MGD
small scale/medium scale short term intervention
By short term I assume you mean 'non-enduring' i.e. a single shot with no roulement. Unfortunately, IMHO, that does not meet the requirement of intervention - intervention in another nations business always leads on to follow on stabilisation / peace keeping. Yes we could do as you suggest for humanitarian relief etc but intervention / peace keeping - forget it. I'm struggling to think of a recent intervention operation that has been 'short term' - even Sierra Leone left a significant training team behind for some years.
Bottom line - if we're going to reduce our forces to the size of say Belgiums (random choice - don't know their actual size) then we need to reduce our aspirations accordingly. If that means just the defence of UK territory (and whats left of its sovereign territory) plus the odd hurricane / flood relief then so be it. Leave the big wars to those with the money / forces - USA and China!
Pheasant
So true - and the reason many of these companies can bid cheap is they pay peanuts and rely on ex-servicemen looking to supplement their pensions.