WThe 6th Airborne Division in Palestine was initially posted to the region as the Imperial Strategic Reserve. It was envisioned as a mobile peace keeping force, positioned to be able to respond quickly to any area of the British Empire. In fact the division became involved in an internal security role between 1945 and 1948.
WThe Army Council was the supreme administering body of the British Army from its creation in 1904 until it was reconstituted as the Army Board in 1964.
WThe Bachelor's Walk massacre occurred in Dublin, on 26 July 1914, when a column of troops of the King's Own Scottish Borderers were accosted by a crowd on Bachelor's Walk following the Howth gun-running operation. After some baiting, the troops attacked “hostile but unarmed” protesters with rifle fire and bayonets - resulting in the deaths of four civilians and injuries to in excess of 30 more.
WThe Battle of George Square was a violent confrontation in Glasgow, Scotland between Glasgow City Police and striking Glasgow workers, centred around George Square. The 'battle', also known as "Bloody Friday" or "Black Friday", took place on Friday 31 January 1919, 82 days after the end of the First World War. During the riot, the Sheriff of Lanarkshire called for military aid, and British troops, supported by six tanks, were moved to key points in Glasgow. The strike leaders were arrested for inciting the riot. Although it is often stated that there were no fatalities, one police constable died several months later from injuries received during the rioting.
WThe FV4601 MBT-80 was a British experimental third-generation main battle tank, designed in the late 1970s to replace the Chieftain tank. It was eventually cancelled in favour of the Challenger 1, itself an evolution of the Chieftain design.
WThe Haldane Reforms were a series of far-ranging reforms of the British Army made from 1906 to 1912, and named after the Secretary of State for War, Richard Burdon Haldane. They were the first major reforms since the "Childers Reforms" of the early 1880s, and were made in the light of lessons newly learned in the Second Boer War.
WThe history of the Irish Guards as an infantry regiment of the British Army dates from the Regiment's formation in 1900. The Irish Guards have an over one hundred year-long history during which the regiment have served with distinction in almost all of the United Kingdom's conflicts throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries ranging from the First World War to the War in Afghanistan.
WThe Home Service Force was a Home Guard type force established in the United Kingdom in 1982. Each HSF unit was placed with either a Regular Army or Territorial Army regiment or battalion for administrative purposes and given that formation’s title, cap badge and recruited from volunteers aged 18–60 with previous British forces experience. It was introduced to guard key points and installations likely to be the target of enemy special forces and saboteurs, so releasing other units for mobile defence roles. It was stood down in 1992.
WThe Iranian Embassy siege took place from 30 April to 5 May 1980, after a group of six armed men stormed the Iranian embassy on Prince's Gate in South Kensington, London. The gunmen, Iranian Arabs campaigning for sovereignty of Khuzestan Province, took 26 people hostage, including embassy staff, several visitors, and a police officer who had been guarding the embassy. They demanded the release of prisoners in Khuzestan and their own safe passage out of the United Kingdom. The British government quickly decided that safe passage would not be granted and a siege ensued. Subsequently, police negotiators secured the release of five hostages in exchange for minor concessions, such as the broadcasting of the hostage-takers' demands on British television. A 2014 academic source confirms that the attackers were "recruited and trained" by the government of Iraq.
WThis is a list of British Regular Army regiments after the Army restructuring caused by the 1957 Defence White Paper: many regiments were amalgamated between 1958-60. Further cuts and amalgamations took place in the 1960s and early 1970s.
WThe following is a list of units transferred to the Territorial Force on 1 April 1908, or raised in that year under the terms of the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907, and the associations by which they were administered. The County Association of Rutland did not have charge of any units, but did provide facilities for sub-units of the Leicestershire Yeomanry and the 5th Battalion Leicestershire Regiment. A number of units, particularly those attached to the Royal Garrison Artillery and Royal Engineers, had their titles altered again in 1910.
WThe Llanelli riots of 1911 were a series of events precipitated by the National Railway Strike of 1911. Mass picketing action at Llanelli railway station was brutally suppressed by the police, resulting in the deaths of two men, shot dead by troops of the Worcestershire Regiment. Rioting followed and magistrates' homes were attacked and railway trucks were set on fire, resulting in an explosion which killed a further four people.
WThe Malleson mission was a military action by a small autonomous force of British troops, led by General Wilfrid Malleson, operating against Bolshevik forces over large distances in Transcaspia between 1918 and 1919.
WThe Osnabrück mortar attack was an improvised mortar attack carried out by a Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) unit based in mainland Europe on 28 June 1996 against the British Army's Quebec Barracks at Osnabrück Garrison near Osnabrück, Germany.
WThe Reserve Forces Act 1937 was an Act of Parliament of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It allowed "Class A" British Army reservists to be called up for active service during their first five years after leaving the Army.
WThe Sergeants affair was an incident that took place in Mandate Palestine in July 1947 during Jewish insurgency in Palestine, in which the Jewish underground group Irgun kidnapped two British Army Intelligence Corps NCOs, Sergeant Clifford Martin and Sergeant Mervyn Paice and threatened to hang them if the death sentences passed on three Irgun militants: Avshalom Haviv, Meir Nakar, and Yaakov Weiss, were carried out. The three had been captured by the British during the Acre Prison break, tried, and convicted on charges of illegal possession of arms, and with 'intent to kill or cause other harm to a large number of people'. When the three men were executed by hanging, the Irgun killed the two sergeants and hanged their booby-trapped bodies in a eucalyptus grove near Netanya. When the bodies were found, the booby trap injured a British officer as they were cut down. This act was widely condemned in both Palestine and the UK. After hearing of the deaths, some British troops and policemen attacked Jews in Tel Aviv, killing five and injuring others. The killings also sparked off rioting in some British cities.
WShivering Sands Army Fort [U7] was a Maunsell army fort built near the Thames estuary for anti-aircraft defence. It is made up of several once interconnected towers north of Herne Bay and is 14.8 km from the nearest land. They can be viewed from Shoeburyness East Beach on clear days. The Shivering Sands fort was the last of the Thames estuary forts to be constructed, and was grounded between 18 September and 13 December 1943.
WThe Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed the auxiliary forces of the British Army by transferring existing Volunteer and Yeomanry units into a new Territorial Force (TF); and disbanding the Militia to form a new Special Reserve of the Regular Army. This reorganisation formed a major part of the Haldane Reforms, named after the creator of the Act, Richard Haldane.
WThe Territorial Army and Militia Act 1921 was an Act of Parliament of the Parliament of the United Kingdom affecting the reserves of the British Army It modified the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907, renaming the existing Territorial Force as the "Territorial Army" and the Special Reserve as the "Militia", and updated or repealed a number of outdated regulations.