"....we did not eat the pigeon..."

They don't need to reopen SDSR, they'll just hide the additional cuts in PR11 :hmm:

You Sir, have got it in one - it's going to hurt (again!).

S4G

Which is precisely the problem - this is exactly what happened last time, and it saw programmes being pushed right to the next PR on financial, rather than strategic grounds. It doesn't take the brains of a rocket scientist to work out that there are always going to be additional costs imposed by delays; it also rewards "entryism" of deliberately underestimating costs to get something into the programme, knowing that virtually nothing is ever actually cancelled - MRA4 being the obvious exception.

Heroic assumptions aren't.

S41

Trust....never.
 

My daughter's in an ATC Sq and their flying time has been cut by 75%. She's only 16 and upset as she doesn't think that she'll get her chance to experience flight with the RAF now. Moral is very low generally on the Sq.
Only a small unit as things go but to hear what some of the guys and girls are saying about what's happening and their opinions about today's politicians, whatever the colour is very eye-opening.
Only a very small story but there's an underlying feeling that I'm picking up. Politicians need to be very careful from now on. There's no trust.
The thing is, is this country actually worth fighting for as things are? I've heard so many people asking this question in my travels. Does the population care if we don't have any armed forces? I take my hat to the RAF, indeed to all armed forces personel for somehow not telling our leaders to f--k off (please excuse) when they want blood to be spilled or to a lesser extent snow cleared, civil emergency work carried out etc. You're being abused. I'm now starting a second bottle. Good luck...:mad:

It does strike me that a feeling of anger and resentment is growing across all sectors of society, and I really wouldn't be surprised to see more and more unrest spilling on to the streets.

And whilst the anarchists and their like will no doubt tag on, at the heart of this will be the average man in the street who is being slowly and mercilessly strangled by rapidly increasing taxation, rapidly decreasing value for money in terms of the returns we get from government, commerce and industry from our increasing 'investment', red tape and political correctness. And frankly, the claims of Cameron et al that they are just sorting out the mess they inherited is growing rather tiring and is simply a way to tighten the screw on middle England ever tighter.

And when the police can't cope, the fire brigades, prison services and chunks of the transport infrastructure have all gone on strike, it will be us, the military, that is called in to plug the gap. You don't need heavy armour, aircraft carriers or fast jets when all you are is a paramilitary organisation - and that is the what we are rapidly becoming. Soon we won't be doing exchange tours with US forces, we'll be off to Italy for a tour with the Carabinieri or to some other such gendarmerie. Combat tours will be a thing of the past, as we will be off to some sleepy hollow in theatre to train up a local police outpost.

Frankly, the writing is well and truly on the wall - we are rapidly heading towards an irreducible minimum.

I wish I had a counter argument to the last two posters:

But I dont........

The minority sectors of UK society must tread very carefully, for there will be many in poverty that will take any opportunity to make a student protest in London look like a walk in the park. At the very least, those same protesting students are the core of tomorrows society; and they will have long memories. Toxteth II is a distinct possibility.

Guzlin makes an excellent point. My decision to leave the RAF at my 38/16 point was largely based on exactly the same question and the answer I came up with was a resounding no - (1994 - yes, KOS, I know...). Then as now a Conservative-in-name-only government was strip-mining the defence budget in a vain attempt to buy the favours of an electorate which, by and large, knows little about the armed forces and cares even less. It saddens me to see it happening again and how much worse things are this time round.

The majority of the population will do sod all though - they've been numbed into a compliant zombie like state as the government suck their blood and give less and less back to the people who need it, and more and more to the people who least deserve it.

The country is ripe for radical extremist exploitation - and I mean perhaps extreme right wing feeding on a simmering resentment that may mean that - rather than explicitly vote for it, they won't vote against it, sleepwalking into something very bad.

Really nothing has changed. I was in a pub in Chester the night news of Kennedy broke. A retired sqn ldr aged no more than 40, on learning that I was a newly commissioned fg off gave me a word of advice. Oddly a year later, entering my first operational mess I was given the same word of advice by a copilot.

RESIGN

Diablo,

re toxteth 2 - which is exactly why any damage done to public property should be left - no money for repairs to facilities if the locals want to behave like animals.

I cant believe they discussed using water cannon on the students - in December in freezing conditions, it would have cleared the streets in an hour.

