BBC NEWS
2005/03/14
Is the Army failing new recruits?

The Army has been accused of a "catastrophic failure" in the way it treats new recruits by an MPs' inquiry.

The Commons Defence Select Committee report was sparked by four deaths at the Deepcut barracks in Surrey between 1995 and 2002.

It recommends a new independent complaints panel to deal with bullying and abuse, and proposes raising the minimum age of recruits to 18.

However, it stopped short of ordering a public inquiry into the soldiers' deaths.

What is your reaction to the report? Does it go far enough? Do you think the army fails its recruits?


SUGGEST A DEBATE
This topic was suggested by Amanda, Wales I would like to discuss the issues at Deepcut Barracks. Surely a public inquiry is due?

Yes, the Army has failed new recruits. Ability to cope with stressful, dangerous and frightening situations can be learned. It does not have to be a quality you are born with. The solution is simply effective training and development for the psychological side of soldiering. Not only will this reduce tragic events, but will also provide better soldiers.
Chris, Devizes

Trainee soldiers should never be placed in a position where they believe killing themselves is a better option than living.
John, Sheffield, UK

When your training goes so badly wrong that people die it is reasonable to expect some criticism. Only the forces let people hide and avoid responsibility, claiming their environment is "special". The appropriate demands of recruits may be different from civilian life, but senior officers should be dismissing those who fail to train correctly. After all in business the senior management could end up in court!
John, Fleet, UK

My son completed his basic training last year (I completed mine in 1964!). He had no complaints on either the method of training or the attitudes of the training staff. The MOD are being defensive over the treatment of recruits (but then they always close ranks over any report that criticises the forces). Then Deepcut incidents are a disgrace and should be investigated by a public inquiry.
Jeffrey Williams, Waterlooville, Hants

The Army isn't the only employer that suffers from bullying
Peter Evans, Bristol
The Army isn't the only employer that suffers from bullying. The difference is that being a soldier is a way of life. In most employment you can walk away from the job at the end of the day. While saying that, this needs to be kept in perspective. What is the percentage of suicides in the Army compared say with the Civil Service of the same period?
Peter Evans, Bristol

I strongly believe that the images shown on television of British soldiers torturing and mistreating prisoners are part of the one and the same culture that led to the death of four recruits at the Deepcut barracks. It is also part of the culture that has come to accept the unacceptable - a law that violates Habeas Corpus - a law passed by a state that believes that everybody is guilty until proven innocent. Brutality, lies and deceit are the main principles in modern Britain.
Carlos Cortiglia, London, United Kingdom

I find it astonishing that the Army isn't responsible to national laws. If someone is killed in Army barracks then the police should have made inquires and if necessary brought someone to justice. We just appear to be continuing to spend money again and again on useless panels rather than just one public enquiry. It is almost as if someone wants to hide something and it doesn't give me much faith in the Army's own judicial system.
Tim Balmford, Henley

By all means push recruits to their limits, but have the realistic expectation that some won't be up to the job and make sure those recruits are given the help they need to either toughen up and get on with the job, or leave. Why would it be a problem to have a counsellor available so that recruits who are failing can be helped to see that maybe the army isn't for them, and help them leave with their self-respect intact? The alternative, of course, is to push everyone as hard as possible, kick the poor performers while they are down, then wait for them to commit suicide.
Mo C, UK

Abuse of recruits at Deepcut and of prisoners in Iraq was the result of one factor only: bad officers. Had the soldiers concerned been looked after by keen young officers who worked closely with them at all times no problems would have arisen. This is why frontline fighting regiments don't have these problems.
Guy Hankin, Crediton, UK

Some kids buy into the adverts by the army, which tell them it's a career, a chance to see the world, etc. All very nice, but not very truthful. They have to realise that training is brutal and soldiering in wartime is even worse. War isn't about fairness and niceties. You will see horrors that go beyond the understanding and imagination of most people. I'm not suggesting I agree with what has happened at Deepcut, but soldiering is not a normal 9-5 job, and there's no reaching for the personnel policy when the muck and bullets start flying.
Lee, Hebburn, England

