There seems to be two discussions at present. # 1The standard of leadership at unit level
held that leadership was the most important gold standard that he looked for in his men. It didn't matter how clever they were accademicaly, if they didnt exhibit leadership skills by the bucket load, they would never get anywhere with him. He was our Chief for 25 Years, and most of us loved him. Except of course the weak "Yes Men" who bent this way & that as it seemed appropriate. They couldn't lead anyone out of a brown paper bag, and so it seems is the style of the service today!
A wise man indeed.
And #2 The arbitrary approach to the closing of units.
yes we are a 'force multiplier' but we are an expensive department
So long as the maths work out, and I believe they do, the cost of air support is irrelevant. It saves more than it costs, by spades full in my opinion, the only question is positioning of the units. Getting rid of Henlow in the first days of this project was a mistake and has left a hole in reasonable cover, but we are where we are, and until the Met come on stream the SE region will have to soldier on.
I wonder how the service provided is viewed by the troops on the streets, and are they calling for helicopters as often as they would if it were their own county's asset?