Tuesday’s  attack on the US airbase Bagram, which killed four American troops, conforms to what Taliban spokesmen said would happen, announcing their ‘spring offensive’ back in April.

So expect more attacks and particularly an attempt to kill as many foreign NATO forces as possible.

(Afghan police on patrol. Picture: Getty)

No change here then, talks or no talks. The various Afghan resistance groups wish to be seen to be ‘beating’ the foreign invaders from their country, whether or not that is in fact the case.

This will go on regardless of talks – be that talks with America or talks with the “puppet regime” as the Taliban continue to call the Karzai government.

In a push for further destabilisation as NATO pulls out, insurgents have attacked a number of foreign aid groups around the country in recent weeks – notably the Red Crescent in Jalalabad for the first time in 26 years. Deaths of several aid workers in the capital too.

So it is the 352,000 Afghan army and police who have to deal with this, after Tuesday’s formal handover.

That is, a third of a million men in uniforms. But a man in a uniform does not a soldier make. And the police? Cops there remain illiterate, notoriously prone to bribes and sexual assaults; turned onto the streets and checkpoints of Afghanistan with perhaps a couple of brief training visits to the firing range with the AK47.

Old tactics

A competent, trained match for seasoned insurgent fighters assaulting their checkpoints? Well the casualty figures for Afghan forces tell the story – soaring as NATO returns to barracks and flies out.

The army still lacks the artillery it needs – specifically Russian made, US acquired D-30 howitzers. With forward spotters, trained crew, maps, map-reading ability, competence in the required mathematics, a crew can lob a shell into a front door from the best part of ten miles.

So the new model Afghan National Army?

No maths, not enough maps, not enough trained forward recon – result? They revert to the old tactic of just pointing the barrel horizontally at a visual target a mile or so distant and having a go.

The vital fleet of transport helicopters to support this new model army is just not there. The essential transport planes are not there.

The casualty air evacuation systems are not there.

The morale isn’t there either with turnover and desertion at such a high level you need to train around 50,000 new men every year to replace those who wandered off the job.

‘Ring of Steel’

NATO commander, US Marine Corps General, Joseph Dunford just keeps repeating the mantra that support and training of Afghan forces is his number one priority.

As well he might, for that hope that Afghan forces can cope – and with the above issues and vastly reduced air support for ground troops hope is about all it is – remains the only game in town for NATO leaving now and all-but gone from Afghanistan by the end of next year.

Afghan military officials and Karzai’s people make great play of how well the Afghan Special forces have acquitted themselves in recent weeks, faced with small groups of suicide attackers assaulting targets like the military section of Kabul airport recently.

It is true, in this attack they repulsed and killed several men with no losses.

But equally it is true that these attacks continue to take place with regularity in and around the capital with its supposed ring of steel. Road checkpoints around the Afghan capital actually have signs up in English bearing the legend ‘Ring of Steel’ which reassures nobody, even the tiny minority who can read them.

So it goes with the Afghan Army and Police – a lot of noise and fanfare, but the facts behind it all remain disconcerting for those anxious about what waits round the corner as NATO leaves, finally preferring to fork out $4.1 billion every year for an army that prefers to use a Howitzer as a blunderbuss and hope for the best.

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“It was quite funny really,” says Philip Jellyman, “we only really knew something was up the next day. I suppose that’s not that good in the middle of a major nuclear incident, is it?”

Er no, I concur. Not all that good.

His colleague, Anthony Ballard, takes up the theme: “My neighbour came round and started shouting about how we had to leave. That there was this problem with the plant. But he’s – well – a bit excitable. We didn’t really think all that much of it.”

Eventually they got into the car and drove to the assembly shelter at the school. Philip says uppermost in their minds was the thought that a long day of clearing up broken windows lay ahead that Saturday, after the earthquake the previous afternoon.

However, there is one thing worse than an assembly shelter full of frightened people near to a major nuclear plant about to blow up and go into meltdown.

