China recruits former British military pilots
Disgusting Behaviour
Those of us that leave or plan to leave are fully aware of ALL the opportunities and we make our choices according to our own personal values and requirements. I was aware of China but opted for somewhere else (that’s not to say I was guaranteed a job there by any means). I won’t judge anyone that did go that way though.
BV
BV
I leapt out of bed when I heard this. How sad that this has come to pass.
I recall the late, great Geoffrey Wellum saying that the cadets he met on his visits to Cranwell were 'right out of the top drawer'.
On the one hand I am glad that he is not alive to hear that the inheritors of the legacy of the Few have sold their country out by flying for China.
On the other hand I would have loved to have heard what he had to say about ex military pilots working for the Chinese. I have just heard Nick Robinson on the BBC Today Programme ask if they are they traitors. The public will surely think them so.
I recall swearing my allegiance to Queen and Country on the Holy Bible at Cranwell. I never forgot it and would never go back on the deal.
We have just seen the most patriotic demonstration of faith in our country with the splendid Queen's funeral and few of us will forget the sight of the Guards, the most loyal of soldiers, acting as pallbearers.
These pilots are utterly selfish and utterly naive with it. China has been remarkably successful at infiltrating every level of our society in ways too numerous to mention. The Confucius Institute has found a place in many British Universities not least the Institute of Education in London.
Something is seriously wrong with our culture and values and this country needs to wake up pretty quickly to all the threats.
In the meantime what to do about these pilots? The BBC have just broadcast that a Bill will be fast tracked through Parliament to deal with the problem. I don't think we need these pilots back here and I don't think any airline needs to employ them. I also don't want my taxes funding their pensions.
I recall the late, great Geoffrey Wellum saying that the cadets he met on his visits to Cranwell were 'right out of the top drawer'.
On the one hand I am glad that he is not alive to hear that the inheritors of the legacy of the Few have sold their country out by flying for China.
On the other hand I would have loved to have heard what he had to say about ex military pilots working for the Chinese. I have just heard Nick Robinson on the BBC Today Programme ask if they are they traitors. The public will surely think them so.
I recall swearing my allegiance to Queen and Country on the Holy Bible at Cranwell. I never forgot it and would never go back on the deal.
We have just seen the most patriotic demonstration of faith in our country with the splendid Queen's funeral and few of us will forget the sight of the Guards, the most loyal of soldiers, acting as pallbearers.
These pilots are utterly selfish and utterly naive with it. China has been remarkably successful at infiltrating every level of our society in ways too numerous to mention. The Confucius Institute has found a place in many British Universities not least the Institute of Education in London.
Something is seriously wrong with our culture and values and this country needs to wake up pretty quickly to all the threats.
In the meantime what to do about these pilots? The BBC have just broadcast that a Bill will be fast tracked through Parliament to deal with the problem. I don't think we need these pilots back here and I don't think any airline needs to employ them. I also don't want my taxes funding their pensions.
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Whilst it’s a tremendous backhand compliment revealing a level of subconscious inferiority - I’m not sure a few British retired pilots are going to revolutionise the Chinese Air Force.
Let’s remember we don’t have a “Top Gun” equivalent or Aggressor squadron and the last time a Brit pilot shot down an enemy aircraft was 1982, those pilots having long retired.
You can buy good books on tactics*, but at the end of the day it’s embedded QWI totally familiar with their aircraft’s performance and weapons - which I doubt they’d release to a foreign instructor - followed by hours of continuous training in ACT, 2v2, 4v4 and combat training against dissimilar types.
You can buy talk about battle management, flanking, beaming etc etc. But it has to become second nature.
Which is why we have, or had, so many exercises such as Cope Thunder, Red Flag, Mallet Blow etc.
Unless they’ve run off with th3 technical manuals for the weapons or electronics of something the Chinese want to copy or defeat I can’t see this as more than an embarrassment,, not a disaster.
Let’s remember we don’t have a “Top Gun” equivalent or Aggressor squadron and the last time a Brit pilot shot down an enemy aircraft was 1982, those pilots having long retired.
You can buy good books on tactics*, but at the end of the day it’s embedded QWI totally familiar with their aircraft’s performance and weapons - which I doubt they’d release to a foreign instructor - followed by hours of continuous training in ACT, 2v2, 4v4 and combat training against dissimilar types.
You can buy talk about battle management, flanking, beaming etc etc. But it has to become second nature.
