A British Royal Marine claims he was subjected to a “witch hunt”, interrogated, and detained by counter-terror police after he questioned what is allegedly diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) policies to get women into the Corps even if they don’t meet its stringent training standards.
A Royal Marine says he circulated a survey questioning the wisdom of quietly dropping the standards of the elite fighting force to increase its diversity by pushing women through the selection process that would have otherwise failed had they been men. It was signed by 1,000 Corps members, he claims.
It is alleged after this document was escalated up the chain of command it was initially dismissed as Russian misinformation and then subjected to a “witch hunt” that culminated in the Marine being detained by terrorism police as he returned from a family holiday because they wanted to interrogate his “views”.
British newspaper The Daily Telegraph states it has verified some claims made, including that the Marine was flown to London from his posting for an interrogation and that he was later held by police under counter-terrorism legislation.
The claims come from a video monologue posted to a gaming YouTube channel delivered by the Marine, who stated of his motivation: “we believe we have the high standards that we keep for a very important reason, which is to prevent Marines from being killed in dangerous situations when we go to war, and we’ve been told that we will go to war very soon”.
These high standards are “being selectively dropped for political reasons for the bespoke intention of forcing women through Royal Marines training for a political victory lap”, he asserted, claiming: “Everyone talks about this, everyone in the Royal Marines is concerned about this. Not because we wake up in the morning and want to say anything bad about the other gender, but because everyone knows implicitly in the Royal Marines that if you speak out, because of the political landscape and who is in political power at the moment… you will be silenced as I have been silenced… your career will be threatened… your friends and your family will be threatened.”
The Royal Marines is one of the world’s most respected fighting forces and its coveted ‘Green Beret’ can only be worn by those who have passed the 13-week All Arms Commando Course. The unnamed Marine said in the bid to get a woman through the course, they were being handed “unearned paper-passes”.
“I voiced that concern and now I am being treated like a terrorist and a criminal”, he said, explaining that other Marines were threatened with punishment if they did not divulge the identity of the anonymous petitioner. Having been eventually identified, the Marine said he was flown from his posting to London and subjected to an interrogation. In that discussion, he said his superiors dismissed the concerns raised and said their only interest was his attitude to women serving in the corps.
He was later detained by police under counter-terror laws while returning from holiday, an assertion the Telegraph report states has been admitted by the Ministry of Defence. He said of that episode: “…’we’re holding you here under the Terrorism Act’. And I’m just shaking my head in this instance. And I said: ‘Have I committed any acts of terrorism? Am I expected to commit any acts of terrorism?’ And they said: ‘No, we have you here because of your views’.”
It is stated the Ministry of Defence denied engaging in positive discrimination in the Marines, asserting that despite the Marines being theoretically open to women since 2018, not one has yet passed the Commando Course.
The explosive claims of the Ministry of Defence’s allegedly unforgiving posture on DEI policy comes hot on the heels of a Royal Air Force recruitment scandal, where it was proven it had actively discriminated against what it internally called “useless white male pilots” because it wanted to get “a balanced BAME/female/male” intake for pilot training. The Royal Air Force is now said to be short on pilots after not enough applied, although it denied this as “nonsense”, claiming “The past RAF recruitment discrimination issue has no relevance to pilot training or recruitment.”
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