I'm sure I'll be accused of stirring up an anti civil service argument but looking at the quote "An assessment by the Royal United Services Institute last month expects a reduction of around 25,000 servicemen and 15,000 MoD support staff by 2014.", I find it a little surprising given that there are already more civil servants than military.
Why, in these times of cutbacks, will there be an even more disproportionate number of civil servants to uniformed manpower? Is it because they can strike if the cuts are too unpalatable. I guess we just bend over again!