Which is why we have, or had, so many exercises such as Cope Thunder, Red Flag, Mallet Blow etc.
Unless they’ve run off with th3 technical manuals for the weapons or electronics of something the Chinese want to copy or defeat I can’t see this as more than an embarrassment,, not a disaster.
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Need a dictionary so you? A jet engine from 70 years ago has nothing to do with RAF aircrew committing treason. You so-called current/ex-RAF bunch are quite weird on here.
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China may not be our enemy (yet) but they are definitely America's enemy, and America lets us play with their nice toys (AMRAAM, F35 etc.). They also invite us to share intelligence and take part in their programmes, RAF pilots are currently flying B2, F35 and F22 in America, would they let us do this if there was a risk these pilots would subsequently go and fly for China? I have spoken to a number of US exchange officers about this and they are absolutely furious, don't imagine the Pentagon is overly impressed either. It may not be technically illegal but neither is having sex with a 12 year old in the Philippines. Ultimately your actions in teaching the Chinese how to be better could end up being used to kill Western or Taiwanese pilots, if you can live with that, fine. I couldn't.
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On the other hand...
Just how unprincipled have our own governments been proven to be over all these years? These Western lighthouses of 'democracy' and 'integrity'?
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Integrity? Isn't that another thing that IOT is supposed to drum into RAF pilots?
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Oh?
I did leave out the majority of corporations, banks, councils, police, priests, professional sports, Supreme Courts, newspapers, food industry, automobile repair technicians, etc. hell, people in general.
Last edited by 70 Mustang; 19th Oct 2022 at 04:04. Reason: added
Might be be part of this announcement! below:
John Healey, Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, asked the Secretary of State for Defence:
“What steps his Department is taking to ensure that the disruption to the UK Fast Jet training is minimised over the next three years.”
James Heappey, Minister of State for the Ministry of Defence, responded:
“Measures being considered include sending further trainees to the NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training programme in the USA; accelerating planning for No 11 Squadron (Joint Qatar/UK Squadron) at RAF Leeming to train RAF pilots from late 2022 until 2027;and working with allies and partners to examine whether UK pilots could be trained overseas, or where we might pool our resources, to mutual benefit.”
Maybe we will send them students?
John Healey, Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, asked the Secretary of State for Defence:
“What steps his Department is taking to ensure that the disruption to the UK Fast Jet training is minimised over the next three years.”
James Heappey, Minister of State for the Ministry of Defence, responded:
“Measures being considered include sending further trainees to the NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training programme in the USA; accelerating planning for No 11 Squadron (Joint Qatar/UK Squadron) at RAF Leeming to train RAF pilots from late 2022 until 2027;and working with allies and partners to examine whether UK pilots could be trained overseas, or where we might pool our resources, to mutual benefit.”
Maybe we will send them students?
Reality check
Come on people. Seriously. You can bleat and wail all you like but put yourself in their shoes.
You’re living in Britain with all its current problems. You are an over-worked Typhoon pilot being paid little more than a train driver (many of them will have been earning less) living in crappy old accommodation, spending months a year away from home in an organisation that increasingly makes pilots feel like they are bit-part players in a world where admin and D&I matters more than the delivery of air power. Then someone comes along and offers you a quarter of a million per year, tax free to teach some Chinese pilots how to fly jets.
In that same world, those guys look at the pilots who are only a few years ahead of them in the system who have nice houses and investment portfolios mainly because of luck with timing. They hear stories of the ‘good old days’ but cannot equate it to what is currently happening around them.
I decided it wasn’t for me but, with all things considered, I am not going to embark on a moral crusade against those that took them up on the offer.
Morals and principles are all well and good. The generations before these guys can sit in their (mortgage free) nice houses with their BMW parked on the driveway and wax lyrical about how these guys are treasonous for heading East. Fast forward 30 years and these same guys, if they’d decided against it, might be sitting in their rented semi with a Vauxhall Astra parked on the driveway feeling morally superior but bloody miserable.
Perspective and empathy is important.
BV
You’re living in Britain with all its current problems. You are an over-worked Typhoon pilot being paid little more than a train driver (many of them will have been earning less) living in crappy old accommodation, spending months a year away from home in an organisation that increasingly makes pilots feel like they are bit-part players in a world where admin and D&I matters more than the delivery of air power. Then someone comes along and offers you a quarter of a million per year, tax free to teach some Chinese pilots how to fly jets.
