Money
You guys ...
you keep on saying "There is no money"
and yet ... there is a huge amount of money which the government is using ... for other things. Often wasteful or downright foolish.
If we just look at "Defence Money" we are still spending huge amounts on a distant war which many believe we have already lost.
There is money for UK Defence, we just need to adjust the priority. We should consider scaling down the expeditionary intervention regime-change aspect and rebuild robust defence of what is important.
The RAF equipment balance looks all wrong, we seem to be awash with Chinooks to carry soldiers ... where exactly after Afghanistan? There is also an awful lot of UAV/RPAS capable of finding a thug on a motor-bike ... where are we going to use these after Afghanistan? do we have any reconnaissance assets capable of operating in anything other than a benign air environment? After the RAPTOR on Tornado goes I think not.
The AVM (ret'd)'s paper is indeed dated but in places still relevant - and it does raise the 'MPA' topic in (yet) another thread.
Maybe we will look seriously at the feasibility of leasing Block II P-8A's. We should not wait until the (proposed) 2015 SDSR happens before we at least consider this.
It is my hope that whenever the next SDSR comes along it will provide the opportunity to re-shape our defence forces to do that - Defend.
I would like to think that a Multi-Mission Aircraft would find a place in the RAF/RN. And the money? There is Government money, if they stopped wasting it we would all see the benefits.