Forces prepare for axe to fall on fighter jet fleet in drastic cuts package - Telegraph

I know it's in the Telegraph and may well be tripe but just so readers are all aware:uhoh:

Gee Whizz, politicians I wouldn't give you an old lampshade with a hole in it for 'em. Only last week the denial that the review would be revisited was issued.:mad:

FB:)

So, scrap one fleet of 80 jets to save 1 billion, because, and I quote CAS, it's not big enough to meet our needs. Keep fleet of 134 jets at cost of 7 billion. Then shortly after cut said fleet to 20 jets less than the other efficient, capable , flexible and cheap fleet you've just removed.

Couldn't make it up. Though the Telegraph may have.

SammySu

I'm an armchair spectator now, but this is depressingly predictable. Seems to be:

- Fail to make tough choices;
- Fudge a defence review;
- Fill gap with untenable assumptions;
- Declare victory!
- Publish document. (Get promoted).
- Repent at leisure.....

£300m would be saved if you lost about three GR4 Sqns and a base. If true - and I can well believe that the SDSR finds themselves £1bn short, though £1.6bn is surprisingly large - then it means a GR4 "force"of four(ish) Squadrons plus and OCU(ish), is depressingly possible.

And with all of the engineering at Marham, this would be curtains for Lossie, too. (Unless you move QRA(I) North from Leuchars, which is a whole other kettle of fish.)

Still, it's enough to do Afghanland and retain some element of a sub-strategic option. Not much of one, though.

Finally, though I would've given up a couple of Sqns of GR4s to keep MRA4, I can't see if this is the real level of required cuts that MRA4 would've made it back earlier on. An appalling situation.

S41

What I find depressing about the comments on loss of capability etc, and the anti government diatribe, is that the MOD has failed dismally to live within its budget, every project has a cost overrun and arrives late! Any company run like the MOD would be out of business! The MOD must learn to live within its budget and drive out waste. I mean does it really need two super capable and very expensive Typhoons to escort an Etihad airliner, which had a drunken abusive passenger, into Stansted!
In the past we were all sad when we lost our overseas postings to Singapore etc, but the service has to get real, someone has to pay, and I'm sure I am not alone in thinking I pay too much tax!
Get rid of few useless civil servants and senior officers, now there's a start!

That situation with the airliner could have turned out to be anything. Scrambling to Jet Fighters (without the adjectives) was nothing out of the ordinary. Although, I do believe in the normal course of events, the R.A.F. scramble one jet each time. The Americans uusally scramble two, as far as I'm aware. But they're much more gungho!:ok:

FB:)

More importantly, MoD does not actually know where the money goes. Oh it will be aware that the budget for this programme is £Xm and that it spent £Y&Z on contracts A&B against that programme. However, (particularly when you root around in what was DLO) the actual service, thing, product purchased is very hard to touch, particularly when one adds in the RAB element.

I once saw an equipment IPT with a budget of tens of million with a line item against which was a description which no-one could actually explain what it was. That line item represented 25% of the entire budget.

Might actually be worth a root and branch review of the accounting system before butchering any more capability....

RANT MODE ON. Please do not think I am an apologist for the Government - I am not - their latest measures have just cost me £16000 per year. However, people talk on this thread of them failing to make tough decisions - does anyone seriously think that axing Nimrod and Harrier, making servicemen and women redundant et al was an easy decision. People also talk of a root and branch review - that's what I believe is going on at the moment; the biggest review since the MoD came into being in the 1960s - everything is up for scrutiny. We have to shoulder some of the blame because for too long we have had VSOs and Senior Civil Servants who have shied away from telling the politicos what a mess the Defence Budget has been in; they have simply been content to push the problem a couple of PRs to the right so that the wheel doesn't come off on their watch. It will take time, because to rush it will result in more of the sort of B****x that we've had to put up with for years now. Circumstance will inevitably change, and this will cause parts of the process to start again i.e. you won't sell some very expensive hardware to an oil-rich country, so that reasonable assumption that you made a few weeks ago that there would be X billion coming in via Defence Sales to help fill the black hole is now no longer worth the paper you wrote it on - back to square one chaps". There is also the inertia to get over - the sceptics who say "yeh yeh, we've seen this all before". I really believe that this time it's different; the country is pretty much bankrupt. When the previous muppets came into power all those years ago they inherited a strong economy with money in the bank - and look how they left it. Yes, they are good for the Armed Forces - because they spend money they haven't got, just as they do for the Health Service, and Social Service et al. RANT MODE OFF - and I hope I haven't upset anyone. CB

FB - ref your post No 58.
SOP is to scramble 2 for very good operational reasons.
CB