A bit bloody late

It was in December 2006 that we published our own "shopping list" for new equipment to fight the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan, much of which addressed the urgent need for better surveillance capabilities.

To give him his due, on 27 February 2007 Chris Bryant, who had then recently been to Basra Air Station, asked in Parliament what was to be done to ensure that we have better ISTAR — intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance.

On 21 March 2007, we offered "cheap and cheerful" options for achieving improved surveillance. Like Bryant, our comments went unreported.

Then, on 22 April 2008, we were writing about Robert Gates, the US defence secretary, observing how difficult it is to get the USAF "old guard" to change its ways, and address the realities of fighting counter-insurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He was addressing officers at the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base, telling them that the US military needed more UAVs and equipment to collect intelligence and conduct surveillance in Iraq despite a big boost in those capabilities since 2001.

On 5 August 2008, I was writing of complaints, voiced in The Daily Telegraph that the MoD has been "slow to appreciate' potential of drone aircraft in Iraq and Afghanistan". To that, I ventured that we would say, in a voice laden with irony, "You don't say!" We might also add the question, "what took you so long to notice?"

However, it was on 4 December 2007 that I had written, in the specific context of securing adequate surveillance assets: "Until and unless we start getting grown-up discussions ... we are going to get nowhere."

There has been very little in the way of grown-up discussions since, certainly not in the British media, but now we get The Daily Telegraph picking up on Gen Dannatt's call for 24 hour surveillance in Afghanistan.

This follows his "shopping list" of more equipment he delivered last month, and we are now told that his demand for more surveillance systems is his most explicit yet. Sir Richard wants an increase in resources for Britain’s Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition, and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) programme, "a network of planes and unmanned drones that collect images and listen in on enemy forces."

As the same time, a document submitted to the Commons defence committee, has the MoD admitting that it does not have enough ISTAR specialists. "Manning shortfalls in these groups vary widely and may apply at different levels within a trade group. The ones of particular concern from the point of view of current operations are linguists, human intelligence operators, image analysts and Royal Engineer (geographic) and manning shortfalls in these areas range from 10 per cent up to around 40 per cent."

Then, in evidence to the committee, senior military officers expressed concern about the shortage of ISTAR specialists in Afghanistan. Brigadier Kevin Abraham, Director Joint Capability at the MoD described the staff shortages as "a serious challenge" to ISTAR operations.

With the scene thus set for him, Liam Fox makes a foray into what for him is virgin territory. Despite having had hundreds of opportunities to raise the issue, in Parliament and elsewhere, only now does he finally observe that: "Good ISTAR capability, in addition to more helicopters, earning the trust of the local population and increased armour, is the best way to counter the IED threat. If there is a shortage of this capability, the Government must do everything it can to fill that gap."

He, the media, the military and, in particular, Gen Sir Richard Dannatt, could have been saying these things three years ago. They weren't. But, in his own intervention, David Cameron accuses ministers – and only ministers - of paying inadequate attention to the Afghan operation, saying the government must show more "focus" on the mission there. His remarks could, however, equally be addressed to his own defence team and also to the MoD and military.

Speaking personally – we are allowed to do this occasionally – I am getting tired of all this posturing. I take a great deal of flak from all and sundry, about not "being there", about my lack of military experience, about being "ill-informed" – and all the rest of the crap.

Yet I was writing seriously about the role of surveillance in counter-insurgency as early as November 2004 - getting on for five years ago – and have made over 70 references to the need for surveillance on this blog alone, with a particularly strong piece about equipping for counter-insurgency warfare in August 2006 and one in November 2006 on surveillance.

Then, in that November, I was complaining that "all we hear is silence". Now, all we hear is complaints from the very people whose voices we should then have been hearing. I think that I'm more than a little justified in saying they're a bit bloody late.

COMMENT THREAD

The trouble with armoured vehicles

Originally published by Defence Management
Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Several of the MoD's newest armoured vehicles already have major design flaws according to defence author Richard North. The old way of thinking has to change.

The MoD and Armed Forces are unable to learn from their mistakes or admit erroneous decisions in the design and procurement of armoured vehicles resulting in a string of inadequate vehicles being sent to the frontlines of Afghanistan and tragically as a result, large numbers of casualties, a prominent defence author has said.

