Might have been done before:-
STAFF GUIDANCE ON DEFENCE RESTRUCTURING
1. This guidance is being issued to remedy a perceived difficulty experienced by Staff at all levels in
understanding the rationale behind recent Defence re-structuring. In particular many Staff Officers seem
not to understand how reducing the numbers of aircraft, ships, tanks, artillery and soldiers results in a more
flexible, robust and effective fighting force.
2. In particular it seems that much of the confusion stems from a systemic misunderstanding of the
correct use of military terminology. A list of common terms and actual meanings follows.
3. In addition there follows an explanation of the key assumptions embedded within the Defence
Review. All Staff Officers are encouraged to seek clarification through their Chain of Command if they still
have any questions.
Staff Terminology used in the new Defence Plan:
Term MOD meaning
Flexible a. Smaller
b. Unable to operate unless under US protection
Robust a. Smaller
b. Lacking reserves or regeneration capability
Networked Smaller, but still unable to talk to each other
Capable Smaller
Agile Really, really small
Deployability Method of making the Forces, primarily the Army, able to send higher percentages
of their manpower to a distant location. This is achieved by reducing the overall
numbers involved, i.e. “In future the Army will be able to send 50% of it’s
manpower to Africa in the back of a Cessna, thus achieving greater deployability”.
Reach The distance the American’s are willing to fly us
Efficient Much, much smaller
Streamlined Just unbelievably small
Just in time For the funeral.
Integrated Process by which all three services get to brief against each other in public leaks,
attempting to justify and defend their own budget against cuts, thereby doing the
Treasury’s work for them. Taken to extremes by the Army in which Corps and
Regiments fight each other, and perfected within the Infantry.
Technically ambitious a. Slang, as in “He was being a bit technically ambitious when he tried to drive
that car through the wall” (cf, “To propose a Bowman”)
b. Description of the far future
Reserves Integral part of current Operational Manning.
Rationalisation a. Cuts
b. Psychological term, meaning to use complicated arguments to avoid facing
unpalatable truths, i.e., “we don’t need to pay for both expensive servicemen and
equipment, because we will be networked, agile, and technically ambitious”.
Rapid Used in a comparative sense, as in “The rapid erosion of the Himalayan
Mountains…”
Modernisation Cuts
Radical Deep Cuts
Transformation Really Deep Cuts
Sustainable Assuming zero casualties, no leave and no emergencies.
Sentences such as “these proposals capture our aim for a speedy deployable, agile, joint and integrated,
technically ambitious defence capability” will make more logical sense to the experienced Staff Officer once
the above definitions are applied.
4. It will also help if Staff Officer’s bear in mind the following Planning Principles. Point C will be of
particular relevance in explaining the rationale behind restructuring to Junior Staff.
a. Use of Special Forces. No one in the general Public has a clue how many there are, so they
can be announced as deploying to every country in the world.
b. Aggressive use of terminology can compensate for lack of actual forces. For example in the
past effective deterrence of a reasonably capable Maritime threat would require the despatch of a
task force, consisting of destroyers, frigates, submarines and possibly even a carrier. In the future
this task will still be achieved by a task force; but task-force will be the new description for a minesweeper.
c. The new Defence Plan was not resource driven. A comprehensive strategic estimate was
conducted, from first principles, identifying the current and potential threats to the UK and it’s
interests, allowing a reserve for the unexpected, and also allowing for recurrent non-warfighting
tasks such as Fire Strike cover and Foot and Mouth disease. Against the tasks identified an ideal
manpower establishment and Task Org was then identified. By an amazing coincidence it
happened to fit almost exactly within current Treasury MOD expenditure plans, and even allow the
MOD to carry half the costs of Iraq and Afghanistan.
d. Much of the current crisis in Defence Spending can be directly traced to the high costs of
legacy equipments. These were ordered at a time of ignorance in the past when Planners naively
seemed to believe that the threat they identified as imminent would remain the same for the 20-30
year service life of the equipment they were ordering. The assumption in the 1980’s and 90’s that
tanks, artillery, and aircraft would be needed in the future was ridiculous, as none of these
equipments have been used by the British Armed forces to any degree since the Falklands war.
However, current planners possess better foresight and are able to predict future threats for at
least the next 40 years. We are therefore able to be certain that Britain is unlikely to need any
tanks, aircraft, submarines etc. past about 2015.
e. Britain no longer needs a significant anti-submarine capability. No other nation possesses
submarines in any numbers, submarine technology is unlikely to advance at all over the next few 30
years, and should anti-submarine technology or skills be required at any point in the future they
can be reconstituted overnight from the reserves. (Once the reserves have been reconstituted). In
any case by 2020 the UK will be fully integrated into mainland Europe, and will therefore no longer
have a coastline to defend or be reliant upon sea-supply.
f. Similar arguments apply to air defence.
g. The Regimental System. In the past the Regimental System has been seen as the cornerstone
of British Military success, creating a system in which the individual is made to feel part of a
greater family, often stretching back hundreds of years, in which he is nurtured and developed, and
to which he feels such great loyalty that he is inspired to sacrifice himself if need be for his
Regimental comrades. However, the British youth of today are so naturally self-sacrificing and
community spirited that additional incentives are now unnecessary, and in any case the threat to
soldiers on the ground has been assumed away. There is therefore no further need for a system
whose main purpose is to generate fighting spirit, and it can be safely emasculated to achieve
administrative efficiency (see “Efficient” above).
h. High divorce rates within the Services will solve manpower crises, by ensuring all service
personnel will be happy to conduct back-to-back tours forever, as no one will have any families or
friends to miss.
i. Savings will be ploughed into the purchase of large numbers of hats. This will be essential
as in future everyone will be at least treble or quadruple hatted. Wars will be fought in rotation on
a strict “first come, first served” basis.
k. Future savings will be made by abolishing all training for the Chiefs of Staff. After all they
haven’t proven remotely as effective at manoeuvre warfare, disruption, dislocation or divide-andrule
as the Treasury.
l. Successive efficiency measures can be made to reinforce each other. For example, each
time troop numbers are cut, a unit can then be tasked to conduct the same jobs as before.
Provided there are no actual massacres of Friendly Forces, the new troop numbers can be seen to
have been fully as effective as the previous numbers, and so can form a baseline for achieving
efficiency cuts to new troop numbers. Savings can then be invested in new equipment, in the same
way that British Airways fires half its pilots every time it needs to buy a new plane. The ultimate
aim is to have one man, but equipped like Dr Octopus. He will sleep with one eye open at all times
to replicate full manning.
m. Key Assumptions: Current levels of operations are an aberration, will never be repeated,
and should form no guide to current manning requirements, let alone future ones. Gerry Adams
has embraced peace, there is no more requirement for crowd control in Northern Ireland, the FBU
have forsworn strikes along with all other key public workers, Osama Bin Laden is about to hand
himself in and the Easter Bunny will be providing Area Air Defence for London.
5. More detailed guidance can be found in JSP 4708- “Magic Mushrooms, their consumption, effects
and results in the MOD” and Minister Hoon’s Autobiography “What Colour is the Sky in My World?”