Army recruiting Monuments Men to protect artefacts in war zones

A FORMER Gulf War tank commander is recruiting experts to form a unit that will protect cultural heritage in war zones, similar to the role carried out by the famed Monuments Men who saved artistic treasures from the Nazis.

Lt Col Tim Purbrick, who took part in Operation Desert Storm in 1991, will command the newly created Cultural Property Protection Unit (CPPU).

The new unit will draw on members of the Army, Navy, RAF and Royal Marines. Civilians who want to join will have to enlist in the Army reserves.

Once up and running, the 15-strong unit will be sent into war zones where art and archeological sites are at risk. The creation of the unit is a response, in part, to the desecration by Isil of ancient sites such as Palmyra in Syria and Nimrud in Iraq.

“It’s a revival of the Monuments Men, which was disbanded at the end of the Second World War,” Lt Col Purbrick, 54, a Royal Lancers reservist, said. “We’re looking for experts in the fields of art, archaeology and art crime investigation.”

The British team also draws inspiration from the Art Looting Intelligence Unit, set up in 1944 by the Office of Strategic Services, the precursor to the CIA, to try to recover paintings and artefacts plundered by the Germans. The CPPU will be tasked with protecting art and archaeology, investigating looting, bringing smuggling gangs to justice and informing allied forces about cultural heritage sites.

“The idea will be to identify sites so we don’t drop bombs or park tanks on top of them,” said Lt Col Purbrick.

The formation of the unit is also a response to Britain’s decision, last year, to ratify the 1954 Hague Convention on protecting cultural property during military conflict.

The unit will seek advice from similar organisations in other countries, including a specialist cultural heritage protection unit of the Carabinieri, Italy’s paramilitary police force.