Lockerbie - 36 years on

Wednesday, 21st December 1988. 7.03pm. Flight PanAm 103 was en-route from London to New York, when it disappeared off air traffic control radar, substituted by several fragments, which fell to the ground. One piece slammed into the town of Lockerbie. All on board the plane were killed, alongside eleven townspeople from Lockerbie when houses were destroyed by falling debris and fire. The plane had been brought down by a bomb, planted by terrorists allegedly linked to the then Libyan government of Col Ghadaffi. The full chain of command for the attack has never been fully clarified, in public at any rate, and there are questionmarks as to why security services didn't manage to foil the plot. One man was put on trial, convicted and sentenced. In 2009, he was released on compassionate grounds and repatriated to Libya.

All that is immaterial to the relatives and friends of those killed. They are remembered in a memorial on Sherwood Crescent in Lockerbie, which was flattened by the downed plane. We remember them all. 

Image courtesy BBC

July 1981. On my way north with family for the annual holiday. As we headed north up the A74, an all enveloping horror made me lie down on the back seat. I cannot explain what it was about, or why. But after I had given in to my emotion, I looked up again and asked where we were. "Lockerbie", came the answer, and I saw the sign for the A709 turn-off to Lockerbie and Lochmaben flash by.


The same sign that can be seen in the footage from December 1988. The location where parts of the plane came down. Don't ask me to explain the coincidence. I can't.

In 1988, I was a student in Holland, and given to watch rubbish on the television. That evening, the Lockerbie images flashed by - and that road sign. A74 Glasgow, the North - A709 Lockerbie, Lochmaben.

May the innocent victims of Lockerbie, from the plane, or on the ground, all rest in peace.

This post is scheduled for publication at 7.03pm on Saturday, 21st December 2024.

Syria

So, Syria's dictator has run away from his country, after he had been abandoned by his backers Russia and Iran. 

I recall Iraq's dictator, Saddam Hussein, back in 2003, being ousted following America's "shock and awe" operation to remove him, accusing him of being in possession of weapons of mass-destruction. Saddam appears to have gotten rid of those, but he became a scapegoat for 9/11. He was unceremoniously hanged in December 2006, after (I think) 45 years in power, being feted by the high and mighty of this world. Saddam had been useful to the USA as a counterweight against the Islamic Republic of Iran; the two countries fought an eight-year war. Saddam deployed chemical weapons against his own population, the Kurds. Halabja was a killing ground against up to 5000 people. But when the Yanks booted him out, Saddam's WMD were nowhere to be found. Nobody mourned his dreadful death, but the justification for the invasion was void.

I recall the equally maverick, but equally deadly dictator Muammar Ghadaffi, Lybia's leader with the assumed rank of Colonel. His regime has been accused of masterminding the downing of PamAm flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988. We commemorate the 36th anniversary of that atrocity on 21st December. But Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who had been accused of involvement with the attack was later released on compassionate grounds. Kenny Macaskill, the Scottish justice secretary in 2009, conveniently overlooking that Al-Megrahi had been convicted of crimes that showed no compassion at all. 

Syria's Bashar al-Assad also deployed chemical weapons against his own people, in his own capital, 11 years ago. The uprising from 2011 caused a civil war that appears to have been concluded with his fall. A ghastly dictator, who had no compunction in killing Syrian civilians, prompting a mass exodus. Their number is thought to be as much as 11 million. Some have ended up here in Stornoway, I know of a barber shop which was set up by a Syrian refugee. 

Will these refugees come back? Once the elation of Assad's craven flight to his paymasters in Moscow has subsided, they may be well advised to await developments, and see whether Syria is spared the bloody aftermath that followed the removal of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and of Muammar Ghadaffi in Libya.

NaBloPoMo 2024

Well, that fizzled out after day 11. Not that I have that much to report on these days, but could have done better. I'll just post a picture from the Christmas illuminations that adorn Stornoway for the festive period. The switch-on event was last Tuesday, 26th November, but was only able to get out take a picture during the hours of darkness the next evening.

NaBloPoMo 2024 - day 17

This morning, the 39-year old ferry Hebridean Isles departed Stornoway for the final time, to be scrapped. Three hours later, the Tesco superstore opened its doors for the first time on a Sunday. I walked past half an hour later. The carpark was full, surrounding streets even busier than during a weekday at that time; a camera crew were skulking about, waiting to trap the unwary - and a group of poor souls, forlornly holding up a banner saying "Remember the Sabbath, to keep it holy". There is an attitude around, beyond this island, that we should come into the 21st century, join the rest of the country which has been enjoying Sunday trading for three decades. That is condescending, and ignorant of a special way of life that we can afford to have, 50 miles off the mainland. But, the die has been cast, Tesco has claimed that there is widespread support for its Stornoway store to open on Sunday. There is, I know that. And as it's there, it will be used.

