specify the ( .... ) did i forget to add "in my opinion" i would have thought that you of all thinking people kenty would hold the veiw that "difference of opinion is healthy"? even if i am totally wrong. it would be far better for silly me if you could be specific about what part or all of my text is wrong and why you think so rather than reduce yourself to ( .... ). from george galloway to nick griffin, which politician has this veiw ?
At this time i feel the only way this government will survive the next General election is to do a 'Maggie Thatcher'.
By throwing all of our armed forces into Afghanistan with a gloves off/no holds barred mandate it would be Labour's last throw of the dice gamble for political survival in office.
Pakistan must be directly involved as one of our allied forces allowing the border area to be opened to allied troops hunting the enemy as our enemy repects no border except as a safe haven to strike from.
Nowhere to run to and nowhere to hide.
The same should overtly apply in Britain to the 'enemy within'.
The alternative is to get out of this conflict completely.
All in or all out?
The main problem for the armed forces is that no matter what they are asked to do they do it,and do it well, but the politicians never get tired of asking them to do new things or even worse changing their minds (sic) about what they want the forces to do.
The other problem is money and admin orientated. Although defense spending has gone up as gordon and co are fond of telling us this is a half truth. Yes spending has gone up, but a lot of it, well most of it is down to "cost overruns" on equipement purchases from amongst others Thales, and BAE defense sytems, (aka Big And Expensive)as well as a number of American companies such as Lockheed Martin. The other part of the equipment budget increases is what is now refered to by the MOD as an "urgent operational requirement". Examples of this are desert camo uniforms ( remember iraq?) body armour, ammunition etc.
This has come about because some bright spark in the treasury worked out that it costs money to buy this stuff, and then you have to spend money on staff and buildings to look after it, much better to sell it all off for a fraction of what it cost, sack the staff who looked after it and sell the buildings off to property developers. After all you can always "just buy the stuff when you need it" or so the theory goes. Obviously the hollowness of that theory has been exposed, but as the current PM was running the treasury when they went down that line no doubt they will continue with it and as a result there will no doubt be continuing stories about equipment shortages.
Right thats me done for now, my twopenneth worth, time for bed !!!!!!
Spelling corrected, fingers crossed.
We might not like the reasons we might not like the government but..These are our people fighting and Im sure they all deserve our respect and support.