Hello all- casual observer for many years!
Beagle- Why be a dream stealer? We all heard the stories while we were young and aspiring about how things were not as good as they used to be and my overriding memory was of the many, many nay sayers both mil, ex-mil, and civilian. Did it stop me? No. It made it feel like running through treacle though!
Surely it is now our role to encourage the passion in the next generation in the knowledge that we understand the essence if not the detail of how things will be for them in the current and future military.
Any words of discouragement would be based on our paradigm, not theirs, and it is not fair to be the wet blanket when we should be the ones making their eyes sparkle as we describe our own journey.
For me it was all about the flying and there are few places anyone can experience the type of flying we did than in the RAF. I'm pretty sure that many aspiring pilots will feel the same. Somehow I feel that the length that people will serve will reduce significantly though.