NaBloPoMo 2024 - day 11

 Armistice Day. The day, now 106 years ago, when the guns fell silent on the Western Front, after more than four years of slaughter. The blame was laid squarely at the Germans' door, although it had been more an pan-European royal spat. Years ago, I visited the village of Tolsta Chaolais in Lewis, where the first war memorial was built in the 1920s. A local resident commented to me: "Why did eighteen men from our village have to die, because an Archduke got shot in Sarajevo?" And that summed it up nicely for me. The fact that more wars have followed in Europe says enough.

Tolsta Chaolais War Memorial

NaBloPoMo 2024 - day 10

Today is Remembrance Sunday, when we commemorate the Fallen from two World Wars, and conflicts before and after. Here in Lewis, the focus is quite strongly on the First World War. Out of 6,300 who joined up, more than 1,100 did not survive. Of that number, more than 200 drowned on 1st January 1919, when their ship, HMY Iolaire, sank just outside Stornoway harbour. Although the vessel ran aground on reefs, only 50 yards from shore, the atrocious weather and sea conditions made it impossible for a rescue to be mounted. Seventy-five managed to scramble ashore; the remains of 65 were never recovered from the sea.

This is a picture from an installation which has stood off South Beach in Stornoway since late 2018. Although the lighting has long since failed, and the posts are now decaying, this image of it depicts the outline of the Iolaire. Each of the posts denotes someone on board; the red lights indicate a life lost

NaBloPoMo 2024 - day 09

 It is 86 years ago since the Night of Broken Glass [Kristallnacht]. That night, an organised mob of Nazi forces and sympathisers went on the rampage in towns and cities across Germany, smashing and destroying Jewish-owned property and businesses. It was a foretaste of what was to come during World War II. The extermination of anyone deemed sub-human by the warped mind of Adolf Hitler and his henchmen. Jews topped their league of the unfit, closely followed by gypsies, the mentally ill and many many others. The Reichskristallnacht was a night of infamy, and not just to Germany. Hitler had already been allowed to get away with murder for several years beforehand. In 1936, he occupied the Rhineland which had been ceded to France at the end of the First World War. The League of Nations, the predecessor of the United Nations, cried wolf but had no bite. On 12 March 1938, Nazi forces marched into Austria to join that country to Germany, an event referred to as the Anschluss. Neville Chamberlain flew to Munich to meet with Adolf Hitler on 30 September 1938, returning with the infamous phrase: "Peace for our time". Six weeks later, the Reichskristallnacht took place. Only a few months later, Germany invaded the Sudetenland area of Czecho-Slovakia, and again, nobody moved a finger to stop. In September 1939, Hitler thought he could get away with the invasion of Poland. But this time, it prompted a declaration of war, signalling the outbreak of the Second World War. The lights have gone out in Europe, it was said at the time. The lights in Europe had already been extinguished in 1914, and had not been relit, not even at the end of the First World War. The Versailles Peace Treaty of June 1919 contained all the ingredients for another war, which duly materialised. After the unspeakable atrocities of the Second World War, Germany was divided into four by the victorious allies. The British, French and American sectors became West Germany, whilst the Soviet sector was turned into East Germany, a communist state. Berlin was similarly divided. Until 1961, people from the East fled to the West in droves. A barrier was erected across Berlin in August 1961, later replaced by a high, concrete wall. Similar barriers were put up along the borders between East and West Germany. Anyone trying to flee from East to West was shot on sight, no questions asked. The advent of Mikhail Gorbatchov as leader of the USSR in the 1980s heralded a start of change. And when this wind of change blew across eastern Europe, it blew away all the communist regimes within the space of a few months in 1989.

The Berlin Wall was torn down on 9 November 1989, and you can see the dilemma. Do we remember the Kristallnacht, and not celebrate the reunification of Germany? Do we celebrate the reunification, and ignore the Night of Broken Glass? Maybe the two can be reconciled. The Berliners remember the Kristallnacht in a very low-key but poignant manner. Every year, in the evening of November 9th, candles are left on the doorsteps of houses that were ransacked that night.

The flame, burning at the top of this post, is my candle of remembrance for Kristallnacht.