Gilbert Masie

Gilbert’s Bestiary – April 2012

Gilbert Masie — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:56:41 +0000

That hoary old source of myth and legend the Titanic is back in the news again. It might be 100 years since it disappeared beneath the waves of the North Atlantic yet it regularly rises up again like a rusting ghoul to provide material for writers and broadcasters, usually to no good effect. Dear old Lew Grade was an early victim. He financed a film called ‘Raise the Titanic’. It was a disastrous and expensive flop and he was heard to remark that it would have been cheaper to have lowered the Atlantic. Anyway in all this ballyhoo one major player in the drama always gets ignored. I am talking about the iceberg. Icebergs are big things. Not so big as to be visible by the forward look out on the hapless liner perhaps, but big enough to rip a huge gash in the ship’s side. What I want to know is this: why did not Captain Smith moor the Titanic to it thus using it as a buoyancy aid and why did they not land the passengers on to it thus freeing up boats for the remainder?

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I always thought that Gordon Brown was the most incompetent politician of the modern era but George Osborne is giving him a good run for his money. How anybody can manage to end up getting into trouble over Cornish pasties is quite mind boggling. But then to seek to tax charitable donations is really bordering on the bizarre for a Conservative Chancellor. As far as I was aware the ultimate goal of Conservatism is to move from taxation to charitable donation not the other way round. That he has completely lost the plot is evident by his absurd comment that he was “shocked” that some of the UK’s richest people have organised their finances so that they pay virtually no income tax. Personally I would have thought that he would have been more shocked to find that they had not. I think a clue as to his problem is in the accompanying picture of the young Osborne in his Bullingdon livery. In my experience the Bullingdon was notable more for the damage it inflicted on its venues rather than the intellect of its members. Whereas the Comus Club on the other hand ………

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For reasons that I will not bore you with I have had a number of close confrontations with the Grim Reaper of late. Mr Reaper has fortunately been dealing with others not myself but his appearance has still been unsettling. I have been reminded of a number of things that I had always sort of put off to a bit later in life when I had sorted things out a bit. Mr Reaper has made it clear that ‘later in life’ is now.

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The latest news from Afghanistan is further testament to the haplessness of the policy being pursued being there by NATO and ISAF. I attach a picture of good old ‘Bobby’ Roberts, Earl of Kandahar. He had the right idea of how to gain military success in Afghanistan. You win a battle, declare victory and get the f**k out of it.

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I have just heard someone put forward a most intriguing hypothesis. The picture is of a bowl of yeast. Yeast, as I am sure you are aware, is used in brewing and wine fermentation and the suggestion is that it uses the human race to maintain and propagate itself. The idea that the pinnacle of creation is not homo sapiens but a uni-celled fungus and that all we are is a particularly useful method for it to reproduce is one that I find really quite chilling.

