Can I just say that I despise you for your behavior on this forum. Very unofficerlike in my opinion.
Why unofficerlike? I thought the point FW made was entirely justified.
The ethos of officer training (well, in the Army at least) is to always put your men before yourself - so you eat after they have eaten, get your head down after them, wake up before them, eat after them again. As others have pointed out, the appropriately monikered Mental's opening line was "I'm a Harrier pilot and..." The rest was all about self-preservation.
HMG has invested about £3m in his training as a Harrier pilot, so even if he no longer has the opportunity to pay that back as a Harrier pilot, he has the opportunity to pay it back as an RN officer. Even on a ground tour, that is a damn good, honourable, dignified, well paid job, with good career prospects. He should consider himself extremely lucky.
There are a lot of people in the defence industry signing on the dole today.