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Description
Mr. Ethell describes remaining neutral in his position as the Senior Liaison Officer between the Israelis and Syrians.
Donald Stewart Ethell
Donald Stewart Ethell est né en juillet 1937 et a grandi à Victoria (Colombie-Britannique). Son père était un ancien combattant de la Première Guerre mondiale et de la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Sa mère était infirmière. Sa soeur et lui ont étudié dans un pensionnat en raison des emplois qu’occupaient ses parents et ils retournaient à la maison seulement à Noël et pendant les vacances d’été. La mère de M. Ethell est décédée lorsque ce dernier n’avait que 10 ans. <br><br> Lorsqu’il s’est enrôlé, M. Ethell a joint les Queen's Own Rifles à Calgary. Après plusieurs années de service comme soldat d’infanterie, on l’a recommandé pour qu’il reçoive la formation d’officier. M. Ethell réussit le programme et s’éleva au rand de colonel. Plus tard, il a commandé des troupes canadiennes et des troupes des Nations Unies au cours de divers missions partout dans le monde. Au milieu des années 1990, Col. Ethell a pris sa retraite après plus de trente-cinq ans de services distingués.
Transcription
The Force Commander, at the time, who had gone through a Finnish course commander back to a Swede, Villein said " I want you to stay on as a Senior Liaison Officer", so even though there was a deputy chief of staff, Austrian at this time, he said " No, you've done it for two years and I want you to carry on." Because we had done a number of things with the parties not the least of which of exchanging prisoners and bodies and so forth. So you would, with both societies you have to prove yourself and you have to establish credibility, you got to establish trust, you got to remain neutral and at the same time my Israeli colleague and my Syrian colleague, who hated each other's guts I might add, they were at war with each other, basically they were the same, they had kids. So we could switch off from a professional discussion and "by the way Linda's here, you and .... I forgot her name... are free for dinner, sir," and then we wouldn't talk business. You could separate that providing you had the balance, because if you did it with one and not the other, the intelligence system would know that, they knew exactly when I went into Tel Aviv, who I was seeing and who I was talking to.