Armchair admirals torpedoed by idiocy

STILL the images shock – HMS Sheffield, mortally wounded, wreathed in smoke. Her captain, Sam Salt, wan and stunned. A matelot, face soot-blackened and burned hands swaddled, flanked by medics…

And now we are told the loss of the first Royal Navy ship since the Second World War was a toxic mix of ineptitude, poor preparation and ill luck.

We, 35 years on from the Falklands, sit safe and are invited to tut disapprovingly at a declassified report saying officers on Sheffield’s bridge stood mesmerised as an Exocet missile curved toward their starboard flank; to roll our eyes because the anti-air officer was having a coffee while his assistant was in the heads – the toilet to us land-lubbers.

An Exocet is as long as an estate car and skims the sea at eight feet and 700mph.

Who among us can say we wouldn’t freeze facing one? Sheffield’s watchkeepers had seconds to react – time for ‘Look out!’ or ‘Dear God!’ or ‘Goodbye’ but little else.

Intelligence reports warned Sheffield to beware of Argentinian submarines and advised, wrongly, that she was beyond the range of Galtieri’s Super Etendard aircraft – no surprise the airthreat team were relaxed.

There were mistakes, yes, and maybe there should have been a court martial for some. War is governed by unforgiving Big Boys’ Rules.

But the extremes of conflict expose our best and our worst and no one can say how they would react in such dire straits. Only armchair admirals declare: ‘I would never have been so stupid…’

Some live the military dream and thrive in the crucible of war. Peter Ratcliffe was Regimental Sergeant Major of 22 Special Air Service and was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal after a buccaneering First Gulf War. Pinning on the decoration, the Queen enquired if his war had been terrible. He said: ‘Actually, Your Majesty, I rather enjoyed it.’

A favourite book of mine is Reminiscences of a Louisiana Tiger, about a trencherman New Orleans journalist who waddled off to the American Civil War certain he would not survive the rigours of Confederate cuisine, let alone combat. He took to both very well.

Few join up imagining failure and injury or death, but even the toughest succumb.

ANOTHER SAS veteran, the late Colonel Clive Fairweather, did unstinting work for the Scottish arm of the Combat Stress charity which helps post-traumatic stress disorder casualties.

He introduced me to men who once dreamed of derring-do only to have their minds snapped. Clive, himself a warrior forged in combat, was never judgmental.

These people had experienced trauma beyond their ability to cope and they needed help, not banishment or pub bore ‘Well, I would have…’

We cannot grasp what hell it was to be in a flash-hood on Sheffield as that flame-tipped missile bore down; to have an Iraqi bullet tug at your camouflage smock, as Peter Ratcliffe did.

We can, however, have respect for those who put themselves in harm’s way for their country and empathise

with those who suffer as a result.