ARmy Rumour SErvice

Murder is murder whether it happened yesterday or in 1948. If you were a victim or a relative of a victim would you not want justice?

This kind of think besmirches the reputation of the British Army trying to cover it up or pretend it did not happen besmirches the reputation of the country.

We, rightly, expect the Japanese to be apologetic for the activities of their army during the Second War. If people acting on our behalf have committed murder then it should be properly investigated and if it happened then we should be prepared to acknowledge it apologies and make reparations.

So anyone who was there will be at least 80?
Not convinced anyhtin conclusive will come of it

Originally Posted by BuggerAll

Murder is murder whether it happened yesterday or in 1948. If you were a victim or a relative of a victim would you not want justice?

You are correct, however there have been two investigations that were inconclusive. It is dificult to see who 60 years later the evidence is going to be any clearer

I think this is " smoke and mirrors" moment, things like this only come out when the government want to try and smear the military, I'm surprised the have not said it was a Gurkha unit

This story has been doing the rounds in the press for a number of years now, I think it first surfaced in the 1960's from memory.

Justice is a sort of two faced thing - depends on whether on is looking as a victim or as a defendant. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. Trite statements I know but though harsh measures were adopted in the ulu, straight forward murder very unlikely in a group of men. Mai Lei notwithstanding.

'This story has been doing the rounds in the press for a number of years now, I think it first surfaced in the 1960's from memory.'

True, I am old enough to remember when the story first surfaced (as you say, early '60s). The ex-Scots Guardsman who contacted the press freely admitted that 'he was in it for as much as he could screw out of it'. Bearing in that most of the battalion at that time would have been World War 2 veterans, and would probably have served in Burma and Malaya, it is unlikely that a massacre of this scale would have gone unnoticed.

Oddly enough, a few years ago, I did some work in Malaysia and this story is now part of local legend (the Malay Malays have no love for the British). However, the version that I heard had it that the victims were local Malays and not Chinese.

Heard this story from my father, who served in Malaya, though much later than '48. By then it was an urban legand; the story went that the Scots Guards massacred the villagers and burned the village to the ground. The bodies were buried in a mass grave and even maps of the area were changed to wipe out all trace of the village.

My dad thought it was b0llocks even back then, and I'm inclined to believe him. Anyone remember the Scotland Yard investigation into "war crimes" committed by the Paras during the Falklands War? Waste of time and money...