Another bright idea from yet another "think" tank

If there's one thing that absolutely boils my piss, it's politicians talking about Britain's future defence requirements. We DON'T KNOW what our future defence requirements are. Since WWII, no government has EVER got it right... Nobody predicted that five years later, we'd have to scrape together the manpower to fight one of the allies - China - on the other side of the world. Then they tooled up to face the massed armoured divisions of the Red army. When our actual defence requirement turned out to be thirty years of counter-terrorist operations within our own borders! Then we have the money pit that is Eurofighter... five years late & more than triple it's budget we finally get the plane that was built to outfly the most advanced aircraft of the Soviet Unio........ oh. Politicians have never got it right on this subject. They won't get it right now. They'll commit us to eye-wateringly expensive projects... which will either be cancelled, which is money for nothing, or which will turn up years late and many times overbudget. What no politician will ever do, though is face the fact that they can't always predict what's coming. Like it's somehow admitting failure to allow the armed forces to buy 'off the shelf' systems as and when they need them, to meet actual, genuine defence requirements, rather than the predictions of ministerial think tanks. Rant over.

I quite like the idea of a "Ministerial Think Tank" - just randomly select enough ministers to man a Challenger, give them some basic training, and then send them off to Afghanistan. It would be like the famous John Prescott Battlebus, only a tank in a war zone. Of course I expect it to be an early casualty to friendly fire...

The prime minister (*) is visiting a primary school and he visits one of the classes. They are in the middle of a discussion related to words and their meanings. The teacher asks the PM if he would like to lead the discussion of the word "tragedy." So the illustrious leader asks the class for an example of a tragedy. One little boy stands up and offers: "If my best friend who lives on a farm, is playing in the field and a runaway tractor comes along and knocks him dead, that would be a tragedy." "No," says the PM, "that would be an accident." A little girl raises her hand: "If a school bus carrying 50 children drove over a cliff, killing everyone inside, that would be a tragedy." "I'm afraid not," explains the exalted leader. "That's what we would call a great loss." The room goes silent. No other children volunteer. The PM searches the room. "Isn't there someone here who can give me an example of a tragedy?" Finally at the back of the room, little Johnny raises his hand. In a quiet voice he says: "If the plane carrying you was struck by a missile and blown to smithereens, that would be a tragedy." "Fantastic!" exclaims the PM, "That's right. And can you tell me why that would be a tragedy?" "Well," says the boy, "because it sure as hell wouldn't be a great loss and it probably wouldn't be an accident either." (*) Replace by politician of choice.

RTL: We cant fill the ranks because youngsters fall into 4 categories these days, those that want a well paid "white collar" job straight away to keep them in the lap of luxury they have become accustomed to, those that dont want to work, those that want to go into further education to get good paid jobs (see first category) and those that are willing to start at the bottom and work their way up. Unfortunately the latter group is in a minority these days. There's a fifth group - those who would like a Services career, but are put off (or dissuaded by parents) because of the way you lot get treated when you get home (especially if no longer "fit for active" any more). As to refighting the Battle of Britain, its probably true that scenario isnt going to come along again, however, to fight even limited conflicts you need air superiority to land your troops by helicopter etc. which means you need fighter aircraft to escort them before, during and after missions. Not such a white elephant in those circumstances. I agree with you completely - I was really speaking specifically about the Typhoon, rather than the idea of high-level air support for ops elsewhere. As I understand it, it cannot operate from either of the planned aircraft carriers (am I wrong there?) and on that basis, it is of no use on missions outside fixed bases - which for the forseeable future is the UK and Germany. Whilst I wouldn't leave the UK defenceless in that sense, the sheer cost and fiddling with spec over the years has made it a horse designed by committee. Thats not to say that the MOD and HM Forces dont waste money themselves, for example we have less Squadrons in the RAF than we did in WWII, but yet have 4 times more "Air Staff" and Officers than we did then! Go figure!! Yes, all the services seem massively "top-heavy" (didn't we have more admirals than ships back in the 90s?) - why is that? Is it because of all the planning/procurement functions that simply didn't exist 50 years ago?