And that is when the shelter’s empty. The streets are empty. The town’s empty.

Both men finally, and rather suddenly, realised everyone seemed to have gone. The emergency shelter was empty.

“That’s when we realised,” says Anthony, “then I saw the head of the school dressed in full nuclear protection kit. He was shouting at us from inside a building, to get out of town – now. So we did.

“The police were cruising around in full nuclear protection, yelling at us to get out of town immediately.”

“I left with the clothes on my back,” says Philip, “and that’s not great in Japan where you can’t get stuff to fit easily. I was saved by a nice kind American chap who dropped in to our evacuation shelter one day with loads of his unwanted clothes.”

Rugby playing ‘gaijin’

Both men stayed with the ship, with the children they’d been teaching in Futaba, the tiny town of 7,000 which houses the giant Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant and its large coastal reactors, three melted down, crippled by the quake and its 50 foot tsunami.

Philip has been teaching at Futaba Minami elementary since 2009 and Anthony at the junior high since 2008.

For the past two years they’ve simply moved with the children they taught, south, to Kazo City and the district of Kesai.

Here, surrounded by a class of infants who clearly adore the large, rugby-playing ‘gaijin’ (foreign) teachers, the headteacher pays tribute to two Englishmen who could easily have left for jobs anywhere in Japan.

“They are Samurai,” laughs their boss in the head teacher’s office over coffee, “they are warriors. We appreciate very much that they stayed with us.”

Both men say it’s simple – the care deeply for the children. Philip’s friends in the Futaba rugby team begged them to continue teaching their evacuated children, somewhere, somehow.

And they still go back. Every few months they can apply for a vehicle and people permit and they revisit what remains of their rented homes, nuclear protection suits on, Geiger counter in hand.

‘It’s still lovely’

The quake took the windows and door out. Two years of lush hot summers and harsh winters have done the rest. Dogs, cats, rats, mice and spiders live where they once did.

Anthony likes to go down to the coast, perhaps half a mile from the stricken plant.

“It’s still lovely. You see – I just miss the place. The coast, the Pacific, I used to go down to the beach just north of the plant almost daily. It’s a sort of sun trap. I was going to buy land there, build a house.”

Now he looks wistfully at photos of the plant festooned with cranes as the clear-up scheduled to last at least 40 – yes 40 – years grinds on.

“It’s weird in there,” says Philip,” some areas the radiation’s really low. Then you get these hotspots for no apparent reason. You can walk across the street and the counter goes from point one or something, then suddenly the alarm set at 10 millisieverts goes off.”

Anthony shows a photo of a blue plastic-gloved hand. Taken a year ago his Geiger reading is 102 microsieverts. A chest x-ray is 0.02. At this level a change in human blood cells is readily observable.

Nature gradually reclaims Futaba. As it does Namie, Tomioka, and Okuma. Four towns close to the plant. Some 54,000 people in this zone will not return home until at least 2017 now – six years after the meltdown.

Even that seems optimistic.

Moving on

“Realistically?” asks Philip, “I don’t think I will ever go back to live there.”

He speaks for the growing realisation here. As time goes by the children move on quickly and adjust to new lives – Kazo City is soon home, not lovely little Futaba on the coast.

Working age people know there are no jobs and so no future near the stricken reactors.

And, to be brutal, the elderly are going to die before any real movement back is going to happen.

So our two teachers who stayed with their children, their people, just revisit when they can.

Anthony says: “I miss it, pure and simple. It was a lovely place. And I want to chronicle what’s happening there now.”

So back and forth they go, and back and forth to the clinic for regular radiation checks as well.

Two British teachers. Two British Samurai.

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So, Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes is the White House point-man spinning the US towards war in Syria. And spin is what it is all about – remember Obama’s stated position is that if  ”a whole bunch” of chemical weapons were used or moved around in Syria this would cross “a red line”.

Not exactly precision language but you get the drift; whole bunch = lots.  Note too the other Obama statement on this that “intelligence assessments are not enough”.

