Page 134 - Demo

134%u000b%u0006%u0001%u0004%u0008$)%u0006%u0004%u000c%u000c%u0009%u0007%u0004%u0018%u0006%u001a%u0001%u000c%u0004%u000c%u00063%u0001%u000f%u0010%u0018%u0006%u0008%u00073%u000b%u0007%u00103%u0006%u0008%u0001%u0009%u000c%u0006%u0004%u0015%%u0006%u0009-%%u0017%u0006ffi%u0006%u000c%u0006#%u0015%u0016*%u0017%%u0013.%u0006Commissioned into the RAF Regiment in 1956, Mickey Witherow%u2019s service included stints in Aden, the Gulf, Libya, Belize, Northern Ireland and Germany. He commanded No 26 Sqn, No 3 Wg, the Regiment Depot at Catterick and in 1963 he was the first Regiment officer to attend the RCDS; staff appointments included stints at both Ramstein and Rheindahlen, and as Director of Personnel (Ground) and Director RAF Regiment. After leaving the RAF in 1990 he joined Coutts Consulting Group, retiring as its Director of Information Technology in 2001. %u0007%u0010%u0001%u0018%u000f%u0009%u0007%u0010 In 1994 our Society%u2019s seminar on the RAF Regiment (Journal No 15) included the RAF%u2019s locally8raised Associated Overseas Ground Forces, the Iraq and Aden Protectorate Levies and the RAF Regiment (Malaya). However today I propose to go a little deeper into their history and their post8war operations under RAF Regiment command. These courageous, predominantly Moslem, forces receive scant (and sometimes pejorative) mention in published history and when recognition is occasionally given, to the Aden Protectorate Levies particularly, it usually relates to the ten years from 195781967 when they were controlled by the British Army. %u000b%u0006%u0001%u0003%u0004%u0005%u0006%u0004%u0007%u0001%u0006%u0008%u0001%u0009%u0006%u0005%u001a%u0007%u000c%u0006F%u0007%u0001%u0004AG%u0006 The new Kingdom of Iraq was mandated by the League of Nations to British imperial protection from 1919. Apart from its own fledgling Army and British garrison troops, Iraq had the %u2018Muntific Horse%u2019 a militia, raised in 1915 as a bodyguard for itinerant Ottoman Empire Magistrates and Political Officers. In 1919 this unit was reconstituted as %u2018The Iraq Levies%u2019 under British Army officers and NCOs. Their establishment was for 1,250 officers and men. In 1922, the Levies, with their British Army element, were assigned to the local command