Oooh - scrapping the barrel methinks in para 1. Aren't we all talking about the use of NVD in SAR (read: operations) no-one cares who invented it (AEG, Germans). Come on you can do better defending than that
The man who first flew the goggles into Chile in 82 was Nige North at the time - off to drop some unexpected guests thru the backdoor. He would take umbrage at them not being effective, methinks.
Atleast when the RAF use NVD in the Falklands, they are land based more or less and only infrequently do they drift far offshore - I watch the stats.
Remember the RN constantly fly to their 'home' which is a dark thing floating on dark stuff in the dark. And the dark thing is also moving too. A tad more challenging than flying to and from a ruddy big island. Ooops, nearly forgot - the RAF aren't allowed to land or take off from ships on NVD are they? Why's that then?
RN didn't need NVD because of their environment - overwater ops. It's only because of its maturity over the years that they adopted them much later.
As long as the essence of civvy ops retains its grass roots (firmly ensconced in RN overwater experience with a soupcon of overland RAF experience), they will do very well in the future thank you very much
Existing civvy ops - QED.