There's always money to be had when our political masters need it. The problem is that defence is not a high enough priority at the moment and that it doesn't affect the possible voting patterns of the electorate in the same way that spending on the NHS, Education and Social Security has. For that reason we always end up sucking the hind tit........unless there is a "patriotic" war to be fought e.g. the Falklands War as distinct from other "interventions" of late such as Afganistan or Libya.
Our political masters still think we can deliver where it matters and this is dangerous IMHO as we could all too easily find ourselves engage in Syria or some other scrap. Even a UN peace-keeping job in somewhere like South Sudan or the C.A.R. would stretch us to breaking point.
All D.C.'s talk about having two aircraft carriers under construction will not cut any ice unless they are fully crewed, by people with the right experience/training, AND a full complement of aircraft plus all the paraphernalia that goes with putting ships like that to sea, with stores ships and tankers in support, with hopefully a frigate/destroyer/SSN in support.
With HM Treasury sanctioning over £375Billion of quantantive easing to stimulate the UK's economy all it would take would be say 5% of that total to be injected into the defence budget and we would be able to procure new MPA's, additional F-35's AND stop the loss of trained personnel through forced redundancy which is leaving the armed forces with critical skill shortages esp. in aircrew, engineering and medical branches.
Just my 2c's worth. Rant over.
MB
PS
Do this and the government might also persuade me to vote for them in 2015!