The death of Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe last week in a Viking armoured vehicle brought a renewed focus to the MoD's armoured fighting vehicle strategy. Although IEDs and landmines have proven to be an effective weapon utilised by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, the MoD has only been partially successful in buying better protected vehicles. .

Richard North, author of the book "Ministry of Defeat" and the editor of the Defence of the Realm blog, outlined to Defencemanagement.com a series of poor procurement decisions and strategies that have resulted in a widely ineffective fleet of armoured vehicles coming up against IEDs and landmines.

"The concept of risk has been ignored," North said in an interview. As a result this premise is "eroding the ability to field certain vehicles."

The vehicle protection problems faced by British troops today in Afghanistan can be traced back to various campaigns during the Cold War era including in Rhodesia. The effectiveness of using IEDs on vehicles became clear yet military planners in the US and Britain for the most part ignored the new threats. Heavier armoured vehicles have to be transferred by ship because they are too heavy to fly. Military planners felt that this negated the advantages that an expeditionary force would have.

Even after the use of IEDs became a prevalent tool of the insurgency in Iraq, procurement officials in Britain continued to buy the same types of vehicles for operations in Afghanistan.

The Snatch, Viking and Vector were all sent to Afghanistan in the first year of major British combat operations but are now all being withdrawn from service due to their flawed designs and a lack of adequate armour to deflect explosions. Dozens of British servicemen have died in the vehicles during operations due to poor protection even though Snatch was upgraded with additional armour and the Viking and Vector vehicles were procured in 2006.

Protection has been the primary focus of vehicle designers in an effort to overcome casualties caused by bomb attacks. While there have been some successes such as the Mastiff and Ridgeback armoured vehicles, which the Taliban have effectively given up attacking, there have been widespread concerns with other models in the new fleet of vehicles the MoD has procured under an urgent operational requirement.

The Jackal has attracted the most concerns due to its design according to North. The front seats are over the front wheels making the driver and front passenger vulnerable to any explosion. Problems with the weight distribution have made the Jackal susceptible to rollovers, and bolt on armour has proven to be ineffective and has taken away the little mobility the vehicle has.

Army commanders have also been forced to use the vehicle, originally designed for off-road reconnaissance, for fixed road reconnaissance, supply escorts and patrols.

Already ten servicemen have died in the Jackal, despite the MoD spending hundreds of millions of pounds procuring it.

But the problems do not stop there. Last year the MoD ordered 262 Husky armoured vehicles from Navistar Defence, to be used as medium sized command and support vehicle in less dangerous areas. But according to North the deal came just as it was confirmed that the Husky had failed a blast test during a US Army vehicle contract competition. US Army officials are alleged to have expressed concerns over the "basic" design of the hull bridge which resulted in the Husky failing the mine test.

Given the success of v-shaped hulls on vehicles in Afghanistan, it is not clear why the MoD is procuring a standard hulled vehicle. Word of the US Army test failure was not announced until after the MoD had signed the £150m contract with Navistar.

There are also concerns over the new Panther armoured vehicle which North calls fundamentally flawed and "stupidity beyond measure". Panther is a designated command vehicle which will allow the Taliban to target higher ranking officers and field commanders in greater numbers than ever before.

The MoD is scheduled to buy 400 of the vehicles which North describes as "a fine modern product of the Italian automobile industry, and therefore completely unsuitable for military use."

The outside of the vehicle is made from "crushable" or "deformable" materials. While the Panther is well protected, any attack by an IED or mine will cause significant damage to the vehicle resulting in it becoming non-operational.

Procurement officials spent £400,000 per vehicle but it did not come with adequate protection for the engine, no electronic counter measures equipment and it only held three people. North estimates that by the time the full upgrades are completed, the MoD could be spending up to £700,000 on a vehicle that the insurgents can destroy with £20 worth of explosives.

The MoD for its part has argued that a number of upgrades have made the Husky, Jackal and Panther better protected and more able to deal with the operational challenges in Afghanistan.

The number of vehicle design flaws is part of a wider debate on mobility v. protection. Many vehicle design experts have argued that you cannot have both. If you have an agile vehicle it is limited in how much armour it can have. If you have a heavily armoured vehicle, case in point the Mastiff, you lose the element of surprise and ability to rapidly descend on the enemy or exit an operational centre.

North disagrees.

