The extent of American hypocrisy is truly galling. There are some other islands belonging to Britain about which the Obama White House has nothing to say. Perhaps Mrs Clinton would like the British government to sit down with the former residents of Diego Garcia, now living in squalor in Mauritius? Given that the US uses the atoll as a military base, housing B2s and refueling extraordinary renditions, this seems unlikely.

Diego Garcia is a stain on Britain and America; the Falklands aren’t. Given this irrefutable fact, the White House has no right weighing-in on anything flying a Union Jack.

But still, possession is 9/10 of the law and 9/10 of the other tenth comes from winning a war to repel an illegal invasion of said possession. I’m with Hugo Rifkind:

Honestly, where do you people get off calling us colonialists? Generally speaking, we gave our empire back. You moved to yours, and then basically killed everybody. Forgive me, but I just don’t see how this puts you in a morally superior position.

Another thing: I’ve long thought that the Brits would sour on Obama. Well, America’s refusal to immediately put the smack on Buenos Aires over this is another reminder that Mr. Obama is not on “our side.” Nothing new there, I suppose. After all, back in 1982, the US took a lot of persuading to allow British jets to use its runway on Ascension Island.

Ascension Island is British.

CNN was quite different. Wolf Blitzer announced the news and then hosted a couple of Talking Head’s whose view of Knox was of an innocent girl, stitched-up by dodgy, third world Italian justice. We learned that the case against her was “preposterous,” “shaky,” “trumped-up,” and that the whole trial was a sham.

I have no idea whether Knox is guilty but I am certain that had Knox been British and Kercher American, the reporting in England would have been similar (so much for media non-bias). Watch what happens if the US puts Gary McKinnon — the autistic British computer hacker — away for the threatened 60 years (cf. Knox’s 26). American justice!

Football is rotten. Not just bent, not just greedy. Rotten, as in an infestation of maggots munching their wormy way through the once beautiful game.

The Thierry Henry incident confirms it. It’s not really about Henry — professional athletes will always seek competitive advantage, some will cheat.

No, I blame FIFA. Talk about asleep at the wheel. As custodians of the game they must take immediate and decisive action to exile the cheaters. The remedy is easy:

1. Video panels to assess every high level game, identify divers and other cheats, and serve offenders with lengthy bans.

2. Video replay. Give managers two challenges per game.

Until this happens, football will further descend into pantomime.

Anyway, I just watched Beck talk to a psychiatrist — A PSYCHIATRIST — about Obama’s initial response to the the Ft. Hood shootings. Apparently, he did not show enough emotion. (A PSYCHIATRIST!) I’m not sure what the point was. Maybe Obama is supposed to be insane. At the very least, he hates white people. Also, Americans must take the power back. And cry.

Cut to the UK and The Sun’s campaign of hatred against Gordon Brown for writing a letter to a dead soldier’s mother with a few spelling mistakes and poor handwriting. Never mind he wrote a hand-written letter — a perfectly reasonable and sensitive gesture. No! The scruffy writing in thick pen and the misspellings are proof that Brown is an oaf, a dimwit, and a heartless bastard AND MUST BE REMOVED.

(Brown is blind in one eye and has dodgy sight in the other. Hence thick pen and poor handwriting.)

Faux outrage brought to you by News Corp.

Dan and I are hitch-hiking from Vienna to Bruck an der Mur. We are abandoned near Semmering and fail to get an onward lift so end up rolling out our sleeping bags in the woods off the road. It is April and cold so we start a fire, a beautiful pyre that warms our weary bones.  Flashing blue lights. Someone had seen the glow and called the Polizei. Once they establish we are English students and not illegal Serbian immigrants, the police leave us to our woodland beds but join us in urinating on the fire (seriously). Freezing night. Awake to see a mouse looking at me.

#2: 2009, Traunsee, Austria.

The last night of a wonderful few days in the mountains. We bivvy down by the side of the lake underneath the mighty Traunstein. The fire is sublime but catches the attention of a forest ranger who drives down to inspect. Again, Dan leaves me to talk my German way out of trouble. The ranger doesn’t mind the fire but warns us of rockfall and suggests that if we stay the night there is a good chance a boulder will roll down the mountain and crush our heads in our sleep. “But you can stay if you want to.” Er, no. We reluctantly kick out the fire and move on.

