‘We want Tony Blair to bring the troops out – not in six months but now, to prevent more loss of life’, Rose Gentle, whose son Gordon died in Iraq, told News Line yesterday.
Rose was responding to the news that the 100th British soldier had been killed in Iraq that morning.
She added: ‘I’m actually quite angry about it, another young boy’s life has been lost, another family, their lives have been ruined.
‘Tony Blair sent his son away to work in the White House. Why doesn’t he put a uniform on his son and send him out to Iraq?
‘We think now Tony Blair will have to find a way to bring these boys out, instead of sitting in London now with his cronies from America, planning for other boys’ lives to be lost.
‘We’ve lost a hundred, a hundred’s enough!’
She added: ‘I blame the government for these deaths, and the deaths of thousands of Iraqis.
‘We all know when the boys went into the army they could get injured or killed – but they didn’t expect to go to war for a cause based on lies from the government.
‘The boys out there want to go home and they are asking people who want the troops withdrawn not to give up and support the Military Families Against the War.
‘Six more months in Iraq could be six more lives.’
The 100th UK forces fatality since the 2003 invasion was a soldier from the 7th Armoured Brigade. He was killed by a roadside bomb at approximately 8.34am local time in Um Qasr, Basra Province.
Three other soldiers were injured, one seriously, in the same incident and are receiving medical treatment at Shaibah medical facility.
Yesterday’s death followed that of Lance Corporal Allan Douglas, 22, who was killed by small arms fire in Maysan province on Monday.
His mother, Diane Douglas, said her son had been back to his Aberdeen home over Christmas and had not wanted to return to Iraq.
She added that it was a ‘damn disgrace’ that young lads were being killed in Iraq, adding: ‘I don’t think Tony Blair should have put any young kids out there.’
The news broke of the 100th British death as Prime Minister Blair was heading off to a two-day conference in London on ‘stability’ in Afghanistan, after deciding last week to send another 3,500 British troops to the dangerous Helmand province.
Downing Street claimed that Blair was ‘deeply saddened’ by the latest deaths, but he believed the ‘struggle for democracy’ in Iraq had to be continued ‘because we are making progress’.
Reg Keys, whose son was also killed in Iraq, referred to the anger that boiled over after British tanks were used to bust two SAS troops out of an Iraqi jail.
Keys said: ‘When I saw those tanks on fire in Basra I knew the balance had tipped. We are not wanted there, British troops are exacerbating hostilities. The sooner we get out the better.’
He added: ‘These lads were sent to Iraq on a falsehood. The inspectors said there were no weapons of mass destruction.’
Over 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed by occupying forces and some 230 British troops have been injured by resistance action since the war was launched on Iraq in 2003.
