Has the UK Ministry of Defence finally lost the plot.

The United Kingdom is one of the safest nations in the world having no enemy nations or possible enemy nations in the entire european continent. You guys don't need to spend much on defence and if the sh1t hits the fan again, rearm and rely on your alliances.

thanks,
drfunk

[edit on 7-9-2004 by drfunk]

Yes very true, the possablity of the UK getting attacked is highly unlikley, but drawing down the number of highly capable aircarft is just odd. The attack / strike element that the Jags current help with will have to be meet by the Tornado GR4 untill the Typhoon gets the next software update.

It's just a strange thing to do upgrade the Jag's and the F3 to replace them ALOT sooner than planned. The Jag's ware to fly untill around 2008-9 but will now be out of service in just two years. However that gives the UK plenty of time to change it's mind again.

Thank fully the MOD now just put stuff in storage for a years untill fully replaced and the new units are fully trained, the days of the cutting up of stuff is long gone!

Orinigally posted by Devilwasp

you dont know how bad it is for the genral british army squaddie sminkey, they get 20 rounds apeice. when they go out on patrols they swap flack jackets with the ones comeing off patrols.
i would rather have a better military than some tourist attraction.

- I have no doubt things can be improved in some areas Devilwasp. I am not claiming everything is perfect.

I am also well aware that complaints about training involving live firing (in each arm of the services) have been made for decades though and are hardly unique to this gov.....and, in fairness, have not been demonstrated, when it has come to it, to have fatally weakened the capacity of the men to do the job either, thankfully.

No doubt there are valid criticisms that can be made but only yesterday I came across a story about US families being asked to fund the bullet-proof (or should that be resistant?) flak jackets of their family in the military to the tune of a discounted $1500 a piece or so.....and that is in the case of a USA spending so lavishly on defence like it is going out of fashion.

That may be an apocryphal story but the point remains that few operate in such a manner that complaint is unheard of.

Sometimes the complaint itself gains common currency but is based upon ignorance. The problems with Challenger2 for instance, a tank (so our press would have us believe) so unsuited to the desert that we must suffer heavy losses if it ever came to a shooting war......oh, and naturally all this governments fault.

2 strips of canvas cured the dust problems and there were no heavy losses. At all.

It's always worth bearing in mind the agenda some folks have at work in this area IMO.

Originally posted by namehere
what if an ally is playing you, not making their true intent seen, building up against you right in front of you, they could do that especially to leaders who think such a thing is impossible, why do you think the US has a plan for every country incase they turn on us? the UK should have such plans and the ability to execute them too with impunity.

- Well ok, that's a possibility, in a kind of theoretical way I suppose.

Nevertheless none of our close allies (except the USA) is building up anything in any way that might be threatening to the UK. The usual complaint is that they are not doing enough and that has been said for quite some time.....and, again, to attempt to do so would take years and be very visible. Training the personnel alone would be a massive undertaking and who of our allies is going to attempt to attack the UK, a power equipped with sophisticated nuclear weapons (if things really started to go badly for us) anyway?

To suggest we attempt to match US forces just in case they turn on us is IMO not only impossible financially and politically but utterly unnecessary and is in any case an absurdly unlikely proposition. Why would the US attempt to take over the UK militarily? They are well on the way to doing that culturally (joke......er, kind of).

IMO it might sell a few trashy novels to some but the US and Europe are not going to go to war. It would ruin us all either just economically or litterally.

There will be direct changeover of a sort, the last Jaguar Sqn to disband in 2007 will then immediately re-equip with the first A2G Typhoons. Incidentally the Jaguar was scheduled for retirement in 1995 and the recent revamp was only carried out because that target fell by the wayside.

I agree that it is a good aircraft, if woefully underpowered. There was a plan to re-engine them with RB.199's in 1978 (the plan to be carried out during 1981-83) but it was canned as it required an all new rear fuselage to be built for each aircraft and at the time AST403 was thought to be coming into service by 1988 anyway, another error.