Not quite sure what you are driving at fareast, if you are saying Sandys' was obviously wrong because you were a pilot longer than predicted - with that point one can only agree.
The threat that Sandys chose to address was the major one, towards which Britain bought, eventually, and at great expense, a sub launched nuclear deterent to counter the Soviet threat. He thought that Britain had no chance of matching the Soviet Union in terms of conventional forces.
India, Pakistan (Iran?) have bought into the nuclear club, but would never use their nukes. - you believe because their leaders would not want to suffer the economic consequences of using them? It's a similar argument for them for buying into nuclear as it was for the UK, it's a cheaper way of standing up to intimidation than spending massivly on conventional forces.
For years the RAF kept itself busy chasing after Bear D's, it still does - so what? Russia has enough ICBM assets to turn the UK to dust if it should chose to face the consequences of retaliation from sub launched nuclear ICBM.
Sandys was trying to take a sensible course, to satisfy the anounced policy of the day - withdrawal from East of Suez etc - and to focus on what was perceived as a highly critical ongoing threat from the Eastern Bloc.
Last edited by Jetex Jim; 12th Mar 2008 at 15:03.