Tecumseh,
I am sorry to be droning on about this particular point, but this is where it seems to me that this saga turns from being yet another biblically scandalous procurement debacle into something else. Ok, they screwed up procuring Mk2, so what? I have bought but not yet read Citadels of waste, but am all too familiar with the plot; so much so that I am deferring reading it all until I am in a suitable mental state!
I have no sense that any of the dramatis personae in relation to the crash had any personal culpability in relation to the procurement.
And yet Bagnall felt inclined to sign the RTS, attempting to cover his bases as he did so, and two even more senior officers chose to protect him when the proverbial hit the fan in the most dramatic fashion. Odd.
It would be too cynical to speculate about whether any of them went on to post service employment with any of the contractors involved, so I won’t.