#3: 2009, Charnwood Forest, Leicestershire.

A few miles from our home there is a secluded little wood that has a perfect bedding plateau — dry canopy overhead and a pine needle bed below. One match, some paper, a handful of pine needles. Fire! Then Dan sees a light. A farmer is driving his truck in the field below, a beam of light scouring the valley and the trees on the side. The light hits us and we frantically throw dirt on the fire. Is he looking for us? The fire reignites. Crap. The truck stops.

“Friendly fire is as American as Ronald McDonald’s apple pie, Mom’s diet coke and a Starbucks muffin.”

- The Mirror, 27/5/02

Last week I caught a joke about American “friendly fire.” It was along the lines of this quip — “British soldiers in Iraq were being shot at on a daily basis…although obviously it’ll get much safer when the Americans leave” — but transplanted to Afghanistan.

This is a common source of gallows humour around here and reflects a genuine problem. The Times has cataloged recent American FF deaths until 2007. The first is one I remember vividly at the time: the nine British soldiers killed by the US in 1991 during the Gulf War. In a conflict in which little death was inflicted on the British by the enemy, this friendly fire incident was big news.

Cockpit film in 2003 of American A-10’s firing on British vehicles in Iraq sparked predictable outrage, but as far as I can tell, the basic question is not being asked:

Are the Americans more incompetent than most and should her allies wave white flags when Uncle Sam revs his engines? Or is it an inevitable and unfortunate side effect of being the biggest kid in class? Regarding the latter, this guy thinks that the Brits invented friendly fire back when we had the biggest guns.

Besides a treasure trove of family stories from aunts, uncles, grandparents, parents and older siblings, my mother possesses remarkable childhood memories reaching as far back as before her second birthday.

Tonight, I want to tell you about my granduncles Theodor and Emil Fritz who perished in the battle of Crete on May 20, 1941.

My mother told me that my grandmother had confronted the director of the Office of Racial Policy (Rassenpolitisches Amt der NSDAP) in Stuttgart and told him: “Why don’t you just exterminate the entire German people.  After so many centuries, there is no one left who does not have Jewish blood.”

My granduncle Emil had been arrested twice on the street because he did not appear to be “Aryan.”  The first time, Emil had dressed up as a fiddling gypsy while fundraising for the Winterhilfswerk, a charity of the propaganda ministry.  I do not know the details about the other arrest.  Perhaps, it was sufficient to be short, dark haired, and dark skinned to be suspicious.

The family would then have to report at the police station with a family tree to demonstrate the absence of Jewish ancestry.

These troubles came to an end when Emil volunteered to become a paratrooper.

Emil’s enthusiasm for the paratroopers infected his older brother Theodore.  Theodore had been a Lutheran pastor, which would have exempted him from conscription.  However, his enthusiasm, energy and success had provoked the jealousy of others who reported him to Church authorities and made his life difficult.

So it was not difficult for Emil to enthuse his older brother for the paratroopers.  Theodore said to my grandmother: “Margaret, if I come back, I will be a teacher.”

My mother remembers that one night, she was allowed to stay up late, perhaps for the first time in her life.  Her parents were busily preparing a meal and a dinner table.  Then the guests arrived and my mother had to go to bed.

Of course, the girl couldn’t sleep.  The guests, the talk, the laughter, and the songs were too exciting.  That night, my grandparents saw off fifteen paratroopers who only knew that a secret mission was imminent but no one knew when and where it would take place.

Theodore told his sister: “Margaret, I won’t come back.  I feel it.”

On May 20th, Emil took off with the first wave.  Already on the runway, a commanding officer ordered Theodore to remain behind.  The officer argued that he could not burden their mother with the loss of two sons on the same day.

Theodore could not bear to stay behind while his friends and brothers were risking the lives in battle and ran along the plane as it was taking off.  When he could not get on, Theodore begged another commander to let him on his plane.

