[BITList] Off Topic - A clarion call to come to senses - at last!

[John Feltham]

General Sir David Richard’s call for a review of the Armed Forces is  
timely

It’s time for our defence chiefs - the head of the Royal Navy, Army  
and Royal Air Force, to put the security of the nation before the  
interests of their own individual services, writes Sean Rayment.

Sean Rayment
Daily Telegraph, London: 25 Jun 2009

Decode General Sir David Richard’s speech at the Royal United Services  
Institute yesterday and the message is obvious - the military needs a  
Strategic Defence Review - now . But the next review should go much  
further than any before. "It’s time", as Air Chief Marshal Sir Glenn  
Torpy, the out-going head of the RAF told me earlier this month, "to  
kill some sacred cows". It’s also time for our defence chiefs - the  
head of the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force, to put the security  
of the nation before the interests of their own individual services.

The British military is still effectively equipped to fight a European  
war against a conventional adversary - an event which is wholly  
unlikely to happen. Tomorrow’s threat will not come from strong  
nations such as Russia or China as in the past, but from weak or  
failed states such as Yemen and Somalia - the current breeding grounds  
for Islamist extremism.

What use are 1000 heavy Challenger tanks, even if the Army had them,  
against an enemy who lives and fights amongst a rural populace and  
whose hearts and minds we are trying to win? What use is the multi- 
billion pound Trident nuclear submarine fleet against an enemy which  
attacks western capitals with hijack civilian airliners? The RAF have  
an aircraft now so sophisticated - the Typhoon - that at the moment it  
can’t fly in Afghanistan because it is feared the adverse conditions  
of the southern desert - the wind and sand - may restrict its ability  
to fly. Great.
There is no suggestion that all of these conventional weapons should  
be scrapped but we must get the balance right.

Britain will be fighting in Afghanistan for many years to come. Our  
lack of success in the country so far is in part due to our shortage  
of troops, so the Army should expand, if necessary at the cost of the  
other two services. Success in Helmand will in part be due to  
restricting the enemies freedom of movement - that can’t be achieved  
with the woeful number of troops currently in the province.

Unmanned Air Vehicles have been a major success in the fight against  
insurgents. They have saved British lives and have dealt several  
deadly blows to the Taliban high command - but the RAF only has around  
five - why?

Every day in Helmand, British troops are being killed and injured by  
improvised explosive devices because they are forced to travel by road  
rather than by air due to a shortage of helicopters. Such levels of  
wanton negligence border on the criminal. British troops are dying and  
will continue to die unless petty inter-service rivalries are killed  
off - hopefully this is the first step in the right direction.

URL: Click to read page on electronic version of Daily Telegraph:  http://tinyurl.com/l2gs9q-- 
  
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