Random Historical Moments

Some corner of a foreign field

"There was a time when military manuals - advising on the conduct of what was called "low-intensity operations" - emphasised the importance of "denying urban guerrillas a hinterland" in which they could take refuge. The Boer commandos in South Africa and Tito's partisans in Yugoslavia (freedom fighters or terrorists according to taste) made sudden strikes against occupying forces and then disappeared into the country. It is important, the army used to say, to prevent the assassins who wait round the corner of city streets from finding safe haven in the homes of sympathetic families. Perhaps the army manuals still give the same advice. If so, it seems that nobody in the Home Office has read them."

The Home Office may be under the misguided impression that they are English and that Birmingham is part of their homeland not anyone else's "hinterland". If Roy Hattersley really does see Birmingham as some kind of latter-day Danelaw I don't think he has the faintest idea how much trouble we're in. Sutton Park might do nicely for the mass graves...

posted by Brituncula @ 2:43 PM