The Mail has obtained a memo sent to the MoD by Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe. He warns that helicopter shortages would cost lives; tragically, he was prescient. The Mail is not publishing the complete memo, which contains sensitive information, but Lt. Col Thorneloe wrote:
‘We cannot not move people, so this moth we have concluded a great deal of administrative movement by road. This increases the IED threat and our exposure to it… The current level of SH (support helicopter) support is therefore unsustainable… and is clearly not fit for purpose.’
This appraisal, widely circulated within the MoD, demolishes Gordon Brown’s denial that helicopter shortages cost lives during Operation Panther’s Claw, the offensive that claimed Lt Col Thorneloe’s life.
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