I have read this thread with interest and would like to add something that may be of help
The term "the grass is always greener on the other side of the hill" comes to mind
If you want to be unemployed, especially in the engineering dept then go ahead, the Civilian side of things at the moment is Dire.......... no, I would re categorise that as worse than Dire..
I am a fully qualified ex RAF Multi Licenced Engineer and I have a job, BUT a lot of engineers I know have none, no prospect of getting one and are struggling. Contracting wise I have friends that I would if being honest judging by their work and work ethic along with the quality of the said work, rank in the top 10% of contractors, these are the guys everyone want, and he has suffered months of unemployment in the last year. One I know sold his car, dropped behind with his mortgage but has managed to recover that situation. My sisters lad has finished college and has all the modules for his licences in place, he would even work for nothing if he could to get the experience period required to ratify his licences, and he has tried for a year to find a placement to no avail. At the end of the day a licence puts you in a stronger position employment wise, but how many of you have that? and then you will be competing with a plethora of fully qualified and type rated engineers from major airlines that are unemployed and seeking work.
The UK civil scene, from an engineering point of view is dead, lots of airlines are simply shifting their maintainance oversees to agencies that can do the job cheaper, Malta, Latvia etc and I have even known of aircraft going from the UK to the Phillipines for their checks.. look at the likes of Air Italia, a lot of their aircraft are shifting to the Irish register to they can get maintained to the US system in Ireland I believe.
So no matter how bad moral is.......... think of the cheque at the end of the month and if it is guarranteed or not and the family, lifestyle you need to maintain..........
Just my ten penneth, but I felt it needed to be said.