What makes you think/assume the current lot will get back in at the election in May?

Personally I think Cameron and Osbourne's comments are irrelevant to what the next 5 years will bring as regards UK Defence matters.

He's not...

Torque of the Devil,

Just paraphrasing Philip Hammond's statement from last weekend on the Andrew Marr Show:

"Mr Hammond, a former defence secretary, told the BBC's Andrew Marr show: Mr Cameron "is passionate about our armed forces. He has always been absolutely clear that he is not prepared to preside over any further cuts to our regular armed forces."

"Times" today quotes the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies who reckon that the cuts the Chancellor would have to make 2015-2020 would rise from the planned £18.3 Bn to £ 26.6 Bn if he has to hit the 2% defence mark

hence the reluctance at the Treasury & No.10 to make a commitment

Shaping up nicely to be a NHS v Defence election. So we'll lose it - brace for impact.

Melchett01
Its more a case of NHS, education and foreign aid v all the rest including defence. Current Tory dogma will not countenance cuts in those three areas so everyone else has to suffer more.

Rumour has it they will be printing instructions on how to fold the pages of the SDSR report to produce the future air assets.

First of all, I refer the honourable gentlemen commenting here to post 206.

As to what is being reported:

BBC News - Defence equipment plan 'at risk', say MPs

Interesting developments in Germany:

Germany to bring 100 mothballed tanks back into service - BBC News

Arguably the first major reversal in military cuts in Europe.

JTO,

A very interesting move, albeit of not much immediate use in the Ukraine debacle. However, I would be surprised if it did any more than raise eyebrows amongst the odd policy wonk on board the campaign buses. Given how close the polls are, the politicians of all hues seem to be desperate to buy votes and are making expensive promises left right and centre, all of which will reduce funding for defence amongst other areas.

A Think Defence article on just what is left in the barrel:-

Fixed and Rotary Aircraft in Service Numbers and their Pilots - Think Defence

Can be summed up as "not a lot".

Is it wrong to be surprised by the 23 different rotary types, compared to 26 fixed wing!

I know there will be a rather dull reason as to why, but, at a glance, is does seem to be a list that needs 'streamlining'. Stand by for SDSR '15...

Still, as alluded to, a disappointingly low number of each fw type, and proportionally lots of training frames.

Good point, Willard. But the other end of the spectrum sits with those that belive that they can build aeroplanes that can do all the jobs required.

But, again, I think you make a good point.

I suppose to some extent it boils down the commonality of oily bits and stuff that makes wiggly amps and whether a new tech publication is required. Same goes for (air)crew training, how feasible is it to get out of one frame, 'run' across the pan and fire up an outwardly similar type...

What happened to the Tutor? Number of rotary types (and rotary w**kers as well?) will shrink massively when Sea King and Lynx die.

Foreign Aid ?

"India, which was thought to face a complete cut, will instead see a small rise of 2.19%"

This is where your money/capabilities are going.

Indian defence imports rise 56% in three years - IHS Jane's 360

Although I don't regard myself as a trendy leftie, I think using a quote from the Grauniad published in March 2011 is a bit disingenuous.

Far better to use The Dail Outrage, whose story from Feb this year, unfortunately, seems very plausible.:mad:

So with a little over a week to go until D-Day, what's the latest thinking on where the axe will fall and how deeply will it cut? Working on the assumption that Defence will be required to contribute to further austerity measures regardless of the party in No. 10, just where do we go from here?

Returning from a particularly tedious meeting, we decided to liven the drive back up by war gaming potential scenarios - not easy given that most of the fat has already gone! Working on the following assumptions:

No further cuts to regular manning (based loosely on comments reportedly made by the PM).
No immediate changes to the pension scheme given that we're just trying to implement the last batting and it was stated that AFPS would be a 25(?) year scheme.
As previously reported a 1% increase in the equipment budget but with no guarantee that we will meet NATO's 2% target.
No desire to reduce our footprint on the world stage.

Based on those assumptions, the sorts of scenarios we came up with included:

1. Sell second carrier as soon as practicable as we will never be able to equip it, man it or even afford to maintain such a large asset in care and maintenance.
2. Chop the Tornado Force early and move to the Typhoon fleet being the go to fleet until the introduction of JSF
3. Given the stage the project is at and we can't afford to change the carrier layout again, remain in the JSF programme, but for a significantly slimmed down buy of maybe 24-36 platforms.
4. No further CH-47 buys as replacements for the Merlin fleet given reduced size of Army. AH-64 replacement numbers reduced. Transform UK's airborne capability to Air Assault. Given the current limited airdrop capability and trg hours/frames combined with the experience of the Green Army in Afghanistan for whom air assault operations were the norm rather than a more specialised capability as in previous generations, many units will have experience and with continuation training maybe able to fill the gap
5. Look to rationalise bespoke/mission specific aircraft. Get rid of Sentinel and E3, move to a 737 NG based fleet of MPA and AEWC as off the shelf purchases. Review whether we actually need and properly understand the SAR/GMTI role and capability and if we decide we do need it, integrate such capabilities on future UAV platforms as funding allows.
6. RAF Regt numbers reduced given our reduced numbers of airfields and assumed minimal deployed footprint in short-medium term. Or even absorbed into Army entirely.
7. Officer training to be centralised along the lines of ICSC/ACSC with a common syllabus around which environmental specifics are taught to the single services, thus saving on real estate and engendering jointery from day 1 and setting conditions for the creation of a Defence Force in the medium term.
8. Reserves to be either scaled back or FF2020 slips to 2025.
9. Senior officer numbers slashed in a modern version of Night of the Long Knives (second order effects being to drive more people out as the career pyramid collapses, third order effects including reduced wage bill as those further up the pay scale leave and reduced immediate pension/departure payment bill as people go early).
10. Further pay freezes (both incremental mark time and 0% annual rises) or may be even cuts for all ranks above a certain level e.g. Cpl. Allowances cut further. Officers' uniform tax allowance scrapped. All specialist pay stops as soon as you leave a post where you are actively engaged in that duty - immediate loss on posting to ground tour.

I'm not saying any or all of those are sensible or likely to happen, it was just the musings of 2 bored officers on a long drive trying to wargame possible ideas given the lack of clarity and detail in any of the manifestos so far. But given that we've seen some rather insensible and unlikely decisions made in recent years, I guess in the absence of any hard evidence then any or all maybe just as likely to happen if the above assumptions hold true.

I suppose that if officer training were to be centralised, then Sandhurst would be the natural conclusion, as the location is more travel friendly to those likely to attend than either of the other two extremes. Cranwell would be ideally suited to either a 'Westfield' Shopping Mall concept, or perhaps reduced (demolished) to provide hardcore ballast for the HS3 East Coast rail route that could then be re-aligned to proceed through the site.

As for pay cuts above the rank of Cpl, I assume that is meant that pay cuts will be implemented all the way from Cpl up through the ranks towards GP Capt, along with flying pay being abolished for the days when aircrew are not actually flying?

Assuming/hoping this is veiled (albeit poor) attempt at humour, I will add in the interest of accuracy Flying pay no longer exists. To do as you suggest would mean the RAF only want to recruit and retain on days when I/we/you actually fly.

In this day and age not a lot of recruiting and retaining will be done.

:ok: