The mothers of heroic Scots soldiers who were killed in Iraq have vowed they will never forgive former PM Tony Blair on the 20th anniversary of the Gulf War.
Christine Morgan, Margaret Valentine and Rose Gentle continue to grieve for their sons who were lost in the conflict, which began with the Allied invasion of Iraq on March 20 2003. And they continue to claim that then Prime Minister Blair went to war on fake intelligence and without public support for the conflict.
And they warn that the UK should never again send its sons and daughters into conflict without proper justification. Twenty years on from the “shock and awe” blitz of Baghdad, the mothers have all watched on as their sons’ friends have grown up and built families and careers.
And they have wondered on the lives their beloved boys were denied. Christine Morgan’s son Marc Ferns was just 21 when he was killed by a roadside bomb in Basra in August, 2004.
After his death Christine urged Prime Minister Tony Blair to bring British troops, who were meant to be a peacekeeping force, home.
She said: “I do think that Tony Blair made decisions based on nonsense and he misled us all about what was happening. He didn’t have a son or daughter to send to war and he didn’t think about the devastation it would cause to families like ours.
“I wasn’t very happy when he got a knighthood because of the decisions he made.”
Brave Marc was the third generation of his family to serve in the Black Watch and died during his second tour of duty in Iraq. Before he even headed off to Iraq, Marc spoke to the Daily Record about his proud family tradition, saying: “I couldn’t look my Ma and Pa in the eye if I didn’t do my duty. We all think about our family at a time like this.”
Christine, 67, said there isn’t a day that goes by that she doesn’t think of Marc.
She said: “I always get quite emotional when anniversaries approach. Marc’s birthday was on Hogmanay and he was 21 when he died, so we always have a good think about him at that time.
“I feel so proud of him and that feeling never changes. We keep quite close with other families in Glenrothes and around, who have gone through the same loss as us, and that has been a great comfort over the years.
“We have stayed in Glenrothes and I still see some of the boys he went to school with and I watch them growing into men and having kids of their own. I can’t help but wonder if Marc would have had boys or girls and what he’d be doing with himself.
“I do know that he died doing and duty and we’ll be forever proud of him. But he shouldn’t have been sent to Iraq in the first place.”
Christine said the constant TV updates on the Ukraine conflict also make her think with sadness of her son. But she said: “This is a very different situation because the people of Ukraine are fighting to free their country.
“I have been running collections for Ukraine because I want to show my support. This is a war that can be justified and that whole country is just being incredibly brave.”
Margaret Valentine, of Whitburn, also thinks of her son, sapper Robert Thomson, who was just 22 when he died in 2004. The most painful and enduring regret is the feeling that her boy died in agony, when a trench he was digging collapsed and buried him, due to negligence by officers.
Margaret, 65, said: “He was brave to go to Iraq but he didn’t sign up to the Army to go to war. He was a clever boy and he had seven O levels and five highers and he was mainly thinking about a career, which the Army encouraged young recruits to do.
“I’m aware of the 20th anniversary approaching but all it will do for me is raise the same questions that will always be there. What was it all about? What did we improve in Iraq? Is Iraq now at peace? Was it worth it?
“It was all just a lot of politics with America’s aims, whatever they were, driving everything. I refuse to accept that my son’s death was for nothing. He was a soldier and he accepted he could be sent into a conflict and that was what he did.
“He died doing his duty as a soldier. But the questions won’t ever go away.”
Margaret admits to retaining bitterness over Tony Blair’s pivotal role in taking the UK into Iraq.
She said: “As far as Tony Blair goes, I will say that he is the most inept Prime Minister in the history of the UK and should never have sent our young soldiers into the conflict.”
Motherwell fan Robert, known to his friends as Rab, joined the 35 Engineer Regiment in 2002. He was posthumously awarded two medals from Iraq for Operation Telic One and Three.
Rose Gentle, 59, became an outspoken critic of Tony Blair in the immediate aftermath of the war after her 19-year-old son Gordon’s untimely death in Basra in 2004. The knighthood of the former PM enraged Rose, who said: “He should be in jail, not making millions of pounds travelling the world to tell of his big achievements.”
In the years that followed Gordon’s death, Rose was embraced by the anti-war movement. But 20 years on she sees things differently.
She said: “Here we are in 2022 and all I feel is that the catastrophic and criminal actions of Tony Blair have gone without any punishment. He’s just brushed it all aside.
“I felt a lot of grief and anger over the years but, 20 years on, I don’t feel at all like an anti-war protestor. That’s not what I am. I’m a mother who lost her son and I cannot help myself but think of Gordon every day, many times a day.
“I have taken great comfort from the way Gordon’s pals have continued to stay in touch and pop round. They were just boys but they have grown into men and they have their own families.
“My own grandson is friends with one of Gordon’s pal’s boys, so although it’s lovely to see others doing so well, it’s just natural that I find myself thinking of the man he could have become.”
Rose added: “There are wars that are just, that we can defend, like what we are seeing in Ukraine. They are bravely defending their country against Russia and it saddens me to see what they are going through.
“But this 20th anniversary is nothing to celebrate. It’s a national disgrace that we are marking.
“It’s right that we remember that we should never send our young people into war again for some corrupt lies.”
