Ben Roberts-Smith: Former SAS officer Peter Winnall slammed for joking about murder allegation

A former officer in the Special Air Service Regiment and critic of Ben Roberts-Smith was slammed on social media for joking about the murder charges against the Victoria Cross awardee.

Responding to a satirical article proposing a paintball fight between Mr Roberts-Smith and one of his accusers, federal Liberal MP Andrew Hastie, corporate consultant Peter Winnall wrote on Instagram over the weekend: “I’d go watch except innocent bystanders likely to get kicked off a cliff!”

As a major, Mr Winnall led an SAS squadron when it was sent to Afghanistan in the second half of 2010. The comment about bystanders being kicked off a cliff is a rare example of one of Mr Roberts-Smith’s SAS opponents going public about the five charges of committing the war crime of murder in what has been dubbed the “murder trial of the decade”.

The remark was made in response to a post by the Betoota Advocate satirical newspaper advertising a fight between Mr Hastie and Mr Roberts-Smith at the SAS headquarters in Perth on June 6. “Enough Talk,” the article said, “Hastie And BRS To Settle Differences At Local Paintball Skirmish, Winner Gets Canning.”

Canning is Mr Hastie’s Federal electorate in northern Perth.

After declining to respond to The Nightly, Mr Winnall wrote in The Australian today: “Unfortunately the public debate on this has degraded into personal attacks and tribalism. Anything that can be used to discredit an individual gets used as ammunition.”

SAS sources said Mr Winnall was a long-time critic of Mr Roberts-Smith. He believed the famous veteran was part of a group of aggressive corporals and sergeants who wielded too much control over the special forces unit during the Afghanistan war, they said.

Rule 429A

In 2012, while hunting an Afghan army soldier who killed three Australians and wounded two more, Mr Roberts-Smith’s team questioned people in the village of Darwan in southern Afghanistan. During the operation, federal prosecutors allege the then-corporal kicked a farmer, Ali Jan, off a river embankment and had him executed.

Mr Roberts-Smith has said “there was no kick” and “I don’t remember seeing a cliff either”. He has not been required to enter a plea in court but said he is innocent and welcomes the opportunity to clear his name.

A former member of the 2nd Commando Regiment, Scott Jones, responded to the Instagram comment by asking if Mr Winnall’s soldiers operated under a rule used by the International Security Assistance Force known as ROE 429A, which allowed Western forces to kill people “resisting ISAF in its mission to facilitate the lawful extension of Afghan government”.

“You may not have got a bravery medal for the deployment, but I heard they gave you “C0ck of the year” award back in Perth,” Mr Jones wrote. “Your career Didn’t last too long after that from memory. Hope you are well xoxo”

‘We fled’

One SAS source said Mr Winnall was given the humorous award at the SAS’s annual end-of-year celebration in 2010, the same year Mr Roberts-Smith stormed a Taliban machine-gun nest in Tizak, the act recognised by the Victoria Cross.

The “Cock of the Year” award has since been seen as a way for the regiment’s soldiers to punish leaders they did not like. A memoir by another SAS officer, Mark Wales, said Mr Winnall was nominated for the award after trying “to correct a culture where in his view some soldiers were wielding too much negative influence”.

Mr Winnall, who now runs a Perth-based consulting business called Rekon Group, was twice awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, which recognises outstanding leadership in action.

Mr Jones’ response has now been deleted. He didn’t respond to a request for comment. He is part of a group of special forces veterans supporting Mr Roberts-Smith, whose murder trial is likely to hinge on the evidence of four SAS veterans who have agreed to testify in return for immunity from being charged with murder themselves.

Last month Mr Jones said his unit was sent to Darwan in 2013. The Australians and their Afghan allies were attacked so ferociously they gave up and left, he said.

“Everyone went to ground and eventually the (Afghan) partner force were so scared that we fled,” he told the Two Worlds Collide Podcast. “(We) called for the helos back and we got the fuck out of there. And this is the alleged incident site where they’re just Afghan villages, innocent Afghan villages.”

Mr Hastie, a former SAS officer, has refused to discuss the murder charges, saying he might be called as a witness.

“I’m just very cautious, given that a fair trial, the presumption of innocence and a few other legal principles are at stake here, so I won’t be commentating like other public figures on this,” Mr Hastie said three weeks ago after Mr Roberts-Smith’s partner, Sarah Matulin, called Mr Hastie a “traitor” on Instagram.

The comment was deleted. Ms Matulin and Mr Roberts-Smith are both former employees of the Seven television network, which is part of the same company as The Nightly.