Gilbert Masie’s Bestiary – January 2012

admin — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 00:54:03 +0000

Watch this space

Gilbert’s Bestiary – Spring 2011

Gilbert Masie — Mon, 02 May 2011 11:41:21 +0000

Gilbert’s Bestiary – Spring 2011
Spring has sprung! Chaucer tells us that when April’s sweet showers have pierced the drought of March to the root then folk think about going on pilgrimages. Well Gilbert Masie does not do pilgrimages but the seemingly sudden burst of 2011 into some form of life has encouraged me to make another contribution to the blogosphere.
From my point of view the winter of 2010 to 2011 was not only one of the coldest but also one of the most miserable in recent memory. However, the dry and sunny weather, the pastel shades of the tree blossom and the green shoots not just of my vegetable patch but also the British economy has cheered me up considerably and it was capped yesterday when I heard the cuckoo giving it Laldy outside of my bedroom window.
I am not sure if I have told you this before but a couple of years ago, at around the end of April, an extraordinary noise roused me from my bed in the early morning. Peering from my window into the garden I discovered that my Lelandi hedge had become a honeymoon suite for a pair of lustful cuckoos. It being early and me being tired all I could manage was a few muttered words of male camaraderie to the cock bird before I stumbled back to my pit.
This was a very poor reaction. I later learned that if I had managed to capture even a few grainy images of the frenzied feathered fornication on camera I would have been able to sell them for a not inconsiderable sum. Apparently cuckoo coupling is an event in the natural life of the United Kingdom that awaits its Attenborough moment. I pass it on; might make a good project for the kids.
Talking of nuptials another reason that 2011 is turning into a vintage year is the recent Royal wedding. I have to say the service left me slightly misty eyed. From the opening bars of Parry’s “I was glad” I felt quite a catch in my throat. If they had ended up with “Zadoc the Priest” I would have been bawling like a baby. We can wait for the couple’s coronation for that one but there was still enough Parry to make it a very English occasion and, to me, the main reason why it was so special was that the participants seemed to genuinely mean what they were saying.
I never bought in to their parent’s wedding. It was quite apparent to me from the very outset that poor old Diana was being procured for ulterior motives; perhaps the most blatant, cynical and unpleasant exploitation of a young woman that there has been; if you don’t count Elton John’s marriage that is.
Much has been made of the pageantry but as much as I like a bit of a display I have to say that the costumed flummery on show was verging on the preposterous. Prince Harry, for example, was togged up in an ensemble of scarlet and gold that would have looked ostentatious on a Ruritanian Lion Tamer. Besides him there seemed an extraordinary number of other people who hold appointments that require them to wear a uniform and when I say uniform I am not talking of a simple outfit but an ensemble that looks as if it has been put together from a trunk of old Gilbert and Sullivan tat.
But that was only the men. My wife noticed that the nuns who made up part of the clerical entourage were very drably attired. It looked, for all the world, as if they had been surprised dusting the altar or arranging the flowers and had to pretend to be part of the team. Most perplexing was some chap who wore a rather battered fore and aft hat trimmed with feathers whose only job seemed to be ushering people in and out of the North door of Westminster Abbey. Who the blue blazes was he?
Sadly the BBC, either as part of its cuts or because of some stupid political correctness, failed to have a military expert on hand to explain these arcane issues. In the great days of Richard Dimbleby and Tom Fleming all of these points would have been carefully explained. I mean if you do not know who or what Gold Stick in Waiting or the Assistant Quartermaster General is then a great part of the enjoyment of the spectacle is lost. I am open to offers.
Another highlight of the Spring has been the new war we seem to have got ourselves into. How do we do it? When I passed out of Sandhurst in 1979 the then Commandant told me and my fellow graduates that we were being sent forth to command soldiers in the defeat of the Queen’s enemies and the defence of the realm. In the 16 years I served we only fought the Argentinians and the IRA. In my view they respectively qualified as legitimate targets. Then we started to pick fights with the Iraqis, the Serbs and then the Afghans. Now we are having a go at the Libyans. Do they pose a threat to the Queen’s peace, do they directly threaten the realm? No, it appears that military force should now be exercised against anybody who we basically do not like very much. OK, I think that as a policy it stinks but if we are going to put it into practice then let us go after all the bad hats. First on my list would be Robert Mugabe.
The conduct of operations in Libya to date has forced upon me an uncomfortable epiphany. I have suspected it for some years but now I am convinced. The standard and calibre of persons reaching high rank in the military is inferior to what it was 20 or so years ago. A simple test is a direct comparison with the United States Army. In my day the American military was a subject of some considerable ribaldry. To us they lacked style, subtlety and flair. In contrast we were the army that spawned Lawrence of Arabia, Orde Wingate and had actually defeated a Communist insurgency in Malaya. All the Yanks could produce were dull, unimaginative drones like General Westmoreland.
Sadly it seems that this has all now changed. Since the end of operations in Northern Ireland we seem to have lost all our expertise in low-intensity operations and it is the Americans who display the originality and resourcefulness. Their commanders, Petreus and McCrystal, are figures of genuine gravitas who exude a calm authority as opposed to ours who appear nervous and ill at ease. In my view this is down to a number of factors but the most important of which is that career advancement in theBritish Army now seems to require some form of service with the SAS or some other special forces. This is a mistake. The SAS is all very well for lightning raids, cheese wiring enemy sentries or living in a bush for six months but is not very good at commanding large formations, encouraging ordinary soldiers and looking at the ‘big picture’. Working with elites makes one impatient with those who do not measure up and impatience can rapidly turn to contempt.
It also engenders in Commanders a direct and aggressive response to any military problem. This can be infectious and encourage a similar approach in the civil servants and ministers the Commanders advise when what is really needed is a more measured and thoughtful approach. Why are we constantly trying to take the fight to the Taleban rather than undermining their influence by a proper ‘hearts and minds’ campaign? If I went to Kandahar or Kabul and visited a British Commander’s office would I find a copy of Sir Robert Thompsons ‘Defeating Communist Insurgency’ and if I did would it be gathering dust on a shelf or lying, well thumbed, upon his desk? I’d like to know the answer to that question.
Finally, another reason to rejoice in 2011 has just been announced. Osama Bin Laden is dead. He has been taken out by a United States Navy Seals team after he had been tracked down to a compound in, wait for it, Pakistan. Ah, you may say, clearly he was lurking in some remote part of the tribal areas of the North West Frontier, somewhere the writ of law does not run. Well, you would be wrong. He was found, living comfortably, in the Pakistani equivalent of Camberley. Abbotabad, as its name suggests, is a pleasant Home Counties sort of place full of parks and comfortable residences and home to the Pakistani equivalent of the Sandhurst Royal Military Academy. How, in the name of Allah, can the most wanted man on the planet end up living there without, apparently, anybody in authority knowing?
His demise is proclaimed as a subject worthy of great rejoicing and it seems many are doing so however I have three reservations. The first is that I think old Osama was a busted flush anyway and his departure will not make much difference to those who are really committed to jihad. The second is that as an ally in the war on terror Pakistan is as much use as a chocolate fireguard and finally, if you really piss off the Yanks, there is nowhere to hide.

