Davejb
I presume from the anger apparent in your post that you are another Nimrod orphan. In that case what has happened to you is rotten and you have my sympathy. Since your resolve cracked and you did post, please let me make a couple of points.
Of course there is a lot of rubbish on this thread, indeed on ALL threads. That is because of the wide range of interest, knowledge, ignorance, experience, ego, prejudice and aggression spread throughout the posting fraternity and it goes with the territory. That is also why forums (fora?) like Prune are so interesting and thought provoking. It is not a valid reason for shooting a thread in the head, in fact quite the contrary. If what is being posted upsets you, don’t read it, but don't advocate silencing it. If one keeps an open mind and looks closely, there are usually a lot of valuable nuggets to be found hiding among the rubbish.
It also helps if posters read and understand what other posters have written before letting go with both barrels. For example, your para 2 suggests that I advocate a civvie inshore capability and a military long range one. I apologise for not making myself clear. I advocate the military carrying out military tasks, such as protection of military assets like submarines, wherever they may be, much of which will be long-range, and the civvies carrying out non-military tasks, such as customs work, surveillance and policing of merchant vessels around our coasts, which is by definition short-range. You suggest having one organisation responsible for doing both. That implies having a mega-expensive military asset like a LRMPA tasked with checking merchant vessels in the channel to see if they are illegally cleaning their tanks, and makes no financial, management or any other sort of sense. The Defence Budget is for defence, not for customs and border control duties.
Finally, this is NOT another "Nim thread". Nimrod is dead and gone, though not forgotten, God rest its soul. This is a thread about a future UK MPA capability, if it can be resurrected in some useful form. Despite your own hurt and pessimism, I’m sure that you would support that aspiration.