I am not rejoicing at the return of Old Etonian Simon Mann from jail in Equatorial Guinea. His failed coup attempt was just one of a series of ventures in which a group of upper class public school English former officers worked with former apartheid era forces to try to seize control of mineral resources across Africa.
You can find the story of my own involvement with them, the full background and the untold evidence of Blairite complicity in my book The Catholic Orangemen of Togo.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/01/buy_the_catholi.html
Long term readers of this blog will know that Mann’s erstwhile mercenary partner, Lt Col Tim Spicer, frightened my publisher out of the book by commissioning Schillings to send threatening letters under the UK’s notorious libel laws. But the book is entirely true, eyewitness stuff, as witnessed by the fact that, since self-publication, over a thousand copies have been sold while tens of thousands have read it free online – but there has been no sign of the threatened libel action from Spicer.
New Labour, of course, went on to consummate their relationship with Spicer by making him a multi multi millionaore providing mercenaries to their invasion of Iraq.
Had Mann’s coup succeeded in gaining the oilfields of Equatorial Guinea, it would almost certainly have resulted in the deaths of large numbers of Africans, just as Mann and Spicer organised in their in Executive Outcomes days. That is why I think he should still be in jail.
Strangely, I share that desire with Jack Straw and the with the Foreign and Commonwealth Ofiice, for very different reasons. They are pressing Mann to keep his mouth shut.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/foreign-office-warns-mann-to-keep-quiet-1816864.html
Straw has admitted the FCO had prior knowledge of the coup attempt. Just how far their involvement went is something they appear keen for Mann not to tell us.
On the plus side though – judging by the comments Mann made in the interview with Channel 4 news, there would seem to be a good chance he will be paying ‘Scratcher’ a visit with an ice axe in the near future.
Craig thanks so much for this post. I knew I had information about Mann on my computer but since I’ve had a new hard drive, things are rather disorganised. Now I remember the info came from your excellent book.
Mann will go ahead and write his book. Unless of course the government offer him another few million with which he can buy a comfy wee holiday home.
The Chinese seem to be so much better at gaining control of resources in Africa, and they don’t use mercenaries.
Hell would seem an ideal location for such people. Not so easy to find contacts with influence and not so restricted time-wise. Characters who made themselves larger than life and beyond the law will find themselves utterly powerless and without help. Brown obviously needs all his best bastards for the next stage in his war on Pakistan. Plenty of room for all.
I see Mandelson gets a mention…
http://tinyurl.com/ybhava4
If Simon Mann really is in possession of information that the government, at the behest of its Deep State SIS establishment arbiters deem ‘a threat to national security interests’ or some such then, to quote Don Corleone, he will be made an offer he can’t refuse.
I don’t get it – why he was released so soon by Equatorial Guinea. Even his spilling of beans and naming of names didn’t absolve him from his own involvement. I expected him to be kept in jail for longer. I wonder what deal was done.
Perhaps his total silence now that he’s out?
Imagine what people such as these could do in a place like Northern Ireland, where they’d have a free run to practice all manner of wargames and crafts.
Oops…
Well they’re doing it in Iraq with no accountability and no record of how much oil they’re siphoning off from the Iraqi people.
I think the logical conclusion is that Mann belongs to the SIS, which is charged to protect the economic security of the country. In running such operations investors are encouraged to join an enterprise not only to benefit themselves financially but to provide a cover should it become necessary.
I don’t believe a deal was done; a more subtile tactic was used through the use of Scotland Yard, to make the president believe that the British were going to carry out a proper investigation. The president was persuaded that Mann was fully cooperating and would testify against the other ‘plotters’. So was the president cleverly hoodwinked?
Surely no-one is suggesting that Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo expects Mark Thatcher and that Lebanese Oil Dealer to be presented to him by Scotland Yard in exchange for him having freed Mann?
And if the names were of people even more powerful then it looks even more unlikely doesn’t it?
Simon Mann had better not venture up or down any stairwells, or near any bodies of water, or to the tops of any tall buildings, or out into the hills, or ontgo the road in or out of a moving vehicle. One wonders if, when the time comes, Tom Mangold will turn out to have been his best friend.
Btw, has anyone ever heard of a company called, Stirling Communications’? Just wondered.
In the deep countryside of North Lincolnshire, are there strange, fenced-off areas of land? What’s been going on there for the past 25 years? Who knows?
Channel 4 news had a pretty pathetic sob story about him when he was jailed. Why i don’t know. He was a mercenary and as you say Craig was hardly in it for humanitarian reasons. They talked as if he was some martyr for democracy, because the government he was overthrowing was a dictatorship – as if UK and US govt backed coups were picky about what form of government they installed (or overthrew).
He also seems to have been amazingly stupid. He and the other mercenaries in the coup team took all their guns and equipment via a Zimbabwean airport – and even left them all there for a considerable time before they planned to leave. Why exactly did they think the Mugabe government would be sympathetic to a bunch of British backed mercenaries overthrowing an African government?
It is a great pity that the majority of persons commenting on this blog, do not take the time to furnish themselves with the facts of the situation, before voicing their opinions.
E.G. Duncan Mcfarlane ” The weapons were stored in Zimbabwe for a considerable time ” The weapons were actually purchased, quite legally by the way, from Zimbabwe Defence Industries, which is a Government owed armaments company. They were paid for, ad the receipts issued.
To those timid souls amongst us, I say, if you feel it imperative to offer you uninformed opinions, get the correct facts beforehand. Otherwise, be polite enough to refrain, and be content to know, that there are many things that all Governments do behind the scenes, in the National interest. And that there are those among us too, that have the ability and the courage to accept such challenges, even though the risk is often huge.
The “stay at home types” should be thankful for men like Simon Mann.
“To those timid souls amongst us, I say, if you feel it imperative to offer you uninformed opinions, get the correct facts beforehand.”
Will do.
“Simon Mann’s coup plot: nasty, brutal and posh”…
http://tinyurl.com/y9vbh43