Now look at what Rhodes has said: “Our intelligence community assesses that the Assad regime has used weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale against the opposition multiple times in the last year.”

So – intelligence assessments say small-scale use. Yet the spin now is that the red line’s crossed.

The White House said in a statement issued late on Thursday that the use of chemical weapons “violates international norms and crosses clear red lines”.

Hang on, since when did “small scale” mean the same as “whole bunch”? If “intelligence assessments are not enough” before – why are they suddenly enough now?

Ever get the feeling you’re being played?

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One minute they are in the house with the family and perhaps the children. An hour later they are in the silence of a plush, air-conditioned “cockpit” in a nearby military base. A two-person drone flight-control team receives data, co-ordinates on the people who will be targeted on this shift for death, because the USA says so, half a world away in Afghanistan, Pakistan or Yemen.

They may be armed fighters. They may, in fact, be entirely innocent. It is the ultimate in remote killing via the missiles of Reaper or Predator unmanned drones. Then the operators will do the BDA – battle damage asessment – and the camera images get in close. They see the bodies. They see the pieces of bodies. They see the people struggling for life. They see them bleeding out. The heat sensor will show the hot blood-pool against the cooling, dying, human body.

In an illuminating interview, NBC Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel has spoken to former air force drone operator Brandon Bryant, 27. He says he was involved in over 1,600 deaths-by-drone and is haunted by what he did, diagnosed with PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) even though he was thousands of miles from the killing he committed.

His job was operating the camera. One day they were ordered to target three men, armed – as most men are in rural areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan, and they were five miles from the nearest US forces. They fired missiles at the men. He watched the thermal images of the growing blood-pools -

“The guy was running forward, He’s missing his right leg. And I watched this guy bleed out and. I mean, the blood is hot.” He watched the man’s body cool into death and become the same colour-match as the surrounding ground.

“Like, this isn’t a video game. This isn’t some sort of fantasy. This is war. People die. You don’t feel the aircraft turn. You don’t feel the hum of the engine. You hear the hum of the computers, but that’s definitely not the same.”

The disconnect of what many cannot help but feel to be a particularly cowardly way of killing people by stealth, is clearly not without psychological cost. And he is not alone in paying a price in terms of PTSD for which he is receiving counselling.

“People say that drone strikes are like mortar attacks. Well artillery doesn’t see the results of their actions. It’s really more intimate for us, because we see everything.”

Towards the end of his stint as a drone operator he was approached by his commanding officer. He presented him with a certificate tallying the numbers of people who had died as a result of his work: 1626. He was supposed to treasure this, feel good about it -

“I would’ve been happy if they never even showed me the piece of paper. I’ve seen American soldiers die, innocent people die, and insurgents die. And it’s not pretty. It’s not something that I want to have – this diploma.”

What he does have, to go with the diploma are sleeplessness, bouts of unexplained anger and binge drinking episodes – classic PTSD symptoms.

The real victims of the ever-expanding US drone operations are, of course, the innocents killed and recently disclosed classified CIA evidence underlines their number is large. And the Pentagon recognises that their “target-selection” is seriously remiss in several respects. The wider effect of all this in constantly producing visceral hatred of the west in these parts of the world is another major unquantifiable effect – but as we see, there are problems right back home in the USA.

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It is a bastion of the English judicial system that when a person is charged with an indictable (serious) offence which will be heard at a crown court, the charges are formally read out to the defendant in the magistrates’ court and arrangements as to bail applications and the next hearing are formalised and decided upon.

The committal hearing commits the case to the higher, crown court. So these are short affairs, the defendant mostly speaking only to confirm their name and address and brief legal applications are made.

That, usually, is that.

It was clear from the off this would be no usual committal hearing.

For a start the police helicopter overhead and the crush barriers out side the front of the court spoke of heightened security and media interest.

The hearing itself took place more than an hour later than scheduled before Emma Arbuthnot, deputy chief magistrate at Westminster Magistrates’ Court.

