British Army 2010 and onwards

[buglerbilly]

Military Logistics 2010: British Army outlines support priorities for next decade

November 23, 2010

The British Army’s Director General Logistics, Support and Equipment, Maj Gen Chris Deverell has revealed his vision of ’Supporting Capability 2010 to 2020’ at the Military Logistics conference today.

Addressing delegates in Bristol, Deverell said ‘information challenges’ in the contemporary operational environment (comprising multiple layers of C4ISR assets and networks) had yet to be ‘replicated’ in the UK armed forces training regimes.

‘We must train as we fight,’ Deverell exerted while illustrating how US ISR assets and wider communications networks all contributed to complex feeds into various Battlegroup Headquarter elements.

Describing the use of Protected Patrol Vehicles in Afghanistan especially, Deverell outlined how despite a ‘very steeply rising curve of capability’, support and training challenges also needed to be ‘grappled’ with.

He conceded that the availability of combat and support vehicles in Afghanistan had not reached target levels of 80 per cent. Referring to figures released on 11 October, Deverell described how the UK’s operational fleet of combat vehicles had achieved availability levels of around 78 percent compared to 65 percent for combat support systems: ‘Collectively, we have to do better,’ he explained.

Fleet management was also an issue with Deverell saying UK forces were benefiting from ‘inappropriate levels of capability’ when they received equipment. Elsewhere, he described how British Army Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME) troops were ‘still buying [repair] tools on the internet’.

Finally, Deverall described UK Ministry of Defence moves to best ensure ‘secure equipment and resources necessary to train as we fight’.

‘Commanders require freedom of action. If equipment isn’t safe, it restricts their ability to operate,’ he said while referring to a ‘blue-on-blue’ incident in Afghanistan involving a Javelin anti-tank guided munition. ‘Processes to decrease risk to the lowest level possible’ were required, he concluded.

By Andrew White, Bristol

[buglerbilly]

SAS commander quits Army amid claims defence cuts have hit morale

A highly decorated senior SAS commander, who masterminded a deadly campaign against the Taliban, has resigned from the Army amid claims that defence cuts are hitting morale.


The commander's resignation follows that of Brigadier Ed Butler (above) who was considered one of the most brilliant officers of his generation Photo: HEATHCLIFF O'MALLEY

By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent 9:00PM GMT 27 Nov 2010

Friends of the colonel, who cannot be named for security reasons, said he had grown increasingly despondent with service life following the cuts imposed on the military by the Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR).

It is understood that two highly respected Brigadiers, one of whom also served with the Special Forces, are considering their positions.

Senior officers have warned that many more high calibre officers are expected to resign in the coming months especially if the Continuity of Education Allowance – which pays for a proportion of boarding school fees for service families – is cut.

During the SDSR process one of the few themes which united the views of the defence chiefs was their joint dismay at the threat to cut the allowance.

Defence sources have also told The Sunday Telegraph that the SAS officer, who won a top military award while commanding special forces in southern Afghanistan, resigned because he felt the family sacrifices demanded by the Army had grown too great.

Friends of the officer have revealed that he made his decision after the publication of the SDSR last month.

One colleague said: "There is a lot of dissatisfaction within the Army at the way in which the SDSR was handled and it seems he has simply had enough and wants to do something new.

"He is a rather aloof and quiet individual and did not discuss his resignation with anyone."

The colonel won huge praise from both British and US generals after creating a new covert Task Force that has struck a series of devastating blows against the Taliban command structure.

Under a new strategy, the SF Task Force began targeting insurgent commanders in operations the success of which has led to commanders referring to them as "harvesting the Taliban".

The colonel was due to attend the Higher Command and Staff Course, which is reserved for those officers expected to reach the upper echelons of the Army.

He was recently seconded to Kabul to oversee the US Special Forces investigation into the death of Linda Norgrove, the British aid worker, who was killed in a botched rescue operation.

The senior officer's departure has shocked many within the Army and the Special Forces community who have described him as "irreplaceable" and his loss as "incalculable".

The colonel, who is married with two young children, commanded the SAS from 2008 until 2010 and was regarded as the "golden boy" of his generation.

He was recognised as having the potential to reach the rank of general when he arrived at Sandhurst where he was regarded as a "star" cadet officer and has held a series of fast-stream high level jobs within the Ministry of Defence.

His departure follows that of Brigadier Ed Butler and Lt Col Richard Williams, who were both SAS commanders and regarded as two of the most brilliant officers of their generation.

One officer of General rank, who asked not to be named, said Ministry of Defence civil servants who "only did money" were undermining morale in the Army.

He said: "Continuity of Education Allowance (CEA) is vital ground for the Army. Following SDSR it has been tinkered with in order to save some money. As a consequence some officers are already leaving.

"We need to focus on outputs not just the financial inputs. There are those in the Ministry of Defence who only do money and don't get it.

"The Army will always be mobile. Therefore families will have to move. An officer's career is shaped by a broad range of jobs. CEA enables that. If you remove it, officers will not stay. The allowance is currently claimed by about, 5500 tri-service families of whom 58% are officers and 42% are other ranks.

"If we wish to retain quality people and we genuinely believe in making people our edge, we have to invest in them. If we only focus on financial input, we will lose the best.

"We cannot afford to lose men like the colonel. He is irreplaceable and the value of his experiences and training over the past 20 years are incalculable.

"Most of my peer group will put up with all the friction an Army career brings with it, as well as the dangers and hardship of operations. But if outsiders tinker and alter the means by which we sustain our lives then many more will leave.

"To focus solely on the cost of CEA is to miss the issue. The issue is how is to retain quality people despite the lack of stability in our lives."

The general continued: "My sense is that there are many nervous people out there who are now genuinely worried for the future.

"The Army staff college has seen a steep reduction in the number of majors requesting to extend their commissions.

"The Army's future depends on these men and women and we can't afford to lose them – this is one of the unintended consequences of the SDSR."

The officer, who has served in the army for more than 25-years added that he would also consider his position if the 'balance of support became unsustainable" for his family".

[buglerbilly]

Review of Reserve Forces gets underway

A Defence Policy and Business news article

26 Nov 10

The first meeting of the Reserves Steering Group, which has been established to implement a six-month review of Reserve Forces, took place earlier this month.


Territorial soldiers surge forward during an exercise in Scotland (stock image)
[Picture: Mark Owens, Crown Copyright/MOD 2010]

The Prime Minister commissioned the six-month review of the Reserve Forces, to be known as Future Reserves 2020 (FR20), as part of the Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR).

FR20 will be a fundamental review of the Reserve Forces' role and structure. The study will be organised in three phases and will announce its findings in summer 2011.

The Prime Minister commissioned the review to ensure that the MOD makes the most efficient use of reservist skills, experience and capabilities. Vice Chief of the Defence Staff (VCDS), General Sir Nicholas Houghton, will lead the review, supported by Julian Brazier, who has been appointed as his deputy.

At the first meeting of the steering group, discussions centred on establishing the scope, methodology and reporting timelines of the review.

VCDS outlined the need to explore the future role and structure of the Reserve Forces properly, ensuring that members take a holistic view of the Reserves and employ the same intellectual context that informed the SDSR.


RAF medical reservists (stock image)
[Picture: Senior Aircraftman Ash Reynolds, Crown Copyright/MOD 2010]

The review will explore the role of the Reserves as part of the 'Whole Force Concept'. The Whole Force Concept is a means to man a balanced force structure, comprising of Regular and Reserve personnel, contractors and civilians, optimised to meet Defence's requirements.

FR20 will be organised into three phases. In Phase One, the study will develop a common understanding of the context in which Reserves will be used in future and define the strategic principles around which the balance between regular and non-regular manpower should be designed.

Phase Two will focus on Reserve Forces structures needed to complement the Regular Forces and meet operational requirements.

Later, in Phase Three, the study will develop a detailed concept and outline plan for the implementation of new single-Service Reserves' structures.

General Houghton said:

"The SDSR has provided the Regular Armed Forces with an opportunity to adapt, to ensure they are structured effectively to meet the UK's security interests in the year 2020 and beyond.

"The skills, experience and capabilities of our reservists must be at the forefront of our mind during this study."
General Sir Nicholas Houghton

"This study will examine the most efficient structure of the Reserves in order to best support the regular component in the future. The skills, experience and capabilities of our reservists must be at the forefront of our mind during this study.

"I am most pleased to be working with Julian Brazier on this project. He brings with him a wealth of experience.

"Julian and I intend to approach the study as open-mindedly as possible. We have no pre-conditioned agendas or resource envelopes. We are mindful of the need for betterment and for efficiency, but we are determined to properly explore the utility and role of the Reserves in the same intellectual context that informed the SDSR.

"Our reference point will be the Future Force Structure 2020 and we must examine the Reserves in the context of the Whole Force Concept. Central to all of this will be the volunteer ethos of reservist service and I am mindful that the future structure of the Reserves must provide suitable rewards for reservists, combined with added value for Defence."


A Royal Marines reservist abseils down a rock face during a high altitude mountain warfare exercise (stock image)
[Picture: Crown Copyright/MOD 2009]

Julian Brazier, the Member of Parliament for Canterbury and Whitstable, has direct experience of the Reserves, having served as a Territorial Army officer for thirteen years, six of them with Airborne Forces.

The Reserve Forces are an integral part of the UK's defence capability, making a vital contribution to Defence. This has been demonstrated by over 24,000 reservist mobilisations since 2003 in support of current operations, which demonstrates a change in the way the UK uses its Reserve Forces.

Reserves are now more heavily integrated with their Regular counterparts than ever before, recognising that they are needed as much for routine augmentation as they are for high tempo operations at maximum effort.

FR20 aims to align the Reserves to new strategic defence policy, ensuring they are correctly structured, supported and resourced to meet the challenges of the future.

Reservists provide a multitude of specialist skills, which it would not be practical or cost-effective to maintain within the Regular Forces. Therefore, FR20 will aim to identify the correct regular/reservist balance within the context of the Whole Force Concept and in support of developing work on Future Force 2020 structures.

[buglerbilly]

MoD sacks soldiers by email

The Ministry of Defence has apologised after a reported 38 soldiers - including one serving on the Afghan front line - were sacked by email.


Photo: AFP/GETTY IMAGES

By Andy Bloxham 7:33AM GMT 15 Feb 2011

The men, all warrant officers, were told they were losing their jobs because "the Army has to make significant cutbacks", according to The Sun.

They have completed several decades' service and continued in the Army on a rolling contract called the Long Service List.

Due to an error they were given the news that their contracts would be terminated in 12 months by email instead of in person.

The message was reported to have said: "In my capacity as the Career Manager for the Versatile Engagement Long Career (VEng LC) and Long Service List (LSL), I write to notify you that with regret, I must issue you with 12 months' Notice of Termination.

"As I'm sure you are aware the Army has to make significant cutbacks and we as the VEng LC & LSL are expected to play our part in reductions."

An Army spokesman said: "We apologise for the distress that this will have caused.

"Commanding officers have now spoken to the soldiers concerned to ensure that they receive all necessary advice and support."

Jim Murphy, the shadow defence secretary, said the soldiers had been treated in a "callous, cold-hearted, soulless" way and called on Government ministers to take responsibility for the incident.

The shadow defence secretary told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: "We can't halt every redundancy in the Armed Forces, but this is no way to treat men and women who have served their country fearlessly for so many years.

"Sacking anybody by email is wrong, but sacking our Armed Forces in this way is absolutely unforgivable.

"Ministers should explain what happened, take responsibility for what has happened and clarify - were any of these soldiers serving in Afghanistan when they received an email saying 'Start planning your retirement now'?"

Mr Murphy added: "There is a problem here. The Government is running the MoD in a shambolic way. It has had a defence review led by cuts, rather than by our military and foreign policy needs.

"There has been a rush. Mistakes are being made, some of them very serious."

The Daily Telegraph yesterday disclosed that a quarter of the RAF's trainee pilots are to be sacked, with up to 100 student pilots being told they had no future in the service.

[buglerbilly]

DATE:03/03/11

SOURCE:Flight International

British Army to begin Watchkeeper UAV training in May

By Craig Hoyle

The first British Army personnel selected to operate the service's new Watchkeeper tactical unmanned air vehicles will begin training on the system in May, while the first equipment is due to be deployed to Afghanistan before the end of the year.

Flight-testing activities in Israel and the UK have now exceeded 220 sorties using Watchkeeper 450 (WK450) air vehicles, a design developed from Elbit Systems' Hermes 450 for the Thales UK-led programme. Fourteen of these had been performed from the ParcAberporth unmanned system test centre in west Wales by earlier this year, the Ministry of Defence says.


© Thales UK

"We will continue flying both paths in parallel and finish trials around May," says Nick Miller, business director for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (ISTAR) and UAV systems for Thales UK. Training activities will then begin for the first intake of Royal Artillery personnel at the army's Larkhill site in Wiltshire, before they participate in operational field trials at ParcAberporth around mid-year.