A question for those with more knowledge about the Royal Navy, are there enough escorts for two carriers ? Or are the Type 45 en Astutes part of that escort ? The Type 45s were meant to be part of the escort, but they're being cut back too. I'd hazard a guess that the two carriers will be axed, and with no carriers to escort we could get rid of most of the escort vessels. The navy gets very overlooked - a fairly large proportion of the forces in Afrghanistan are naval ones. Air support is vital, but if you're away from secure bases, a carrier would probably be a handy source of distant air support.

There's a fifth group - those who would like a Services career, but are put off (or dissuaded by parents) because of the way you lot get treated when you get home (especially if no longer "fit for active" any more). Sixth group - dissuaded by careers officer; actaully, the RN chap I spoke to told me my eyesight wouldn't be good enough so there wasn't any point going further in looking at offcier training. Have subsequently found out this was inaccurate, somewhat too late for me. Now going slightly off-topic - Battledamaged; Personally, I didn't expect a 'white-collar job' straight away, as it is archaeology doesn't really come into that anyway, and I'm certainly not in an industry where I expect to be in the lap of luxury at any time; nor was further education for me a pathway into that well-paid lap-of-luxury job; it's the type of thing you need to get anywhere in archaeology at my stage, without the years of field experience, given the competition for jobs. The MA and now PhD are because I'll need them, and because I'm really an academic, again not because I want them in order to be paid lots of money; some of us 'youngsters' (I assume 23 counts) do have some dedication which isn't based on money and the easy life y'know. :whack:

I apologize, I didnt want to sound "preachy" or argumentative, and there are some valid points been raised, I was being very general in my comments, and Rob... I didnt mean to imply everybody who goes into further education is in it for the money, although from my limited experience of students, they go for an education, which in turn will greatly enhance their earning prospects, whatever field it is they are interested in, rather than going for example, lesser paid and more menial jobs straight from school. Again it was a generalization, there are always going to be exceptions, I just meant that the majority seem to do it to help their chances of better jobs with better pay prospects, and I thank the stars that there are a lot of dedicated people who go into further education and study hard to attain jobs that require specialist knowledge. Where would we be without doctors, engineers etc. Will also agree that the Navy do get a bit overlooked with their role in Afghanistan and elsewhere. RtL: you are correct in saying Typhoon was over budget and that it can only operate out of fixed sites, however, fixed sites are made wherever they are required, for as long as they are needed, not just permanent sites in UK and Germany, they also can fly from UK, be refuelled in the air and complete missions far from base, before returning, this is however, not cost effective, its easier to make a semi permanent fixed site closer to where it is needed, and once the job, like Iraq, is finished, leave it for the locals to utilise.

I have no shame in admiting that I went to Uni to increase my possible earnings, I picked a course that sounded interesting but money was my motivation, it didn't work so I am going back as a postgrad but its still the money that motivates me.

I went to university so I could spend 4 years sleeping, drinking and fornicating (of which I managed 2 out of 3, which isn't that bad...). I can't be the only one.... :hmm:

I'm finally going to go in a few weeks, I don't drink anymore and the wife frowns on my fornicating so I guess I'll just have to sleep.

BD - no worries; just thought I'd make the observation :)

I went to university so I could spend 4 years sleeping, drinking and fornicating (of which I managed 2 out of 3, which isn't that bad...). I can't be the only one.... :hmm: Me too.

I went to university so I could spend 4 years sleeping, drinking and fornicating (of which I managed 2 out of 3, which isn't that bad...). I can't be the only one.... :hmm: Me too. I didn't go to Uni till I was 25, I already lived with my lass and had to work virtually full time while I was there. :grr: Its grim up north...

We lived in 'ole int ground when I went to University......... ........... in fact twernt even a university at all............... it wer only a UNI and twas int Cardiff and no bugger int right mind would go to Cardiff even int daylight even if given a free bus pass......... bus pass, pah luxury, we had to get up 6am int morning to feed orse, then built cart......... :) (apologies gentleman, rather a fine evening out I'm afraid :doh: )

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