My guest today is Paul Marshall. He is a recently retired British Army officer who spent 34 years in uniform. He has deployed on multiple military operations all over the world including on combat, peacekeeping and post-conflict recovery operations. He started his career in South Korea as a UN observer before spending time in Bosnia and Herzegovina during some of the most difficult times of the war. He also took part in both Gulf wars as part of the fighting forces. In the subsequent years he supported a number of global crises and natural disasters before once again returning to Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2014, this time in the prestigious role of United Kingdom Defence Attaché to Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some of the topics we discussed are:

Tensions at the DMZ between South and North Korea

Management of Iraqi prisoners of war

Scars of war among some of his peers

The aftermath of the Ahmići massacre in Bosnia and Herzegovina

The importance of immediate support during natural disasters

Understanding of the local context as a force multiplier


As you will hear in the episode, we make reference to the Ahmići massacre in Bosnia and Herzegovina. You can find further information here:

https://ahmici.sensecentar.org/

Also, I made reference in the discussion about Bosnia and Herzegovina being the highest recipient per capita of foreign aid. Here is the data from The World Bank. When looking at the figure, keep in mind that the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina is around 3.3-3.35 million.

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/DT.ODA.ODAT.CD?locations=BA