Current programme activities are centred on proving the WK450's full flight envelope, and on advancing sensor and datalink testing using production hardware in a synthetic laboratory at the Leicester manufacturing facility of Thales/Elbit joint venture U-TacS.

Flight testing using the UAV's twin electro-optical and Thales I-Master synthetic aperture radar/ground moving target indication (GMTI) payloads is also going well, says Miller, with "GMTI the real winner".

"We're building ahead of schedule," says Miller. "The first 10 air vehicles are already built, along with several ground control stations."

Following the completion of field trials, the Watchkeeper system will be involved in exercises on the Salisbury Plain training area in Wiltshire. This will for the first time see UAVs making use of a temporary segment of restricted airspace available after taking off from the MoD's nearby Boscombe Down test centre.

Army operations with the WK450 will start in Afghanistan late this year, with the equipment to provide a sixth "tasking line" to provide ISTAR support for UK and coalition forces.

The new system will progressively replace the interim service provided since 2007 via an urgent operational requirement deal with Thales. Using leased Hermes 450s, the company has delivered more than 43,500 flight hours of surveillance support, with five tasking lines now in use.

"We do about 80% of the airborne ISTAR for the UK's forward operating bases," says Miller.

The current urgent operational requirement arrangement is contracted through mid-2012, with this to enable the army to make a phased transition to using its new Watchkeeper equipment. Deployed Hermes air vehicles are meanwhile about to gain a GPS-based automatic take-off and landing capability.

[buglerbilly]

U.K. Logistics Data Systems Underperforming: Study

By ANDREW CHUTER

Published: 30 Mar 2011 19:00

LONDON - Failure to adequately fund logistics data system improvements is partially responsible for shortcomings in U.K. efforts to improve management of the supply chain, according to a report to be released March 31 by the National Audit Office (NAO).

The government-spending watchdog said the key constraint to upgrading systems was the lower priority the Defence Ministry accorded to updating or replacing logistics data systems compared with purchasing new weapons.

"Sufficient resources have not been available," it said. "The Department [the MoD] has identified its aging legacy IT [information technology] systems as a significant operational risk," the NAO said.

With some of the data systems more than 30 years old and no longer supported by manufacturers, "the Defence Logistics Board recently raised the risk of failure in base warehouse inventory management systems to critical," the NAO said.

Failure of the systems, which tell the MoD what assets it has and where, could lead to shortages on the front line within 30 days, the organization said.

Despite that risk, the NAO said the 70 million pounds ($112 million) in funding required to fix the problem has not yet been made available as an add-on to the Future Logistics Information Services (FLIS) contract awarded to Boeing UK last year.

The 803 million pound FLIS program is aimed at modernizing and bringing under a single roof 270 legacy logistics information systems operated by 50 contractors. The project will see data centers across the U.K. reduced from 15 to two.

FLIS promises big improvements to supply chain data operations if it works as advertised, and is one of several initiatives being pursued by the Defence Equipment & Support arm of the MoD to upgrade the logistics network capability and architecture.

But even where funding is being made available, compromises in functionality in order to reduce costs is hampering the effectiveness of systems, the watchdog warned.

A case in point, it said, was the Joint Asset Management and Engineering Solutions. The systems provide global and near real-time visibility of assets such as the vehicle fleet and engineering data.

"The system can only transfer data on a memory stick, which introduces a significant risk of data loss and error because funding for more advanced functionality was not approved," said the NAO. The investment shortcomings were partially responsible for the MoD making on-time deliveries to troops in Afghanistan in only 54 percent of cases.

For priority items scheduled to be delivered by air within five days, the failure rate fell to about 66 percent, according to the report.

Despite that, the NAO said the MoD performance had improved since 2009 and the department had been largely successful in getting materiel into theater, sending 130,000 consignments to Afghanistan last year.

The failure to deliver on time was caused either by suppliers unable to respond to theater demands or the inability of the department to forecast accurate usage and materiel repair rates to ensure the right amount of stocks are held, the report said.

There were significant gaps in the information the MoD produces on issues such as stocks and costs, the NAO said.

Amyas Morse, the head of the NAO, said in a statement that the MoD "urgently needs better supply chain information systems with the appropriate skills and processes to match."

[buglerbilly]

Call of duty: the Army's new recruits

The war in Afghanistan, the recession and cuts in personnel have combined to make competition for Army places tougher than ever. Rob Blackhurst follows would-be soldiers from recruiting office to basic training

By Rob Blackhurst

9:00AM BST 22 Apr 2011

The Pallasades shopping centre in central Birmingham has seen better days. On a Wednesday morning there is barely any passing footfall amid its 1980s-style fuchsia-pink signs. Even the discount stores are deadly quiet, sitting cheek-by-jowl next to the blacked-out windows and final reduction signs. The bleakness of these overlit walkways finds an echo in the local economic statistics. Recession has bitten here harder than anywhere else in Britain, with 13 per cent of the population out of work – almost the same grim level as in the north-east of England.

But there is one premium brand that is attracting passing trade. The Armed Forces recruitment centre here is Britain’s busiest, each year processing more than 8,000 applicants to the Army alone.

A ghostly-pale 16-year-old occupies one of the soft chairs at the front of the office, hair freshly gelled, talking to a uniformed soldier. He tells him that he has stopped turning up to school. 'Don’t sit on your backside,’ the recruiter says sharply, fixing him with a stare. 'Things won’t come to you.’

Over the past few years the recruiters who work in this office have been under less pressure than usual since, for the first time in a generation, the British Army is full. Whether because of the heroics of Afghanistan or the resurgence of youth unemployment, those who want to join up can now find themselves on a waiting list for years.

Below the shop floor, in a windowless, gunmetal-grey office, I meet Major Bob Bath from 143 (West Midlands) Brigade, the avuncular, moon-faced officer in charge of recruitment in the Birming*ham and Warwickshire region. In his fifties, he is wearing regulation combat uniform and has thinning cropped hair. 'For a couple of years now we’ve had a wait before people could physically go into training,’ he says. 'That’s unique for the Army. Because of the recession, soldiers weren’t leaving in the volumes we expected. The grass wasn’t greener somewhere else. For the first time in many years, we are fully manned.’

Before the downturn’s full impact, in 2007-2008, 15,000 soldiers were leaving each year, and the Army was having difficulty making up their numbers. Last year, as the economy faltered, only 11,500 decided to take their chances in the civilian job market. The number of new recruits taken on in turn fell from 14,500 in 2007 to 9,000 last year.

With the Army being at about its target strength of 102,000, and with the planned 7,000 decrease in numbers following the Strategic Defence Review, Major Bath’s recruitment targets have been slashed. Consequently recruiters can now be far more discerning about whom they take.

The most obvious explanation for the upsurge in applicants would appear to be the war in Afghan*istan, though it is not that simple. 'The perception is that whenever there’s a war people queue round the block to join the Army,’ Major Bath says. 'Actually, that’s not the case. During conflict, recruitment doesn’t drop off – but it doesn’t spike either.’

But, he adds, Afghanistan has transformed the public’s view of the Army, which has had some impact on recruitment. 'Over the past few years I’ve noticed that the public are far more generous with their praise. I walk through the shopping centre every day in uniform and at least one person will shake my hand and tell us what a fantastic job we do. And that’s across all age groups.’

Though the chairs at the front of the recruitment office may be full, only one in 10 of those who walk in here makes it into the Army. But this is not because, as is popularly believed, young people, with their sedentary lifestyles and expanding waistlines, are simply unfit to fight. 'The basic beast that joins the Army today is different from when I joined in 1975,’ Major Bath says. 'For example, many more young people can actually run at the standard of a trained soldier before they join.’ And he has noticed that young soldiers, trained by years of Xboxing, are much more dexterous than their predecessors.

They are also more likely to do their own research to check any claim about the job that has been made by recruiters. This doesn’t always mean that they understand the risks. A third of the staff working in the Birmingham recruitment office have been injured on operations from Northern Ireland to Afghanistan. Some are posted here temporarily while they recuperate, and can provide a corrective to gung-ho applicants on the realities of war.

'We are at pains to tell them that this isn’t a risk-free job,’ Major Bath says. 'The young boys say they want to do active service. I say, yes, you are up for it now – that’s because bullets aren’t smacking past your head. It’s fairly safe to be brave in a chair. It’s a whole different thing when you’re trying to cover 400m of open ground and people are shooting at you.’

Major Bath introduces me to Capt Richard Harris, a contained young officer who visits schools to publicise Army apprenticeships – a selling point in an industrial city where manual trades are dying out. In training, recruits take home £811.38 a month after all their accommodation and food costs, and can earn up to £32,000 within five years. He is studiedly low-key when going into schools, choosing not to wear a uniform.

'We are softer in our marketing,’ he says. 'We sit and chat quietly with people rather than say, “We’re the Army. Come and join us.”’ Their message on pay has been reinforced by the soldiers returning from tours of duty. 'There is a good message on the street from the soldiers on leave,’ one of the recruiters tells me. 'If they’ve been to Afghanistan for six months they will have been paid their £5,000 operational allowance, so they may be driving a flash car.’

Though some non-officer jobs require formal qualifications, entry criteria for the Army remain flexible enough to include those who have flunked their formal education. Entrants simply have to get through a psychometric test (known as the British Army Recruitment Battery Test), which assesses 'trainability’ rather than intelligence. In front of a computer screen in the recruitment office, applicants are tested on how quickly they can rotate shapes in their head, how quickly they can do mental arithmetic, and whether they can spot the odd word out in a sequence. (Sample question: the highest number is 12, the lowest number is 3, which of these two numbers is further away from 8?).

They also have to take a basic test of literacy and numeracy. Though demands vary depending on which part of the Army they are aiming for, the minimum standards required in these tests are level 3 – the expected reading and maths age of a nine-to-11-year-old. (Most are above this, though some that aren’t at this level can still be taken on if they show commitment during selection. But they have to reach level 3 if they are to pass beyond the first phase of training.) This is followed by two interviews in which recruiters and candidates decide which of the Army’s 140 different jobs is the most suitable. Those with the lowest score tend to be directed towards the infantry; only those with the highest scores can join the Royal Military Police.

The 16- and 17-year-olds known within the Army as 'boy soldiers’ (though women attend too) go to Army Foundation Colleges. Since they can’t be deployed on operations by law until they are 18, they complete a longer 50-week course combining classroom work, vocational training, military training and an apprenticeship in a specialist trade.

Every non-commissioned soldier has to pass an extended two-day interview at an Army selection centre. Though some start their training immediately, others can be waiting for months or years to get a place in training if they have applied to enter a competitive trade with few places, or if they have scraped through the selection centre. (Those who pass with top marks tend to be expedited through the system.) Even after passing the assessment, recruits are free to abandon the Army if they find a different career during their wait for a training place. To keep them interested, the Army can offer them short military training courses until a place in proper training becomes available. But a few weeks before they begin training they have to make a commitment by taking an oath of allegiance.

Today three young men are in the Birmingham recruitment office to sign their oath of allegiance to join the infantry. It should have been four, but one dropped out just before the ceremony. The initial contract offers employment for 12 years, though soldiers can apply to leave after four. They sit underneath a 1960s photograph of the Queen. Major Bath stands at the front while two mothers, one with a toddler in tow, spread themselves around the room with cameras primed. 'You couldn’t be joining the Army at a better time,’ the Major declares. 'You are cast-iron guaranteed employment if you want to stay 12 years – that will see you through the recession, won’t it?’

He talks about how they are guaranteed to deploy on operations – unlike the 'drinking club’ that he joined during the Cold War. 'It’s not like that now. We work you for a living.’ In a monotonous mumble, the recruits read out their oath to bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, her heirs and successors.

Afterwards, I talk to Sean Riddell, a 19-year-old with short ginger hair from Great Barr. 'One of my best mates is in the Army. He is getting paid to hang around with his friends and see the world. And I don’t want to be in a dead-end job any more. I was labouring, earning £5 an hour breaking my back for nothing.’ What about the dangers of Afghan*istan? 'I think everybody’s worried a bit, aren’t they? But it’s experience at the end of the day.’

His mother, Mandy Myers, 41, tells me that he had intended to do A-levels 'but he decided it wasn’t for him and that he’d try and get a job. But all he could get was labouring. Going to Afghan*istan – of course I’m very concerned. But you could have an accident walking across the road. It’s a secure job, and you can’t really say that about anywhere else nowadays.’

Next to Riddell is Omar Crossgill from Hands*worth, who is due to join the Welsh Guards. He is 30, one of the increasing numbers of older recruits. 'I have young sons and feel that I have to set an example and stop certain things,’ he says. 'For my sons’ sake I decided to switch my life around from the street and all of that. I don’t want them asking, “What is my Dad doing? Is he an idler?”’

The Army Selection Centre at Pirbright, near Aldershot, is a bleak place in the late winter with its redbrick buildings, council-house-style married quarters and windswept parade grounds. A group of applicants huddle against the cold in their suits at Brookwood railway station, waiting to be picked up by an Army minibus. As they file on board they are given a number by a glowering corporal, which is the only name that they will answer to over the two days of selection.