Training has to be tough, or we will produce weak unmotivated soldiers, sailors and airmen
Frankie, Leeds
Well said Chris of Preston and Peter of Nottingham. Although not having army experience I was in the RAF - the army will always get the rough end of war. However, MPs/civilians will never understand how the armed forces work. Training has to be tough, or we will produce weak unmotivated soldiers, sailors and airmen. That will contribute to losing a war, which will happen at some point, if we continue to make training softer. Tough training makes you strong minded, determined but also a good team player and builds character and self-reliance. My training in the RAF was 3yrs, rough and hard at times, but it was always fair.
Frankie, Leeds

I joined the Army at the age of 15. Yes, there was some bullying but it was always accepted as part of induction into Army life. I believe that this government is turning the Army into a bunch of pampered kids, who if put to the test in a "real war" would fall apart. An army should be trained as they need to behave in combat...tough!
Mark Simpson, Deal, Kent

Nothing will change. MPs publish reports and things carry on in the same vein. There should be a public enquiry and heads should roll both in the Forces and at the Ministry of Defence.
Sick of Cover-Ups, E Sussex

This is nothing new - the attitude has always been 'break em down and build em up', which is understandable. I can see a time in the very near future when people are bringing claims against the Army for not preparing them for the realities of war, ie brutality, etc. Do people really join up expecting to be spoken to politely at all times, and never put in a position where they may be exhausted?
Mark, Didcot, England

The people here who suggest that people who can't handle this kind of treatment don't belong in the Army shock me. Infantry or other military personnel that may be involved in combat in some way or another need to be fit and prepared in this way, but people need to remember that there are logistics staff, medical personnel, and even musicians who should maintain a standard of mental and physical fitness befitting the Army, but don't need to be turned into a lean, mean, killing machine.
Darryl LeCount, Paderborn, Germany

The Army is doing what it has always done. It trains people to kill or be killed. Their preference is to train people to survive. The Army has a choice, it either continues to do what it does best or it can dilute its methods to conform to political correctness and try to mop up society's ills. The problem lies in today's youth, not the Army's methods in training people to stay alive. Despite the image they try to give themselves, as hard, tough, streetwise, children of a gansta culture, today's teenagers are soft. They have "rights", they are used to creature comforts. Swear at a youth today in basic training, it's abuse and bullying, deny them central heating or a warm dry bed on exercise, it infringes their human rights. They neither receive discipline at home or at school. Responsibility is never insisted on when they are taking their rights. The British Army has always lived or died, literally, on its discipline and toughness gained in basic training. How many more British servicemen or woman would die in conflict without it.
Terry, Horsham

I find it worrying that so many military and ex military contributors here seek to justify this sort of bullying. Comments like "war is hell", "training has to be tough", "combat is unlike anything in civilian life" do not excuse what happened at Deepcut. Sure training has to be demanding to prepare recruits so that they have a better chance of survival in combat. But is that really best achieved by killing them or mentally breaking them before they even see a war zone much less fight in one? I suspect most of these commentators are using this is an excuse for a bit of immature macho bragging. Anyone that complains about bullying isn't as tough as me they seem to be saying. How very childish.
Anna, Newbury, UK

I served with Paras and all I can say is that training is undertaken in an aggressive manner because it has to be
Robert, London
I served with Paras and all I can say is that training is undertaken in an aggressive manner because it has to be. In training we were subjected to what some would call (at the very least) bullying. I went in at 17 naive and immature and to use a cliché 5 years later I left a man. I never once looked back at all we went through and felt hard done by, at the end of the day it was done for a reason. The problem now is society has changed to such a degree that the quality of the candidates coming up is very low, add to this the fact we now life in politically correct gone mad world and invariably there will be problems.
Robert, London

I am disgusted at the treatment new recruits have been receiving at the Deepcut barracks. I personally know a young recruit at Deepcut who has been treated in a terrible manner. He has been made to feel as if he has been sent there to be punished rather than him being there through his own choice. More investigation has to go into the corporals and majors at Deepcut, they make the recruits' life hell and something should be done about it.
Laura Jane, Glasgow

Let me start by saying the deaths of these people are unacceptable, but with the pressure from above to fill the rank and file of today's "modern" army and the lack of decent talent coming through, lowering of standards for entry then hoping to bring them on when they are in, is also unacceptable. People looking in from the outside are quick to confuse progressive encouragement with bullying. Instead of playing the numbers game, been there know what goes on, kick the flotsam and jetsam out, instead of getting them to leave by what ever means available, that's an element of the problem. Soldiers can feel very insecure in situation if they are not 100% sure that those around them can do the job.
Jim, UK

