As a boy, Lt Col Tim Collins loved playing soldiers. Now, writes Suzanne Breen, he is leading the Royal Irish Regiment across Iraq
Sporting sunglasses and puffing a big cigar, Lt Col Tim Collins cuts a striking figure leading his men across the desert in the war on Iraq.
Born and reared in east Belfast, the commander of the 1st Battalion of the Royal Irish Regiment has long been a conspicuous character.
Pride of place on the wall of his office back home is a blood-spattered German G-3 automatic rifle, seized from the body of a military leader in Sierra Leone.
Collins (42) came to prominence last week when he addressed 600 troops before their assault on southern Iraq. Part of his speech was widely reported.
He told the soldiers to be magnanimous in victory. They were entering Iraq to liberate, not conquer. He spoke of the area's biblical history. "We will not fly our flags in their country. We are entering Iraq to free a people, and the only flag which will be flown in that ancient land is their own. Show respect for them," he said.
The assertions were hailed by "liberal" supporters of the war, but other parts of his address received less coverage. Collins's commitment to ferocity in battle should not be underestimated.
"The enemy should be in no doubt that we are his nemesis and we are bringing about his rightful destruction," he told his men.
"There are many regional commanders who have stains on their souls and are stoking the fires of hell for Saddam. As they die, they will know their deeds have brought them to this place. Show them no pity."
Collins's family has a tradition of service in the British army that dates back to the Crimea, India and Burma campaigns. His grandparents were from Dublin.
His mother, Mary (71), says she is intensely proud of her son and only wishes her husband, who died last year, were alive to see him. Known as TC to his friends and Nails to his men, because of his steely attitude, Collins was the only boy in a family of four.
He grew up opposite a Territorial Army camp, which he was in and out of regularly as a child.
"Even before he started school he was playing soldiers with five or six friends," his mother told the Sunday Mirror.
"They formed their own little regiment, and he was the commanding officer. They dug trenches on waste ground and fought their wars there every single day."
His mother recalled making a uniform for one of her four-year-old son's Action Man toys when he looked at her and said: "I'm going to be a great soldier!"
On coming home from school, he would immediately change into a camouflage suit. His prize possession was a second World War helmet, and he always carried a case marked Confidential, which he kept under his bed.
Collins studied history at Queen's University, in Belfast, before attending the military academy at Sandhurst, in England. He picked up several shooting awards. He has also served in the Royal Corps of Signals and was based in Cyprus, Berlin and Northern Ireland, including south Armagh.
He normally lives at Howe Barracks in Canterbury with his wife, Caroline, and five children. He always sends his mother a local flower from his postings - she recently received a desert orchid.
She said her son is motivated by concern for others. "He wants to remove the demon that's in the midst of Iraq and for the people there to be happy. He is such a kind person." Collins's hobbies are shooting game, fly-fishing and golf, but the Royal Irish Regiment is the dominant force in his life.
On assuming command of his battalion, he reintroduced the shamrock-green caubeen, with its deep-green hackle, as normal working headdress. The unit had previously worn green berets, bringing out the caubeen only on special occasions.
Explaining the change, Collins said: "My men will wear it with the same pride a paratrooper wears his red beret, a royal commando his green or an SAS man his sandy beret. It's a mark of pride, something which sets us apart."