As others have picked up, there doesn't seem to be any serious provision for the other scenarios outlined in the SDSR other than taking action within a US led coalition.
Presumably the Chiefs of Staff would have told the Politicians that they were not being adequately resourced to be able to undertake operations of the scale outlined in the SDSR and its fact sheets and briefing documents?
Why then are Richards and Houghton quoting these elements of SDSR as though it were all still achievable with the resulting force structure?
I ask the question again: at what point do senior officers have the honesty and/or the moral fibre to stand up and say that:
"After this cost cutting the result is that we can no longer fulfil the missions that we could before it, and the scenarios outlined in SDSR are not realistically achievable."
Is it really the job of senior officers to be complicit in spinning this as being something that is perfectly alright? Is defence of the politicians' reputations more important than the defence of the realm?
At what point do they stop pushing out the tired optimistic 'stretched but not over-stretched' claptrap and the gung ho, can-do 'yes we can, albeit at risk' nonsense that just encourages the politicians to take more and more?