"I think it is a false paradigm. The Army doctrine says that you optimise on mobility and for specific theatres or specific threats you add on protection. Protection is seen as a separate issue added on after the event with design parameters," North said.

The problem is that when a "mobile" vehicle needs additional protection, engineers use bolt on armour which prejudices mobility. Vehicle engineers and procurement officials in turn conclude that mobility and protection are mutually contradictory.

Bolt on armour in many cases has proven to be ineffective against IEDs and mines.

Engineers should instead be "optimising for protection and then adding mobility" in vehicles according to North. A mobile well protected vehicle is possible but it would require a different mindset throughout the MoD's project teams and within industry.

There is still a large adherence to the successes of the past, North argued. Using mobile armoured vehicles to defeat Rommel in North Africa in the 1940s is still a primary reference point for today's armoured vehicle fighting strategies even though the scope of warfare has changed dramatically since then.

As a result, of the hundreds of new vehicles the MoD is rushing into service, many are plagued with design flaws or are used the wrong way.

"They are repeating the same mistakes and are doomed to repeat them over and over again," North said. With problems and concerns already arising in the Husky, Jackal and Panther vehicles, more mistakes could be on the way.

Richard North is the author of "Ministry of Defeat" and the website Defence of the Realm.

COMMENT THREAD

Half as much with more protection

With the results of the closely-fought M-ATV contract to supply off-road protected vehicles to the US armed forces being announced yesterday, US Armed Forces are to get their protected vehicles for Afghanistan at half the cost paid by the British MoD, which has selected one of the unsuccessful bidders.

As reported by The Financial Times, the clear US winner is Wisconsin-based vehicle manufacturer Oshkosh – already a major supplier of trucks to the US and supplier of the HET and tanker fleet to the British Army.

In winning the contract, the Oshkosh vehicle (pictured above) beat off a bid from BAE Systems, from Force Protection – which had teamed up with General Dynamics to work as a consortium called Force Dynamics – and Navistar International.

The value of the contract is $1.1 billion for an initial 2,244 vehicles, working out at just over $490,000 per unit, or just under £300,000 at current sterling exchange rates. This compares with the £600,000 being paid by the MoD for the Navistar Husky, one of the unsuccessful entrants, which is reported to have failed the mine resistance test.
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This puts the MoD in the classic position of spending twice as much as it needs to, for substandard kit, when it could have saved money and lives by joining in with the Americans on the M-ATV programme – with the added benefit of achieving logistic commonality.

Needless to say, with the BBC already having delivered its "puff" for the Husky, you will not get a squeak of protest from Britain's favourite broadcaster – which, after all, knows a thing or two about wasting money.

COMMENT THREAD

As rejected by Americans

On the very day that the MoD has announced its order for an American armoured SUV for our troops in Afghanistan, analysts are suggesting that its performance "did not meet US military's expectations". It is thus unlikely to enter US military service.

The vehicle was chosen by the MoD last October as one of a range of new "tactical support vehicles" for Afghanistan. It is to be called the Husky. The preferred bidder was Chicago-based Navistar Defence.

When details were released in November, we were considerably less than impressed. It is not a custom-designed MRAP, with the classic v-shaped hull. Instead, the MoD has picked a conversion based on a civilian SUV pick-up truck known as the International MXT 4x4. To equip it for its warlike role, we have yet another Army/MoD bodge, with appliqué (i.e., bolt-on) armour.

Undeterred, the MoD has now announced that it is going ahead with the order, having awarded a contract for just over 200 vehicles at a cost of £120 million – close on £600,000 each.

The contract for modifications to the US-built vehicles, and systems integration, has been awarded to the Malvern firm Dytecna, which has had the local newspaper twittering that some "50 new jobs will be created at following the award of a prestigious equipment contract for the Ministry of Defence."

Needless so say, the MoD is in full propaganda mode, with Lt-Col Nick Wills at the helm. He is the MoD's, Tactical Support Vehicle Programme Manager in the "Defence Equipment and Support's Protected Mobility Team", and is telling us that, "The Husky vehicle provides a robust and very mobile protected support vehicle for operations. The design has picked up on many of the lessons from current operations."