With everyone finally in place, Michael Adebolajo was shepherded into court between two security officials behind the glass-screened dock which can clearly accommodate up to perhaps a dozen defendants at any one time.

Emma Arbuthnot was low-key, conversational in her approach but things went off- piste almost from the off.

Almost immediately Mr Adebolajo objected to having to stand up when the magistrate entered the court. He made plain his issue over this, standing to ask why it was necessary, as it was briefly but clearly explained.

With a left arm heavily bandaged and possibly in plaster, and his right arm gripping the Koran, a supporter in the public gallery tried and eventually succeeded in making eye-contact with him, whereupon the defendant began blowing a series of kisses which he would continue to do throughout the proceedings from time to time.

He told the magistrate that he wished now to be known as Mujahid Abu Hamza and the magistrate duly addressed him by that name in all subsequent exchanges.

The charges were read that, on May 22nd 2013 he murdered Drummer Lee Rigby and that he also attempted to murder two police officers identified only as E48 and D49 and that he was in possession of a 9.4mm KNIL model 91 revolver with which he was unthreatening unlawful violence.

At this point a second interruption as Mr Adebolajo suddenly stood to say:

“I’ve not heard the charges put to me like this before.”

The magistrate said to him in reply to this:

” It is how we do it.”

Arrangements were confirmed for his appearance at the Central Criminal Court in London otherwise known as The Old Bailey, on 28 June.

As proceedings drew to a close he pointed to the ceiling to indicate there no god but Allah and then blew more kisses to a supporter in the gallery who was praying by this stage and he said:

“I am just a man – I want to alleviate the pain.”

With that the business was concluded and he was led away to the waiting blue prisoner-transport vehicle with two police-car escort and helicopter suveillance aboce in the clear early-summer skies over London.

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The Iraq war saw the biggest-ever protest in the history of London – the mother of all focus groups, you might say. We know from opinion polls before during and after the war that it was a historically unpopular enterprise for the Brits.

Yet now comes a poll about perceptions of the war which, notwithstanding the above, shows public perception wildly at odds with reality.

By common consent the war cost at the very, very least, 100,000 Iraqi lives and the figure may well be several times that.

Yet the poll, by ComRes shows the following in establishing public perceptions of the Iraqi death toll since the invasion of Iraq in 2003:

• Two-thirds (66 per cent) of the public estimate that 20,000 or fewer civilians and combatants have died as a consequence of the war in Iraq since 2003.
• One in 10 (10 per cent) think that between 100,000 and 500,000 have died and one in 20 (6 per cent) think that more than 500,000 have died.
• According to public estimates, the mean number of deaths in Iraq since the invasion is 189,530.
• Women in Britain are more likely to underestimate the number of deaths in Iraq since the invasion than men. Half (53 per cent) of women think 5,000 or fewer deaths have occurred since the invasion compared to one-third (35 per cent) of men.

Perhaps that last figure is the most startling – a majority of women and more than a third of men polled say fewer than 5,000 deaths have occurred. That figure is so staggeringly, mind-blowingly at odds with reality as to leave a journalist who worked long and hard to bring home the reality of war, speechless.

If we believe the results, then war-makers in government will take great comfort, as will the generals who work so hard to peddle the lie of bloodless warfare, with all the cockpit video propaganda video news releases and talk of “collateral damage” instead of “dead children”.

Equally – questions for us on the media that after so much time, effort and money, the public perception of bloodshed remains stubbornly, wildly, wrong.

ComRes interviewed2021 British adults online between 24 and 27 May 2013. Data were weighted to be representative of all GB adults aged 18+. ComRes is a member of the British Polling Council.

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First came confirmation that the interview was on. We flew to the Qatari city of Doha.

And waited…And waited…Then we were given a day, then two hours notice – a location.

That is an area of the city and a time. No address – just initial directions to the general area.

We proceeded junction to junction; roundabout to roundabout, stopping to receive new directions at each way point.

