Time running out at last for Australia’s military chief

THE iconic symbol of coalition victory in Iraq in 2003 was Saddam Hussein’s Firdon Square statue toppling to the ground.

Sic semper tyrannis, as they remarked in Rome.

In September in Richmond, Virginia, the US Confederate capital, General Robert E Lee’s statue was removed after standing for 131 years.

A case of sic transit gloria, the traditional reminder to newly anointed popes of the transitory nature of life and earthly honours. Lee was long dead, but the normally inscrutable Saddam missed all the fun from his spider hole under a chook pen in ad-dawr near his hometown Tikrit, though it was clear he had never even considered resigning his presidency for life. His plan to establish an Iraqi ruling dynasty based on his sons Uday and Qusay who, like their father had no qualms eliminating potential rivals, even close relatives, foundered on personal vanity and terror, ending ignominiously at the end of the hangman’s rope. Celeri et cito.

Alphonse Gabriel Capone used a similar modus operandi to secure his authority.

When a couple of underlings were suspected of plotting, Alphonse organised a fraternal dinner, during which he fatally battered the suspects with a baseball bat. Mors vincit omnia, as they say in the Mafia. This was a precursor of the modern HR practice of a tap on the shoulder, a sure sign your use by date has passed and your services are no longer needed. A major international corporation has finessed the tap to an invitation to lunch, a la Capone.

On return, the victim is handed his personal possessions and escorted from the building, ad infinitum.

Informed Canberra insiders suggest CDF Angus Campbell has already been tapped numerous times but refuses to leave before the end of his ‘contract’. One can only speculate as to his motives but, like Lee and Saddam, his legacy will eventually be dismantled.

The sooner that happens, the better for the ADF’S future they believe, its reputation having already been trashed on Campbell’s watch.

If Campbell’s intentions were to ensure a sympathetic future leadership, which remains in his thrall, as some believe, that should cause great concern.

Perhaps Oliver Cromwell got it right in 1653, telling parliament, “You have sat too long for any good you have been doing lately.

“Depart, I say; and let us have done with you.

“In the name of God, go!” Et tu, Angus!

The unexpected strikes without warning.