However, this same vehicle has been under consideration by the US forces, as one of the four competitors for the prestigious MRAP All-Terrain Vehicle (M-ATV) contract. And, with unfortunate timing Reuters today announced that Navistar had filed a complaint with the Pentagon over the evaluation process.

Since, in a typical government bid, contractors may file a formal protest only after government action has been taken, analysts have taken this to mean that the vehicle has been eliminated from the competition. The suggestion is that Navistar's engineering performance on this contract did not meet the military's expectations.

Given that this is a commercially engineered vehicle and road legal, the most obvious inference is that the vehicle has failed to meet the protection specifications laid down by the US Army. But, for whatever reason, the rejection by the US military casts a major shadow over the MoD choice of the vehicle for British forces.

If it were not so tragic, costing the lives of many brave men and women, there would be something endearingly comic about the MoD's unerring capability to get it wrong. But then, of all the sins of which the MoD is manifestly guilty, inconsistency is not one of them.

And now, contrast with this.

COMMENT THREAD

Let loose the dogs of chores

So far, reported only by one obscure (to me, anyway) online business site, the MoD has at last given some more details of its new £700 million armoured vehicle package announced by John Hutton last month.

This is the Tactical Support Vehicle (TSV) range – all given names from the canine genus, as has become customary in British Army armoured vehicle nomenclature. These, though, are to be the workhorses, doing the fetching and carrying and other chores, rather than fighting.

At the heavy end – very much as expected – we see the Force Protection Inc nominated at the preferred bidder with the Cougar flatbed. The MoD offers a photograph (above), which includes the vehicle being dressed up with the characteristic Barracuda Mobile Camouflage System (MCS) which we see adorning the Snatch Land Rovers and Vectors, so one might think that this is the final form, without bar or additional side armour.

However, once the wonks back home get at it, we could see it come out in a very different form. The MoD is, in fact, saying that it will be "up-armoured and integrated with UK specific equipment such as communications systems and protection measures in a similar way to Mastiff."

Less impressive is the nomination for the Husky – the "medium" vehicle. The preferred bidder is Navistar Defence with a vehicle based on the International MXT-MVA (pictured). As a cargo truck, it will have a four-man cab and a cargo capacity in excess of 1.5 tons. It will, however, come as three variants: utility, ambulance and command post.

This vehicle does not come with rave reviews. It is not a proper MRAP, with the classic v-shaped hull, but is a conversion built on an International MXT 4x4 pick-up chassis, with appliqué armour.

The last thing the Army needs is yet another truck type on its inventory. An alternative is the cargo version of the Bushmaster called the Copperhead. With the Bushmaster about to enter service with the special forces, there would be some commonality but, it appears, this is not to be.

The third and least satisfactory of them all is the Coyote TSV (Light) which is to be a 6x6 derivative of the Jackal designed by Supacat Ltd. We are told that it will also have a cargo capacity in excess of 1.5 tons and a four-man crew.

The MoD does not offer a photograph of this, but it may well be similar to the Supacat "Extenda" seen in Paris earlier this year (pictured). There are no indications, as yet, as to whether this will be armoured in the same way as the Jackal but, if it is not, soldiers would be better protected going to war on bicycles.

The best thing that can be said of this vehicle is that it will share the same degree of vulnerability as its smaller cousin. Frankly, if the extreme mobility for which this vehicle is famed is really needed in the supply role, then the best option would not be a ground vehicle at all, but a helicopter or even – as was adopted by the LRDG in World War II - light aircraft (spool down to fifth picture).

Of this new package, John Hutton tells us the vehicles "will give the troops in Afghanistan the additional bite they need in the fight against the enemy. They do a formidable job and deserve nothing but the best." Despite these fine words, it is by no means clear that they (the troops) are about to get what they deserve.

COMMENT THREAD

How many more times?

After a somewhat prolonged absence from this blog, we return with a report, trailed in The Daily Telegraph about UAVs – not that the readers of this esteemed newspaper can possibly be exposed to such a fearsome combination of initials. They have to be told of "drones".

Anyhow, the legend according to this newspaper, not without justice, is that the MoD has been "slow to appreciate' potential of drone aircraft in Iraq and Afghanistan", to which we would say, in a voice laden with irony, "You don't say!" We might also add the question, "what took you so long to notice?"

This "discovery" however comes not from the newspaper – which could never have worked this out for itself, but from the House of Commons Defence Committee, which has just published a 149-page report entitled, "The contribution of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to ISTAR capability".

