemy combatants of fully armed troops in an Anglo-US operation described by the London Independent last Friday as a "search and destroy mission".

Home Counties on the range

THE unsavoury reputation in the Six Counties of the Black Watch Regiment of the British Army will elicit little sympathy for their plight in Iraq's 'Triangle of Death'.

And while we haven't forgotten the Black Watch, although the Black Watch is under fire in Iraq, its officers haven't forgotten us.

In a pooled dispatch filed this week by the Times of London under Ministry of Defence censorship, a senior Black Watch officer described Fallujah as being relatively well-to-do and the equivalent of "Berkshire or Surrey with guns". Comparing the Black Watch's actual battle experience to being in Ireland, the unnamed officer added:

"This is an area of bright, well-educated people. They can lay on deliberate, well-though-out attacks.

"It's like Henley-on-Thames with the IRA."

Tartan terror

THE Black Watch may be saved as a regiment because of its high profile in the siege of Fallujah.

The campaign to halt British Government plans to merge five of the six Scottish regiments has provoked bags of hot air about the pride of this Scottish regiment. The trouble is that the history of the Black Watch stretches back to when the regiment was originally raised as six independent companies in 1725 to suppress Scottish nationalist rebels in the Highlands after the first Jacobite Rebellion in 1715.

Their dark tartan and their role as a sort of Scottish UDR, being Westminster's native militia upholding foreign occupation and suppressing dissent by their countrymen, led to their being dubbed 'The Black Watch'.

Not a history to be proud of, one would have thought, but a tradition they continue in Iraq.

KOSBie hero on drugs charge

ONE OMAGH-BASED Scottish squaddie who won a Conspicuous Gallantry Cross in Iraq may soon have his discharge papers to parade alongside his medal.

Corporal Shaun Jardine of the King's Own Scottish Borderers was arrested in England last month outside a nightclub in Ashford, Kent, on suspicion of possessing a 'Class A' drug. The KOSBie received his gong from Queen Elizabrit at Buckingham Palace last week. But on 10 December it will be Jardine versus the Queen when he comes before the court again on the drugs charge. If found guilty, he will be kicked out of the British Army.

Death drivers to Fallujah

TEENAGERS engaged in anti-social behaviour, so-called joy-riding and shoplifting are being targeted by the Blair Government for fast-track recruitment into the under-strength British Army.

Young offenders will sent to military training camps, supposedly to instill some discipline into them, but a Youth Justice Board spokesperson revealed that the move is also designed to "improve the potential for recruitment into the armed forces".

The Youth Justice Board hopes that teenagers will "develop long-term links with the military to help them stay away from crime".

Some hope.

Fool Monty

NORTH DOWN DUP Deputy Mayor William Montgomery claims he was shocked to find himself travelling with Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness and Gerry Kelly in a visit to Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps at the invitation of Jewish community figures in Belfast.

Monty accused the Sinn Féin duo (two out of 122 people) of using the visit as a publicity stunt. Even David Ervine of the UVF-linked PUP dismissed Monty's moan.

And Belfast organiser Lisa Leopold said: "A couple of people expressed surprise at their presence but no one refused to go and not one person complained to me."

DUP man Monty said that if he'd known the Shinners were going he wouldn't have. We're sure he would have been missed.

Somme Orange appeal

SIR REG EMPEY, one of the Ulster Unionist Party's head honchos, is demanding a "showdown" with British Ministers after three top Orangemen were questioned by Peelers about a Somme commemoration parade.

The three big Oranges were quizzed about the uniforms worn by a flute band named after the UVF's youth wing, the Young Citizen Volunteers, and whether they broke Parades Commission restrictions.

Reg claimed that Orangemen have been doing a lot in recent years to steer people away from loyalist death squads. But Reg's tune is out of step with the Orange Order's parades on The Twelfth and elsewhere and the high participation of UDA and UVF bands in them.

Bullets stop Thatcher bodyguard

A POLICE BODYGUARD to Margaret Thatcher, the hated British former prime minister, has been arrested for stealing illegal 'dum-dum' ammunition but is still serving with the Metropolitan Police.

Dum-dum ammo was found in his police-issue handgun when it was inspected. Outlawed more than 100 years ago, the bullets fragment on impact, shredding through the victim's body, causing trauma and resulting in greater blood loss than ordinary ordnance.

Scotland Yard has only confirmed that a 51-year-old officer was arrested on Thursday, 4 November, and bailed to appear in court in December.

Fine Gael pay-off

THE Mullingar Accord treaty hitching the 26-County Labour Party's wagon to the Fine Gael carthorse may result in the two parties coming together for a joint party conference to be televised live.

The event will be covered by Sky TV's Pay Per View - if you watch it, Sky will pay you.