SDSR - multi-post

Continuing its lamentable tradition of getting everything wrong whenever it prints a story about defence, the Telegraph breathlessly reports that the Army's FRES system is to be junked.

It was a Cold War relic from the start, and millions of pounds and dozens of lives were sacrificed to keep the project alive instead of bulk-buying the off-the-shelf, V-hulled armoured vehicles that warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan demanded.

Once the MoD finally bowed - far too late - to the immediate imperative, FRES was dead. Formally announcing that Dannatt's dream is to be buried constitutes an overdue burial of a blood-soaked, reeking corpse.

Meanwhile the Express reports that the RAF may be relegated to a primarily transport role for the other two services. I've edited the following quote, as the original was unbearably badly drafted.

The RAF could lose many of its fastest jets to concentrate on transport aircraft and helicopters. "The RAF could be led by a helicopter man in future", said a senior source. Its earliest Eurofighter Typhoon jets could be put up for sale. "The trouble is, no one is likely to want them", the source added.

No terribly surprising, since the concept is 30 years old.

Anyway, please God let it be true. It remains the case that it is hard to decide which is more true: that the RAF is irrelevant to national defence needs, or that national defence needs are irrelevant to the RAF.