As might be surmised from the title (and the length) this deals with much more than the tardiness of the MoD but, as to that singular conclusion, had the Committee made its observations in June 2006 when we – from our lowly, amateur position – first started writing seriously about the subject, it might have been of some use.

As it is, when UAVs could have made a difference, and especially in Iraq, they were not available, the Army still then relying on the useless and ruinously expensive Phoenix, another of those MoD procurement disasters, the full extent of which has never been properly explored and probably never will – at least, not by the Defence Committee.

Now, with the addition of three Reapers to the inventory (one of which has since crashed) and the addition of the Hermes 450 as a stop-gap, until Watchkeeper arrives, the problems of availability (but not entirely) are largely solved. Thus, the Committee's comment is essentially history, so much so that The Telegraph is one of the few newspapers that can even be bothered to write about it.

And, although defence correspondent Thomas Harding makes a decent stab at the story, the detail is relegated to the online edition, the print version summarising even that and placing it in a "news in brief" section.

The story would have had more impact if the Committee had sought to explore the consequences of the failures of the MoD to introduce this technology into theatre earlier, and its current failure to exploit the technology as fully as it might. For, as we discussed in earlier pieces, while the Army was sending soldiers to their deaths in lightly armoured "Snatch" Land Rovers, on fruitless anti-mortar patrols, the most appropriate technology was the UAV, which could have been used, had it been available.

Even now, when we see foot patrols in Afghanistan ambushed or bombed, with the inevitable casualties, we wonder whether some of that patrolling could not have been better done with UAVs and thus whether troops are being exposed to needless danger.

Equally – with special relevance to the recent death of Lance Corporal Ken Rowe and his dog - again one wonders if all the available technology is being used.

L/Cpl Rowe, it will be recalled, was a dog handler, accompanying foot patrols with a specially-trained sniffer dog, tasked with detecting bombs and weapons caches. It is of more than some importance, therefore, to know whether the use of technology such as the UAV-borne Automatic Change Detection System, currently operated by US forces as the "Buckeye" could have been of value in reducing the need for such vulnerable assets.

Needless to say, the Committee does not even begin to explore this issue – preferring instead to regurgitate material spoon-fed to it by its carefully selected MoD witnesses. Not one of the Committee members have had the sense to look elsewhere for their information.

A similar deficiency exists in the Committee examining UAVs only in the context of their specialist role as Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) assets. It does not look at the broader picture of how they could best be integrated into the battle plot.

Invaluable for being able to produce real-time video imagery from a huge area, UAV intelligence is of limited value unless our forces are able to respond to it. For instance, the detection of groups of Taleban on the move is of little immediate use unless air assets or ground forces can be employed to deal with them.

In that context, the piece we linked above in turn links to a narrative offered by Michael Yon, where he describes the combined actions of a UAV and light helicopters in tracking and then intercepting an insurgent mortar team.

In the wide open spaces of Afghanistan, that combination would be a powerful asset against often fleeting targets, an idea we have rehearsed only recently. Nothing of this, of course, impinges on the brains of the Defence Committee members.

There was some hope, incidentally, that the issue of helicopter provision was going to be aired fully, with reports of an MoD helicopter summit in the MoD last week, but if anything substantive came out of it, we have yet to hear what it is.

There was some brief hope that the experience of the Rhodesian Light Infantry and the Selous Scouts in the 1970s, with their pioneering use of Alouette III light helicopters (pictured), might have percolated into the consciousness of the MoD strategists. But recent optimism might have been misplaced.

In the round, therefore, we are not much further forward. Things are moving behind the scenes, but all so desperately slowly. We were writing about the need for light helicopters in November 2006 and so many times since that we have lost count. How many more times can we write the same thing?

COMMENT THREAD

The grim Reaper

Well, not so grim, unless you happen to be a Taleban in Afghanistan – the first of the RAF's Reaper Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have arrived, (rightly) hailed as "Britain's most sophisticated unmanned surveillance system".

Operated by 39 Squadron, which was the last unit to fly Canberra PR9 surveillance aircraft, the equipment may be very different but their role is the same – providing all-weather, intelligence for commanders and ground forces, now grandly named "Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition and Reconnaissance" (ISTAR). It is not only defence expenditure which is undergoing inflation, but titles as well.

