high spirits

I wouldn't say the threat level is higher than in AFG. It depends how 'down in the weeds' you go. The FJ mates should get Op allowance though.

FODPlod

The MoD statement said: “Operational allowance is paid to those service personnel on operations where they are working at high risk over a sustained period.”

I therefore support the payment of the £29 per day operational allowance to all aircrew committed to a 6-month tour flying over Libya but not to anyone whose most hostile confrontation is liable to be with the hotel concierge after closing time. This also applies to the £5.3k 'windfall' bonus currently awarded on completion of a 6-month tour in Afghanistan/Iraq. However, I believe the allowance and bonus have previously been paid to everyone serving in theatre so would such a distinction in this case be seen as divisive? (And that's before we broach the subject of qualification for campaign medals!)

Deployed personnel are supposedly in 'field accommodation' yet being fed and watered in comfortable hotels and on base at considerable expense to the public purse already. This is just like in any mess back in the UK but without having to pay 'subs' so can an additional bill be justified for local overseas allowance (LOA)? After all, everyone is supposedly busy performing war work, not on extended local leave. I'm assuming they already have the benefits of free phone calls, internet access, postal facilities, etc?

Pontius Navigator

The operational allowance was a welcome, if knee jerk reaction, benefit for those serving in inhospitable locations. It was clearly not thought through and introduced without thought for future operations etc.

Now, with money scarce, a similar thoughtless decision has been made.

Chris Griffin

FODplod,

you assume a great deal and are quite clearly uninformed. From personal experience as someone on the airborne periphery I know the FJ mates deserve every penny Op Allowance would bring. A lot of utterly pathetic penny pinching is going on. I'm sure more examples will follow.

FODPlod

Are you this rude towards all new posters?

If you read my post again, I said "I therefore support the payment of the £29 per day operational allowance to all aircrew..." i.a.w. the same rules governing the precedent set for Afghanistan but I can't see why it should apply to non-aircrew who never leave the base in Italy.

Easy Street

There is definitely a precedent for receiving the Op Allowance when operating from a 'safe' location. All aircrew on Op TELIC received Op Allowance on a per-day basis each time they crossed into theatre. Only one claim per day was allowed - ie multiple sorties didn't get you any 'extra'. If you were over Iraq at midnight local - lucky you - you got 2 days'-worth. Furthermore, if your days claimed exceeded 50% of your total deployment, you got Op Allowance for its entire duration.

The engineers didn't appear to mind this differential so much; it was their ineligibility for a TELIC medal that miffed them.

Given the probability of roving SA-6 and SA-8 being available to the Colonel's forces, I would say that it's an outrage that the Op Allowance has been denied.

Fox3WheresMyBanana

The risk of having to eject over Gadaffi's forces, whether due to enemy action or mechanical failure, is well worthy of Op Allowance in my opinion. Given we've just taken out #3 son & 3 grandkiddies, I shouldn't think The People's Guide is going to come over all 'Geneva Convention'.

I'd have expected better from CinC Air and DCinC Ops, both of whom I've served with.

Off Hot

'All aircrew'

Including AWACS and tankers who will not be flying within range of AD systems??

Debate...

bakseetblatherer

I don't remember any extra money in Telic, we certainly didn't track time over Iraq in anything but our log books. First I've heard of this, hope the Libya guys do get it.

Easy Street

basketblatherer,

You may not have got op allowance on TELIC if you served there before the allowance was introduced. I definitely got it on the last 2 times I went there, in 2007 and 2008.

bakseetblatherer

Ah too old, I was there at the start. Anyway the guys in Libya should get it IMO. It is ridiculous parsing the 'risk' like that.

Lonewolf_50

hanoijane:
That you see a close parallel tells us a great deal about you, and what you don't know, or more likely, refuse to see.
Not quite. This statement tells us a lot about you, none of it complimentary to your morals, culture, and your ethics.

Get over yourself, jane.

All that sniping aside, this adventure in Libya remains of dubious objective. If you look at the UNSC resolution underlying the political justification/support for it, it's rather vague and somewhat open ended.

What, quite frankly, is the envisioned end state?

To end the civil war/uprising/rebellion?
What is being done by outsiders is prolonging the civil war.
To facilitate a partition of the country?
That isn't the mandate.
To overthrow the Ghadaffi regime?
If that's the objective, it's being done all half arsed, at best, and it isn't the mandate ... though that seems to be the subtext ...

One doesn't protect civilians by prolonguing a civil war, but the first is what the UN mandate is intended to do, and the second what the NATO operation is doing.

It's a mess, but a quite different sort of mess than the Viet Nam mess was.

Not all messes are equal, jane, there are an infinite variety of messes to be had, found, made, and caused.

What a piece of work is man ...

hanoijane

Oh, Lonewolf, I'm so over myself I think I'm ready to fall in love with myself again second time around

Your argument - that there aren't a number of striking parallels between the current situation in Libya and early 60's Viet Nam - seems to be at variance with a fair number of informed observers of the conflict. Try googling 'Libya+new+Vietnam' if you'd like confirmation. Of course, you could be correct and everyone else wrong...

As for your final sentence, I consider the clumsy use of quotes to be the last refuge of the inarticulate. But if we're headed down this route, may I offer in reply something the late Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu came to understand all too well;

"Whoever has the Americans as allies does not need enemies"

Mike7777777

I doubt if the majority of the inhabitants of Western Europe would agree with that. No US involvement in WW2 = Red Army tanks reach Calais, no US involvement in Europe 1945 to 1989 = Red Army tanks reach Calais.

Pontius Navigator

Mike, your logic is flawed.

No US involvement = Ja vol Mein Herr.

No convoys to Russia, no military aid to Russia, no B29s so they could build the Bull, no German submarines to copy, no German scientists to develop US/USSR missiles etc etc.

draken55

Back on thread. To-day's news is not encouraging.

Gaddafi destroys Misrata rebels' fuel supply in air raid | World news | guardian.co.uk

SRENNAPS

Please could somebody tell me what this is?

Pontius Navigator

I think it is one and the same thing:

As for pilots getting danger money, I was not aware that there was a payment of danger money in AFG, more a question of a hardship bonus for the adruous nature of campaigning there. As I said before, it looks like the AFG operational money was a Government knee-jerk reaction by the last Government (same deal with compensation tariffs) without it being fully thought through.

Uncle Ginsters

Op Allowance or not, it seems to me that current ELLAMY deployments are causing more hardship than most HERRICK OOAs.

The lack of planning means that our already busy guys and gals that have just seen scything cuts across many areas are now off on a 4-monther with about a week's notice - that must surely count as a 'hardship' in some respect. Many of them still face HERRICK and MPA dets (for Typhoon and VC10) on their return

Op Allowance itself is clearly defined as being for those in harm's way by its geographical limits (Afghanistan and Iraq, AFAIK). The last threat matrix I saw didn't exactly show Gadaffi inviting us round for coffee

Another slap in the face from the decision-making bean-counters.....

Thelma Viaduct

"We continue to degrade and destroy a range of military assets including tanks, armoured personnel carriers and rocket launchers that threaten the civilian population." does this mean with another 10 years of bombing they will be able to launch a missile attack on the UK in 45 mins??? And why oh why do the military fall for the government BS time and time again, to the point where they genuinely believe what they're told???