A Mossad injection 15 years ago very nearly killed the man we were going to see. Three years ago another top Hamas official was assassinated in a Dubai hotel room by a group of Mossad agents dressed up as tennis-playing tourists on faked passports – including British ones.

So the Palestinian group Hamas, do not take chances. Elected to power in Gaza over, yet deemed “a terrorist organisation” by the US and the EU, Hamas remains committed to denying Israel’s right to exist and resisting Israel by force of arms.

We arrived at a villa after several calls for the next stage of directions. “So who owns this place then?”

“It is owned by a man,” came the reply from the genial man in charge of welcoming us to this safe house.

Several times the producer would ask the question, several times, exactly the same smiling reply. We hand in our mobile phones. We walk through an airport-style scanner. The film equipment is carefully, intimately, searched. Then tea, cakes, sweets and we wait.

Finally, the courtyard doors open again and Khaled Meshaal emerges from a 4×4 with guards. The boss of Hamas is with us.

Neatly trimmed beard, soft-spoken with a ready smile, careful to greet all our team and both cameramen with handshakes. Scrupulous not to neglect or ignore anybody in the room. The guards take up postions by the door and outside. Open- necked shirt, neat, dark jacket: the technocrat, fixer, pragmatist, very much intended look.

I start with Syria.

Hamas left Damascus in January last year, for Doha. Goodbye to his longtime friend and ally President Bashar al-Assad: “The military approach is wrong. It makes the crisis worse. It doesn’t solve anything,” he explains, “it only makes it more complicated. What we are witnessing today proves our advice was right.”

So advice to Assad to seek a political solution when it looked feasible. And now Hamas denies the accusations that it is supporting rebel Syrian groups like the Free Syrian Army.

“We do not interfere in Syrian internal affairs nor do we interfere in the Syrian Crisis and this is our policy towards the Arab Spring and all other Arab and non-Arab countries in the world,” he said.

“So when the British government wants to arm Syrian rebels they’re making a mistake?” I ask.

“Hamas policy is against any foreign intervention in our countries.This is our general principle. But at the same time we support the rights of people to freedom, democracy and reform and we are against the use of force and violence, massacres, and military options against them. We support people to win their rights, but we are against foreign intervention.

“The international community has been talking about this for months and I think there is a kind of deception going on, and that there is a hidden agenda from many international parties to prolong the Syrian crisis and destroy Syria. These parties do not want to see recovery for Syria…they use positive slogans but in reality their attitude identifies with the Israeli agenda of destroying Syria, more death, and prolonging the Syrian crisis.”

I ask: “In moving to Doha you are sending a clear message to Assad that he should go?”

“No no, this is not what we meant. We, as the leadership of Hamas, had to leave Damascus the moment we felt that our efforts to convince the Syrian leadership to choose a solution other than the military one failed. On the other hand, the Syrian leadership was not happy with Hamas’ political stance and also, I felt they wanted to put pressure or demand on us to stand by the official Syrian position and support the leadership in their military solution to the Syrian issue … this is why we did not feel then I could stay, so we left – circumstances forced itself on us, but if Assad goes or stays, that’s up to the Syrian people not to us,” is the reply.

“But you moved to Qatar,” I say, “which more than any other supports the rebels in Syria. You’ve betrayed a great friend in Bashar al-Assad and betrayed Iran.”

“I explained to you why we left and this not a betrayal of any one We did not mean to anger any party by our political position, we just stuck to our principles.”

But it’s clear the move has been difficult. Relations with Syria are strained to put it mildly. Qatar has long been the key sponsor of the uprising in Syria. The Emir recently visited Gaza, and as we speak Qatari money is rebuilding the ruins of Israeli bombing back in Gaza.

And then Israel itself.

Bizarrely Hamas and Israel may even find themselves close to being on the same side over Syria. Israel bombs, Hamas leaves Damascus and seeks refuge in the coutry supporting the rebels. How deep is the rift with Assad? If profound, then on the basis that my enemy’s enemy is my friend Hamas could be uncomfortably close to The Zionist Entity as they would have it:

“If you use this kind of description,” says Mr Meshal, “how can you explain the Israeli assault against us in Gaza months ago?

