I don't think this lad was a musician by primary trade employment, rather he was an infantryman first and foremost, who had volunteered for a period of service with the Battalions Corps of Drums. Apparently he was doing a stint in recruiting based out of their Regimental HQ in the Tower of London when he was executed.

While employed as a drummer, this would have been a secondary roll for him while he was with the 2nd Battalion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Woolwich_attack

The Regimental Creed of the RRF....

I am a Fusilier, trained and ready to deploy.
I will defend my country's freedoms with respect and integrity.
I will always maintain my arms, my equipment and myself.
I will place the mission and the team first.
I will never accept defeat nor let down my mates or my Regiment
I will always be one of England's finest, a Fusilier.

Folks who enlist as military musicians though can expect to deploy and do. Some will see front line service usually working with medics as stretcher bearers or in other support roles: http://www.army.mod.uk/music/29721.aspx

Well, what else do you do? You say you've been in Afghanistan, what purpose does that serve other than to demonstrate that an infinite amount of money spent and deaths incurred (Russian, British, Afghan) changes nothing there?

I know that we (the West) occasionally drop missiles on schools and wedding parties. Tough luck, eh, Mohamed?

I know that as recently as yesterday, Presidet Obama said that we must "try" to stop killing civilians.

I know that hundreds of people have been held without charge in Guantanamo for a decade or so; one of them, a Brit, is even acknowledged to be innocent of wrongdoing, but the US & the UK will not release him to the UK purely they are terrified that he would use his freedom to describe his ordeal. So they keep him locked up.

These are all reasons why disenfranchised young men are angry and easy prey for radicals. And while the West continues it's boisterous awaydays, more and more angry young men will be drawn to the extremist cause.

But hey, you've been there, and with your well-rounded life experience and that open mind of yours, you're the Expert.

I'm guessing that there are a lot of Afghan girls who are going to school and getting an education that may appreciate the efforts of our forces. That and preventing the country being dragged into some kind of Taliban led Cambodia year zero.
I would also hazard a guess that the operational aims of our forces differ slightly from those of the Russian occupation of the 80's!

How do you explain the reason that these Islamic nutters (or as you would put it, miss understood young heros) go round killing their own people, women and children incl, with suicide bombs at markets and such like in Afganistan and Iraq?

He was a machine gunner, according to the posts from his unit left on the Torygraph website yesterday.

Yes, thanks for that and airbornesappers's explanation too. I'm not that clued up on military roles. When it happens on home-turf it certainly magnifies the tragedy of war.

Amen to that....in spades

I'm not for one moment saying these people are misunderstood young heroes - they're misguided murderers, no more, no less.

They blow each other up because they are completely ****ed up. As would you be if foreign armies had been occupying your country for decades. Since 1980 in the case of Afghanistan. If you'd seen your cousins, schoolmates, colleagues shot, blown up, brutalised, marginalised by anyone and everyone - these people are seriously damaged, thanks to us. Who put the Taliban in power? Not one of the west's brighter ideas, was it?

That's the problem. It is very rare for any of the "leaders" in the world to have been involved at the sharp end of armed conflict. If they had, I suspect they would be far less willing to send others to perform their, or their corporate sponsors', dirty work.

Unfortunately, armed conflict isn't that clinical or devoid of innocent casualties.

I do like the argument used above that goes, essentially something like this: If another does something that I believe is unjust, they shouldn't blame me if I then retaliate. I appreciate that that is paraphrasing, but the gist of it is true. Of course, the "horrors" performed by "westerners" in the recent past, were usually a result of "horrors" committed against them; and so the circle continues

Is there a difference between innocents killed by, for example, drones when the drones are attempting to kill "enemies" that choose to hide among civilians to ensure their deaths provide their cause with an opportunity for propoganda, and the innocents killed because a suicide bomber decides to denotate their IEDs among a crowd of people? I believe that there is; I appreciate others don't.

What about Muslim v Muslim in Syria or Iran/Iraq. No illegal occupation there?

A fine hair but not a relevant one. The machete victim wasn't an innocent, he was a soldier.

... and so, I suppose, the argument goes they were justified in killing him to make a political point, is that it?

If it wasn't for the many brave soldiers who gave their lives over the years you would most likely be writing the above in German, or maybe Argentinian?