Mike Jackson: British imperialism from Derry to Iraq. posted by Richard Seymour

General Sir Michael Jackson, if similes are worth anything, is like a shark. Think of the carnivorous teeth jutting from his mouth, the angular face, the black eyes swimming in a red sea. The civilised upper class comportment is precisely the manner he will assume when he bites your leg off. Melodrama or comedy? We'll get to that.

As photographs emerged of British soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners - not our dear British boys! - at a detention camp near Basra, the good General was the image of cold fury and reserved disgust. He told the media that, though he could not comment on an ongoing trial, the army condemned "utterly all acts of abuse". It's an old story.

In Derry, on January 30th 1972, the Parachute regiment shot dead 13 civilians during a civil rights protest. The man in charge of the operations that day was a sprightly young captain of the 1st Battalion named Michael Jackson (he was 31 at the time). As the paras leapt into action, Jackson could be seen yelling "Go, Paras, go!!". In order to justify the shootings, Jackson kept a 'shot list' , describing those shot as "nail-bombers", "pistol-firers" and so on. None of the thirteen civilians shot were firing pistols or lobbing nail-bombs or carrying rifles. They were fleeing.

Notoriously, in a meeting held involving then Prime Minister Edward Heath, Lord Hailsham explained that there was a law that allowed the British Army to shoot enemies of the crown. Much more than that, the British government was obliged to take action. One British para has told the Bloody Sunday inquiry that there was no shot or threat from the crowd or alleged snipers:

"The only threat was a large assembly of people and we were all experienced soldiers who had been through riot situations before."

He added:

"We were all in high spirits and when our lieutenant said, 'Let us teach these buggers a lesson - we want some kills tomorrow,' to the mentality of the blokes to whom he was speaking, that was tantamount to an order."

Never mind. Thirteen murders was a step up in Michael Jackson's career. From that point on, his feet have barely touched the ground. He was later given the command of the 1st Battalion which had carried out the atrocities in Derry, as this very polite BBC profile explains (doesn't mention Bloody Sunday). He then worked for the MoD for some time before being knighted.

The next time we hear of him, he is leading the British side of military operations in Serbia, as part of the Nato chain of command. You can see a charming photograph of the general with Wesley Clark and Croatian ethnic cleanser Agim Ceku, who had been placed in command of the KLA during the US war on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He has since been promoted to Chief of the General Staff (2003) and his knighthood was promoted to Knight of the Grand Cross (New Year) for his leadership during the war crimes in Iraq.

Jackson has come a long way since his youthful ineptitudes in Derry. There is unlikely to be a 'shot list' today. It will suffice to say that anyone killed by British troops is a suicide-bomber, rifle-bearer, pistol-firer or some such thing. Torture, not unknown in Northern Ireland in the particularly brutal period following Bloody Sunday, will be the act of a few rotten apples, bad people who bring the army into disrepute. But Mike Jackson knows better. As a former para, he will know that British troops are trained for brutality, not humanitarianism.

Still, if you don't like all that, you can read a very polite interview with the General on Breakfast with Frost here .