After a medical (heart murmurs and asthma are the most common reasons for rejection), recruits are put through a series of physical tests. Those joining the infantry have to run a mile and a half in less than 12 minutes and 45 seconds, though others get a few seconds longer. All have to carry two sloshing 20kg jerrycans up to 150m without dropping them, and perform as many pull-ups on a beam as they can. Many of the fittest have already been earmarked to join the Paras. Seventy-seven per cent pass here on the first or second visit; many of those who fail are deferred, and given another chance when they have persuaded their recruiter that they have addressed their weaknesses.

Team-building comes next: recruits have to move their team on to two raised wooden platforms, using only a piece of scaffolding and a plank, while avoiding an imaginary minefield. In the freezing February air, they holler in a variety of Welsh, West Country and, among the Common*wealth soldiers, Ghanaian accents. All the time the instructors are shouting at them, though they are no more aggressive than an average PE teacher.

The recruits generally are full of enthusiasm, but one is glassy-eyed, sitting back and staring into space when he should be listening to instructions. They have already picked him out as hopeless. 'He’s just not with it – he’s going to struggle to get through,’ the instructor says. 'I can live with a guy who’s a little bit quiet, but you can see when they are completely out of their depth.’

Next is the grenade exercise, where recruits have to crawl on the ground and throw dummy grenades. This is designed to measure physical courage. In the buffets of wind, word has not reached the back of the queue that they all have to dive when a grenade is thrown. 'What are you doing?’ the instructor shouts. 'You would have all been killed if that was live!’

One of the more demanding parts of the assessment is the 'ice-breaker’, where applicants have to talk about themselves in front of the rest of the group. Their work experience is as varied as working-class life in modern Britain. They have run nightclubs, worked in video shops and call centres, as fitness instructors and plasterers. Many of them have found the world of temporary service industry jobs unsatisfying. At least half that I speak to have Army careers running through their families – many grew up on barracks in Germany or Northern Ireland with fathers in the same regiments that they want to join. A common theme, especially among the older recruits, who are two or three jobs into their working life, is the disappearance of alternative blue-collar jobs with attractive prospects.

Later in the afternoon, I sit in on the final interview that applicants face to decide whether they will be offered a place in the Army. First in is Matthew, a 27-year-old, who is trying to join the Royal Welsh Regiment. Previously he worked at Debenhams and as a trainee site manager in the building trade.

The interviewer, a grizzled major 35 years into his Army career, offers him some advice: 'Your girlfriend needs to know that she can’t harass you every two minutes. I’ve seen it too often with guys in training. If she’s crying down the phone because she’s missing you, that will have a detrimental effect. Before you know it, you’re out, you’ve gone home.’ After tapping on his computer he confirms that Matthew has got the highest possible mark. 'You’ve got an A grade. You’ve got some bleak times ahead of you – but you can be rightfully proud of yourself.’

Matthew blinks away tears and tries to contain his urge to punch the air. 'Yes…’ he says into his trousers, before remembering to add the obligatory 'Sir’.

As he shuts the door on the recruit, the major says, 'We get the full spectrum of the very bright who have got everything they want to those who have got absolutely nothing. A guy came through the other week who’d been beaten up by his stepfather. He’d never achieved anything. He didn’t do brilliantly here. But he did enough for us to give him a shot. He’s in training and doing very well. We can end a cycle of dependency on the state.’

A week later I return to Pirbright to see the beginning of Initial Training – the 14-week grounding in basic soldiering. Here recruits learn how to fire an SA80 rifle on the nearby ranges as well as the other traditional skills of a soldier: how to march in step on the parade ground, how to iron a regulation-issue military shirt, and how to salute. They have lessons on handling grenades and rifles; learn to map-read; and build up their physical confidence through climbing, potholing and hill-walking during an adventure course in Wales. They also attend lessons on the realities of war.

In a cool moment of seriousness, they have to fill in forms that name their religion alongside their name, number and blood type for their identification dogtags. This, they are told, tells the padre how they should be buried if they are killed in action.

In his office, beneath yet another 1960s photograph of the Queen, Major James Hurst, Battery Commander at the Army Training Centre here, talks me through the programme. At his feet is his spaniel, Curly. 'She has incredible military bearing,’ he says. It is a high-ranking officer’s perk to be able to take a dog to work on training bases.

For the first seven weeks, recruits are banned from drinking alcohol and not allowed to leave the training camp even at weekends. Eighty per cent of them will pass out at week 14. The rest either choose to leave, fail the medical or, in rare cases, if they prove extremely disruptive, can be declared 'unfit for Army service’. Pirbright has a capacity to train 4,500; a few years ago it was operating at full tilt, but it is currently running at around half capacity owing to the fall in the number of vacancies, though training places are expected to expand again next year.

'Some of the recruits will be walking around like zombies. They have what we call the shock of capture,’ Major Hurst says. 'They are used to doing what they want. If they want a pizza, they’ll have a pizza. They come here and suddenly they can’t.’

The 14 weeks at Pirbright is an intensive experience. And it is a steep learning curve for those who have never turned on an iron or got out of bed before mid-morning. Since entry age to Pirbright ranges from 17 to 33, a 17-year-old could find himself next to a man almost twice his age with children. This diversity extends to their education levels too, now that Army trades have become more technical and pay has improved.

'You might find a guy with a couple of GCSEs in the next bed from a guy who is doing a PhD,’ Major Hurst says. 'In the old days the guys who had the better educations would tend to become officers. Those who hadn’t got as good an education would join as soldiers. Nowadays it’s not really like that. There might be guys who are very intellectual but who will not pass the officer selection process.’

The dormitories tell the same story. By some beds there are pin-ups from the FHM calendar while on others there are pictures of toddlers. Andy Haslem, 24, from Birkenhead in the Wirral, is joining the Royal Signals, after working in leisure centres and at Sainsbury’s. He has a picture of his daughter next to his bed. 'Six months is a short time for the long-term future of my family at home,’ he says, 'especially as my dad and my girlfriend served in the Army. Nothing can compare with the perks – meeting new people, travelling the world – unlike the job I was doing before, which was a lot of mundane bickering. But you need to know it’s what you want to do.’

At the end of the 14 weeks, the recruits face their greatest test: a five-day field exercise in the bracken and woods around Pirbright where they have to engage with an 'enemy force’, made up of instructors, which culminates in their having to storm a hilltop enemy position with mock grenades. The exercise is based on an action that took place in Afghanistan’s Helmand province in 2006.

For these five days, they have to live in 'shell scrapes’ – hastily dug 18in trenches with only plastic sheeting above them for cover – while the instructors disrupt them at all times of day and night. For the first time they are living off ration packs, and learning to perform regular foot-checks for blisters, to function in the cold, and to cope with sleep deprivation. 'Morale will be good because it’s nice and sunny,’ says Capt Barny Taylor, 28, one of the instructors from the Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment. 'When it’s raining you see their heads drop. And you have to refocus them and say, “What would you do in Afghanistan if it was raining. Would you stop?”’

Afterwards, the recruits sit in a circle to snatch some rest. They are tired, but running on adrenaline, with the end of initial training in sight. Next week they will pass out in the parade ground in front of their families before going on to more specialised training with their regiments.

Sean McAlistar, 19, a trainee driver from Stirling in Scotland, has war paint on his face. He describes how he ended up in the Army: 'I was an apprentice joiner for three years. But I was paid off. I’d been thinking about this since I was 14. My dad wasn’t too happy about it, but I talked him around.’

So why do the recruits think there is a spike in interest in the Army? Many of those I talked to, especially the younger ones, were attracted by the possibility of action in Afghanistan. 'A place where I will be tested’ is a phrase that often came up. But a desire to face far-flung danger can’t tell the whole story. During the Iraq conflict, recruiters struggled to persuade young people to enlist, because it wasn’t a popular war. Afghanistan, with its regular tales of heroism in the press, seems to be different. In the minds of many young people here, there is a sharp contrast between the unstable and unrewarding work that they have been doing in civilian life and the respect they can earn in the military.

But the 'cast-iron’ guarantee of employment promised by Major Bath to his Birmingham recruits seems a bit shaky now. The Army announced this month that there will be 1,000 redundancies in the first tranche this year. Though nobody who has served for less than eight years will be made redundant, some will lose their jobs after serving less than the contracted 12.

Despite the recession, it is striking that the complexion of the Army hasn’t really changed. It is still the traditional fertile recruiting grounds –Birmingham, south Wales, southern Scotland, Liverpool – that are making up the numbers rather than areas such as the South-East that have fared better in the downturn. There is still a large number of Army families where sons follows fathers. When asked what had made them join, glossy recruitment ads were rarely mentioned. It was almost always the personal experience of a parent, a brother or a mate.

And what of the claim that the training has become softer? Unarguably there has been a quiet revolution in the past 15 years to bring the Army into line with civilian norms. Duvets, once banned, have replaced blankets. Where once television and even pay phones were outlawed in the first eight weeks of training, recruits now have access to Sky TV, laptops and, during downtime, their mobile phones.

The casual brutalism that sergeant majors once specialised in has, officially at least, disappeared. 'Back in the 1970s and early 80s the Army training we went through was a regime to weed out the weak,’ Major Bath in Birmingham told me. 'You got a kicking. Your locker went out of the window. There’s none of that now. It would not be tolerated. The whole culture has changed.’

When I visited Pirbright, the frequent reference to the rights of recruits could make a crusty old colonel beetroot-faced. As they filled in their personal details, their data protection rights were read out, they were told how to exercise their right of 'voluntary withdrawal’, and, in the corner of their television room, there was a pile of leaflets about self-harming. Recruits were even encouraged to fill in feedback forms with suggestions for how training could be improved.

Major Bath, though, with the weariness of an old soldier, thinks that complaints that the Army is getting softer are the same in every generation: 'There is always a blame culture with the Army. The regular Army say that recruits aren’t like they were when I was a lad – they’re not as tough. The regular Army blames the training depots; the training depots say that the recruits coming off Civvy Street are hopeless. And the recruiting industry is saying, actually, mate, you are getting the best of what we’ve got. And so it goes on.’

[buglerbilly]

SAS at risk of recruitment crisis as Army is stretched to the limit

The SAS is facing a shortage of recruits because ordinary soldiers are too over-stretched to apply for the elite regiment, a leaked letter from the head of infantry has warned.


The SAS has played a leading role in the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and is thought to be responsible for seizing key terrorists Photo: REUTERS

By Thomas Harding, Defence Correspondent9:30PM BST 24 Apr 2011

The high “operational tempo” of the Armed Forces and the “unrelentingly demanding” operations in Afghanistan are combining to “mitigate against Special Forces recruitment”, Brig Richard Dennis warned. The SAS was also losing its unique position in the military as “interesting operations are no longer seen as the preserve of Special Forces”.

The disclosure is a major blow as the SAS is regarded as the world’s pre-eminent Special Forces unit. The regiment has played a leading role in the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq and is thought to be responsible for seizing key terrorists.

However, the head of the infantry said in the letter to Gen Sir Peter Wall, the head of the Army, that he now had deep concerns over the “challenge of fully manning the SAS”.

In the letter, seen by The Daily Telegraph, he warned that immediate action was needed to increase the “depth and quality” of potential recruits.

The letter also quoted the commanding officer of 22 Special Air Service Regiment who expressed the need for “more youthful, quality volunteers”.

Brig Dennis listed a number of areas of concern, including the lack of opportunity to train for selection as a result of operations in Afghanistan and a perceived “fear of failure” among soldiers.

Although official figures are never released, The Daily Telegraph understands that the SAS has a staffing crisis with a shortage of one-third of its total front-line strength. The letter also indicated serious manning issues within the wider Army, which is about to be reduced by 5,000, saying there was a shortfall of 700 corporals and the equivalent of at least one captain for every rifle company that was hindering recruitment.

The letter quoted the commanding officer of 22 SAS speaking at the annual infantry conference.

“He emphasised the understandable need for more youthful, quality volunteers, whilst accepting that opportunities for exacting service existed within most aspects of current RD [regimental duty] operational deployments.” Brig Dennis then wrote: “I am content, notwithstanding the need to avoid any complacency, that the infantry community delivers sufficient officer and soldier volunteers to Selection. I am less confident about how we guarantee better depth of quality to increase selection pass rates.

“Indeed, for any measure to be successful you might consider that Army action is essential if we are to increase selection success and the enduring quality of our SF [Special Forces] community.”

The letter is one of the most serious indications that the Government’s draconian defence cuts are undermining the Armed Forces at a time when the Libyan conflict is intensifying and 10,000 troops are deployed in Afghanistan.

It is understood that, contrary to some reports, SAS units are not currently operating undercover in Libya.

The staffing crisis that has gripped the SAS is said to have led to urgent discussions between the Director of Special Forces and senior Army commanders.

“Manning levels are at an all-time low and we can’t get away from it,” said a Special Forces source. “It used to be that we could operate well enough with 10 per cent down but with a third of the guys either leaving for security jobs, coming to the end of their careers or getting injured it is getting serious.”

