Crab,
Regarding your post, but maybe to add a bit of balance we cannot slag off senior officers and PMA too much - lets not forget that only 13 months ago the Rotary Wing Strategy was announced in Parliament by the then Prime Minister himself - including the purchase of 22 shiney new wokkas.
We all know the lead in time for a frontline CR wokka pilot, let alone any increase to those involved in more specialised niche roles.
If we had been staring at our tummy buttons with 22 new aircraft and not enough aircrew to fly them (as per the Army having to place AH into storage) then we would have been too quick to say that the senior management should have primed the the training pipe line sooner.
However, what is really being missed here is the link between the airline and private aviation industry with the future for supply and demand. Is anyone looking at Flight International - Dubai Airlines, Ethiad and that is without the emerging markets of South East Asia. As to the European airlines, they too are just riding out this storm and are actively engaged in demographic modeling against their future business cases - all flexible and which can be put into place at the drop of HRs hat - especially when the aviation industry is acutely aware that many of the current pilot HR pool are (generally speaking) those self made individuals that have thrown money at the problem (i.e. accepted the significant type rating fees, long term handcuffs and low salary) in comparison to the historical aircrew pool of self improvers whom built their experience through PPL, becoming flying instructors and working up to becoming an airline pilot with a solid and varied aviation experience foundation (rather than the self made individual jumping straight in as First Pilot with the very basic requirement achieved in the shortest possible time). Many in the aviation industry are beginning to correlations between the increase in aircraft accidents and incidents with the experience levels of their aircrew (quelle surprise!).
My point being that once again experienced military aircrew with known career paths, log books and flying standards will soon become a much sought after commodity that the key driver of the airline industry will be ready to throw money at to lure at a moments notice - and that is without the morale factor of the austerity measures and continued global operations (not just Afghan, potentially the Middle East, Ivory Coast and Korea all look highly possible between now and the next Defence Review.
The key issue is that the military manning levers will never ever be able to keep up (and compete) with the private aviation sector.
Lets add other factors to pure demographics and airline double digit growth - which sane minded young, bright, enthusiastic, talented and capable young person is really going to opt for a career in military aviation on leaving school/university? The negative
PR and low morale due to the rushed and Treasury led Defence Review will result in the best talent going else where, and H M Forces struggling to get the right calibre through the career offices doors and into cockpits of tomorrow's military aircraft - and that is without any potential reversal of some of the rushed and crass decisions that have just been made by (what I believe) has been a hoodwinked Prime Minister led astray. Lets (hypothetically) say that a UK national MPA capability is to be re-instated, or that the Harrier (or some other carrier borne) capability is suddenly recognised as essential to the UK's National Security interests - where will these aircrew suddenly come from when the Politicians of tomorrow suddenly realise (with a cold sweat) what rushed decisions they made in 2010.
Chopping the training pipeline now is like removing the insurance policy for the future. Previous posters are so right - we have been here before - Project MARLYN (Manning and Recruitment in the Lean Years of the Nineties) was published in the late 1980s, but was ignored which resulted in the long term shortage of aircrew and subsequent divisive and unnecessary FRIs having to be used to assist the previously poor strategic manning levers.
From a rotary perspective, the Merlin and Puma OCFs being full is as much a part of us ensuring that the Fisheads get nowhere near our SH - we all know that they would open it in a heart beat if we gave them a chance. As to the wokka - we not only have our extra aircraft inbound, but also the whole upgrades to get through.
Again the key point that the requirement for CR trained SH aircrew has and will not go away (even if the Afghan withdrawal timeline goes to plan and there are no other international conflicts or 'peace support' operations) , we still need to keep the pipeline churning out potential (SH) pilots - and that is without any more push factors from the austere Treasury and the increasing pull factors from the private sector that will result in a Voluntary Outflow that none of the military manning organisations will be able to keep up with or reduce......it will be all too late by then.