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Daily Mail
4 days ago
- General
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Britain's biggest Army base is 'overrun by rats' due to overflowing bins and fly-tipping - with even burnt-out cars sitting abandoned behind its gates, soldiers claim
The British army's biggest base has been overrun by rats as overflowing bins, piles of rubbish and even burnt out cars are left to fester behind its gates, soldiers claim. Shocking pictures from inside Catterick Garrison - taken just days after the latest collection was taken away - show huge piles of bin bags spilling from designated disposal areas. Litter - which is supposed to have been collected by North Yorkshire council - lies strewn across the grass lawns under accommodation blocks, an abandoned car with smashed windows sits in a car park and officers within the garrison's wires describe conditions as being 'like a slum'. Catterick Garrison, in North Yorkshire, is the largest British Army base in the world, housing around 13,000 people including military personnel and their families. It is where all infantry soldiers are trained and is home to units from the Intelligence Corps, the Royal Lancers, the Royal Yorkshire Regiment and the Royal Military Police. Colonel Philip Ingram, formerly of the Intelligence Corps, today slammed the situation at Catterick as a 'failure' of the commanders and local council. An officer living in the base, who spoke to MailOnline on the condition of anonymity, said: 'There's mountains of bin bags piling up around the camp and rats everywhere. Litter has blown literally all over the camp outside the accommodation blocks. The bins themselves are all full to the brim - and we had the people come to empty them yesterday. 'The army prides itself on cleanliness, hygiene and discipline. This is my home. waking up every morning and having having to walk past maggots and rats and piles of rubbish. It's just horrible. 'Literally, the first thing that people note when they turn up here now is how poor the situation is, cleanliness wise. 'It's absolutely pushing people to sign off in the force. Our job absolutely has negatives but one of the benefits is meant to be life when you're on camp but at the moment no one wants to be here. 'We as soldiers on the camp are powerless. What do they expect us to do? Take our own rubbish to landfill?' North Yorkshire council are responsible for rubbish collection, the Ministry of Defence said, as they revealed further pest control measures are being put in place. The authority was one of the first in the country to sign the Armed Forces Covenant, with the Armed Forces Act 2021 enshrining into law their responsibility to help prevent armed services personnel and veterans from being disadvantaged when accessing public services. But Col Ingram, who formerly was in command of Intelligence Corps on the base, said officers should have been putting more pressure on the council to look after their men. He told MailOnline: 'It's failure in the Catterick commanders to deal with the local council and it's a failure of support from the local council. 'This and so many other incidences around accommodation for our troops, around the food for our troops, about the way our troops are looked after, shows that the Ministry of Defence does not care about its people.' An MoD spokesperson said: 'We are urgently working with the Council, which is responsible for collecting rubbish from the base, so that collections can be made and to ensure a high-quality living and working environment for our personnel. 'In the meantime proactive pest control measures are in place on the site and we are dealing with any issues as they arise.' It comes as Catterick Garrison faces intense scrutiny after a series of incidents from officers at the base. Earlier this month, Staff Sergeant Andrew Oakes, who was in charge of a pre-signed military cheque book, was locked up after it emerged he stole almost £350,000 from the army to buy three Tesla cars, a hair transplant and 'adult services'. An investigation revealed that the defendant had used 125 cheques between December 2023 and May 2024 to drain £336,448 from the MOD's coffers while he was serving in the 2nd Infantry Training Battalion. And last week the widow of a father-of-three soldier who lay decomposing in barracks for three weeks has blasted the Army for the 'unforgiveable' delay in finding his body. Lance Corporal Bernard Morgan was discovered on January 23 2020 in his bedroom at Catterick Garrison following a prolonged period of 'degrading' by senior officers which involved him being 'shouted, screamed and swore at'. A senior coroner ruled it was 'not possible to determine' whether L/Cpl Mongan died from suicide or natural causes and recorded an open conclusion. North Yorkshire Council has been contacted for comment.
