MOD

I promised more serious content; here goes. Right, everyone is vexed about the RUSI report (PDF download) that was recently published under the names of Gwyn Prins (a minor hero of this blog’s, for his The Heart of War: Power, Conflict, and Obligation in the 21st Century) and the Marquess of Salisbury (no less, who…

Read More Rosyth RUSI Rant

It appears that the defence procurement stories we’ve been tracking are coming to a head. Recently, it emerged that the Astute SSN, Nimrod MRA4, and T-45 destroyer projects are going significantly overbudget again; the first two of these are, of course, the ones that were already £800 million over budget and several years later. The…

Read More The Defence Crisis; BAE Are Still Hopeless

FT: the AirTanker bond issue has, not surprisingly, gone pear-shaped as the monoline insurers fall apart. The story includes some vital detail on precisely what the Defence Procurement PFI team and the consortium have been doing all this time; essentially, trying to finance the deal at an acceptable rate of interest in the middle of…

Read More Can haz air-to-air refuelling? Oh noes…

This PPRuNE thread reminds me of something from the archives. During a meeting we had not long ago, the increasing sophistication and cost of the Unpersonned Aircraft was raised – because by becoming too sophisticated and HVAA in nature, they were in some danger of becoming too valuable to risk in certain scenarios. Rather defeating…

Read More Some are expendable; others are just expensive

Here’s Simon Jenkins’ latest piece of work. For the Tories it is sex, for Labour it is money. Financial scandal sticks to the latter like political napalm. From formula one to ministerial mortgages, privatisation contracts and cash-for-honours, the sign of a £50 note waving in the wind sends Labour politicians weak at the knees. Their…

Read More Simon Jenkins: Double Standards