York's army commander Brigadier Greville Bibby is to retire after a glittering 34 year career. He spoke to STEPHEN LEWIS.

THIRTY three years ago a young, freshly-minted second lieutenant in the Grenadier Guards was posted to Northern Ireland.

Greville Bibby had wanted to be a guardsman since the age of four. "My father was in the Grenadiers," he says.

He entered Sandhurst straight from school in 1980 and passed out a year later with the coveted Sword of Honour for that year's top cadet.

Yet he admits that when, in 1983, he found himself in Crossmaglen, South Armagh, as a young lieutenant responsible for more than 20 men, it was terrifying.

It was the height of the Troubles. He and his men would be on patrol for 18 hours at a time: and at any moment they thought they could be blown up, or shot at on a street corner or from behind a hedgerow or a car.

Under those conditions, all you could do was trust in your training. Men developed almost a sense of fatalism, he says. "It was this feeling that, if you conducted yourself in the way that you had been trained, then if you were going to get shot at or blown up there was nothing you could do about it."

That was their main defence against the fear, he says. "Otherwise, you would never have gone out on patrol."

More than three decades later, that green young lieutenant is preparing to retire with the rank of Brigadier after a glittering army career which has seen him serve in Germany, the First Gulf War and Afghanistan, where he was deputy commander of the British task force in Helmand.

For the last four years he has been commander of 15 (North East) Brigade, headquartered at Imphal Barracks - making him York's most senior army commander.

He has a standard answer when asked if he has enjoyed life in the army.

"I always say I've enjoyed every single day...apart from probably a handful of days which I haven't," he says.

The days he didn't enjoy, naturally enough, were the days when something bad happened - such as when a friend was killed.

One such friend was Lt Colonel Rupert Thorneloe, commanding officer of the 1st Battalion Welsh Guards, killed in Afghanistan in 2009.

In June that year, Brig Bibby - then a Colonel - and Lt Col Thorneloe had watched the trooping of the colour together.

Col Thorneloe was killed a few days later on July 1. "He was blown up by an IUD under his vehicle," says the Brigadier.

Another friend that he lost in Afghanistan was Major Sean Birchall, who was in command of a company of Welsh Guards.

As deputy commander of the British task force, Col Bibby had a 'nice bedroom'.

In early June 2009 he was away from base for a week, so lent his bedroom to the 33-year-old major.

"When I came back, the bedroom was a little untidy. I told a soldier I wanted to see him (the major) and asked where he was. 'On patrol sir' came the answer.

"I said I wanted to see him when he came back. Then 45 minutes later we learned he had been killed."

The prospect of death is part and parcel of life in the army, of course. During the First Gulf War in 1991, Brigadier Bibby was a captain, the second in command of a unit of Grenadier Guards in Warrior armed vehicles.

What he mainly remembers is the endless waiting, in the deserts of Kuwait, for the ground offensive to begin.

"We'd be listening to aeroplanes going over every night, listening to the bombing raids on Iraq night after night for three weeks.

"We were going to go in in our Warriors across the desert, but three weeks was a long time to think about it," he says.

There were no mobile phones in those days, so the soldiers waiting on the ground probably knew less about what was going on than their loves ones back home. "We felt very alone and very frightened."

At one point a senior officer came around and instructed everyone to write a letter home in case they were killed. "That was something I had never done before," the Brigadier says. "These things don't happen to normal human beings. Until it happens to you, you can't imagine how that affects you."

What compensates the serving soldier for all this - for the fear, the tedium, the constant risk of death - is the incredible camaraderie in the army, he says.

When you've risked your lives together you develop an incredibly strong bond. "I've found nothing like it to bring people together. That's why I have loved about 99.9 per cent of my time in the army, every day working with such wonderful people. That's what makes it the organisation it is."

The brigade he has commanded for the last four years - 15 (North East) Brigade, based at Imphal - officially ceased to exist at the end of November, when it merged with Catterick-based 4 Brigade in the latest army re-organisation.

It was what was known as a 'regional brigade' - which meant it was responsible for training army reserve units and army cadets in a from Sheffield in the south to Berwick-upon-Tweed in the north.

As Brigadier he had six reserve units (about 2,500 men) under his command, as well as 6,500 army cadets.

He was also responsible for building connections with local communities and businesses across the region - a role that saw him one moment hobnobbing with the Lord Mayor of York, the next visiting a Persimmon building site in Durham.

There was a very good reason for the Persimmon visit, he says.

"Persimmon have made an undertaking to take army leavers, put them through apprenticeships, and pay them from day one, with a view to offering longer-term employment."

Now that 15 (NE) Brigade has merged with 4 Brigade, the brigade HQ has moved to Catterick.

Of the Brigadier's 80-odd headquarters staff in York, many will relocate to Catterick. Others have joined a redeployment pool, awaiting a posting elsewhere, while some will be made redundant.

He himself, at the age of 54, has opted to retire. He'd have had to leave the army anyway at 55, he says.

Married with three children at university, he leaves York at the end of the year, and hopes to set up a business consultancy.

He'll miss the men and women he's worked with at 15 (North East) Brigade, he admits - and he'll miss the brigade's merlin badge.

But for York itself, it is actually good news.

From next July, Imphal will be the headquarters of the army's 1st (UK) Division. That will mean a bigger headquarters staff at Imphal -and the return of a Major General to York for the first time since the 2nd Division moved its HQ to Edinburgh in March 2000.

"York's military standing will be uplifted in every respect," he says.

 

‘Early retirement is not due to cover-up’

YORK’S outgoing army commander says he is NOT retiring early because of allegations that he covered up the bullying of a triple-amputee war hero.

Brigadier Bibby, who leaves the army next year after a distinguished 34-year career, said he had been completely misrepresented in a national newspaper article which reported allegations that an army corporal who had lost both legs and an arm in Afghanistan had been bullied by a regimental sergeant major (RSM).

The newspaper reported that Brig Bibby had been appointed to review the allegations of bullying, had cleared the RSM, and branded the witnesses who supported the corporal liars.

His findings were later quashed and the Brigadier subsequently resigned amid claims he “covered up the bullying”, the newspaper reported.

But Brig Bibby said the newspaper completely misrepresented the part he had played in the investigation.

He had not investigated the allegations of bullying, but instead had reviewed completely separate claims that there had been a breakdown of trust between the RSM and people in his office.

“This was nothing to do with bullying,” Brig Bibby said.

“The allegation is that I resigned over allegations of a cover up. I have not. The part I played has been completely misrepresented and had absolutely nothing to do with a separate bulling allegation.”

Brig Bibby, who is 54 and would have had to leave the army at 55 anyway, said he had taken the decision to retire at the end of the year because 15 NE Brigade, which he has commanded for four years, had merged with Catterick-based 4 Brigade as part of the army’s restructuring.

“It seemed a good time to leave,” he said.

 

Budget will shrink

Between 2011 and 2013, UK defence spending fell faster than any other area of Government expenditure, according to the Office for National Statistics.

And with defence spending not ring-fenced, and more austerity predicted after the next election, the defence budget is likely to shrink further.

The army’s permanent fighting force has already been cut from 102,000 to 80,000, with increased reliance on reserves to make up the shortfall.

So is the British Army still up to the job in the 21st century?

Brigadier Bibby believes so. “It is not about size, it is about who we are,” he says. “We are still a hugely respected armed force internationally. It is no coincidence that every US or NATO HQ has a senior British army officer embedded within it.

“The ‘new army’, the Army 2020, will be smaller, a regular army of about 82,000 and reserves of 30,000. That is still a force of 112,000, and it will be properly resourced and trained.”