Colin Campbell Mitchell - Aden

Aden

Mitchell was promoted to substantive lieutenant-colonel on 31 December 1966, and made Commanding Officer 1st Battalion, The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (the ‘Argylls’) on 12 January 1967. He achieved fame in the Aden Emergency, which was acted out in the final few years of British rule in Aden. He became known as "Mad Mitch" and was Mentioned in Despatches.

Britain's Aden territory consisted of the Aden City Colony attached to Protectorates with a total land area similar to that of the UK. Within Aden City was a district known as the Crater. The Crater was the old part of the City. According to Mitchell's autobiography, Crater was a "town of 80,000 inhabitants". By 1967, the British position in Aden was coming under pressure from groups of armed Arab nationalists (who were competing for future power after the final British withdrawal), resulting in a counter-insurgency campaign known as the Aden Emergency.

In June 1967 the Argylls were due to take over operational control of the Crater from the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers. However, before this could happen, on 20 June Arab members of the locally recruited Aden Armed Police mutinied and seized the Crater in association with nationalist insurgents. Eight British soldiers from a transport unit were ambushed and killed by the mutineers. Other soldiers were killed in separate clashes.

On 5 July 1967 Mitchell led a force that reoccupied the Crater district accompanied by 15 regimental bagpipers of the Argylls playing "Scotland the Brave" and the regimental charge, "Monymusk". Mitchell subsequently used what were described as “strong arm methods” to keep control of the Crater in the remaining months before British withdrawal.

The reoccupation itself was almost bloodless (one local was killed) and Mitchell then used an integrated system of observation posts, patrols, checkpoints and intelligence gathering to maintain the Crater as a tranquil area while security elsewhere in Aden began to deteriorate.

However, allegations of atrocities were made against Mitchell and the troops under his command. There were also allegations that the Argylls had been guilty of widespread looting. The Argylls used the Chartered Bank building in the Crater as their headquarters and snipers stationed on its roof would shoot at anyone thought to represent a threat in the streets below. A BBC journalist wrote "once we stood together in Crater watching the Argylls stacking, as in a butcher's shop, the bodies of four Arab militants they had just shot and Mad Mitch said: 'It was like shooting grouse, a brace here and a brace there'."

The imposition of "Argyll law" (as Mitchell described it) on the Crater endeared Mitchell to the media and to the British public. But it did not endear him to certain of his superiors in both the Army and the High Commission.

Mitchell's critics stated that he was a publicity seeker and that the troops under his command lacked discipline. One High Commission official described the Argylls as "a bunch of Glasgow thugs" (a statement for which he later apologised).

The reoccupation and subsequent control of the Crater district were controversial. The GOC Middle East Land Forces, Major-General Philip Tower, had feared that reoccupation of the Crater would ignite more disturbances. Tower (a veteran of the North African campaigns and Arnhem) also considered that undertaking a full reoccupation of the Crater was pointless given that British withdrawal from Aden was imminent. Tower had authorized a probe into the Crater to be led by Mitchell using the Argylls and other units. Mitchell used this authority to carry out the reoccupation. Tower later instructed Mitchell to "throttle back" on his operations within the Crater.

Mitchell stated that he considered Tower’s approach to be “wet hen tactics”. The situation that developed was described in The Times as follows:

The Crater reoccupation was carried out on Mitchell’s own initiative. Some MPs asked questions about this in Parliament. Tam Dalyell (Labour, West Lothian) asked whether it was true that: "Mitchell disobeyed operational and administrative orders of his senior officers during the recapture of the Crater".

Mitchell himself later stated that he had been rebuked over the reoccupation by General Tower. The nature of this rebuke was explained by Defence Minister Denis Healey as follows:

The final British withdrawal from Aden took place in November 1967. Colonel Mitchell and the Argylls arrived back at their Plymouth garrison on 27 November. Unlike all the other battalion commanders from Aden, Mitchell was not decorated, receiving only the Mention in Despatches. In the normal course of events, an OBE might have been routinely awarded to him. It was indicated to him that further advancement was unlikely. Reports began to circulate to the effect that the Argylls were to be disbanded.

In July 1968, Mitchell gave notice of his intention to resign from the Army at the end of the year. Although Mitchell had not given the customary 7 months’ notice required of senior officers, his resignation was accepted with effect 1 October 1968.