For this issue, he examines training in e Parachute Regiment and finds out how much, or indeed how lile, it has changed since World War Two. Another unit involved in Bas ra was 3 Para, so it is apt tha t former paratrooper Craig Allen also returns this month. We have pieced together the recollections of Blackman and o f fellow offi cer and veter an Harry James on to tell that stor y, and delved into regimental files t o chart said events day by day. Colonel Blackman was in command of the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards when the regiment and its Challenger 2 tanks rolled toward Basra, culminating in the now famous and one-sided action against Iraqi T- 55s, and the movement of British forces into Iraq’s second city. , who has spoken to assistant editor T om Baker and myself about his memories of the conflict. I am therefore delighted to welcome Lieutenant-Colonel H ugh Blackman (retd) to Even so, it is hard to b elieve that 20 years has gone by. e fathers of some friends were involved in Iraq, and, aer I turned 18 years later, a couple of friends of mine would be deployed to Iraq. It was the beginning of a hugely controversial military operation and occupation which, for British forces, continued until 2011. I also remember the photograph in the newspapers the next day of flash, fire and smoke rising from presidential palace in Baghdad. As a young teenager, I distinctly remember the scenes of ‘ shock and awe’ as TV news streamed an uninterrupted feed from a night-vison camera in Baghdad, watching civilian traffi c disappear from the motorways shortly before tracers rose into the sky and bombs rained down. Few months back, when th e team and I were debating which key anniversaries we would elect to include this year, we were stunned by the realisation tha t the invasion of Iraq by the US-led multi-national ‘ Coalition of the Willing’ was launched 20 years ago on March 20, 2003.
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