So Great a Day as This is Cheaply Bought

Much as the pandemic has been linked to the deaths of a few hundred people, and the British Home Office to a witch-hunt or two, and our free, fearless and cantankerous Press to an occasional untruth, so it appears that, in the process of losing that last unfortunate round of the Great Game, the British armed forces may have detrimented a few collaterals. Altogether the Ministry for Wog-Bombing is prepared to admit to compensating the families of two hundred and eighty-nine security indiscretions, including payments to "calm local atmospherics" after Britain's brave boys in the SAS did a bit too much civilising. Other cases include a payment of £104.17 for a killing and some property damage, although the precise division of the total remains unclear; and one family received a munificent £4,233.60 for the fatal shootings of four children. The .17 and the .60 are a particularly charming touch, showing pragmatic British parsimony at its most righteously accountable.