SAS officers, both serving and retired, have made it clear that the manpower situation could become “irretrievable” if the Army is reduced to a predicted 82,000 men in the 2015 defence review, further shrinking the pool of troops available.

There are also strategic issues, since the SAS is seen as the biggest asset that Britain has to offer in the alliance with America alongside the nuclear deterrent.

While SAS fatalities are reported, statistics for wounded remain secret. However, it has now become apparent that the unit has suffered a high casualty rate similar to infantry units on the front line.

There are reported to be a number of amputees on light duty at their base in Hereford and in one incident in Afghanistan last year, eight Special Forces soldiers were badly injured in a single attack.

“You cannot be in this type of environment deploying loads with lots of lead going down without people getting hurt,” said a serving Special Forces soldier. “There is also a bow wave of guys who have come to end of their time. They are desperately trying to make up shortfall.”

A large number of SAS troops have left for the more lucrative private security market, although some have been tempted back with large financial inducements.

SAS selection is regarded as the most arduous military course in the world. Candidates spend a month running over the Welsh mountains with 50lb loads, which culminates in the 40-mile endurance march. They then spend weeks in the jungle, suffering dehydration and deprivation, followed by a course in escape and evasion, culminating in the resistance to interrogation. On average one in 10 makes it through to earn the sandy-coloured SAS beret.

The letter warned that the amount of deployments the infantry are doing abroad “does not allow best preparation for selection” and said commanding officers’ views differed about allowing soldiers time off for training.

Many soldiers also remain apprehensive about SAS selection because the “fear of failure remains acute”.

“How do we encourage more towards Selection without pushing too hard?” the letter, which was written in February, asked. It also suggested that commanders should “talent spot and nurture” potential SAS men. Brig Dennis concluded that the shortages meant the Army had to “take a more active role in encouraging Selection” as troops begin to withdraw from Afghanistan.

In last October’s defence review the MoD announced a significant increase in spending on Special Forces equipment and capacity. However, this appears yet to yield further recruits.

A MoD spokesman said: “We do not normally comment on SF matters and we can see no reason to change that policy on this occasion.”

The Daily Telegraph has been asked to not publish certain sensitive information contained in the letter at the request of the Defence Advisory Notice Committee.

[buglerbilly]

Reference the above article, there is also the fact that the SAS in the UK can no longer assume a major flow thru of candidates from the Australian or NZ SAS groups as they themselves are fully occupied in Afghanistan. From Overseas candidates, only the Fijians remain a possible/probable source?

[buglerbilly]

SAS: the chosen few who are a force like no other

Despite a shortfall in recruits, the SAS remains a peerless asset to Britain, says Thomas Harding.

By Thomas Harding

7:05PM BST 25 Apr 2011

There was a global intake of breath last month, when an SAS mission to make contact with the Libyan rebels unravelled in humiliating fashion. The fact that the world’s most fabled special forces unit was brought low by a group of farmers was, according to one former commander, like Lewis Hamilton going out of the British Grand Prix on the first lap.

Since the pre-eminent skills of the Special Air Service first came to the world’s attention on the balconies of the Iranian embassy 31 years ago, the regiment has been transformed from a little-known ace up the military’s sleeve to the superstar of the special forces world, home to soldiers of supreme guile and ruthlessness.

“Many are called, but few are chosen” is a phrase often quoted during SAS selection – some solace for the 90 per cent who fail to get through. The six-month process is regarded as the most arduous in the world: candidates undertake a month of running over the Welsh mountains with 50lb loads, culminating in the 40-mile Endurance march, then spend weeks in the jungle, suffering dehydration and deprivation, followed by another course in escape and evasion, culminating in tests of resistance to interrogation.

This produces men who do not understand the concept of defeat, who defy taking “no” for an answer, and who have built an enviable reputation for their country. For America, the SAS and their colleagues in the Special Boat Service are one of the two great strategic assets we have to offer, alongside our nuclear deterrent. The first words that come from the mouths of US generals visiting Britain – such as David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal, both from special forces backgrounds – are of praise for the SAS.

They saw the effect that a few score troopers had in Baghdad during the darkest days. It was the SAS who took the fight to the enemy, who “neutralised” al-Qaeda operatives, Sunni insurgents and Shia militias with ruthless efficiency. In the past year, the SAS has worked its way through the Taliban high command, taking out its members on an “industrial scale”.

No surprise, then, that there was some choice debate in SAS circles when David Cameron, in his early days at No 10, allowed a US Seal team to rescue Linda Norgrove, a Scottish aid worker kidnapped by the Taliban. It ended disastrously, after she was killed by a hand grenade thrown by one of the US troops. The commando in question had form for such antics – which, had he been in the SAS, would already have led to instant dismissal.

Recently, the Coalition has come to appreciate the SAS’s qualities: the defence review significantly increased special forces funding, to somewhere between

£2 billion and £3 billion – almost a tenth of the MoD budget. Yet at the same time, finding the right personnel is becoming increasingly difficult. As we reported yesterday, a letter from the Director of Infantry has bemoaned a shortfall in the number of recruits coming through.

This recruiting crisis is in part down to the fact that young men eager for combat find their thirst slaked by a tour of Helmand, in which they will engage in far more firefights than their SAS colleagues. “I don’t need to go back,” one told me. “I’ve had my Hemingway moments.” Another asked: “Why do six months of selection hell, when you get all the fighting you want in one tour?”

However, the work of the SAS is of a different order entirely. It produces outstanding leaders: six out of the Army’s 36 infantry battalions are commanded by Hereford men. Yet it is probably the most democratic military unit in existence. Most decisions are taken after a “Chinese parliament”, in which every trooper has his say. Officers have refused orders if they think them unsafe, as one did when told to storm an airfield on the Argentine mainland during the Falklands War.

The service also attracts the eccentric. One squadron invited an artist (and former Para) to Baghdad to paint an assault on a house containing an al-Qaeda operative. The resulting canvas is now said to hang in the officers’ mess in Hereford.

And, in the week of the royal wedding, it’s pertinent to recount how two SAS soldiers changed the fate of a nation. Within hours of Prince William’s mother being married, one unfortunate attendee – Sir Dawda Jawadra, the president of Gambia – found himself out of office after rebels staged a coup in his absence. Two SAS men were sent out, picked up weapons in Senegal, then proceeded, with the help of some Senagalese paratroopers, to retake the airport and the radio station, secure the capital, rescue the president’s wife, and restore order in time for Sir Dawdra’s triumphant arrival.

Light forces that can operate with such gumption behind enemy lines are one of Britain’s most valuable military assets. They are also something we should do everything we can to hold on to.

[buglerbilly]

Improved Armed Forces Compensation Scheme comes into effect

A Defence Policy and Business news article

9 May 11

The revised Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) has been launched today, incorporating all of the recommendations made by Admiral the Lord Boyce, former Chief of the Defence Staff, in his review of the scheme in 2010.


An injured Service person being medically evacuated by air from theatre
[Picture: Crown Copyright/MOD 2008]

Service personnel who become injured or ill as a result of their service will now be able to benefit from a more comprehensive compensation package, including an increase, on average in excess of 25 per cent, to all lump sum payments, except the top award which was recently doubled to £570,000.

The maximum award payable for mental illness has also increased from £48,875 to £140,000 in order to accurately reflect the impact of the most serious mental health conditions.

There has also been an increase to all Guaranteed Income Payments, a tax-free monthly income stream which is paid to those who are seriously injured, for life. The increase reflects the lasting effect of more serious injuries on future promotion prospects and on the ability to work to age 65.

Minister for Defence Personnel, Welfare and Veterans, Andrew Robathan, said:


"I am grateful for the recommendations made in Admiral the Lord Boyce's Review of the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme last year. While the review found that the scheme was fundamentally sound, it made a number of recommendations for improvement - all of which will be implemented today.

"We must do all we can for those who become injured or ill in service and ensure the care and support we give them is the best possible. This package of changes will result in a significant financial uplift for injured military personnel and clearly demonstrates our commitment to helping our wounded men and women for the rest of their lives."

All those who have previously received an award from the scheme (since its inception on 6 April 2005) will have their awards uplifted in line with the new increases. Over the course of the next year the Service Personnel and Veterans Agency will be reviewing around 10,000 awards and informing previous recipients of the increases that they will receive.

The Boyce Review also recommended further, detailed examination of a number of types of injury and illness to ensure the AFCS was providing fair compensation in all cases. As a result of this, an Independent Medical Expert Group (IMEG) was set up and has produced a report which makes a number of recommendations. All of those relating to compensation have been implemented in the revised scheme.

One of the key recommendations made by the IMEG is that those who become infertile as a result of service are provided with a number of free cycles of IVF treatment. Given the complexity involved in delivering the recommendation regarding provision of IVF treatment, this is an issue we will continue to work on in conjunction with colleagues in the four health departments in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

[buglerbilly]

A spin cycle that is saving lives in Helmand

An Equipment and Logistics news article

19 May 11

Two Roll Over Drills Egress Trainers (RODETs), armoured hulls kitted out just like a real vehicle that can be completely rotated, are teaching troops in Camp Bastion how to survive if their vehicle hits an IED.


British soldiers using the Roll Over Drills Egress Trainer
[Picture: Sergeant Alison Baskerville RLC, Crown Copyright/MOD 2011]

If one of the British Army's latest generation of armoured vehicles is struck by an improvised explosive device, or rolls over on difficult terrain, the soldiers inside need to know how to protect themselves and safely exit the vehicle.

Two RODET units, which can simulate a vehicle rolling and coming to rest upside down or on its side, are in use at Camp Bastion, and every soldier likely to go 'outside the wire' experiences the delights of going for a spin.

According to Captain Dougie Douglas, the officer responsible for reception, staging and onward integration training at the huge base, the RODET is dramatically improving British soldiers' chances of surviving a vehicle incident without suffering serious injury. He said:


"It's the basic stuff - wearing seat belts, stowing equipment securely and keeping the vehicle clean inside. Some people are just about double their normal weight with their body armour and combat equipment on.

"If the person opposite you gets thrown on top of you, or you get thrown out of your seat against the roof of the vehicle, you could be severely injured. Seat belts save lives, even in a combat zone."

Equipment stowage is important, as items like boxes of ammunition can become projectiles inside a vehicle:

"We illustrate the point using foam rubber ammo boxes", said Captain Douglas. "Being hit in the face by a rubber ammo box is simply a bit annoying - but if it was a real steel one, with 250 rounds of machine gun ammunition inside, that could be fatal."


The Roll Over Drills Egress Trainer or RODET
[Picture: Sergeant Alison Baskerville RLC, Crown Copyright/MOD 2011]

Each RODET session includes the vehicle coming to rest at different angles, with the occupants being told to exit through a different door each time.

There are techniques to be learnt, such as getting out of a four-point safety harness when hanging from what is now the roof without falling across the vehicle, and extracting a wounded or unconscious casualty.

Every move is watched by the operator using a series of night-vision cameras mounted inside the simulator.

A clean vehicle is a safe vehicle, even in the dusty wastes of Afghanistan, as RODET instructor Sergeant Andy Hale of the 9/12 Royal Lancers pointed out:


"As soon as the hull turns over you can see all the dirt and gravel on the floor of the vehicle fly upwards. The same thing happens in an IED strike. The guys learn to keep their protective glasses on, even in the vehicle, but they still come out of the RODET with a face full of dust."

For Captain Douglas, the RODET is a lifesaving investment that has already demonstrated its value:


"Soon after we started the training we had a Mastiff vehicle roll over on an obstacle on the driver training course, " he said. "Everyone rushed over, expecting the worst - but the guys were just extracting themselves exactly as we teach them. Perfect."

[buglerbilly]

The Cost-Effective Delivery of an Armoured Vehicle Capability

(Source: UK National Audit Office; issued May 20, 2011)


Since 1998, Britain has spent £718m on cancelled or delayed armored vehicle projects, but faces an armored vehicle shortfall until at least 2024, NAO says. (UK MoD photo)

The suspension and cancellation of a number of key armoured vehicle projects since the 1998 defence review has resulted in the Armed Forces facing a significant shortage in the principal armoured vehicles they require, until at least 2024-2025.

Today's National Audit Office report found that the Department's standard acquisition process has been undermined by a combination of over-ambitious requirements and unstable financial planning. Despite the commitment of considerable resources, since 1998, the MOD has received only a fraction of the armoured vehicles it has set out to buy through its standard acquisition process.

The Department's reluctance to compromise in setting technologically demanding requirements under its standard acquisition process has put the timely and cost-effective delivery of the equipment at risk. Unwieldy procurement processes have not coped well with rapid changes to equipment requirements in the light of operational experience, resulting in a number of armoured vehicle projects being delayed or abandoned.

Armoured vehicle projects have also suffered from unstable budgets and continual changes to financial plans. As the NAO reported in its Strategic Financial Management of the Defence Budget report, the cycle of unrealistic planning followed by cost overruns has led to a need to find additional short-term savings on a regular basis. Spending to date includes £321 million on cancelled or suspended projects and a further £397 million funding on-going, but delayed, projects. Without significant additional investment sustained over time, the Department will have a shortfall in the armoured vehicles it says it needs until at least 2024-2025.

