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As DN previously revealed, a civilian commander at the Armed Forces headquarters quit his job after it emerged that he lied about his merits in British defense. The man claims, among other things, that he was a helicopter pilot on secret missions in Ireland and Iraq. In March it was bought by the Armed Forces after its alleged merits were investigated internally.
In Britain, there is a man with the same name as the now former chief of defense. The British helicopter pilot has worked for over 30 years both in defense, for the police and for private clients. He says that through Swedish contacts he has found out his name in Sweden. At first, he questioned the defense chief’s claims.
– I’ve never heard of this guy. So I asked some of my colleagues in the navy and air force and they had never heard of such a person, says the British pilot.
– Considering how long I have been in defense aviation, and have worked with the army, air force and navy and as an instructor, it would have been very unusual if I had not heard of a person with the exact same name as me in the same profession.
The British pilot considers that the information on the CV of the Swedish Chief of Defense cannot be correct and says that it is impossible that the man would have had time to complete his flight training in the time he claims. In an interview with DN, the Personnel Director of the Swedish Armed Forces has confirmed that the CV contains false information, but did not want to explain in detail which are true and which are not.
Read more: The Armed Forces have informed the government
The British pilot is surprised that the man has not been revealed earlier by the Swedish authorities.
– It is clear that there have been many things that should have been questioned. I’m not a researcher, anyone could have done it just by looking at their Facebook profile.
Among other things, the Chief of Defense has he wrote on various resumes and on Facebook that he was shot down as a helicopter pilot in Iraq in 1991. In the Facebook message, he has posted two images of a wrecked helicopter. DN’s review shows that the images were posted much earlier online and were later said to show an American helicopter crashing in 1991 in an accident in Saudi Arabia.
– It is very sad that this individual has used those images for his own benefit. All but one aboard that helicopter died. They weren’t shot down, they weren’t on a secret mission behind the enemy line. They flew into a radio mast and crashed. It was a plane crash, says the British pilot.
In a written comment to DN, the British Air Force has denied the information from the Swedish Chief of Defense about the plane crash.
– Obviously it makes me very angry because this person has my name. I’m not saying it’s a fake name, but he has my name and I still work for the military as a pilot and instructor. I am not comfortable with a person by my name claiming these things. Just by looking at his Facebook profile, one very easily discovers that he is what we call a “Walter Mitty.”
Walter Mitty is the name into a fictional character who has also become an expression: an ordinary man with a vivid imagination who dreams of adventure and great deeds. The British driver does not know if it is just a coincidence that his own credentials are similar to what his name in Sweden lied to, or if his own CV has served as inspiration.
– There are no exact similarities between what he says he did and what I did, except that he claims to have been a military pilot in Great Britain.
The former defense chief did not want to be interviewed. He has previously claimed that he left the Armed Forces for personal reasons and that information about his British service is classified and therefore cannot be confirmed.
Read more: The commander of the Swedish Armed Forces had a fictitious background
