BRIZE NORTON AIR BASE, UK – RAF Brize Norton was left red-faced after Palestine Action activists broke into the base and damaged military hardware—including one of the Ministry of Defence’s last remaining fully functional staplers.

Defence Editor: Doug Trench

The incident has sparked an internal row, with critics pointing fingers at the station’s Commander, Wing Commander Louise Henton, accusing her of creating a “paperclip culture of ethical indecision.”

Henton, a former career Personnel (Support) Officer with a sterling administrative record, is now being held responsible in some circles for what one defence commentator described as a “catastrophic outbreak of clipboard warfare.” Her inability to fly a plane, or indeed even reverse a truck, has been highlighted as emblematic of what some allege is the RAF’s declining “combat-first” mindset.

RAF Base

Fuel has been added to the bonfire of Henton’s legacy by resurfaced academic work: her award-winning thesis on human rights abuses by Western forces at Abu Ghraib and in the death of Baha Mousa. The thesis, written during her time at the Advanced Command and Staff College, boldly questioned the “bad apple” defence and dared to suggest that military culture itself might be to blame for systematic abuse.

Blue sky thinking

“She was more concerned about moral erosion than airfield perimeter fencing,” one anonymous squadron leader muttered over a Ginsters pasty. “You don’t stop saboteurs with Kantian ethics and a Masters from King’s.”

While the MoD has neither confirmed nor denied whether any aircraft were harmed during the protest, a confidential source reports the only real casualty was “a Tornado display model and several officers’ egos.”

DEI hire Henton declined to comment, though sources say she has submitted a strongly worded memo—on recycled paper.

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