“The aggression that killed our great leader Ahmad Al-Jaabary after we left Syria. Israel looks after its own interest and has its own policy of assault no matter which country it’s assaulting, if it’s Lebanon or Syria or any other country in the World. Israel is our enemy.”

So does Hamas continue with its position of stating that Israel clearly exists de facto but has no legitimacy to exist in law?

“I am surprised that the world keeps concentrating on the recognition of Israel and its right to exist, while it is an existing state on the ground, occupying the land and expelling its people while practising all manner of killings, aggression and terror. In all civil and religious laws in the world, there is no legitimacy to any one who establishes themselves by means of violation and the seizure of land and the rights of others. Does the international community accept this equation?”

“So yes or no? Does Israel have the right to exist Mr Meshal?”

“You ask your question your way, so let me answer you in my way. I’m telling you, we are the real owners of the land. We have the right to live freely without occupation, settlements, aggression, prisons and Jewishisation of the land.The law I believe in and I think it’s the same for every human being in the world, not only the Arabs and all Muslims is that there is no legitimacy or future for occupation or aggression.”

I wondered if there were any circumstances in which he could conceive of shaking hands with the Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu?

“Although the question is legitimate, how can I have peace with a killer like Netanyahu. Think logically. I am the Palestinian victim, my land is occupied, and my people are displaced. Netanyahu is waging war against my own people, and denies my rights, so why would the world expect me to shake his hand in the future? There was a historical handshake between Rabin and Arafat, God bless his soul, in the White House Garden when they signed Camp David Agreement, but what was the result? This hand, Arafat’s, the hand that shook Rabin’s hand was poisoned and killed by Rabin’s followers after that.”

He accuses Israel of somehow relishing concessions from Arabs in the Middle East for their own sake and here the historical self-image of Hamas is tellingly revealed.

“It’s a kind of sadism because it enjoys and relishes the Arab concessions. This is why the only answer to this situation is to take a rigid stance.

“You are in Britain and you are a respectable TV station. Why are the British proud of Churchill when he was dealing with Nazism when they occupied France and bombed Britain? Why did De Gaulle call for resistance to the German occupation of France from London? Why did he become a hero instead being criticised because of his lack of flexibility?”

With that, he takes his leave in a leisurely fashion. There are more talks with others in side the house before the guard shepherd him into the 4×4 and he leaves the house “owned by a man” and we can now retrieve our mobile phones and, after a suitable time has elapsed, leave the villa as well.

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Channel 4 News has seen a copy of the Letter Before Action now sent from lawyers acting for Craig Whyte, to Rangers FC and key shareholders involved with the club.

Of course they insist they are absolutely serious and this matter is heading to court if the Principals don’t get what they want from Rangers, Charles Green and Imran Ahmad (who remain major shareholders though physically departed from Ibrox).

There are 333 pages of evidence. There are company forms; agreements; text messages; emails and tape-recordings supplied as evidence.

The case they plead is essentially that Craig Whyte and his associate Aidan Earley were deprived of their legitimate interest in the Rangers that arose from the ashes of Administration and Liquidation.

Specifically that Craig Whyte is due £137,000 and “an opportunity to redeem his reputation by achieving a turnaround success at Rangers Football Club.”

And this not happening is deemed to have “…hindered his ability to conduct business activities in Scotland and/or elsewhere.”

This is an interesting claim which will raise some eyebrows since it rests upon Craig Whyte being keen to be involved in Scottish football from which he’d been banned by the SFA just prior to his Rescue Plan for Rangers unfolding.

But the Principals – as Craig Whyte and Aidan Earley are referred to – believed that if a new Rangers company was “quoted on a public market” then the SFA ban could be got around.

