DOG
I accept your point, but what else could the military do? Do you think that the The Scum would have run a story with the headline "PW to carry out routine Chinook training sortie"? We cannot issue a press release every time W or H do some routine training. The Scum and others will want their sensational headline. I happen to believe that most readers will accept the realisitic answer of the MOD on this one. It was a routine training sortie that also happened to be useful.
If it is routine training that would have been done anyway, just that this happened to also involve a slight benefit for some of the occupants, we, the MOD and the three services, should not need to justify that to the tabloid press et al. It's a bit like 'serf's' complaint about The Firebirds doing a 9-ship formation trip. You can please some of the people, some of the time.....