That plane was shot down by the lone British air defense battery.  Although the battle of Crete lasted only for three days, my great-grandparents did not get notified of Theodore’s death for four weeks.  By the time they found the plane, the passenger’s bodies were reportedly so decayed that they identified Theodore by the spectacles on his face.  As far as one can tell under the circumstances, he appears to have died immediately.

Likewise, Emil had been fatally wounded in the air.  His comrades found him within feet of the German positions, having bled to death from a gut shot.  Reportedly, there was a long line of blood and drag marks that indicated that he had been struggling to reach his comrades.

As my great-grandmother had been frail after Emil’s birth, my grandmother had effectively raised him.  Margaret claims that the night her brothers died, she dreamed of an open grave.  Instead of performed the traditional soldier’s hymn Ich Hat Einen Kameraden, the trumpeter played Emil’s favorite song Nun Hat Es Sich Gewendet, das Grüne Buchenblatt.

When the survivors returned, a paratrooper reported that they had indeed played Emil’s song at the mass grave where he was buried.  I am not sure if my grandmother prompted him or if he volunteered the information.  It appears to be the case, however, that Margaret and my grandfather begun to wear mourning beginning May 21st even the authorities had not yet announced the invasion, much less the associated casualties.

Stranger yet, my grandmother claims that in a subsequent dream her brother Emil appeared as a translucent image at the foot of her bed in a white robe.  She asked the figure: “Emil, is it you?”  He replied: “Tell mother gently.”

Of the fifteen young men who had been guests at my grandparents’ house, none would return alive from Crete.

On his death, my great-grandmother found Theodore’s childhood journal.  Every day begun with the entry: “Today was a nice day.  Mother was happy,” or “Today was a bad day.  Mother was unhappy.”

My great-grandparents considered it a blessing that their sons, at least, did not have to kill anyone as they had died at the beginning of the battle.  Of course, from our vantage point there is something absurd about that attitude.  If killing is the problem, you really should not be a Nazi paratrooper.  But it is difficult to appreciate the divided loyalties that one might feel at times of war and few people are as consistent as Quakers, especially not German Lutherans.

Regardless, my great-grandfather knew quite well what he was talking about.  When the Greeks rose against the invaders, General Student ordered atrocious retaliation against the civilian population, which would have marred Emil and Theodore’s conscience for the rest of their lives.

Later, my great-grandparents lost their youngest son Siegfried at the Eastern front, whose story deserves separate attention.  If my great-grandmother had been an American, she would have been a triple gold star mother.

In 1944, the old couple’s home was fire bombed.  When they escaped the house, the clothes on their backs were burning and my great-grandmother’s hair was aflame.

They had literally lost everything but they were alive and except for some burn wounds unhurt.  To put our losses into perspective, both my mother’s and my father’s extended families were lucky.  We did not loose women and children, just men and property.  Many other families fared a lot worse, especially, those suffering under German occupation.

No man should have to die without having the opportunity to have children.  Emil and Theodore remain interred on Crete.  Only their sister Lore and one of my mother’s cousins visited their grave side.

I have never met Emil and Theodore but I cannot forget them.  Although my second hand memories are a poor substitute for their dreams, aspirations, and disappointments, they add value and meaning to my life.  Seeing my daughter perform on stage and my son learning the oboe, I sometimes wonder which bit would remind me of their great-granduncles had I been lucky enough to know them myself.

The Adamekhütte, like all such Alpine huts, is a remarkable place. It’s like a high altitude pub/youth hostel and was packed to the rafters when we arrived on Saturday. The climate at 2000m is noticeably colder; the topography barren and eerie. The next day we plodded up the moraines and on up the glacier, reaching the Obere Windlücke which heralds the beginning of the summit climb (west ridge). Crampons off, Klettersteig harness on. The via ferrata is quite easy but the 1000m drop to the south keeps you honest. Luckily for the vertiginously wary, much of it was shrouded in cloud.

You can summit and get back to the car in one day, but this means that:

(a) You have to get up early.
(b) Your knees take a prolonged pounding.
(c) You miss another evening playing cards in the Adamekhütte.

So, we came down the next day, taking a different, longer route to the Upper Gosausee.

Glacier, hut, Klettersteig, extreme mountain beauty: Dachstein FTW!