To address shortfalls in equipment for current operations, such as in Afghanistan, the Department has placed greater reliance on the Urgent Operational Requirements (UORs) since 2003, at an additional cost of £2.8 billion. This has been more successful and has significantly improved protection levels for UK forces against today's threats. The UOR process is not a sustainable substitute for the standard acquisition process. While some UOR vehicles may be taken into the core fleet, the Department does not expect these vehicles to offer a long-term solution to its armoured vehicle needs.

Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, said today:

"The MOD's standard route for acquiring priority equipment has not been working in the case of armoured vehicles. Too many major projects have been cancelled, suspended or delayed and the Armed Forces will not be fully equipped with the vehicles they need to carry out their full strategic remit until at least 2024-2025.

"While some of the lessons learned from the successful use of the Urgent Operational Requirements process can be applied to core projects in the future, a long term solution is likely to need significant further investment, realistic plans and stable budgets sustained over time."

The Comptroller and Auditor General, Amyas Morse, is the head of the National Audit Office which employs some 900 staff. He and the NAO are totally independent of Government. He certifies the accounts of all Government departments and a wide range of other public sector bodies; and he has statutory authority to report to Parliament on the economy, efficiency and effectiveness with which departments and other bodies have used their resources.

Click here for the full report (45 pages in PDF format) on the NAO website.

http://www.nao.org.uk/idoc.ashx?docId=85b907d4-1f92-402a-bf35-6340d78ff65d&version=-1

-ends-

[buglerbilly]

Leaked Internal Report Says Army Ill-Prepared for Urban Warfare

(Source: British Forces Broadcasting Service; posted June 01, 2011)

An internal study has reportedly revealed the British Army is not prepared to fight in built-up areas and lacks the ability to anticipate threats from future enemies.

The Army's shortcomings are highlighted in a planning report called Agile Warrior - which the Daily Telegraph says it has seen.

The assessment was carried out by the Force Development and Training Command which tries to prepare the army for likely future operations.

Some believe future conflicts are more likely to be in urban areas than the countryside of Afghanistan.

The report says the role of tanks, armoured vehicles and helicopters will need to change in order to better support infantry troops.

It also claims the army lacks the precision weapons needed to target enemies without endangering civilians.

An Army spokesman said while the focus remains on Afghanistan, commanders were prudently planning for the future.

-ends-

[buglerbilly]

U.K. Army Must Become More Expeditionary: Chief

By ANDREW CHUTER

Published: 1 Jun 2011 13:03

LONDON - The British Army has become too used to fighting from sophisticated, well-resourced bases in places like Afghanistan and needs to rebuild capabilities more suitable to expeditionary warfare, according to the head of the Army.

"We have got far too used to a post-expeditionary psyche, where we have hard-wired bandwidth and quite sophisticated facilities in places like Camp Bastion," the main British military base in Afghanistan, said Gen. Sir Peter Wall, the chief of the General Staff.

"We need to transition our thinking to a more expeditionary psyche, where in the early days of a new campaign, we will be forced to operate without the sophistication we have managed to grow in the Afghan landscape," Wall said.

Speaking more broadly about the future development of land forces here, Wall said the British Army would have to transform itself from its Afghan-centric campaign to "something that gives us a more broad-based military capability with a regrowth of contingency.

"Like a number of other armies, we have over this period been forced to put some aspect of our war-fighting capability temporarily on hold as we got completely absorbed by the challenges of success in Afghanistan," he told an audience of senior military officers and industry executives at the Royal United Services Institute conference on land warfare here June 1.

The conflict in Libya is the latest reminder of the need for balanced capabilities. The Army, he said, needs to be able to deliver capabilities that will match the hybrid challenges of the future.

"Combined arms maneuvers remain a part of our repertoire, but it has to modernized and coupled with the ability to handle asymmetric threats and irregular threats and also take account of additional dimensions in battlespace, for example cyber," the British Army chief said.

British forces are well equipped to fight the Taliban, but the picture is more challenging when one looks at the equipment beyond that conflict, he said.

"The Army has an excellent suite of equipment at the moment, but it is specific to the Afghanistan challenge," Wall said. "If we look at our forward equipment program, it's rather a different story.

"We face a budget which is reducing considerably over the early years of the current decade, after which we will certainly require real-term growth over the latter part of the decade if we are to resource [our plans] for Future Force 2020," Wall said.

Future Force 2020 is the British government's plan to restructure the military over the next 10 years.

[buglerbilly]

U.K. Army Fears Loss of Battlefield Mobility

By ANDREW CHUTER

Published: 2 Jun 2011 15:18

LONDON - British soldiers will be walking to war if the Ministry of Defence fails to deliver a coherent equipment plan as part of its restructuring of the U.K. military later this decade, according to a senior Army officer.

Maj. Gen. Bill Moore, the MoD's director of battlespace maneuver and master general of the Ordnance, singled out the need to fund a planned upgrade of the Army's Warrior infantry fighting vehicle as vital to enabling the British military to maneuver in the post-2015 era.

"While support for operations [in Afghanistan] is the main effort, we need to deliver a coherent Future Force 2020. If we don't get this right and don't get the Warrior [capability sustainment program] funded and maintain the other things in our program, the Army will be walking to war from 2015," Moore told an audience of senior officers and industry executives at a June 2 conference on land warfare, hosted here by the Royal United Services Institute.

The MoD has been in negotiations with Lockheed Martin UK for months to update more than 300 Warriors with a new turret, gun, electronic architecture and better armored protection.

The future of the program has been wracked by uncertainties as a result of heavy defense budget cuts imposed by the British government over the next four years.

The general said there is an enduring need for the Warrior, and the current machine has reached the end of its tether with an obsolete gun, a power-to-weight ratio on operations that is near its limit and other failings. The update would allow Warrior to stay in service beyond 2040.

While Moore may have had his tongue in his cheek over the "walking to war" comment, he said that even if Britain manages to maintain all the programs in the budget, there would still be an issue of being able to maneuver properly in the 2015-20 time frame.

There is a clear budget gap across many of the key maneuver equipment plans post-2015, and he said armored vehicles, support helicopters, air transport, support vehicles, ISTAR and joint fires would all require more funding if Britain is going to develop the Future Force 2020 concept fully.

One bright spot, he said, is the progress on the new armored scout vehicle being developed by General Dynamics UK. The team developing the turret for the vehicle conducted its first live firing with the 40mm case telescoped cannon system integrated in mid-May.

Lockheed Martin is leading the team using a Rheinmetall Landsysteme-designed turret. The tests, conducted in Germany, involved firing 20 rounds. General Dynamics said the milestone was achieved five months ahead of schedule.

Moore said Britain also needs more helicopter lift capabilities, including additional Boeing Chinooks and upgraded Eurocopter Pumas.

AgustaWestland Merlin battlefield support helicopters are being transferred to the Royal Navy for commando operations.

Future Force 2020 is a planned transformation of the British military into a more adaptable, but smaller, expeditionary force by the end of the decade.

The transformation, part of the 2010 British government strategic defense and security review, is sparking increasing debate here on military requirements and how they will be funded post-2015, against what could be a backdrop of continuing economic uncertainty and budget pressure.

[buglerbilly]

Armed Forces 'should recruit more part-time soldiers', review urges

The Armed Forces should recruit more part-time soldiers to help Britain prepare for conflict and natural disasters, a review ordered by David Cameron has concluded.


The Territorial Army had been told it must halt training for six months due to pressure on government finances Photo: GETTY

By Andrew Hough

8:00AM BST 04 Jun 2011

The study, led by Gen Sir Nick Houghton, the Vice-Chief of the Defence Staff, will also urge a rethink on plans by ministers to cut the TA’s budget.

The Territorial Army, and its Navy and RAF equivalents, should be asked to shoulder more responsibility in future operations, the review will say.

The six month review, ordered to assess how the services will operate in the 21st century, will call for the part-time soldiers to be used more readily in war, terrorist attacks and any natural disasters that hit Britain.

The Future Reserves 2020 study, due to report back in the summer, will reportedly advise a balance between reserve and regular forces that reflect Britain’s closest allies, such as the United States and Australia.

In those countries the proportion of part-time soldiers, sailors and airmen is higher.

It will conclude that the ratio between numbers of part-time and full-time troops, which currently stands at 15:85, needs to be increased.

This compares with a 50:50 split between reservists and regular forces in America and a 40:60 divide in Australia, Canada and New Zealand, The Times reported.

It will also contain proposals to deploy company and potentially even battalion-size reserve units on operations such as in response to a flood in Britain or a terrorist attack.

The recommendations in the report, to be submitted to the Prime Minister by the end of June, marks a reversal of plans drawn up inside the MoD to cut the already diminished number of reservists.

During the negotiations leading up to the Strategic Defence Review, Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, was shown plans to reduce the number of reservists by a third.

The Daily Telegraph reported last year that a MoD paper that was circulated in Whitehall had set out three options for TA numbers, all involving substantial cuts.

Even the most modest cut TA numbers were thought to be reduced to around 24,000.

A “central” option was discussed would leave the TA with approximately 14,000 soldiers. The most radical would see TA numbers fall to barely 9,000.

The TA currently has around 35,000 soldiers, but Ministry of Defence officials say several thousand of them are “dead wood” who cannot be deployed on front line operations.

Running the TA costs almost £500 million every year and each reservist soldier costs more than £15,000, significantly more than each Royal Navy and RAF reservist.

The review is expected to show that over a five-year period a full-time soldier, with their housing, pension and welfare expenses, is three times more expensive to maintain and deploy than their part-time equivalent.

Figures show that the number of TA reservists is declining after three years of underfunding, in what one source described as “withering on the vine”.

Gen Houghton is conducting the review with assistance from Julian Brazier, the Conservative MP, who was asked by Mr Cameron to help to conduct the review, and the retired Lieutenant-General Sir Graeme Lamb.

“At the end of this process we want to end up with a much better relationship between the regular and reserve forces and with the reservists feeling that they are better appreciated,” said Mr Brazier, a former TA officer.

“I do not think you are going to see the overnight slashing of training and personnel numbers that you have seen in the past.

“The size and scale of the reserves will depend upon where the Prime Minister decides to set the balance. I think what we will be announcing will please reservists.”

General Lamb added to the paper that under current resources, initial manpower available in a catastrophe “will start to run out of gas pretty quickly”.

“While we have the ability to export our force, I am not sure the resilience in homeland security is as comprehensively covered as we should feel comfortable with given all the issues such as cyber security, unnatural or natural disasters, and the nature of how extremism, radicalism and terrorism can be brought to bear,” he added.

An MoD spokeswoman said that reserve forces “are, and will remain, an essential part” of the Armed Forces.

“The Future Reserves 2020 study is about ensuring we have Reserve Forces that meet our future needs,” he said.

“The study is seeking opinions from across the Defence community and will report back in the summer.

“It would be wrong to speculate on the potential outcomes of the review while it is still ongoing.”

[pdf27]

The TA currently has around 35,000 soldiers, but Ministry of Defence officials say several thousand of them are “dead wood” who cannot be deployed on front line operations.
Problem is the useless f***ers who'll never be deployed due to being a complete liability will show up as "deployable" in the statistics, while those who make the unit actually function (e.g. 60 year old CQMS's who are in every weekend ensuring that all the kit is squared away for exercises) will show up as "non-deployable". I'm leaving the TA over the summer, in large part because things are just getting ridiculous with numbers and training - and if those cuts go through there will be a lot more like me. The further people have to travel to a drill night - and the less they see of their TA mates - the less likely they are to stay on. Sadly, this is something the government - and indeed the regular army - have never understood, and probably never will.

[buglerbilly]

Territorial Army reserves could replace 5,000 soldiers in review

Thousands of regular soldiers could be sacked to boost the role of the Territorial Army under a government cost cutting review.


Soldiers from the London Scottish Regiment Territorial Army take up firing positions in Afghanistan. Photo: PA

By By James Kirkup and Thomas Harding

7:30AM BST 16 Jul 2011

The Daily Telegraph has learned that reserves will take a significant role in front-line operations at the expense of up to 5,000 regular soldiers.

The reserves review, which was commissioned by David Cameron and will be published on Monday, has led to clashes with senior military commanders concerned about the impact of further cuts on the army's operational capability.

Critics of Britain’s reserve forces say they are inefficient and ineffective, while advocates say that properly supported reserves can be cheaper and more flexible than regular forces.

The review will recommend that the TA should retain it's current strength of 36,000, with an estimated 5,000 reservists will be trained for front-line operations. According to defence analysts, however, at present only one in 20 TA soldiers has sufficient training to be deployed.

It is understood that the MoD is asking the Treasury for £150 million a year of extra funding for the TA to cover the oost of additional recruitment, training and equipment.

Gen Sir David Richards, the Chief of the Defence Staff, is understood to be battling to receive guarantees that the Army will not face any further cuts until the TA reforms are in place with the estimated 5,000 “deployable troops ready and trained”.

