Mixed military perception of Browne

By Paul Wood
BBC defence correspondent

The first military judgement I heard on Des Browne, a year ago now, isn't printable. The then new secretary of state was visiting Afghanistan.

Forces nicknamed their boss "Swiss Des" after a Fast Show character

Two soldiers came into our tent fresh from seeing Mr Browne on what was supposed to be a morale-boosting tour of the British base. Morale had not been boosted.

People were lined up, expecting the kind of back-slapping, hand shaking, blustering, joking, sometimes intimidating performance that John Reid would have given. Instead, said the soldiers, Mr Browne made some tentative, mumbling conversation.

Then, they said, he went into lunch, piled his plate high with food and made a bee-line across the crowded room to an empty corner. Several tables full of soldiers were left slack-jawed in his wake.

I wasn't present for this alleged incident but the two soldiers said they had seen it and they were furious. It certainly seemed to exemplify some of Mr Browne's problems as secretary of state.

Comedy comparison

First, in an environment - the military - which values clear, demonstrative leadership, Mr Browne is not charismatic.

To some, his careful, lawyerly phrasing, full of double negatives and sub-clauses, fails to rise to the occasion when the issue is life or death, victory or defeat.

He keeps in touch with what is happening out there -- and he cares MoD insider

Damagingly, his services nickname is "Swiss Des". That's because his grey pompadour bears an uncanny resemblance to that of "Swiss Toni", the character in the BBC comedy the Fast Show, whose career as a car salesman flags because he's lost his confidence.

Secondly, Mr Browne sometimes seems unlucky.

On that visit to Afghanistan, for instance, all the careful planning for good coverage was thrown into disarray when, on the very day the secretary of state arrived, the first British soldier was killed in action in Helmand. Sadly many more such deaths were to follow.

And yet, something unexpected happened on that trip.

At the end, the two soldiers I'd met, who'd been raging about Mr Browne, changed their minds. They'd seen him quietly and seriously absorbing the many detailed briefings and they had been impressed.

Genuine respect

It took a little longer to establish a connection than perhaps Mr Reid might have done but at the end of it Mr Browne had earned the troops' genuine respect.

Mr Browne has now been to Afghanistan three times, Iraq four times, more than any other defence secretary, say his inner circle.

"He keeps in touch with what is happening out there -- and he cares," said one close advisor.

As the defence secretary will know from those visits, the main British base in Afghanistan, Camp Bastion, is often engulfed in a gritty sand storm, one third of which, they tell you, is composed of dried human excrement from the villages and refugee camps across the desert.

Mr Browne is in one of those storms now.

'Cash for interviews'

Ninety per cent of contributors to one popular Army web site say they have no confidence in his leadership.

"Geoff Hoon set the bar low yet somehow Des shimmied under it," said one poster. "I would not put him in charge of a boy scout troop," said another.

Mr Browne is being criticised in some military circles for accepting responsibility for the "cash for interviews" affair, as some call it, while at the same time maintaining it was the Navy's decision.

Handling of the sailors and marines' return has been criticised

However, that is in fact the position as the three services have considerable autonomy within the MoD.

Some of those I've spoken to in the MoD agree that his BBC interview last week did not do the job required. It was too apologetic, too hesitant, shades of "Swiss Toni" in one of those shiny grey, three-buttoned "boy band" suits popularised by the ipod-stealing Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

If the past week represents a disastrous - and for New Labour - unexpected failure in image management, Mr Browne's supporters point to the substance of what he has achieved as secretary of state.

This includes a big pay rise for the troops, much needed extra helicopters to Afghanistan; and the incredibly quick procurement of new armoured vehicles for Iraq.

"People in the building told him you'll never do it in six months," said one MoD official. "But he did. The senior officers respect him and think he is a good defence secretary."