Awkward times

Misinformation, awkward confessions on the evening news, lessons to be learned…it is nothing other than the furore over the decision of the government to allow, and then not to allow, the sailors who were captured by the Iranians to sell their accounts of the incident to tabloid newspapers.

Rolled up in this are three issues of grievance. The first is that the service personnel sold their stories. The second is that the government appeared to connive in this, hoping to spin the stories and then to bask in reflected glory. Finally, that apologies were given but that no one appeared to be held to proper account.

Perhaps one of the reasons why this has made so many commentators uncomfortable is that it has punctured the image of our service personnel as the noble wronged. Our glorious soldiers, or rather sailors, were being treated unsportingly and unfairly. It was all bad form on the part of the Iranians who had captured