Ed Butler son of Sir Adam Butler MP and grandson of Conservative politician Richard Austen "Rab" Butler. Ed Butler Brigadier Edward Adam Butler CBE, DSO (born 27 February 1962) is a former British Army officer who commanded Task Force Helmand. Educated at Eton College and the University of Exeter, Butler was commissioned into the Royal Green Jackets in August 1984. He was mentioned in dispatches for his service in Northern Ireland in November 1991, received the Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service for his service in the Former Republic of Yugoslavia in Autumn 1997 and received the Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service again
Rab Butler new Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax in the House of Lords, Butler was the main Foreign Office spokesman in the House of Commons. In internal foreign office discussions after the Anschluss of Austria, Butler counselled against a British guarantee to go to war to defend Czechoslovakia, and approved of the Cabinet decision (22 March) not to give one (he later omitted these facts from his memoirs). Butler spent most of the Sudeten Crisis at a meeting in Geneva about reform of the Covenant of the League of Nations. He strongly approved of Chamberlain’s trip to Berchtesgaden (16 September), even if it