Sky News broadcaster Andrew Bolt has warned that a “sinister” campaign to traduce Liberal MP Andrew Hastie’s reputation risks a chilling effect on witnesses expected to give evidence at Ben Roberts-Smith’s upcoming war crimes trial.
The war hero has been charged with five counts of murder, a war crime, each carrying a maximum sentence of life imprisonment should he be found guilty.
Ben Roberts-Smith has always maintained his innocence.
Speaking on his program on Monday night, Mr Bolt said that the ongoing campaign to accuse Mr Hastie of being somehow central to the case against Ben Roberts-Smith was wrong and concerning.
The relationship between former Special Air Service (SAS) officer and federal MP Andrew Hastie and soldier Ben Roberts-Smith has been the subject of ongoing speculation after Mr Hastie gave evidence at his defamation trial.
During the defamation trial against Nine newspapers, Mr Hastie gave evidence that long-standing rumours existed about serious misconduct in the armed services.
He later praised the “moral courage” of SAS veterans who testified in the trial about the alleged war crimes in Afghanistan.
Mr Hastie has also stated that Ben Roberts-Smith is entitled to the presumption of innocence, but that “none of us are above the law”.
Over the weekend, another long article exploring the relationship between the two men was published by journalist Aaron Patrick in The Nightly.
‘Something sinister’
“Something sinister is going on with a war crimes trial of our most decorated soldier, Ben Roberts-Smith, winner of the Victoria Cross for heroism in Afghanistan, but it’s not what you may think, it’s not what many will want to think or me to say,’’ Mr Bolt said on Sky News.
“What is sinister are moves that I fear will make a fair trial impossible. They’ll also tend to intimidate fellow soldiers giving evidence against Roberts-Smith.
“I’m talking about the full on smear campaign against Liberal front bencher Andrew Hastie, who, as an SAS captain, served in Afghanistan with Roberts-Smith and gave evidence against him when Roberts-Smith sued journalists for defaming him as a war criminal and lost.
“Now, for that, Hastie has been savaged on social media and email campaigns as a rat, a traitor, a coward. Roberts-Smith’s mother last year also emailed Liberal MPs, warning them not to trust him now.
“The mother, I forgive. I mean, I’d also do anything to protect my children, but this weekend came the last straw for me.
“A long article by journalist Aaron Patrick in the West Australian painting Andrew Hastie by hints and snide asides as a wimp, a shirker, a God botherer, a hater, a kook, and an opportunist who betrayed Roberts-Smith for revenge or to advance his own career.
“It is shameless. It is also totally skewed, deceitful through omission, and it makes Hastie seem a lot of things is absolutely not, but you know the way of these things is also extremely damaging. In fact, this smear campaign seems very likely now to cost Andrew
Hastie his seat for the next election.”
Mr Bolt said two things were relevant to know as background to the matter.
“First, it has to be pointed out that The West Australian (newspaper) has long been under the control or influence of billionaire Kerry Stokes, who is also a key backer and funder of Ben Roberts-Smith, and that paper has long been hostile to Hastie,’’ he said.
“The second thing to point out from the start, Ben Roberts-Smith insists he is innocent of the five war crimes, which is now being charged, and now that he is charged, I will not speculate on his guilt or innocence, as so many of his defenders now do, with Hastie as their scapegoat.”
Andrew Hastie a ‘traitor’
Ben Roberts-Smith’s girlfriend, Sarah Matulin, recently branded the Liberal MP Andrew Hastie a “traitor” in an online comment posted on Anzac Day. Ms Matulin later deleted the comment and acknowledged it as a mistake through her lawyers.
Mr Bolt said some of the claims against Mr Hastie were unfair and incorrect.
“This article in the West Australian said (that) Hastie seemed intimidated by Roberts-Smith from the time that Hastie, as an officer, was going through a brutally tough course to join the SAS, where Roberts-Smith was one of the many instructors.
“The article hinted that Hastie resented Roberts-Smith for allegedly not recommending him for joining the regiment, when Roberts-Smith was in fact not in a position to make that call.
“The article suggested that Hastie’s concerns that elements of the SAS had become a killing machine that killed indiscriminately.
“Well, the article suggested was because it was a committed Christian, an unusually committed one, actually, according to the unnamed soldiers he quoted, and that it even talked of cosmic justice.
“He got in another dig by saying that Hastie got jumpy after surviving one Taliban attack, had missed hitting a target during SAS training, had never fired a shot in anger, even when he did become an SAS officer, and had ducked when a machine gun over his head was fired, and on and on. You get the picture.
“This was a hit job, quoting entirely unnamed sources …”
Mr Bolt said that Mr Hastie was in fact not a key witness against Robert-Smith when he sued Nine for defamation.
“It was for a judge to rule the balance of probabilities that he had committed war crimes on three occasions,’’ he said.
“Now Hastie was actually praised by that judge as an honest witness.
“Nor was Hastie some bad or cowardly officer, because also not mentioned is something that Hastie refuses to confirm or to allow me to use.
Mr Bolt said that Army officer performance appraisal reports from 2010, the year he did that SAS selection and passed, and in subsequent years comprehensively disprove any claims or hints or suggestions or winks that he was somehow a poor officer.
“In fact, he was rated outstanding by the SAS squadron and commanding officers assessing him outstanding,’’ he said.
“Nor did this article in the West Australian in the weekend on the weekend note, what three federal court appeal judges did this year when they dismissed Roberts-Smith’s appeal in the defamation case he’d lost.
“See, Roberts-Smith had made key claims in that initial court case that he then had to drop an appeal, because his story was plainly untenable, as the appeal court judges pointed out.
“For instance, he claimed to have killed one of the two armed Afghan men he saw fleeing outside a compound that his unit was searching, with a soldier next to him killing the other, fleeing armed people, squirters, as they’re called, but on appeal, Roberts-Smith had to concede that the men were found inside the compound.
“What I can say is the soldier who killed one of them refused to give evidence that might incriminate himself.
“Two other soldiers gave evidence that Roberts-Smith ordered that soldier to shoot one of the men, and one soldier also gave evidence claiming he later saw Roberts-Smith machine gun the other man, who had a wooden leg or a false leg, shot him in the back.
“Now to repeat, Roberts-Smith denies these claims. Some other witnesses defended him, backed him up, and the criminal case he now faces demands a much higher burden of proof than the one he lost.”
“If you’re interested, you can go read it yourself on the internet, but about this implication that it’s Andrew Hastie who ‘did in’ Roberts-Smith? No.
“In fact, the Court of Appeal judgment mentions Hastie just six times to more than 250 pages, and wants to repeat praise for his honesty, but he did mention at great length other SAS soldiers, other soldiers who’d given evidence against Roberts-Smith.
“So I ask: are these soldiers all traitors and cowards too unusually committed Christians?
“What must these men now feel seeing Hastie punished for saying that he’d heard reports of what Robert-Smith had done, tried to check and later discuss them years later with the head of the regiment, who’d heard them too, and said he was also concerned.
“See, these soldiers, they knew the danger of speaking out.
“Well, now he is seeing how Hastie’s careers, political career, could also be over ‘just like that’ for speaking out about alleged war crimes done in our name, and some soldiers may be wondering, well, who’s next?
“Which soldier hasn’t now been warned they should keep their mouth shut, or else all of that makes the publication of the story spearing Hastie a disgrace.”
