General retreat

may I thank through your letters page Ray Fitzpatrick for his comments on my contributions to Points of View Echo April 13.May I, in my usual humble inimitable style suggest that he obtains and reads a copy of the Daily Mail for the same day and refer to page 20 where the Mail interviews General Sir Michael Rose over the problems in Iraq.Readers will know of my connection through family to the SAS and the Parachute Regiment and would like to know how it would have been different for the likes of the General to resign and for my family member to be given an honourable discharge because of the issue over the war and continued occupation of Iraq. I mean it really is laughable that we have come to this. However, one thing you will note is that the General is having a book published whereas I will never claim a penny for expressing my views. I will never sell myself for twenty pieces of silver over the death and destruction visited by us on the Middle East. Fl Lt Kendall-Smith was incarcerated and dishonourably discharged for disobeying orders which many now regard as being illegal. The war was illegal, the occupation is more than part of the problem, it already is a civil war and the bomb in the Iraqi Parliament is no different to the attempt by Guy Fawkes only Guy Fawkes failed and look what happened to him. Tell me how much worse do the politicians want it to be before we admit defeat and retreat.