MATOMAN
I too thought it a well written piece. However you're viewing the future of civil area ATC from the current perspective with civil 'on route' and a military 'off route'. The intent in the future is to introduce very many more controller tools to simplify things for controllers and also allow more flexibility to aircraft instead of forcing them to fly on airways. Medium Term Conflict Alert, increased automation of the control task, flexible use of airspace, availibility of Mode 'S' to ATCO's etc. will all come in the foreseeable future. The start is in 2006 when the Upper Air comes down to FL195 and we're already seeing the benefits of FUA.
The benefits involved of sectorisation of the military area task has already made itself apparent to an enthusiastic air staff at 3Gp (witness Western Sunset and probably Eastern Sunrise). Civil ATCO recruitment is good and throughput at the college is improving as NATS concentrate on getting more bums on seats. The introduction of more automation and controller tools will inevitably mean that there will be capacity increases in UK airspace, which is in any case not being fully used at all times of the day as it is. There will be some fat in the not too distant future for NATS to absorb some military tasks.
As for D&D, its time this thorn was grasped. Why are military controllers working civil aircraft in emergency, particularly GA who are simply lost? Given the current access to data at GP consoles the military D&D task could, with few additional requirements, be handled from a GP console IMHO (held an Emergency endorsement for 6 years).
BD