MORE ON THE DLAPIPER REVIEW AND RELATED ISSUES

Summed up, the foreword to Volume One of the DLA Piper Review speaks of history, tradition, pride, honour, bravery and unselfishness in the Defence forces. Then, just in case you didn’t get the message, loyalty and broad community confidence are added to the mix. We’re then told there have been enquiries in the past and that Defence supplied DLAPiper with details of these…And there’s the suggestion that it’s perfectly understandable that Defence was obstructive, hindering the process, apparently because it might – and it gets a touch vague on this point – ‘affect operational capability.’ You can bet your left bollock that it might also affect recruiting numbers if today’s young people are made aware of the presence of rapists among the higher ranks of the respective armed forces.

A couple of paragraphs in, we’re reminded that there were, are, victims involved in this process. There’s some genuine substance to follow, with the statement that the Defence Forces belong to the people and not to present or former members. Cool. I’m not sure, however, what operational excellence and ownership have to do with what was actually being investigated. I am reminded of one of  the major flaws in the RAPKE INQUIRY of 1971 which was that a basically phantom question was raised and, incredibly,  answered in the negative. That was: Did Leeuwin, JRTE, have some kind of initiation ceremony? I have no idea where that one sprang from but it seems to have been through a comparison with the Naval College. Shane Connolly was bashed by a gang of senior boys. In my understanding, no-one was questioning behaviour at the Naval College or the presence or otherwise, of initiation ceremonies at Leeuwin, but, it made for a nice, reassuring, judicial conclusion and subsequent headline. Rapke, when one reads the testimony of OD John White,  basically accuses White of bad-mouthing the navy through an accusation raised, purportedly by White, of ‘sadism’ on board HMAS Sydney. Okay, here we had a 16 year-old being questioned by a man experienced in both the navy and the law and Rapke lines White up, flooring him in the 8^th Round with a question about the meaning of sadism – not in its popular usage but its dictionary definition. Understandably, White struggles and Rapke almost taunts the young man, saying, not in as many words but in effect: ’You used a word you don’t know the meaning of  to blacken to reputation of the entire RAN.’ As I’ve said, this isn’t a precise reading of Rapke but it is fucking close.

Whatever else happens from now on, it is to be hoped that people aren’t subjected to cross-examination of the kind I’ve decribed above. I’d also like to remind the relevant powers-that-be that, in some of us, they are not dealing with children and young people any more. Some of us, at least, have grown up.

I’ll be working through  relevant detail from Volume One in the ensuing weeks.