Hello Goes To Helmland

There was an interesting article in the Sunday Indi by Leo Doherty. As he points out, images of prince Harry blasting away on his submachine gun seem dangerously close to propaganda in the war in helmland, where young men are dying for no reason.

Harry has said his time in Afghanistan is the closest to normal he has ever had, presumably referring to the way his fellow soldiers are treating him as one of them, rather than his shooting at people. What a sad statement about his life in Britain. He has had some sharp things to say about Britain also, much quoted in the foreign press, so much for his great patriotism. 'I generally don't like england that much, and you know its nice to be away from the the press and the papers and the general 'shi(tesco)' that they write.

He spoke of flying back with two wounded soldiers who were the real heroes. Perhaps thats the only sensible thing he has said.

The way the media have spoken about the hero prince, and how his mum or gran would have felt, has been nauseating at times. Well done indi for looking at the wider picture of weather we are doing any good by being there. The large number of civilian deaths with all the bombing has lost any appeal to the hearts and minds of the local people. With all the fuss about Iraq there has been little debate about this conflict. With reports of the British army stretched by its commitments maybe its time to go home from both of these conflicts.

There has been considerable criticism for the drudge report for revealing the fact that Harry was in Afghanistan, the media today often see the chance of a scoop as more important than the consequences, in this cast the security risk there story to those serving their country. Another example of scoop before security is when they revealed that Osamas phone calls were being monitored, they probably prevented him being caught years ago.

Leo Docherty has written a book 'desert of death, a soldiers journey'. www.amazon.co.uk/Desert-Death-Soldiers-Journey-Afghanistan/dp/057123688X

The original scoop was in 'New idea', an Australian womens mag.
Their are 7800 British troops now in Afghanistan .