In that same world, those guys look at the pilots who are only a few years ahead of them in the system who have nice houses and investment portfolios mainly because of luck with timing. They hear stories of the ‘good old days’ but cannot equate it to what is currently happening around them.
I decided it wasn’t for me but, with all things considered, I am not going to embark on a moral crusade against those that took them up on the offer.
Morals and principles are all well and good. The generations before these guys can sit in their (mortgage free) nice houses with their BMW parked on the driveway and wax lyrical about how these guys are treasonous for heading East. Fast forward 30 years and these same guys, if they’d decided against it, might be sitting in their rented semi with a Vauxhall Astra parked on the driveway feeling morally superior but bloody miserable.
Perspective and empathy is important.
BV
Sending Students to Canada or the United States to be trained.....as during WWII you. mean?
Ex-military pilots flying for the Chinese....like the AVG....Flying Tigers?
Does History repeat itself?
Ex-military pilots flying for the Chinese....like the AVG....Flying Tigers?
Does History repeat itself?
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a poor comparison?
Probably didn't pay quite so well? 🤣
Come on people. Seriously. You can bleat and wail all you like but put yourself in their shoes.
You’re living in Britain with all its current problems. You are an over-worked Typhoon pilot being paid little more than a train driver (many of them will have been earning less) living in crappy old accommodation, spending months a year away from home in an organisation that increasingly makes pilots feel like they are bit-part players in a world where admin and D&I matters more than the delivery of air power. Then someone comes along and offers you a quarter of a million per year, tax free to teach some Chinese pilots how to fly jets.
In that same world, those guys look at the pilots who are only a few years ahead of them in the system who have nice houses and investment portfolios mainly because of luck with timing. They hear stories of the ‘good old days’ but cannot equate it to what is currently happening around them.
I decided it wasn’t for me but, with all things considered, I am not going to embark on a moral crusade against those that took them up on the offer.
Morals and principles are all well and good. The generations before these guys can sit in their (mortgage free) nice houses with their BMW parked on the driveway and wax lyrical about how these guys are treasonous for heading East. Fast forward 30 years and these same guys, if they’d decided against it, might be sitting in their rented semi with a Vauxhall Astra parked on the driveway feeling morally superior but bloody miserable.
Perspective and empathy is important.
BV
You’re living in Britain with all its current problems. You are an over-worked Typhoon pilot being paid little more than a train driver (many of them will have been earning less) living in crappy old accommodation, spending months a year away from home in an organisation that increasingly makes pilots feel like they are bit-part players in a world where admin and D&I matters more than the delivery of air power. Then someone comes along and offers you a quarter of a million per year, tax free to teach some Chinese pilots how to fly jets.
In that same world, those guys look at the pilots who are only a few years ahead of them in the system who have nice houses and investment portfolios mainly because of luck with timing. They hear stories of the ‘good old days’ but cannot equate it to what is currently happening around them.
I decided it wasn’t for me but, with all things considered, I am not going to embark on a moral crusade against those that took them up on the offer.
Morals and principles are all well and good. The generations before these guys can sit in their (mortgage free) nice houses with their BMW parked on the driveway and wax lyrical about how these guys are treasonous for heading East. Fast forward 30 years and these same guys, if they’d decided against it, might be sitting in their rented semi with a Vauxhall Astra parked on the driveway feeling morally superior but bloody miserable.
Perspective and empathy is important.
BV
Let's be honest, there's probably a load of PLA participating in Tim Davies' flight school/Grim Reapers learning more operational tactics on DCS...
I don’t know what astounds me more, ex RAF aircrew taking money to train Chinese aircrew on western tactics or people on here trying to defend it. There is no defence for what they are doing out there.
Dctyke
You’re assuming the guys in question are teaching the latest, greatest anti-AMRAAM tactics and giving away all of our biggest secrets. The reality will be a lot less dramatic. If they are teaching general flying skills and even BFM they’re not giving away anything that can’t be learned from google.
I would suggest that, before taking the seat right behind the driver on the outrage bus, you should consider that maybe the Daily Mail et al are not in possession of the full facts.
Either way, I wouldn’t want to be one of the guys right now. At least not if I had been planning to return to the UK at some stage and require a job.
BV
I would suggest that, before taking the seat right behind the driver on the outrage bus, you should consider that maybe the Daily Mail et al are not in possession of the full facts.
Either way, I wouldn’t want to be one of the guys right now. At least not if I had been planning to return to the UK at some stage and require a job.
BV