The armed forces are not above the law
Candice Taylor, Newton, UK
The armed forces are not above the law. I find it very concerning as to why a public inquiry into the soldiers deaths is unlikely to happen - surely this should be the main priority, and not the age at which people are eligible to enter the armed forces. I think that it needs to be remembered that recruits of the Army do not belong to the Army, they are still someone's daughter or son, someone's sister or brother and still have friends and family that want to know what happened to them. If deaths like this occurred in civilian life a possible murder enquiry would have been launched.
Candice Taylor, Newton, UK

The Army training needs to be adequate but there is no excuse for recruits being injured or killed in training. Believe it or not, the Army is an employer and does in fact have a duty of care for its employees. Death on the battlefield is bad enough, but during training? Unbelievable. I hope the inquiry is deep and thorough, and those who are shown to be negligent removed from their positions.
David, Cornwall, UK

Of course the army must care for its people, especially new recruits and it seems to me that, generally, they do this very well. Obviously I cannot comment on the Deepcut incidents except to note that it is a tragedy when anybody, especially new recruits, are injured or killed and especially so if through lack of care or concern. That said, it is self evident that the training regimes for an army have to prepare people to face potentially horrendous circumstances the like of which very few people can imagine. It is absurd to think that such activities can be conducted in accordance with health and safety and other workplace regulations. The general public seems to forget this and we are all too ready to condemn matters arising in circumstances that few of us understand and even fewer would elect to experience.
Paul B, Oxford

The Army needs discipline as much as it needs aggression, and it needs it precisely because that aggression can so easily get out of control. Here, as in Iraq, discipline wasn't as strong and that's why these things happened. To suggest that any critics of the Army are a bunch of out-of-touch lefties is understandable but misguided - just because you're ready to fight and die in a war doesn't place you above criticism or mean anything goes.
Pat B, London UK

Army training is hard both mentally and physically for a reason
Allen, England
If you can't handle the pressure of the army then stay in the real world. Army training is hard both mentally and physically for a reason. That reason is to prepare troops for war. I would not be willing to take a man to war with me if he wasn't mentally up to the task he will carry out and the sights he will most certainly see. I would rather see a man break down whilst training than risk the lives of many other troops breaking down in a war zone. I feel sorry for the families of people who died at Deepcut but these things will happen when people are pushed to their absolute limits.
Allen, England

There needs to be a full Public Enquiry, to clear the air, and get to the truth. Senior officers need to be questioned, as ultimately they are responsible for those under their command. In my view, there is no doubt that some of the deaths were not suicide, as it is impossible to shoot yourself the way they were. Those at the top must take most of the blame for not supervising the lower ranks properly, and ensuring that bullying did not occur.
Lester Stenner, UK

The painful truth is that military culture largely reflects national culture and prejudices. Does the aggressive nature of some national and personal behaviour in the UK encourage this sort of abuse in the military? The way recruits and soldiers get treated in the UK is regarded as totally unacceptable here in Sweden. Part of the reason for this is conscription - society is much less tolerant of abuse when those suffering it are not there out of choice. One wonders whether re-introducing conscription in the UK would result in changes in the way soldiers are trained and treated? Another interesting question (and one which is difficult to answer) is whether UK training methods actually produce better soldiers than the methods used here in Sweden?
Richard Loe, Stockholm, Sweden

The scale and extent of the abuse at Deepcut is to be condemned and a proper investigation is essential. But we should be cautious about wholesale changes to Army training. Army life is far removed from civilian life and that gap gets a little bigger every year. It becomes a gaping chasm in combat. Basic training has to be tough, it has to mould the individual, because no matter how tough it is, it is nothing compared to combat. We need a tough, combat effective armed forces, not social workers in uniform. If you think tough training is too high a price, consider the cost of the alternative: lost wars and more dead soldiers.
Neil, London, UK

I served 8 years in the Army. Sure the physical routine is tough during basic training, but there is no excuse for the sort of abuse at Deepcut. Strange to me is how can a recruit shoot themselves twice in the head to commit suicide, once is enough. I say something about this whole mess stinks of a blatant cover up. I and I am sure many people support a public enquiry as the families wish. If nothing is wrong, what have the Army and Govt got to hide ?
Fraser, Edinburgh

