Navy Knickers To Faye Turney’s Crictics Says Iraq Hostage John Nichol
LIKE President Ahmadinejad, the Mirror wants it both ways. It is both affronted and complicit in a spin.
Having paid money to Iranian hostage Arthur Batchelor for his story, it now tells readers of “BROWNE BACKLASH OVER IRAN 15”.
Indeed, so brazen is the Mirror that it pitches this headline beneath Batchelor’s latest chapter.
The news is that Defence Secretary Des Browne should “carry the can” for allowing some of the Iran captives to sell their stories to the press.
Former Defence Minister Peter Kilfoyle says the decision has made the British forces a “laughing stock”. Shadow defence secretary Liam Fox says: “Serving members of the armed forces have, in effect, been put up for auction in the most horribly undignified fashion.”
On this matter, the Mirror hears Batchelor say: “I don’t see what I did is any different from retired admirals writing books on their experiences, or being paid to appear on TV and give comments to newspapers.”
He doesn’t? Readers may pick up a whiff of class warfare. As David Aaronovitch wrote in the Times: “Squaddies – like bimbos – ‘sell their stories’, while generals, rock stars and ambassadors bestow upon us, for our edification and instruction, their memoirs.”
Difference is that Batchelor remains in the employ of the Navy and his part-time job as a professional hostage looks a bit tatty. And what influence has his employer brought to bear on what he can and cannot say? He who pays the piper calls the tune, and all that.
Heroes And Villains
Better, perhaps, to do as the Sun does and ignore the controversy entirely. There is no mention made of Des Brown in the entire paper. But there is a picture of Faye Turney standing alongside John Nichol.
Readers may remember Nichol as the RAF navigator shot down and paraded on TV during the first Gulf War.
Once more the Sun tells readers how blonde Faye Faye was “stripped to her knickers”. And again, these readers are deprived of a shot of said garment, or of Faye re-enacting the full horror of this key moment in the narrative.
Nichol has never spoken of his underwear. He was kept locked up for six weeks. The state of his underpants challenges the depthS of our imagination. And, unlike this recent episode, Britain was at war with Iraq. And Nicole was tortured.
We learn that Nichol was Turney’s “childhood hero”.
Says Nichol: “I wanted to say to her in person that she’s done her country proud – and to ignore her critics who do not have a clue what has happened to her.”
Only we do have clue. We have Turney’s testimony.
Posted: 11th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids Comments (28) | TrackBack | Permalink