Initially the whole Rescue Plan relied on Craig Whyte not being a public part of it at all:

“The Principals also decided that it was desirable that Mr Whyte should not be seen as directly involved in any bid. This was because Mr Whyte was unpopular with the Rangers fans…The Principals concluded it would be necessary to find someone to front the transaction for them.”

And that man – they claim – was Charles Green. Mr Green of course vehemently denies it.

The documentation lays out in great detail how this situation and what followed arose. Hotel meetings in London laboriously listed and detailed right down to tape recordings, texts and emails.

And how they were keen to bring in others to pump investment into Rangers:

“The Principals introduced Jim Park as a consultant in order to introduce Mike Ashley, owner of Newcastle United, who became both a key investor and developer of the RFC retail arm…”

And it all boils to this, from Craig Whyte’s lawyers:

“Our clients have instructed us to issue court proceedings on their behalf against the following Defendants:
- Mr Ahmad and Mr Green for breach of contract and unjust enrichment
- Mr Ahmad, Mr Stockbridge and Mr Green for conspiracy and deceit
- Mr Ahmad and Mr Stockbridge for dishonest assistance
- Mr Green for breach of trust, breach of fiduciary duty and for indemnity and/or
restitution and/or an account of gains under s195 Companies Act 2006
- RFCL for knowing receipt, unjust enrichment, indemnity and/or restitution and/or an account of gains under s195 Companies Act 2006 and for a declaration that it holds property on trust for Sevco 5088
- Zeus for, inter alia, dishonest assistance, conspiracy and deceit
- Rangers International for unjust enrichment, knowing receipt and a declaration that it hold any shares registered or to be registered in its name in Sevco 5088 on trust for the Principals”

Channel 4 News is seeking a response from Mr Ahmad, Mr Green, Mr Stockbridge, Zeus Capital and RFC.

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Not a good day to be travelling what with the BA engine fire at Heathrow and now this. The Pakistan International Airline (PIA) flight inbound from Lahore to Manchester was over northern England and thus well into descent.

At which point the captain called an emergency code system resulting in two RAF Typhoon jets scrambling for emergency escort.

In the UK that means escort for landing at Stansted in Essex, the UK designated airport for emergencies like this or hijacks – the last being the lenghty hijack of an Ariana jet several years ago.

The Typhoons are deployed to get eyes on the aircraft mid-air and begin the escort process to ground, they’re based Coningsby in Lincolnshire.

More from Channel 4 News: London Bridge reopens after day of transport alerts

A passenger said that two other male passengers on PK709 threatened to blow up the plane and later said they were joking. That is not confirmed by the police.

There are other unconfirmed reports that the men attempted to enter the cockpit using threatening language.

Essex police say two men aged 31 and 40 have been arrested, suspected of endangering an aircraft.

Passengers are currently enjoying traditional Essex hospitality before onward transport to Manchester.

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The last time people were killed on British streets for political reasons it was 7/7. We know why that happened because the bombers left videos to explain.

Spool on to yesterday and the alleged attackers capitalised on the new world where almost everyone’s a paparazzi, if not a film-crew.

No need for the pre-prepared video tape – simply wander up to the nearest smartphone and start talking, meat-cleaver in hand.

The need to explain, to grandstand, isn’t new, though the brazen means is, as is the need in this case to simply stand by the body of the soldier until the police turn up.

The sheer insouciance of the suspected attackers, bloodstained, addressing the smartphone-witness, the blood, the body in the road – images which will haunt the public consciousness for a long time to come.

Of course the bloody methodology is not new either. The al-Qaeda reversion to medieval levels of hatchet brutality married to this century’s video technology has a brutal and well-established pedigree from Pakistan to Iraq via Afghanistan.

Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh was the man who cut Daniel Pearl’s head off in Pakistan. He was from a leafy street in Wanstead on the outskirts of London – his parents, who still run a clothing business in the east end – even sent him to the local private school, Forest.

The irony is, such young men are complaining at the British army, when that institution is out of Iraq and soon out of Afghanistan at the end of next year.

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