Mike Jackson

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Mike Jackson 2009

Sir Michael "Mike" Jackson , GCB , CBE , DSO , ADC (born March 21, 1944 ) is a retired general . D. of the British Army and was its Commander-in- Chief from 2003 to 2006, Chief of the General Staff . Before that, he was, among other things, the commander of KFOR in Kosovo .

Military career

Jackson's father was also in the British Army . He himself was a cadet of the Stamford School Combined Cadet Force ( CCF ). In 1961 he moved to the University of Birmingham . Two years later, in 1963, Jackson became an Intelligence Corps officer . He studied from 1964 to 1967 at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and graduated in Russian . After graduating from Sandhurst, he served on a delegation with the Parachute Regiment for two years, then switched to paratroopers in 1970 and served in Northern Ireland when the Parachute Regiment was involved in Bloody Sunday in 1972 . In 1976 he graduated from Staff College and then served for two years as chief of staff in the Berlin Infantry Brigade . He then commanded a paratrooper company again in Northern Ireland . After a six-month course at the National Defense College in Latimer in 1981, he was transferred to the Directing Staff of Staff College in Camberley . During his two and a half year service in Camberley, Jackson was subordinate to the Department of Defense for ten days in the Falklands War . In March 1984 he took over command of the 1st Battalion of the Parachute Regiment , which he held until September 1986. At the time of his command, the battalion was part of the NATO Allied Command Europe Mobile Force (Land). This meant u. a. three winters in Norway that the battalion spent doing arctic exercises. From 1986 to 1988 Jackson served for nearly two years in the Senior Directing Staff (Army) of the Joint Service Defense College in Greenwich . He then completed the higher command and staff course in Camberley in spring 1989 and then spent six months on a scholarship in Cambridge , where he wrote a paper on the future of the British Army.

In late 1989 he returned to Northern Ireland and took command of the 39th Infantry Brigade for two and a half years . From 1992 to 1993 Jackson served in the Department of Defense as Director of the British Army's Human Resources Department. From March 1994 to July 1996 he commanded the British 3rd Infantry Division . In August 1995 Jackson was designated to take command of UNPROFOR in Bosnia and Herzegovina at the end of the year . After the changes made by the Dayton Treaty, however, he took over command of the Multinational Southwest Division of the newly created IFOR for the first half of 1996 . In February 1997, Jackson took over as Commander of the Allied Command Europe Rapid Reaction Corps with the rank of Lieutenant General , followed by a brief assignment as Director of Development and Doctrine. In March 1999 he took over command of the KFOR in Macedonia and then also commanded it from June to October 1999 in Pristina , until he took over command as commander of the land forces on March 1, 2000.

Jackson thus served in the NATO chain of command as the deputy of the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), the American General Wesley Clark . During this period he became known because he refused Clark's order during or at the end of the Kosovo war to block the runways of the Slatina airfield near Pristina in order to isolate and pass through the 200 Russian soldiers who had invaded there - after the withdrawal of the Serbian armed forces the closure of the airfield to prevent reinforcement of the Russian troops from the air. Jackson refused the order with the words I'm not going to start the Third World War for you and thereby prevented a military escalation with Russia, but also undermined it NATO chain of command. At the same time, however, it was already clear to Clark at this point that he would achieve the goal of blocking the runway without the help of the British, because he had the promise of the Hungarian, Romanian and Bulgarian contingents who made themselves available for this. The Russians then had to withdraw because the supply of their isolated 200 men overland could not be guaranteed. If Jackson had carried out the order without direct consent from London and if British soldiers had been involved in armed conflict with Russian troops, he could have been dismissed for insubordination because of his dual role as Commander in Chief of British troops . On the other hand, to oppose Clark meant a refusal of order from a direct superior, for Jackson was Lieutenant General, Clark General and in the NATO chain of command as SACEUR his direct superior at the time.

In 2003 he took over the post of Chief of the General Staff of the British Army, which he gave up in 2006 and retired.

Jackson received the following awards: 1979 MBE , 1992 CBE , 1996 CB , 1998 KCB , 1999 DSO, and 2004 GCB . In 2001 he was appointed ADC . He is married to Sarah Jackson and has two sons, a daughter and three grandchildren.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Showdown in Pristina , article from February 17, 2008 by Benjamin Bidder on Spiegel Online
  2. ↑ Interview with Wesley Clark (PBS.org, June 15, 2001, English); Confrontation over Pristina airport (BBC News, March 9, 2000)
  3. ↑ 'Darth Vader' put on the spot (BBC News, June 15, 1999, English)

Web links

predecessor Office successor
Michael Walker Chief of the General Staff
2003-2006 		Richard Dannatt
personal data
SURNAME Jackson, Mike
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jackson, Michael
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British general
DATE OF BIRTH March 21, 1944