War is hell and sometimes so is training. Bullying is always unacceptable, but a little is to be expected. It would be a fatal error to interpret a tough training regime as a prolonged act of bullying and abuse. Ultimately, it will be soldiers on the ground who'll suffer if the pressure is eased. Train hard, fight easy, so the adage goes.
Ash, London

The army (I thought) is supposed to be about discipline as well as armed force. If it is incapable of reining in those recruits who are incapable of exercising sufficient self-discipline to prevent themselves bullying (and quite possibly murdering) other recruits then it has a huge problem when these same recruits meet unarmed civilians with guns in their hands.
Ellie, Edinburgh, UK

I can but echo the other ex-service posters here. Remember the maxim we were always told - Train hard fight easy.
Rob, UK

With the demands being placed on the Army by civilians with no experience of what they do, I fear that within the next decade we will lose a war. Our soldiers will be too badly trained to cope with what they will have to face.
Andrew, London

What do we want of our soldiers? Please think for a moment about what we expect our soldiers to do. The Army is an aggressive macho environment where men and women are taught to kill - not a liberal namby-pamby boarding school
JCL, London, UK

I think people like JCL of London is missing the point on joining the army, no one thinks its going to be a picnic or, as he put it like a boarding school, however when your being bullied constantly for whatever reason, it makes life hell, whether in the army, school or the office. I joined the reserves some 3 years ago, on being sent to REME for training and being bullied, I quit that weekend, I felt awful to have given up. I'm in my 40s and have nothing to prove, however I did miss a chance of doing something for myself so please, it's just not youngsters that get bullied.
Tricia Bruce, Edinburgh

More recruit monitoring and filtering is needed
Chris, Preston, UK
As a former soldier of 12 years and a veteran of the first Gulf War, two tours of Bosnia and Kosovo all I can tell people who are commenting here who have never served, or fought for their country is that training can never be "too hard". On all of the operations I took part in I never once experienced conditions which would have been "acceptable" in peacetime UK training in terms of safety, welfare and operating conditions. The army is not in the business of being soft, but constant peer reviews and recruiting targets are allowing some recruits who should not be carried as far as they are to reach a point where they are not mentally stable. More recruit monitoring and filtering is needed, and not molly-coddling by the politically correct government overseers who want value for money i.e. less failures.
Chris, Preston, UK

What I have read is deeply disturbing and, to my mind, connects directly with the goings on in Iraq. There is a failure of leadership here and this needs to be brought into the light.
David Ball, Wokingham, UK

I think everybody appreciates that training must be tough, soldiering is not for the weak-hearted, but to push somebody so far that they die before they go anywhere near the battlefield is wholly unacceptable.
Brendan MacLean, Birmingham, UK

The Army hides behind a green veil of secrecy, so the public will never no the truth. And this inquiry will be little more than a slap on the wrist.
Bumble, Dartford, Kent

I went through basic army training and its hell on earth. The staff push you beyond your limits and try and break you, both physically and mentally. It's not nice, but its absolutely essential that you cope if you're going to be a soldier. If you join the army you must expect to go to war and war is hell. Its far better to find out that you can't take the stress in Surrey than in Iraq. Things in Deepcut have gone too far, but if Army training is made too "soft" we'll regret it when inadequately prepared troops are sent into battle.
Peter, Nottingham

Independent panels will not resolve bullying and abuse issues
Alan Glenister, Bushey UK
The report by the Commons Defence Select Committee can only make "suitable noises"; who wants to bite the hand that feeds? Bullying and abuse, unfortunately, are a fact of life in all spheres of employment, humans being humans. Independent panels will not resolve bullying and abuse issues nor will raising the recruitment age make a jot of difference to the army. As for failing in duty, does that mean that soldiers will not be allowed to carry arms just in case they shoot somebody? The real issue is that there should be a public inquiry into the Deepcut incidents and the general management of that particular establishment and its senior management controls.
Alan Glenister, Bushey UK

The army has always been about control and the way it exercises this control is by training recruits to be tough and endure physical and mental pressure. This inevitably leads to physical and mental abuse. Anyone who thinks bullying, racism and prejudice don't exist in the army and that recruits aren't subjected to abuse is only fooling themselves.
Karl Lynch, Belfast N. Ireland

There appears to be a lot of mistrust being created by the Army itself. Iraq abuse, suicides and bullying. Surely the tip of the iceberg. Hardly a good advert for new recruits.
T J Newman, Bournemouth UK

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