Having followed this saga, with interest from day one, I am now drawn to the conclusion that the result is simply the way that things are nowadays.
The current fad of no blame and no shame, no matter what, seems to extend to the obviously guilty as well as those having committed a serious but honest mistake.
As ever, the punishable offence is not the endangering of the aircraft and people on board, but the lack of integrity (or "telling lies", as it was called when I was serving) that followed.
I no longer serve in the Royal Air Force, and I have no say in how it is run, despite contributing through taxation, to the costs of the service. However, I am saddened to see that the current Royal Air Force has been reduced to a state where this situation can be allowed to define the standard of acceptable behaviour of Commissioned Officers.
I remain hopeful that someone will see sense and right this injustice, but I am not holding my breath.
Regardless of how much money has been invested in this man, he's a cad and a bounder, as they used to say, and has no place serving in a blue suit.
I say this not because he used a camera on the flight deck, but because he clearly lacked the moral fibre to say, right away, that he had done so, and tried to apportion the blame elsewhere.
When we have a situation, as clear cut as this, what hope is there for dealing in a fair and honourable way with genuinely bad people? Where is the incentive to do the right thing, when doing the wrong thing has no real lasting consequence?
The original decision to dismiss him from the service, was in my view, entirely correct, but when the established authority makes a decision to overturn that sentence, it is incumbent on us all to accept that.
In a word, tragic.
In two words, fuc tup.