Bob,
If I come across as zealot like, then guilty as charged I guess. You've told me before that if you had any concerns about the safety of your aircraft you wouldn't fly it (or words to that effect). I pointed out that you should be concerned, even though the aircraft was presented to you as serviceable via the F700, because you would not know if it was airworthy (or words to that effect). You, and I in my time, have to rely on faceless dedicated engineers (and increasingly non-engineers) who assure that airworthiness for you. So what as aircrew can you do about it to be the better informed and hopefully re-assured? My advice then remains the same now, read the book (books indeed!). In your case (and FL's) I would start with Red 5. Though it centres on the slices of cheese that sealed Sean Cunningham's fate it acts as a primer on how the system protecting your backsides is supposed to work, how it used to work, how it was subverted by RAF VSOs who ordered the suborning of your bits of paper to sign the Regs off as complied with when they weren't, and most devastatingly of all, to dismiss the faceless dedicated engineers who would not comply, and with them their experience and knowledge base. They were replaced by non-engineers with none of those attributes. The system has never recovered. I am but a spear carrier in this campaign. Like you, a mere driver airframe never told of those who strove daily to protect my sorry arse or even told about airworthiness. What I know about it I have learned in this forum. The good news is that you do not have to read through the PPRuNe archives to get an understanding of the dire state of UK Military Air Safety. Red 5 is available down that mighty tropical river :-
A mere £3.99 to download, and newly updated. You can read it on your PC if without a Kindle with the Kindle for PC app. I can guarantee that if you didn't have concerns before you will when you have read it. Further books by David Hill can be found down the same river. I would recommend them all, unreservedly.
As to bits of paper protecting you and others, I'm loath to use the motoring analogy so beloved of in this forum, but isn't that exactly what an MOT certificate does? Prove a vehicle was roadworthy on test (but not later, as you will no doubt say to prove the weakness of the analogy. Point taken!) ? Airworthiness is proved, or disproved, by a continuous process of audit. Everything that is done to the aircraft or its systems is recorded and certified as IAW the Regulations. Falsify that, or merely disregard the need for the mandated process, and airworthiness cannot be proven and is hence absent. If a simple airframe such as a glider can thus be rendered unairworthy, what hope for more complex aircraft and systems?
As to seeking comfort in the actions/inactions of other nations, did any one of them seek to actively destroy their own Air Safety systems? I suspect we are a world leader in that regard, and will continue to retain that dubious honour until the cover up ends and true reform enacted.
There you go, Bob, more ranting. Just to prove your point.