However, Frank Kitson has always denied that collusion was a product of his theories on the use of ‘counter-gangs’. The lasting legacy of Kitson’s tactics in Belfast was a framework of intelligence tactics of penetration of paramilitaries, abuse of prisoners and the psyops of disinformation, with ‘going in hard’ against the Provisional IRA and coercive control of the Catholic community. It’s not the only new military base in the region: in 2015, the UK announced a major expansion of its military presence in Oman, where the current Sultan is a former UK army officer who secured his role in a British coup in 1970. Fourthly, Kitson was a pioneer of psyops (psychological operations) and media manipulation by briefing and spin, and he established close relationships with British journalists in Northern Ireland, turning them into ‘useful mouthpieces’ (as one journalist told the Saville Enquiry). Still, the events of that day are treated as an aberration, pathologised like a weeping mole on smooth skin.

According to Douglas Hurd’s memoir, the new secretary of state for Northern Ireland, William Whitelaw, saw Irish unity as the solution to the Northern Ireland problem. The 30-year duration of the conflict in the North is the most obvious evidence of the military failure of these tactics. In his obituary in The Times, which reported that he died on January 2, it read that "no general in recent times has provoked more intense and sustained controversy". In the latter case, the country’s account was for a while managed by Priti Patel, who went on to be a Conservative minister, and continued to visit the country as an MP – funded by its government – and advocate for it in Parliament. As is traditional for senior officers of the British Army, Kitson held a number of more honorary positions: Colonel Commandant of 2nd Battalion, Royal Green Jackets from 1 January 1979 to 1 January 1987; [26] [27] Honorary Colonel to the University of Oxford Officer Training Corps from 21 July 1982 to 21 July 1987; [28] [29] and Aide-de-Camp General to the Queen from 14 February 1983 to 1985.The unit responsible, 1 Para, was nicknamed ‘Kitson’s private army’ and had a reputation even in the British Army for being thuggish. The US repeated this ‘surge’ operation in Afghanistan in 2009, hoping to prop up its puppet government there and to defeat the Taliban. Kitson was one of those who organised ‘counter-gangs,’ including captured Mau Mau who had been ‘turned. When Frank Kitson arrived in Northern Ireland during the early days of The Troubles he had already established himself as a highly respected officer, especially in the fields of counter-insurgency and peacekeeping. The establishment of this new precedent speaks to the complex legal boundaries that accompany and define a conflict as nuanced and intimate as The Troubles, especially in the aftermath.

One of the units under his command, 1 Para, was nicknamed ‘Kitson’s private army’ and had a reputation even in the British Army for being thuggish, but its role in the killing and wounding of a large number of civilians in Ballymurphy in July 1971 and Derry’s Bloody Sunday in January 1972 earned it even official British condemnation for being ‘reckless’ and ‘out of control’. Kitson later wrote in his memoirs, Bunch of Five, “Most soldiers [regarded the] finding and disposing [of Mau Mau] in the same way as they would regard the hunting of a dangerous wild animal”. If you want further access to Ireland's best local journalism, consider contributing and/or subscribing to our free daily Newsletter . Kitson himself wrote in December 1971 that successes against the IRA would be hard to achieve without radical change and “we are taking steps to do so in terms of building up and developing the MRF”.This conclusion is also drawn by the British military’s Operation Banner report (2006) into its role in the North, and the claim informs the new JDP 3-40 (2010) counterinsurgency doctrine for the British Army.

As a result of both of these investigations, an archive of colonial documents from Malaya, Kenya, Aden, Cyprus and other places of controversy, hitherto kept secret in breach of Britain’s Freedom of Information Act and amounting to 200 metres of shelving, was discovered. I do not think that the Parachute Regiment in general or 1 Para in particular went about their duties in an excessively forceful way.The first Treaty of Friendship was signed in 1820, nearly 200 years ago, and it remained until replaced by a new one in 1971 on Britain’s withdrawal from the Gulf – a unilateral decision of which my father said – ‘Why? On 15 February 1972, Frank Kitson was knighted by the Queen for ‘gallant and distinguished’ service in Northern Ireland. As an architect of the policy of collusion which saw hundreds upon hundreds of killings for which the British state is culpable, Kitson will be remembered by many in ignominy https://t.