HANDS OFF OUR MEDALS
Ex-Commando labels Defence Force move to strip awards as ‘abhorrent’
A FORMER Australian Defence Force commando is helping lead a campaign fighting against any request to strip soldiers of the medals and honours they earned serving their country.
Up to 3000 current or former soldiers would be affected if the Defence Force opted to revoke the Meritorious Unit Citation (2007-2013).
Wes ‘H’ Hennessey CSM has labelled the request, which stems from the ADF Inspector General’s Brereton Inquiry, as abhorrent and will not stand by while the mental wellbeing of his fellow soldiers and their loved ones are affected.
FORMER ADF commando Wes ‘H’ Hennessey served his country with honour for more than 20 years.
After hearing of a potential decision to revoke the Meritorious Unit Citation (2007-2013), a decision he labels as abhorrent, Mr Hennessey has started a petition against the request made by ADF chief General Angus Campbell.
“Our main concern within the special operations community at the moment is the fact that the chief of the defence force recommended or agreed with one of the particular commendations out of the Brereton Inquiry and forwarded that onto the governor-general,” Mr Hennessey said.
“That was to revoke the Meritorious Unit Citation.
“We believe it as an abhorrent recommendation and referral onto the governor-general is it tarnishes the whole of the special operations task group.
Mr Hennessey was deployed to Afghanistan on a
number of occasions and did not witness or hear of any misconduct by special forces troops during that time.
“I did not (hear of any
misconduct),” he said.
“If I did I would have reported it.
“In fact what I did see was thousands and thousands of operations done by thousands of operators, as in special forces operators, over a 10-12 year period in one of the most unpredictable insurgencies.
“.....if you accumulate the number of operations we ran over that period of time and the number of complex scenarios the vast, vast majority is absolutely exemplary.”
A decision to revoke the medals could affect thousands of current and former soldiers and Mr Hennessey is deeply concerned for their mental wellbeing of those who would be affected.
“When you start pulling apart the whole mental health component and the lack of empathy shown by the chief of defence force’s office in releasing this information – not only the families of the fallen, not only the members past, present and even the future of special operations command, the wider defence force community is reeling,” he said.
“And the reason they are is because of the whole way it has been handled.
“It has been handled extremely poorly.”