The review has been conducted by General Sir Nick Houghton, the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff, and Julian Brazier, a Conservative MP.

If TA reservists are on the front-line by 2015 then it is likely that the Army will allow cuts of 5,000 regular troops, on top of the 7,000 already underway. The redundancies will see the Army drop to 90,000 troops, its smallest size in more than a century.

“If the TA can deliver the manpower and if this can be funded outside the MoD budget then we could see a like-for-like reduction to the regular Army,” said a planner involved in the reforms.

"That is the surety that the Chief of Defence Staff is looking for but he wants to see the model proved before any reductions are made.”

As well as doing more front-line work, reservists could contribute more to “homeland security” work dealing with the aftermath of terrorist attacks and other emergencies.

The review was set up last year after ministers ducked out of plans to make deep cuts in the TA.

A Whitehall official said that Mr Cameron intends to kick the review into the long grass to avoid another clash with military chiefs.

The official said: “You’re basically talking about a plan that would require sacking regular units to fund the expansion of an organisation that’s already struggling to keep up its numbers. Why on earth would the PM agree to that?”

Kevan Jones, a Labour defence spokesman, said: “Major changes are gong to cost money. Without that, the report will simply sit on a shelf.”

An MoD spokesperson said: "Following the defence review a series of additional studies has been undertaken to continue the work of transforming and rebalancing defence. We expect to announce the findings of these studies to Parliament next week and it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time."

[buglerbilly]

Defence shake-up means our smallest Army since the Boer War

The Army is to be cut in size by 17,000 soldiers in a radical overhaul of the armed forces to be announced on Monday.


Britain is to cut its army by 17,000 while boosting territorial units who will be called on for dangerous missions Photo: GETTY

By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent

8:00PM BST 16 Jul 2011

The reorganisation will see the Army shrink to its smallest size since the Boer War, while Britain’s reserve forces will benefit from a £1.5 billion investment programme.

Members of the Territorial Army (TA), the Royal Naval Reserve and the Royal Air Force Volunteers Reserve will receive better pay and conditions, but more will be expected to take part in dangerous military operations when needed.

It is understood that by 2020 the Army will be reduced from its present strength of 101,000 regulars, to 84,000. The number of territorials will be maintained at 36,000.

In a separate development it is understood that RAF Leuchars is to close, leaving only one RAF airbase in Scotland. The site will become an Army barracks.

The Sunday Telegraph understands that the Ministry of Defence has secured extra funding from the Treasury in the next spending round, after 2013, of £1.5 billion to pay for the overhaul of the reserve forces as well as more funding for the equipment programme.

The extra cash will pay for 14 Chinooks, which are due to come into service after 2014, three new Rivet surveillance aircraft and upgrades to the Army fleet of ageing Warrior armoured vehicles.

Approximately 7,000 soldiers will be cut from the Army by 2015, following the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, through a mixture of voluntary and compulsory redundancies and natural wastage. The remaining reduction of 10,000 will take place by 2020.

The review being announced tomorrow into the future structure and role of the reserve forces took nine months. It was led by General Sir Nicholas Houghton, the vice-chief of the defence staff, Julian Brazier, an MP and former TA officer, and Lt Gen Graeme Lamb, a highly decorated former SAS commander. It is understood that all of their findings will be endorsed by Dr Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, in a Commons statement.

Dr Fox will state that after years of neglect in which reserves were stripped of resources and cut to the bone, they will receive millions in extra funding to “restore the reserves’ health and size”.

The Defence Secretary will also announce new specialist roles for the reserves including cyber security, intelligence, linguistic and medical duties. The regenerated forces will also play a part in homeland security and policing roles.

In the foreword of the Reserves Review, the authors say: “Our Commission has concluded that the UK’s Reserve Forces are in need of significant revitalisation and reorientation. Although continuing to do a remarkable job in many areas … the wider picture is one of relative neglect and decline.

“Our Commission recommends the immediate need for resources to be committed to stabilise and then improve the state of the Reserve. Within this unifying idea, our view is that the Reservist element of the Armed Forces must grow to become a far greater proportion of overall Service manpower.”

The aim is to make the reserves more professional, forming more stand-alone units that can deploy and operate on their own, rather than just being attached in small groups across the regular forces.

One of the key drivers of the review has been the cost of reserves compared with

regular forces. Defence sources have told The Sunday Telegraph that five light role territorial infantry battalions cost a fifth of the amount needed to train a regular infantry battalion.

The review also found that Britain was out of step with other Nato countries whose territorials make up a much greater proportion of their armed forces. In the UK, the current commitment of reserve forces is below 20 per cent, whereas in the United States the figure is 50.5 per cent, in Canada 44 per cent, and in Australia 37 per cent.

During the Iraq War in 2004, TA soldiers made up a fifth of the British force in the

country. At present they account for an eighth of the British strength in Afghanistan, a figure which the Government wants to increase.

One senior defence source said: “Over the last few years there have been a series of bad reorganisations which have undermined the structure of the reserves and have driven out many of the best officers. Training funds have virtually stopped and people have been leaving in droves.

“The TA has been reorganised seven times in the last 20 years. One review five years ago produced an infantry structure which prevented the TA from conducting proper collective training, together with an 80 per cent recruiting cap. But despite all of that there are still some very good units in the TA, such as the 4th battalion The Parachute Regiment.

“We are now back to the mentality of the 1930s when the officers paid for the men to go on exercise. The reserves are a valuable resource and they are being wasted.”

The closure of RAF Leuchars will leave Scotland with just one functioning RAF base at Lossiemouth, currently home to a Tornado GR4 Squadron. The new barracks at the Leuchars site will house thousands of soldiers due to be withdrawn from Germany in the next few years.

The decision to transfer the two typhoon squadrons currently based at Leuchars to RAF Lossiemouth was only finalised last Friday, although rumours of the move had been circulating for months.

It will also be announced that RAF Marham in Norfolk — another Tornado base — will remain open, primarily because it is the only Tornado servicing facility.

[buglerbilly]

Historic battalions could be lost in cuts, warns general

Up to a fifth of Britain’s infantry battalions, including some of Army’s most historic names, will be abolished under Government defence cuts, commanders fear.


The Prince of Wales presents campaign medals to members of the Black Watch - a battalion at risk

By James Kirkup, Political Correspondent

9:54PM BST 21 Aug 2011

They believe that as many as eight of the existing 36 battalions could cease to exist as the Army loses 12,000 posts in the next four years.

The cuts have raised fears that historic regimental names such as the Black Watch and the Green Howards could be at risk.

Gen Sir Peter Wall, the Chief of General Staff, is understood to have warned David Cameron about the impact of the cuts at a meeting in Downing Street last month.

The general is said to have told Mr Cameron that some units’ historic names and “cap badges” – unique identifying symbols – could be lost because of the cuts.

Fearful of public protests, the Prime Minister is understood to have responded by asking the general to try to make the cuts without disbanding any “cap badge” battalions.

But Army chiefs have warned that could force them to “salami slice” all regiments, leading to much smaller units that would be of limited military value. One officer told The Daily Telegraph that Mr Cameron’s request was “pretty naïve really – it’s as if he thinks he can order cuts of this size without any real consequences”.

The Daily Telegraph disclosed last month that Gen Wall has written to commanding officers warning them of the “removal of formed battalions and regiments”.

The Army is in the process of shedding 7,000 of its 102,000 posts, under cuts announced in last year’s Strategic Defence and Security Review. The first personnel to be sacked under the SDSR will be notified on Sept 1, when about 1,000 will be laid off. In addition, ministers last month ordered a further 5,000 cuts by 2015 and the Army will be reduced to 80,000 members by 2020.

Army planners are understood to be looking at cutting between five and eight battalions from the infantry. A battalion typically has around 600 men.

Early indications are that at least one Scottish battalion will be lost, and one from the north of England.

The last attempt to scrap historic infantry units, in 2004, left the Labour government facing angry protests from local MPs and military campaigners.

Some Government insiders suspect the generals are trying to use the emotive appeal of the historic regimental names to put pressure on Mr Cameron to back down on the cuts.

Some of the historic cap badges only survived the 2004 restructuring thanks to a compromise deal that means some units effectively have two official names.

So the Green Howards, whose history reaches back to the Glorious Revolution, are officially designated “the 2nd Bn, The Yorkshire Regiment (Green Howards). Likewise the Scottish battalions: the Black Watch is formally titled “3rd Bn, The Royal Regiment of Scotland”.

Both regiments could be vulnerable because they are short of their full complement of soldiers, partly because of poor recruiting in recent years.

I'm astonished by this news, the Howards are my old mob and they NEVER had a problem recruiting during the last half of the 20th Century to my knowledge................you'd have to be seriously incompetent to NOT be able to get the numbers you require or are committed to

Reports have also suggested that a Guards regiment could be disbanded, perhaps the Coldstream Guards. However, the Prime Minister is said to have insisted that the Guards and other units directly associated with the Royal family must be kept intact.

The Ministry of Defence said that the detail of the Army cuts was still being considered.

A spokesman said: “These additional manpower cuts are being scoped and detailed planning is under way to identify a range of options to meet the target of 90,000 by 2015.

“Whilst this planning is ongoing it would be wrong to speculate on the possible outcomes.”

[dan891]

The old XIX have been running short for years, sad to say. They were very overstrength at one point - I think around Options for Change - by nearly a company, but then they were based close to home in Catterick in 24 Airmaybe Brigade and were heavily committed to recruiting. Since then recruitment has not gone so well, even given the relative deprivation in their main recruiting grounds around Middlesborough.

[buglerbilly]

The old XIX have been running short for years, sad to say. They were very overstrength at one point - I think around Options for Change - by nearly a company, but then they were based close to home in Catterick in 24 Airmaybe Brigade and were heavily committed to recruiting. Since then recruitment has not gone so well, even given the relative deprivation in their main recruiting grounds around Middlesborough.

Jeez, that's somehow disturbing to me.............what a cluster! The Howards always had a real tight regimental thing going with 3 generations serving at one time or another not unusual.

[dan891]

Yeah, they still have that. Just have trouble filling all the ranks. I guess in part due to heavy recruiting by the Coldstream Guards and Parachute Regiment in Teeside as well.

[buglerbilly]

Yeah the Para's were always pretty strong there way back into the late 60's/early 70's BUT the Coldstream Guards? That's a new one on me............

The RM were (are?) always strong in Tyneside for some reason.

[I just remembered there is an RMR, Royal Marine Reserve centre in Tyneside and Hartlepool]

[buglerbilly]

DATE:08/09/11

SOURCE:Flight International

DSEi: Thales to update Watchkeeper progress

By Craig Hoyle

Thales UK will provide an update on its progress with the British Army's Watchkeeper unmanned air system at the UK's Defence & Security Equipment International (DSEi) show in London on 13 September, and will also mark a new operational milestone for an interim deal with the service.

A full-scale model of the Watchkeeper programme's WK450 air vehicle will be on display in the exhibit halls, along with Thales's I-Master synthetic aperture radar payload developed for the tactical system.

According to a schedule outlined during June's Paris air show, the first Watchkeeper equipment is due to be delivered to the British Army later this year following the completion of operational testing. Its first WK450s should fly sorties over Afghanistan for the first time during December.


© Thales UK
The WK450 should be deployed to Afghanistan late this year

Meanwhile, Thales has announced that its urgent operational requirement deal to supply deployed intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance services to the British Army has passed the 50,000 flight hour milestone.

Announcing the development on 6 September, Thales UK said leased Elbit Systems Hermes 450s have achieved the total in more than 4,000 sorties flown since June 2007. Its arrangement initially included the use of the aircraft in Iraq, but it now sustains five "task lines" in Afghanistan. The WK450 is an extensive redevelopment of the Israeli-built Hermes 450.

Elsewhere on the Thales exhibit will be its Spy Arrow micro-unmanned air vehicle, which is already in operational use with the French armed forces in Afghanistan. The design has an all-up weight of just 600g.


Spy Arrow micro-unmanned air vehicle

[buglerbilly]

Watchkeeper achieves longest flight

September 09, 2011

The British Army's new Watchkeeper UAS has flown its longest flight yet during a test flight from west Wales.

A test flight in the beginning of September from the Parc Aberporth flight test centre saw the Watchkeeper fly for 14 hours and out to a range of 115 km, making the sortie the longest both in terms of range and endurance.

Major Matt Moore, OC Watchkeeper Implementation Team and SO2 UAS HQ Director Royal Artillery, the organisation that will fly the Watchkeeper in the Army, told the RPAS Symposium held at Shrivenham on 8 September that the flight had been limited by the extent of land-based radar coverage and by constraints in the testing programme.

'We launched the air vehicle at dawn and we recovered it at dusk as we are currently limited to testing in daylight hours only, but we still had another four hours of fuel in the tank.'

Watchkeeper has now completed some 320 hours of flight testing over 230 flights and Moore said the programme is still on track to be fielded in Afghanistan in the first quarter of 2012.

In preparation, a number of modifications have been made to get the aircraft ready for operation in Afghanistan including the addition of covert lighting as well as additional IT systems in the ground control station to make it more compatible with systems being used in theatre.

