Found 435 Results
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More than 17,000 episodes of troops going Awol since 2003
04/02/2011
British soldiers have gone on the run from their posts on more than 17,000 occasions since the start of the Iraq war, The Independent can reveal.
Informed Choice? Armed forces recruitment practice in the United Kingdom
11/01/2011
An independent report by David Gee, published in 2007, highlighting the risks posed to young people through joining the military, how young people from disadvantaged communities are targeted, how information available to potential recruits is often misleading and how the terms of service are complicated, confusing and severely restricting. The research found that a large proportion join for negative reasons, including the lack of civilian career options.
At least 1,000 UK soldiers desert
10/01/2011
More than 1,000 members of the British military have deserted since the start of the Iraq war, the BBC has learned.
Parliament urged to end UK’s recruitment of ‘child soldiers’
Children and young people’s rights groups are calling for a change in the law to end the recruitment of 16 and 17-year-olds into the UK armed forces.
Cadet school
26/11/2010
Controversial plans to radically expand military cadet corps in English state secondary schools are being pushed forward by Ed Balls, the Children’s Secretary, apparently backed by No 10. The plans were the idea of Quentin Davies, a Labour MP who defected from the Tories last year, and come on the back of a government-commissioned review of “civil and military relations”.
UK Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights report on Children’s Rights
22/11/2010
In their report on Children’s Rights, the UK Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights recommended that the ‘UK adopt a plan of action for implementing the Optional Protocol, including these recommendations, fully in the UK, together with a clear timetable for doing so.’ The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommendations under the Optional Protocol were that the UK ‘reconsider its active policy of recruitment of children into the armed forces’ and a number of other measures.
Poppy Appeal is a political tool to support current wars
21/11/2010
The true meaning of the poppy is being forgotten as it becomes a political tool to support current wars, a former elite soldier has claimed. Ben Griffin, the first SAS soldier to refuse to go into combat, also said the use of the word “hero” to describe soldiers glorified war and was an “attempt to stifle criticism” of conflicts the UK is currently fighting.
Army of None
12/11/2010
Strategies to counter military recruitment, end war, and build a better world by Aimee Allison and David Solnit, 2007
This is a book from the heart of the vibrant counter recruitment movement in the United States. It looks at the many ways in which schools and communities have become targets for military recruiters and how those schools and communities have responded – with a powerful movement that seeks to resist the militarisation of young people.
Poppy appeal’s original aims being subverted, veterans complain
07/11/2010
A group of veterans from conflicts including the Falklands and Northern Ireland have complained of the increasing glitz and glamour of the annual poppy appeal and of it being hijacked to marshall public support behind current campaigns.
Reimagining Remembrance
29/10/2010
In this report, the think-tank Ekklesia, argue that Remembrance Day needs to be re-imagined to make it more inclusive, more truthful and more meaningful for future generations, says this report. This would include an honest acknowledgement that some did “die in vain”, an end to “selective remembrance”, a positive stress on peacemaking, and making Armistice Day a bank holiday.
The report follows the death of the ‘last Tommy’, Harry Patch from World War 1, who sadly described current patterns of Remembrance Day as “just show business”.
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict
20/10/2010
The UK remains the only EU country to recruit 16 year olds into the military and one of very few EU countries to recruit 17 year olds. The UK has signed the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict yet there is evidence that the UK continues to target children from vulnerable groups and that safeguards to protect under-18s are not effective.
Britain’s child army
“Stricken by Iraq and low morale, the British army is on a desperate recruitment drive. Its new targets? Poorly educated teenagers and young schoolchildren.”
Watching, and challenging, the armed forces
This article looks at the challenges posed by new military recruitment strategies including the “army showroom” concept and the “Start Thinking Soldier” internet and TV advertising campaign – both “initiatives which utilise the language and tools of computer games and simulation, which young people immediately relate to, and desire.”
Winter Soldier
08/10/2010
The Winter Soldier project, organised by the United States based group, Iraq Veterans Against War, details eyewitness accounts from Iraq and Afghanistan. Much of the testimony focuses on the individual soldier’s experience and how they felt about their participation and actions. Six powerful episodes are available on Vimeo or YouTube.
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