The Sun
07-05-2025
- Politics
- The Sun
How India & Pakistan could spark nuclear war killing 125million as warring neighbours urged to step back from armageddon
INDIA and Pakistan are being urged to step back from armageddon as a nuclear war between the two rivals could kill 125million people. The fighting neighbours traded rocket and artillery attacks in an overnight blitz leaving dozens dead and fears of all-out conflict. 9 9 9 9 Pakistan's leader labelled the strikes an "act of war" and his country claimed to have shot down Indian fighter jets. Now, fears are abound that fighting could escalate to the use of nuclear weapons and kill tens of millions. Peace campaigners like the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons are "gravely concerned" and have called for the two sides to step back from the brink. India and Pakistan only have small stockpiles of nuclear weapons compared to Russia or America - but they have a viscous rivalry and longstanding feud over Kashmir. New Delhi is estimated to have 180 nuclear warheads and can deliver them through land, sea, or air. Islamabad was last officially thought to have 170 weapons but could have grown that arsenal to around 200. Colonel Philip Ingram, a former British Army commander, said the West will be particularly nervous about a nuclear conflict. Ingram said: "Western intelligence in particular will be focused on the readiness and the outloading of nuclear stocks inside both Pakistan and India and monitoring what's happening to them very closely indeed. "The worrying thing about these two nations is that the tensions are very real. "The nuclear weapons are not there to protect them against attack from China or Russia or anyone else. "It's focused purely on each other." Ingram said escalation to using nuclear weapons could happen rapidly and powers like the US would step in to try and prevent their use. He said: "The US Secretary of State, flying into India and Pakistan, would carry out shuttle diplomacy between the two." But that might not be enough to overcome the animosity between the two enemies and their desire to escalate the conflict. One key rung on the escalation ladder would be troops crossing the border in a wider invasion, causing BILLIONS COULD DIE A 2019 academic article predicted how a nuclear war could start between the two countries featuring chilling echoes of what is happening today on the subcontinent. Following a terror attack in 2025, the authors predict in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that skirmishes would at first erupt before the Indian Army decided to invade Pakistan. Pakistani generals then panic and decide the only way they could repulse an attack is with nuclear weapons. 9 9 9 At first Pakistan nukes its own territory to wipe out the invading Indian tanks and soldiers. Sensing a knockout blow, New Delhi decides to launch nukes on Pakistani airfields, army bases, and nuclear weapons depots. Pakistan responds by nuking Indian naval bases and army garrisons - some in cities - and uses its entire arsenal. India then fires some 70 nukes on Pakistan, leaving 100 bombs in its arsenal to continue to deter China. The authors predict up to 125million people would die in the horrifying nuclear exchanges. But the environmental impacts of some 250 nuclear bombs exploding could kill many more, by creating a global famine. Billions could be killed as temperatures drop several degrees around the world and a global food shortage hits. WE'VE BEEN HERE BEFORE Most experts, including Ingram, think India and Pakistan will choose to deescalate the conflict. Ingram said: "I think this is something that will blow over relatively quickly, because I think both nations recognize the implications of what's going on, but that doesn't mean that the tension is going to simmer down. "We might see more skirmishes in coming days and weeks." Tensions have been simmering for decades and the two countries have been at war at least three times before. 9 9 In 2019, India conducted airstrikes on Pakistan after border skirmishes erupted out of Kashmir tensions - but the sides deescalated after that. India's Ministry of Defence said the strikes against the camps were in retaliation to a "barbaric" mass shooting in Kashmir last month, when 26 people were killed by gunmen. A spokesperson said: "These military strikes were designed to deliver justice to the victims of the Pahalgam terror attack and their families." In an article for the Atlantic Council, Alex Plitsas assessed strikes so far seemed calculated to allow the other side to save face. Plitsas said: "By publicly framing the strikes as counterterrorism-focused and avoiding sovereign Pakistani targets, New Delhi sought to limit retaliatory pressure on Islamabad." Pakistan has, meanwhile, kept its rhetoric cautious and vowed it has the The US, China, Britain, and UN have all called for peace. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a post on X: "I echo @POTUS's comments earlier today that this hopefully ends quickly and will continue to engage both Indian and Pakistani leadership towards a peaceful resolution." CONFLICT COULD HELP CHINA Ingram said the conflict risks pushing Pakistan into the arms of the "Axis of Evil" - the alliance between Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea. Ingram said: "It wouldn't surprise me if we're seeing Pakistan supplying some capability to Russia." Ingram said China could use the conflict as a way of testing its weapons on the battlefield to prepare for an invasion of Taiwan. He said: "China could stimulate a refocus of Western attention, you know, back to Pakistan, India, possibly North and South Korea, while China is focusing on Taiwan. "China would love to do that. It's within their playbook. It's the sort of tactics they'd use." Pakistan would likely not start sending weapons to support Russia's invasion of Ukraine as it needs to stockpile ammunition and guns for its own battles. Ingram said: "But I think we'll see closer relations building up, and they could come into this grouping that we are loosely referring to as the axis of evil. "And it's worrying that continues to grow." What is the Kashmir conflict about? The region of Kashmir has always been a contentious issue even before India and Pakistan won their independence from Britain. But the current conflict stems from how the region was split up as the two countries were gaining independence. Indian troops took two-thirds of Kashmir, while Pakistan seized the northern third. Since then, two wars have been fought between the two countries and the row has developed into one of the most intense geopolitical rivalries on earth. There are about 16 million people in Kashmir, split between the Indian-controlled and Pakistani-controlled zones.
