Heseltine 'asked Navy to end Brent Spar protest'

Michael Heseltine, the new Deputy Prime Minister, first suggested that armed forces should end Greenpeace's occupation of the Brent Spar, according to a Royal Navy source.

The Navy was initially reluctant to intervene, telling the Department of Trade and Industry that it could only get involved if the chief constable of a police force followed the correct constitutional procedure and asked for military help.

It is understood Grampian Police did not make a formal request. None the less, the Navy began a study of how it could get Royal Marines on board if called to do so. It also sent a small contingent north to the Outer Hebrides, although this was recalled before reaching the islands.

The planning was going on while the Brent Spar affair was reaching its climax last month. The environmental pressure group Greenpeace had landed four protesters on the redundant oil storage buoy by helicopter as the owners, Shell, towed it to a dump site in the north-east Atlantic. Shell intended to use explosive charges to puncture the buoyancy tanks and send it to the sea-bed nearly 8,000 feet down.

The oil company was ready to land its own security guards on board to evict the protesters, with Grampian Police officers attending to make sure there was no breach of the peace. But Shell's boarding operation was called off at the last minute when, under mounting pressure from European governments and a consumer boycott, it decided to abandon deep sea disposal of the Spar.

Mr Heseltine's former department was involved because it is in charge of the offshore oil industry and decommissioning of redundant North Sea structures.

Callum MacDonald, Labour MP for the Western Isles, was the first to ask questions about possible military intervention. He said it would have been a ''hideous over-reaction''. Greenpeace also said that the idea of ending a peaceful civilian protest with armed servicemen was outrageous.

Both the DTI and the Ministry of Defence declined to comment on any contingency plans they might have carried out. ''It was a matter for Greenpeace and Shell, not us,'' an MoD spokesman said.

t The Brent Spar set sail for Norway from its holding position east of Shetland yesterday after the Norwegian government formally issued permission for Shell to anchor it in a fiord.

The 14,500-tonne structure is expected to arrive in Erfjord, near Stavanger, on Monday. Shell has been given permission to station it there for a year while it plans a method of disposing of the Brent Spar and the toxic wastes onshore - probably breaking it up in a British shipyard or oil rig fabrication yard.

Meanwhile, Greenpeace has written to 80 scientists and experts defending its decision to campaign against deep-sea dumping of the Brent Spar. The environmental group has been alarmed by the opinions of several marine scientists, who have publicly stated that deep-sea disposal was the best environmental option when all factors were taken into account. Greenpeace says several of its critics did not inform themselves fully of the facts before speaking out.