Personnel began training for Watchkeeper in May. As well as flight testing at Aberporth, the Royal Artillery will also conduct training flights from MoD Boscombe Down in Wiltshire from where the aircraft will be flown in airspace specially allotted for UAV flying around and to the south of the Salisbury Plain Training Area. Royal Artillery crews will also be able to use the grass airstrip at Upavon for rough field or austere flight operations with the system.

Moore also said his team was exploring the potential of partnering the Watchkeeper with the Army Air Corps Apache attack helicopter, so that the Watchkeeper could cue or send the Apache imagery of potential targets.

Meanwhile, the RAF's fleet of MQ-9 Reapers purchased under a UOR for operations in Afghanistan has now completed 25,000 flight hours. The RAF's Reaper community is now doubling in size to 10 aircraft and a second squadron - XIII Sqn - is being reformed onto the Reaper to begin ground control station operations from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire. With a fleet of 10 aircraft and 44 crews, the RAF will be able to provide three 'combat air patrols' or CAPs over Afghanistan 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Wing Commander Gary Coleman, HQ 2 Group ISTAR (Land), told delegates that crew retention had been an issue as aircrew were being based at Creech AFB outside Las Vegas for three years away from family and friends in the UK, flying operational missions and then returning home to family.

He also pointed out that the time differences between Afghanistan and Creech meant that while the aircraft was flying in daylight over Afghanistan, the crews at Creech would be working night shifts flying it. Coleman hopes that the time differences will be addressed when flying begins from Waddington which is just four hours behind Kabul time.

He did point out that the Reaper community had enjoyed an influx of personnel from the Nimrod fleet, which was taken out of service in May 2010.

An experimental training programme, Project Daedalus, trained a group of four non-aircrew including two air traffic controllers, a fighter controller and a policeman in the United States to fly the MQ-1 Predator. The four were amongst the top-rated in their class beating pilots with fast jet experience. There is now some consideration in training the four up to fly the MQ-9.

Tony Osborne, Shrivenham, Wiltshire

[buglerbilly]

More on this............

DATE:09/09/11

SOURCE:Flight International

Watchkeeper flies to new endurance record

By Craig Hoyle

Operational trials with the British Army's Watchkeeper unmanned air system (UAS) remain on track to start next month, after the WK450 air vehicle has set a new endurance record in testing.

Maj Matt Moore, SO2 UAS for headquarters, Royal Artillery, said a WK450 completed an almost 14h flight in early September from West Wales airport.

With current approvals restricting test flights to daylight hours only, the aircraft landed with around 4h of fuel remaining, he said.

During the record-breaking UK flight, the aircraft's dual mission payload of an Elop Compass IV electro-optical/infrared camera and Thales I-Master/Viper synthetic aperture radar/ground moving target indication sensor were employed, along with its data link.


© Thales UK
The WK450's dual mission payloads, data link and software were tested during the record-breaking sortie

The UAS was also taken to its 16,000ft (4,880m) service ceiling and 115km (62nm) away from the airport, Moore told the UK Air Warfare Centre's remotely piloted air systems symposium in Shrivenham, Wiltshire, on 8 September. The aircraft also flew using its operational-standard software, prime contractor Thales UK said.

Operational trials with the Watchkeeper will be conducted in October and November, with the first training flights over Salisbury Plain to be made from the Ministry of Defence/Qinetiq Boscombe Down site in Wiltshire in December.

Watchkeeper vehicles and equipment will be deployed to Afghanistan from late this year, to deliver one daily "task line" from the first quarter of 2012. A full service using six task lines should be in place within 12 months, Moore said.

In addition to continuing flight testing, other Watchkeeper activities currently include preparing modifications - such as the addition of covert lighting - for deployment in Afghanistan, Moore said.

Development testing with the WK450 has now passed 230 flights and 320h in the UK and Israel.

Thales UK/Elbit Systems joint venture Utacs is responsible for delivering the Watchkeeper system, which will replace an interim service in Afghanistan currently using leased Elbit Hermes 450s.

The service has delivered 50,000h of intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance services for the British Army since April 2007.

[buglerbilly]

The Cost-Effective Delivery of An Armoured Vehicle Capability: Summary

(Source: House of Commons Public Accounts Committee; issued Dec. 9, 2011)

I strain a little bit with some of this report. Sure a lot of money was spent on Armoured vehicles, wheeled and tracked, that had limited success or were found lacking against the IED's used. However, the same could be said of every western army in Iraq or Afghan service.

To now say that the successful vehicles procured are no longer useful, or won't be after Afghanistan, is arrant nonsense not least because similar terrain will most likely be replicated in the next zone of conflict which, again, may well be in the Middle East. IF its in Africa, then the very same vehicles, largely, will be required there as well..............the major part of the expense has been completed and that is the CAPEX for the vehicles themselves

Armoured vehicles such as tanks, reconnaissance and personnel-carrying vehicles are essential for a wide range of military tasks. Since the 1998 Strategic Defence Review, the Ministry of Defence (the Department) has attempted to acquire the vehicles it needs through a number of procurement projects.

However, none of the principal armoured vehicles it requires have yet been delivered, despite the Department spending £1.1 billion since 1998, including £321 million wasted on cancelled or suspended projects. As a result there will be gaps in capability until at least 2025, making it more difficult to undertake essential tasks such as battlefield reconnaissance.

Partly as a result of this £1.1 billion failure to yet deliver any armoured vehicles, and to meet the specific military demands of operating in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Department was provided with a further £2.8 billion from the Treasury Reserve to buy Urgent Operational Requirements (UOR) vehicles. The Department has used the faster UOR process to deliver mine-resistant vehicles for operations.

However, these vehicles are expensive and are designed for specific circumstances, so will not meet the wider requirements identified in the recent Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR). Delays to the delivery of the principal armoured vehicles have meant that other equipment, such as helicopters and other vehicles, have been used more frequently to undertake tasks such as battlefield reconnaissance and transporting personnel. Using helicopters and other vehicles in this way can be less effective and may divert expensive military assets from other essential tasks.

Over the past six years, the Department has removed £10.8 billion from armoured vehicle budgets up to 2021. Armoured vehicles projects have suffered more severe budget cuts than other equipment projects, largely because they involve lower levels of contractual commitment and are therefore easier to cut. This has left £5.5 billion available for the next ten years, which is insufficient to deliver all of the armoured vehicle programmes which are planned. The Department needs to be clearer about its priorities, and stop raiding the armoured vehicles chest every time it needs to make savings across the defence budget.

The Department acknowledges that it has been both indecisive and over-ambitious in setting vehicle requirements, and that the ways it has sought to procure armoured vehicles have been too complicated. The Department will need to set more realistic requirements in future if it is to deliver projects on time and to budget. We are also concerned that the Department was unable to identify anyone who has been held to account for the clear delivery failures. It is critical the Department has named senior staff with the necessary powers and sufficient time in post to take proper responsibility for and be held accountable for such projects.

The Department has yet to balance its defence budget fully and devise a plan to close capability gaps, despite having conducted the SDSR and two subsequent planning exercises. The Department needs to determine its armoured vehicle equipment priorities and deliver these as rapidly and cost-effectively as possible, including making an assessment of which of its existing vehicles should be retained after combat operations in Afghanistan cease.

On the basis of a Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, we took evidence from the Ministry of Defence on its progress in delivering armoured vehicles.

Click here for the full report (40 pages in PDF format) on the Parliamentary website.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmpubacc/1444/1444.pdf

-ends-

[buglerbilly]

Equipment Minister responds to PAC report on armoured vehicle delivery

An Equipment and Logistics news article

9 Dec 11

Defence Minister Peter Luff has responded to a report by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), published today on the delivery of armoured vehicles.


A British Army Trojan armoured engineer vehicle cuts through the sand during operations in Helmand province, southern Afghanistan
[Picture: Sergeant Rupert Frere, Crown Copyright/MOD 2010]

The summary of the PAC's 59th report, 'The cost-effective delivery of an armoured vehicle capability', states:

"Since the 1998 Strategic Defence Review, the Ministry of Defence has attempted to acquire the vehicles it needs through a number of procurement projects. However, none of the principal armoured vehicles it requires have yet been delivered, despite the Department spending £1.1bn since 1998, including £321m wasted on cancelled or suspended projects. As a result there will be gaps in capability until at least 2025, making it more difficult to undertake essential tasks such as battlefield reconnaissance."

Responding to the report, the Minister for Defence Equipment, Support and Technology, Peter Luff, said:

"The PAC is again misrepresenting the facts. It is not true to say the £1.1bn spent on armoured vehicles has not delivered any equipment. It has delivered Titan, Trojan and Viking vehicles, with Trojan and Viking used on operations in Afghanistan.

"Adapting to changing threats the Urgent Operational Requirements [UOR] process has correctly been used to swiftly deliver world-class equipment to the front line.

"Since May 2010 more than £350m has been approved for vehicles in Afghanistan, including the new Foxhound patrol vehicle which will be delivered shortly. Overall more than two thousand new protected vehicles have been delivered for Afghanistan through the UOR process.

"We recently announced a £1bn upgrade to the Warrior infantry fighting vehicle fleet and over the next ten years we plan to invest a total of £5.5bn in armoured vehicles."

[buglerbilly]

The Public Accounts Committee – Armoured Vehicles

December 9, 2011 10:09 pm
Think Defence
Defence Themes (Business and Parliament)

Published recently is the Public Accounts Committee 59th report, the subject being The Cost Effective Delivery of an Armoured Vehicle Capability.

Under the previous Chair (Edward Leigh MP), the PAC had a formidable reputation but since Margaret Hodge took over it is finding that reputation a little harder to live up to. Its previous defence related report, on project CVF, was cut through with many inaccuracies and dubious statements, hardy the incisive and ruthlessly effective as reports of old were.

So, it is with some interest that I looked at this report, the subject of which should be a an open goal with a goal mouth that is 200 feet wide. The MoD’s attempts at defining and delivering a coherent armoured vehicle programme over the last 20 years have been woeful to say the least and let us not in any way make light of the fact that this inability to bring into service modern and relevant vehicles without resorting to urgent operational requirements has cost many service personnel their lives or limbs, it is not an abstract concept but although it probably doesn’t need saying, it is very real.

Reading the oral evidence is always more interesting than the final report and this is no different but what seems painfully evident is that the chair is straight off the mark with ignorant questions and develops a combative attitude straight away.

There also seemed to be some confusion about who was attending from the MoD and why.

This is incredulous, these are vitally important matters; accountability to the people through their elected representatives might be an inconvenience to the MoD but it is fundamentally important that both parties approach this from a position of cooperation, not some sort of ‘grilling’ or to be treated as a platform for grandstanding or word games.

Evidently, both parties need to work on making sure the sessions are well informed and attended, relevant personnel and not cut short by parliamentary business.

This nonsense would not be tolerated in any business so why when discussing multi billion pound programmes that contribute to the defence of the UK and protection of service personnel should it be tolerated.

Maybe before they start blaming each other, the MoD and PAC should ask themselves if they are doing everything they can, I doubt somehow, the answer would be yes.

The Chair then put forward what I thought was a pretty simple proposition that is well accepted by almost everyone, that the lack of appropriate vehicles cost lives.

This was met with what seemed a collective feet shuffling exercise.

This simply beggars belief and perhaps cuts to the heart of much of what is wrong with the MoD, an inability to admit failing, be frank, reflective and recognise that mistakes and poor decisions have been made.

It might sound trite, but recognising there is a problem is the first step on the road to recovery. Arrogance and self denial will simply mean more dead and limbless service personnel in the future.

Ursula Brennan then waded in with a classic quote about people being killed whilst the MoD was shilly shallying, again, living in abject and utter denial of the reality.

If there is one person on the PAC who can cut through the bullshit it is Richard Bacon MP, read the evidence from Q24 where he repeatedly asks who at the MoD has paid the price for the failings. Despite multiple attempts at avoiding the question when all three from the MoD know the answer is not a single person, Mr Bacon pressed the point.

Again what is obvious is that no one has paid any sort of price because obviously the MoD does not think anyone needs to pay the price.

The next line is about needing UOR vehicles that were an appropriate response to specific threats and specific environmental conditions.

I find this line from the MoD to be rather annoying actually because it paints the IED and hot weather as some sort of magical new things that we could not have possibly predicted, hot weather, I mean come on.

The reason I find this defence frankly nonsensical is two-fold;

One, the British Army has been fighting in harsh climates for hundreds of years and especially in hot climates. I wonder if they see the irony in complaining about extremes of heat and dust when in Afghanistan elements of the Desert Rats have been struggling with vehicles that could not cope with either. We are constantly reminded that one of the reasons anything vaguely defence related is so expensive is because it has to operate in environmental extremes and have defence standards to make sure they can.

