Frank Kitson

General Sir Frank Kitson OBE, KCB, MC (born 1926) is a retired British Officer and counterinsurgency theorist. He rose to be Commander-in-Chief UK Land Forces from 1982 to 1985 and was Aide-de-Camp General to the Queen from 1983 to 1985. In 1985 he became a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire. He saw active service in counter revolutionary operations in post war colonial conflicts. He is one of the leading theorists of counterinsurgency to have emerged from the British military.

The historian Bernard Porter has noted:

"Between 1970 and 1972 Kitson served in Northern Ireland as commander of a brigade in Belfast. He may have been largely responsible for the setting up and development of ‘Psyops’ units there. If he was not, then somebody else was. By all accounts this side of the army’s work expanded enormously over the next ten years, and involved some techniques which could be described as devious. That may be putting it mildly indeed. Among the ‘tricks’ attributed to various British intelligence agencies in Northern Ireland in the 1970s - army intelligence, MI5, MI6, British Special Branch, RUC Special Branch - were torture, for which Britain was censured by the European Human Rights Commission in 1976; murder, faked to look like ‘sectarian’ killings; the planting of bombs in Dublin in 1974 ...; homosexual seduction and blackmail; ‘black’ propaganda and disinformation; ‘shooting to kill’; fabricating evidence; and ‘covering up’. At one stage, because of inter-departmental rivalry, MI5 and MI6 were rumoured to be indulging in covert operations against each other..."

Career

Kitson was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Rifle Brigade as of 23 February 1946. He spent his first seven years as an officer chiefly in occupied Germany.

He was promoted to Lieutenant as of 10 April 1948, with seniority from 15 December 1947.

Kenya

He was posted to Kenya in mid-1953, at the height of the Mau Mau rebellion. According to a Rand Corporation biography:

His primary task was to help the intelligence branch of the police obtain the information needed by the security forces in their fight against the terrorist gangs. In the course of the next two years Col. Kitson developed and perfected a novel approach and technique for the collection and utilization of the special kind of intelligence that is indispensable in guerrilla warfare.

He was promoted to Captain on 15th December 1953.

Kitson was awarded the Military Cross on 1 January 1955 "in recognition of gallant and distinguished services in Kenya, during the period 21st April to 20th October, 1954".

Malaya

In 1957, Kitson commanded a infantry company in Malaya, where according to the Rand Corporation he was able "to apply this [Kenyan] experience in the antiterrorist campaign".

In May 1958, Kitson was awarded a bar to the Military Cross "in recognition of gallant and distinguished services in Malaya for the period 31st August to 31st December, 1957."

The citation read:

For exceptional skill and leadership as a Company Commander during jungle operations. By his devotion to duty he attained the virtual elimination of two communist party branches in a difficult area.

Oman

Kitson served in the Planning Branch of the War Office in 1958. on 28 October 1958, Peter de la Billière in Malaya received a signal from Kitson suggesting the deployment of the SAS to the Jebel Akhdar in Oman. De la Billière brought the message to Tony Deane-Drummond. Kitson and Deane-Drummond subsequently met in Bahrain and visited Oman, where they met David Smiley, the head of the Sultan's Armed Forces. A decision was subsequently taken to deploy an SAS squadron to Oman.

1960s

According to a 1963 Rand Corporation biography:

In recent years Col. Kitson’s assignments have included a year at the British Army Staff College at Camberley; a post in the Military Operations Branch of the War Office, responsible for the Middle East; a tour as army instructor at the Royal Naval College at Greenwich, England; and several months at the Armed Forces Staff College at Norfolk, Virginia. Col. Kitson has recorded his experience in Kenya in a book entitled Gangs and Counter-gangs, published by Barrie and Rockliff, London, 1960.

• Oman 1958-1959

He was awarded the MBE on 13 June 1959.

Kitson was appointed second in command of his old battalion, now renamed 3rd Green Jackets, the Rifle Brigade, in November 1962. The battalion was then serving as part of the garrison of the British sovereign base areas in Cyprus.

Kitson was appointed a Brevet Lt-Col. on 1 July 1964. He became a full Lt-Col on 31 December 1966.

Kitson was awarded the OBE in January 1968.

Kitson was promoted to Colonel on 31 December 1969, with seniority from 30th June 1969.

He was promoted to Brigadier on 30th June 1970.

• Britain 1969-1987

Northern Ireland

• Ireland 1970-1972

Kitson was awarded the CBE on 15th February 1972, "for gallant and distinguished services in Northern Ireland during the period 1st August 1971, to 31st October 1971".

General Officer

Kitson was appointed General Officer Commanding, 2 Division, and granted the acting rank of Major General on 22 January 1976. He was appointed a full Major General on 5 April 1976, with seniority from 2 June 1974. He stepped down as commander of 2 Armoured Division on 28th February 1978.

Kitson was appointed commandant of the Staff College, Camberley on 5 March 1978. He held this position until 18 January 1980.

Kitson was awarded the KCB in December 1979.

Kitson was appointed Colonel Commandant 2nd Battalion The Royal Green Jackets on 1 January 1979. He held the position until 1 January 1987, when he was replaced by David Ramsbotham.

Kitson was appointed Deputy Commander in Chief, United Kingdom Land Forces and Inspector General Territorial Army with substantive rank of Lieutenant-General on 17 March 1980, with seniority from 17 August 1979.

Kitson stepped down as Deputy Commander in Chief United Kingdom Land Forces and Inspector General Territorial Army on 30th May 1982.

Kitson was appointed Commander in Chief United Kingdom Land Forces, succeeding Sir John Stanier, and granted the local rank of General on 1 July 1982. He held the post until 1 June 1985. He was promoted to the substantive rank of General on 1 August 1982.

Kitson was appointed Aide-De-Camp General to the Queen on 15 February 1983, succeeding Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley.

Kitson was appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire in December 1984.

Kitson retired from the Army on 27 July 1985.

He was appointed Honorary Colonel Oxford University Officers Training Corps T.A on 21 July 1982. He held the position until July 1987.

Counterinsurgency theorist

His earlier published work on counter-gangs and measures of deception, including the use of defectors, continues to provoke strong opinions. Although sometimes wrongly credited with inventing concepts of pseudo-gangs and pseudo-operations (for example, used earlier in the Huk Insurrection in the Philippines), his writing gave the issue a wider audience. In retirement he has given evidence to the Saville Inquiry into Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland.

Publications

• Gangs and Counter-gangs (1960), Barrie and Rockliff
• Low Intensity Operations: Subversion, Insurgency and Peacekeeping (1971), Faber and Faber - reprint 1991 ISBN 0-571-16181-2
• Bunch of Five (1977)
• Kitson, Frank (1987) Warfare as a Whole, London:Faber and Faber.
• Prince Rupert: Admiral and General-at-sea (1998), Constable and Robinson
• Old Ironsides: The Military Biography of Oliver Cromwell (2004), Weidenfeld Military

External Resources

• Namebase Frank Kitson
• Bloody Sunday Inquiry Statement of Sir Frank Kitson, 18 October 2001, accessed 4 December 2007.
• Bloody Sunday Inquiry Day 237 - Frank Kitson, 24 September 2002.
• Stephen Gordon, Para boss 'should have sorted Bloody Sunday', Belfast Telegraph, 16 September 2007.
• Tom Griffin, The military response to direct action, General Kitson's manual, OpenDemocracy, 22 December 2010.

See Also

David Kilcullen | John Nagl | Robert Thompson | Orde Wingate