Gilbert’s Bestiary – February 2011

Gilbert Masie — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 03:46:33 +0000

This winter has almost been the death of me; I must be getting old. I have always been pretty good with cold and prided myself that I was able to operate at temperatures much below those where many of my fellow men started to behave like fish fingers in a deep freeze. But this year has been different. The cold has crept into my bones and chilled the very marrow and no amount of steam rooms or saunas seem to be able to thaw it out. I have even bought myself a hot water bottle. But nevertheless; come snow, come rain, come freezing weather, incipient bankruptcy, ungrateful progeny and contemptuous spouses and, worst of all, a sudden inability to hit even a barn door at 10 paces with Number Eight shot I am still so ecstatic over England’s 3-1 drubbing of Australia to retain the Ashes I could even contemplate buying John Prescott a pint.

Why did I mention John Prescott you ask? Well because I cannot stand the man. It is not enough that he personifies everything I detest about Trade Unionism, its inverted snobbery and bitter envy, but he is a bully and selfishly betrayed his wife who, for all her airs and graces, seems to be a complete gem. However, credit where credit is due. I came across a copy of his Autobiography the other day and forced myself to look through it. In there were photographs of himself and Pauline when they first married; and a more good looking couple I cannot recall seeing.

A number of friends of mine have taken to making January a dry month. I once fell into the trap of agreeing to do the same and when I finally staggered my way into the First of February before drowning in a bottle of Tepranillo I made a firm and solemn commitment never do it again. Stupidly, just before Christmas, I accepted a new challenge but was brought back to my senses by a wise colleague. This sparked much criticism so to put the issue into some form of context I decided to weigh myself. The result was so scary that I have immediately cancelled not only all drinking but any form of sustenance at all. So far the weight loss has been achieved without undue stress but I am disappointed that there seems little physical manifestation. To encourage myself and out of morbid curiosity I have taken to photographing my stripped torso on my mobile phone every time the scales reveal that I have actually lost weight. The idea is to create a visual record of my disappearance. I will, hopefully, literally shrink before your very eyes! Unfortunately this is not quite as successful as I had hoped. For one thing I do not seem to be getting any smaller and for another the only scales big enough to weigh me are in my local Boots outlet.

If one tries one can get quite excited about what might shortly happen in Egypt. I was an enthusiastic supporter of the 2003 invasion of Iraq because I rather naïvely expected the West to quickly establish a Western-style liberal democracy which would immediately encourage the young and ambitious Arabs in the rest of the Middle East to overthrow their oppressive regimes and bring about the political, social and religious enlightenment that area has been waiting for since the fall of Jerusalem in 1187. I, therefore, have subsequently felt a genuine sense of betrayal, of being cynically manipulated, by the complete failure of the Allies to do any such thing. That Tony Blair lied to obtain his party’s mandate was never in doubt. I was prepared to forgive him that as long as the end justified it. It did not. However, it is now possible that this enlightenment may be about to start in any case; let us hope so.

The death of John Barry whose brilliant tunes and melodies have been the sound track to my life is the final and unequivocal end of any pretence I might have to being young.