Second, the IED is, contrary to the MoD’s blinkered view, not new. The British Army has been dealing with mines and roadside bombs for decades. Off route mines with explosively formed penetrating fragments have been available and in service equally for decades, the IRA even used them. In Bosnia we developed extensive route proving and clearance techniques and specifically modified blast protected vehicles to deal with TM6 mines, mines with explosively formed penetrators. The very same vehicles were sold and turned up in Afghanistan with Estonian forces where they were used alongside our Land Rover derivatives. To say they the deployment of IED’s by an asymmetric enemy force came as a surprise is equally inexplicable, surely all that was needed was a trip to the library at Shrivenham where extensive materials on Namibia, Rhodesia and Afghanistan could be signed out, many of which would provide ample information on which to avoid being surprised by.

I don’t want to get into the specifics of Snatch, WMIK and Vector and fully appreciate the need for smaller vehicles but that is not the point.

Let us not pretend that we could have not have predicted or reacted quicker because both are plainly wrong and a little less self-denial would go a long way.

Whilst we may applaud the UOR process the scale of them is a fundamental admission of failure to equip and adequately plan for likely eventualities.

It seems to me that despite the perception that the RN and RAF have somehow ‘lost’ in recent defence reviews quite the opposite has happened, with the Army and especially, its vehicle programme, being victim of deep cuts.

Of course making those cuts even worse is the MoD’s inability to step outside military fashion and make its mind up.

The conclusions and recommendations of the report boil down to ‘do try harder next time’ and in all fairness there are some reason for optimism, GVA, Foxhound and other programmes seem to be breaking free of the TRACER/MRAV/FRES debacles and delivering capabilities.

Quick message to the PAC, go and read a few books.

There was also a supplementary note that might be of interest on Chinook costs…


The unit production cost for the aircraft is £34 million at 2011 economic conditions including engines and those items purchased by MOD outside the Boeing prime contract (of which £27 million is the recurring cost of each aircraft alone at 2011 economic conditions). These figures have, due to commercial sensitivities, been rounded to the nearest million pounds.

So there you go, £34m apiece

[buglerbilly]

U.K. Special Forces To Use Wildcat Variant

By ANDREW CHUTER

Published: 21 Dec 2011 10:31

Britain's special forces will use a new version of the Wildcat light reconnaissance and attack helicopters being developed for the British Army and Royal Navy, according to sources familiar with the plan.

The scheme to replace the Lynx rotorcraft used on special forces operations includes acquiring an additional four Wildcats and switching a further four machines from an existing order to create an eight-strong light assault helicopter force.

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman declined to confirm the plan, saying the department doesn't comment on matters involving special forces.

Defence procurement minister Peter Luff confirmed in response to a Parliamentary question that his department is planning to extend the number of AgustaWestland Wildcats to be delivered to British forces from 62 to 66.

The additional rotorcraft, along with four other machines originally destined for battlefield reconnaissance and other duties, will be configured as light assault helicopters, he said in a response to a member of Parliament.

Luff didn't specify who would operate the light assault helicopters, but the sources said the variant would replace existing Mk7 and other Lynx types currently used for special forces operations.

News of the existence of a light assault Wildcat version emerged in the small print of a late-November National Audit Office (NAO) report into the procurement performance of major defense projects.

The report by the government-spending watchdog contained no mention of who would use the new helicopter type.

The MoD's signing of a deal with AgustaWestland in 2006 to deliver and support 62 Wildcats - a next-generation version of the Lynx family - was one of the programs looked at by the NAO.

The change in the order will see Army Wildcat reconnaissance numbers slip to 30 from 34, with a further eight rotorcraft forming a light assault capability. A further 28 similar machines destined for the Royal Navy for use in a maritime attack role remains unchanged.

Luff said the "costs of conversion are still under consideration."

AgustaWestland said it wouldn't comment on the potential additional order.

Deliveries of Army Wildcats from the Italian-owned company's Yeovil plant in southwest England will commence next year. Navy deliveries are scheduled to start in 2013. The timing of assault role rotorcraft deliveries is not known.

News the MoD is increasing its Wildcat numbers comes just days after the last of 22 Lynx Mk9As upgraded in a 92 million-pound ($144 million U.S.) deal with the Ministry of Defence was handed over by AgustaWestland.

The extensive upgrade included incorporation of the same engine being used on the Wildcat to enable the Mk9A to cope with the hot and high conditions of Afghanistan; a new surveillance sensor suite; secure communications; and a 0.50 cal heavy machine gun for escort and other duties in theater.

[buglerbilly]

Ministry of Defence forced to update its war games for Xbox generation

Troops used to playing commercial games tend to lose concentration unless MoD simulations look equally realistic

Nick Hopkins

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 28 December 2011 20.19 GMT


Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. New recruits expect training simulations to be of the same quality, forcing the Ministry of Defence to improve its own war games

The British military has had to radically improve some of its simulated training war games to keep the attention of recruits who have grown up in the Playstation and Xbox generation, a Ministry of Defence scientist has admitted.

Troops are so used to playing high-quality commercial games set in combat zones that they tend to lose concentration unless the MoD simulations look equally realistic. This has become an important issue at the MoD, which is increasingly turning to digital simulations to help prepare soldiers for duty.

Thousands of troops sent to Afghanistan have been trained on Virtual Battlespace2, a spin-off from a commercial game that can, for instance, test their responses when they come under mortar attack from insurgents.

Though the military stresses that these games only supplement traditional methods, it reflects the way technology is transforming military training. With budgets being squeezed across the MoD, simulations are also a comparatively cheap way of giving troops a "virtual'' taste of what they might come up against in a warzone.

Another idea involves issuing RAF trainee pilots with tablet computers such as iPads, to save the cost – and weight – of printing bulky flight manuals that need to be regularly updated and cost £1,000 a student.

The scientists and engineers at MoD's Defence Science and Technology Laboratory in Portsdown, Hampshire, are at the heart of the developments.

Andrew Poulter, the technical team leader, said the military was trying to keep up with the advances that have helped turned computer gaming into a hugely lucrative global industry. Bestsellers such as Battlefield 3, Killzone 3 and the Call of Duty series have taken this genre of video games, known as "first-person shooters'', to a new level.

"Back in the 1980s and 1990s, defence was far out in front in terms of quality of simulation," said Poulter. "Military-built simulators were state of the art. But now, for £50, you can buy a commercial game that will be far more realistic than the sorts of tools we were using. The truth is, the total spending on games development across the industry will be greater than spending on defence."

Poulter is in charge of Project Kite (knowledge information test environment), which has been tasked with putting the MoD back in the forefront of simulation training, in part by buying-in technology from the big gaming companies.

The key to successful virtual training is for the simulation to be realistic enough for people to be properly "immersed'' in what they are doing.

"Certainly, there is a level of computer games experience in recruits. So the plots have to be realistic and the image generation has to be high quality. A lot of the older systems can be very clunky. If you put someone behind a block display, it is harder for them to be completely immersed." But though the commercial games "may look graphically beautiful, they have to be entertaining rather than realistic".

Poulter and his nine-strong team will adapt the software so that the weapons perform as they would in combat "The weapons need to be credible. If they fire a rifle and the bullet travels three and a half miles, then that is not right. If they are steering a vehicle, then that has to be right too. Realism is more important than entertainment. Levels of immersion are very important."

The MoD is using a variety of simulations, from drills to put out a fire in an aircraft to what to do if a vehicle in a convoy gets hit by a roadside bomb.

There are specific Afghanistan simulations, designed to give troops an idea of the tough environment they will find in one of the small forward operating bases in Helmand, and the drills they need to use if they come under attack.

Putting training simulations on tablet computers could be the next big shift in training. It would allow sailors, soldiers and aircrews to practise techniques wherever they wanted to. "Virtual Battlespace is quite good fun, and we want trainees to want to do training," said Poulter.

"It is certainly a lot more fun than going through lists of checks and box-ticking.

"We want them to think 'I would quite like to do a bit more of that kind of thing'. So they might spend 10 minutes [on a simulation] after reading papers in the morning, or in their spare time."

Cost has also become a pressing issue. "If they have already learned some core skills in a simulation, there is less to learn during live training, which is much more expensive and may involve aircraft, tanks, and live round explosions."

Poulter said a commander who came back from Afghanistan told him that two soldiers in his unit had drilled themselves so much on Virtual Battlespace2, he was sure the training had saved their lives when they came under fire. "It has been invaluable. It is being taken seriously. It's not just a game," said Poulter.

[buglerbilly]

Just one in 20 TA soldiers trained to serve on front line

Just one in 20 Territorial Army soldiers is adequately trained to serve on the front line, senior Army commanders and academics have warned.


A soldier from The Territorial Army London Regiment, during a compound clearance exercise at Wretham Camp training area in Thetford Photo: PA

By James Kirkup, and Thomas Harding

6:00AM GMT 02 Jan 2012

With the Government trying to plug the gap in troop numbers using reservists, ministers have been told that the plan could leave the Army unable to function.

Generals have privately informed ministers that they are worried about the quality of the TA members who will be expected to fill in for thousands of regular soldiers who will fall victim to cuts.

The Ministry of Defence decided last spring to cut the Army’s numbers from 100,000 to 82,000 as a cost-saving measure but said the shortfall would be made up by 30,000 TA troops.

But in a letter to The Daily Telegraph, senior officers and academics warned that the TA was a “support” but not an “alternative” to regular troops. “Front-line operations require a level of fitness, experience, and training to regular Army standards that cannot readily be matched by part-time soldiers,” they wrote.

“At present, barely 1,500 TA personnel (5 per cent of Territorial strength) have sufficient training to be deployed in the way that the Government envisages. We urge the Ministry of Defence to halt further cuts in regular Army manpower and to review its current redundancy programme.”

The letter is signed by Dr Peter Caddick-Adams, a serving TA officer and MoD academic, Col Tim Collins, a former SAS commander, and Col Richard Kemp, a former Afghanistan commander.

Defence analysts said many members of the TA were not currently fit enough or adequately trained to operate alongside regular soldiers on operations.

The Coalition’s plans to reform the Army are based on the target of having 30,000 reservists trained to regular standards and ready for deployment by 2015.

But senior commanders are understood to have told defence ministers that target is too ambitious. According to a Whitehall source, Army chiefs are “seriously worried” about relying so heavily on reserve forces in future. “The Army have said this might not be workable,” said the source.

In a major package of military reforms to be announced in early spring it is expected that the TA will be given a much higher profile, including a name change to the British Army Reserve.

By 2015 commanders will be required to bring entire TA units into planning for operations. This will require a substantial increase in TA training days and new laws to compel employers to give time off as well as making training compulsory.

At present TA soldiers train every Wednesday evening and on about 20 weekends a year in addition to a two-week camp over the summer.

Philip Hammond, the Defence Secretary, admitted in evidence to a Commons committee that the chiefs had raised concerns. He added: “The message I am getting from the generals is that the military tasks and contingent capability that we have as our required outputs are deliverable within the configuration of 82,000 or thereabouts regular troops and 30,000 trained reservists.”

Another source said the warnings were driven by the regular Army’s traditional hostility to the TA. The source said: “The regular Army doesn’t want the reserves to succeed, and there are generals who are trying to make sure this fails.”

Generals have also been accused of trying to divert money for improving TA training into the regular Army’s budget.

Julian Brazier, the Tory MP who helped write the Coalition’s reserves strategy, said some aspects of TA training were “a very long way below par”. But he said the new structure could work, as long as the TA received the money it was promised.

An MoD spokesman said: “Since 2003, more than 24,000 reservists have been mobilised. They have, alongside their regular counterparts, demonstrated their professionalism, dedication and courage in the most testing of circumstances.”

[buglerbilly]

U.K. Taps KBR for Deployment Support

Apr. 2, 2012 - 01:56PM

By ANDREW CHUTER

LONDON — The British arm of KBR has landed what could be a significant deal with the U.K. Ministry of Defence to help support the deployment of British military forces domestically and overseas.

The three-year deal, known as the Operational Support Capability Contract (OSCC), will provide the Permanent Joint Headquarters with a single point of contact with industry for planning and potentially delivering contractor support to operations and exercises worldwide, an MoD spokeswoman said.

A previous deal run for Permanent Joint Headquarters by KBR here, known as Contractorised Logistics, or Conlog, has in part been responsible for the company becoming the largest single provider of support services to British forces deployed in Afghanistan.

The contractor operates a water-bottling plant at the huge military base at Camp Bastion in Helmand province, which has produced more than 40 million liters of water and a range of other services, including catering, mechanical and electrical engineering services, cleaning and even camp bus services.

Industry sources said KBR has already been tapped by Permanent Joint Headquarters to provide support services to British military personnel deployed on security duties during the Olympic Games here in July and August.

KBR’s International Government Defence and Support Services organization, based at Leatherhead in southern England, signed the OSCC deal earlier this year and the contract went live March 1.

The MoD has yet to publicly announce the deal has been won by KBR.

A spokesman for KBR here declined to comment.

KBR had previously run the Conlog program for Permanent Joint Headquarters since 2004. The MoD spokeswoman said the OSCC deal builds on lessons learned over the past seven years with Conlog.

She said OSCC is a non-exclusive enabling contract involving military, commercial and embedded contractor staff members to provide support from industry where other options are not suitable.