Clive Fairweather

Clive Fairweather works at Stuart Crawford Associates.

Background

Fairweather 'was born and educated in Edinburgh. He spent 34 years in the army, rising from the rank of private soldier to full Colonel. During this time he completed three tours with the Special Air Service (SAS), which included appointments as security adviser to the Iranian and Jordanian Royal Households in 1970-71. He was second-in-command of 22 SAS at the Iranian Embassy siege in London in 1980.'

Fairweather 'trained at both the Army and RAF Staff Colleges, his last job in the military was at Edinburgh Castle, where he was responsible for security and defence matters in the Lowland Area and was military security officer for the Edinburgh Military Tattoo. On retiring from the army he was appointed Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland, a post he held in the period 1994-2002. He joined Stuart Crawford Associates in 2002.'

Activities

SAS

Fairweather is noted to have been Robert Nairac commanding officer when he was abducted by the IRA

Planning application

Fairweather is also listed in a letter to East Lothian Council on a Cala Homes planning applications as from Sidegate Residents Association at Summerfield House 20 Sidegate Haddington EH41 4BZ

On torture and brutality

Fairweather is on record as a critic of some kinds of brutality and ill-treatment. Of the killing of Baha Mousa and drawing on his own experience he notes:

My main memory of the men under my command is of enormous pride for all the corporate good they tried to bring to the people they had been sent to protect. Nevertheless, though I knew that they frightened the enemy, a minority also frightened me with what they might be getting up to when my back was turned. When those trying to kill you and your men are not easily identified, maintaining tight control in every corner may not be possible.

Torture of certain types is seen as perhaps understandable and perhaps inevitable:

My sympathies are with the former CO and soldiers of the Duke of Lancaster's Regiment, who faced the almost impossible task of bringing peace to Basra. If, in such straits, some soldiers resorted to using sleep deprivation and stress positions to put pressure on suspects for quick intelligence gains - almost certainly not ordered by senior commanders - there may be a life-saving purpose, unacceptable though such behaviour is when seen in the cold light of day.

However, those kinds of torture should be separated from other kinds of brutality:

But vicious beatings with iron bars, nooses placed round suspects' necks, or being forced to drink your own urine have no place in a civilised force.

Again drawing on his own experience Fairweather notes the difference between Iraq and previouscolonial campaigns:

In say, Aden and Kenya, a degree of laxity crept in, but soldiers are now much more aware of the ubiquity of cameras.

In Fairweather's analysis underlying the violence in Iraq and Afghanisatn maybe the dysfunctional home lives of the poorest in society. He notes that 'alcohol is dirt cheap, sweet and easy to get down your throat'. He adds 'the everyday violence that surrounds us all in this information age' and argues that 'no wonder the more impressionable have fantasies lurking in their minds which are then played out', no doubt 'coupled with the violence that has probably been visited on them in their own dysfunctional families.'

'It's not just 14-year-olds, either' he notes; 'there are occasional and growing undertones of this latter practice among today's US, British and other military. Indeed, surely there are echoes of Abu Ghraib in these sickening events which have taken place much closer to home, at the top of Leith Walk. for Fairweather in other words Abu Graibh was a function of social dislocation and the actions of underprivileged soldiers as opposed to being a policy introduced by senior officers and their civilian political bosses.

Affiliations

SAS, former senior officer.

publications

• Clive Fairweather Lest we forget the name of Baha Mousa: Baha Mousa's unnecessary death diminishes every one of us Independent on Sunday, Sunday, 18 March 2007.