Published: Wednesday, 5th November, 2008 09:00
Richard Benyon's Westminster Diary
By Richard Benyon, MP for Newbury
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Richard Benyon
THE United States election is exciting much comment around Westminster.
Not for many years has an election many thousands of miles away attracted so much interest.
This is because people see a real need for a US administration that seeks to re-engage with the world. The Bush Presidency had all civilised peoples across the world behind it after 9/11 but it squandered that opportunity.
We all need a strong United States but one that is in tune with the world, not one that seeks to impose its will unilaterally. I want Barack Obama to win.
You may wish to accuse me of jumping on his bandwagon when it seems he has got it in the bag. Without blowing my own trumpet, I stated in this column nine months ago that I believed he would win.
John McCain is a good man and certainly better than the campaign he has fought. The tipping point for me was his choice of running mate. Sarah Palin is someone who is clearly out of her depth.
Her appointment says more about John McCain than it does about her.
We must hope that a President Obama will ignore those in his own party who call for protectionist trade policies. Such a move would be damaging to US and UK companies alike.
A friend of mine has captured the headlines by resigning from the SAS. He commanded troops in Afghanistan who had to go out on operations in thin-skinned Snatch Land Rovers.
He and others warned that casualties would result and he came back to the UK bitter that he had to attend the memorial services for those whose deaths he had predicted.
I was appalled at how the Ministry of Defence did a hatchet job on this brave man. The Government wheeled out a Minister who blamed my friend for the deaths in question.
The Minister said: “There may be occasions when in retrospect a commander chose the wrong piece of equipment, the wrong vehicle, for the particular threat that the patrol encountered and we had some casualties as a result.”
What a disgraceful thing to say, and so far from the truth.
My friend and his men had on many occasions no alternative but to use Snatch Land Rovers. They called them “coffins on wheels”. Whatever the risks, they did the job and took the casualties.
That a Minister should seek to blame those on the front line is beneath contempt.
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