That aside, the procurement is another "success" for the Urgent Operational Requirement (UOR) system which has brought the Reapers into the field in a mere 15 months. In MoD terms, this is roughly equivalent to Star Trek's USS Enterprise doing Warp 9 – perhaps Drayson's parting gift to the troops.

On a day when Guthrie and his merry men are bitching about underspending and "overstretch", this also represents a real investment is useful technology and a significant enhancement in capability.

With the three machines planned, each with a 42-hour endurance in the surveillance mode, they will be able to provide genuine 24-hour coverage over operational areas when needed. They will thus take much of the load from the ageing Nimrods, which are currently providing much of the ISTAR function.

Had these, or their predecessor, the Predator, been available earlier, perhaps we would not have had the well-rehearsed problems with the Nimrod.

Although the Reaper in RAF service is currently unarmed, it is capable of being armed and the MoD is investigating arming options. Potential weapons fit includes GBU-12 Paveway II laser guided bombs, Hellfire air-to-ground missiles and even GBU-38 JDAM bombs, making them formidable attack weapons.

The betting is, however, that this development will receive scant attention from the media which is happy to report on shortages of kit and its inadequacies, when it suits it, but rarely (as with the Warriors ) reports the good news. We, on this blog – as far as we can – will continue to report both.

Reaper photos courtesy of MoD. Click the pics to enlarge.

COMMENT THREAD

Avoidable and culpable deaths

Following up on our reports on the death of two men on Wednesday night when their RAF Regiment Land Rover was blown up by a mine as they were patrolling Kandahar airport, Booker wrote in his column yesterday that the incident was more than just another tragedy. It was an avoidable and therefore unpardonable blunder.

"We have continued," he wrote, "to lose dozens of these hopelessly unprotected Land Rovers to mines and roadside bombs, at a time when almost every other front-line force in both Afghanistan and Iraq has been equipped with properly mine-protected vehicles, such as the Bushmaster, which have saved scores of lives. Even the lives of British troops have already been saved by the handful of mine-protected Mastiff patrol vehicles (pictured below right) which the Ministry of Defence has sent to both countries (although it won't tell us how many)."

Last November, he added, it was reported that the Taliban were planning to make much more extensive use of mines, to "demoralise" Nato forces in Afghanistan. Every other nation except Britain has equipped its troops accordingly. Uniquely, the MoD is still happy to ask most of our young men to patrol in vehicles in which far too many of them have either died or suffered horrible wounds (again the MoD won't tell us how many have been injured).

This is not just a tragedy, Booker concluded: "it is an outrage, a national disgrace, for which senior figures in the MoD should be held personally responsible."

By coincidence, the Independent on Sunday also ran a piece on the military covenant, a long leader which, inter alia opined:

A key plank of this is that service personnel should be given the right equipment to do their jobs. Perhaps the most compelling example of this is the forces' continued use of the snatch Land Rover in Iraq and Afghanistan. The families of some serving soldiers are so concerned about the continued use of this vehicle – which was designed for Northern Ireland and is not armour plated – that they are considering bringing a class law suit against the Ministry of Defence.

Two of most recent casualties in Iraq – Lance Corporal Kirk Redpath, 22, and Lance Sergeant Chris Casey, 27, – died when the Land Rover they were travelling in was blown up by a roadside bomb. More than 20 service personnel have died in Snatch Land Rovers, yet the MoD has no plans to take them out of service and replace them.

This, of course, we reported and it is interesting now to learn that some soldiers are considering action against the MoD over their continued deployment.

But, if the IOS and others are getting to grips with the deficiencies of the "Snatch" Land Rover, the greater scandal continues, as Booker points out, with the other variant in service, the WIMIK Land Rover – and also its partial replacement, the Supacat WIMIK, known in theatre as the "mobility vehicle", or simply, the "MV" (pictured right).

With responses to the Booker column and other source, we are beginning to discover that the nature of the problem is far more serious than we first imagined, but of a different order from the "Snatch". In the case of that vehicle, it came to our attention because of the high numbers of deaths arising from roadside bombs (IEDs) which were notified by the MoD.

Although there have been a number of deaths in WIMIKs, however, the unreported tragedy of the WIMIKs is the much larger number of troops suffering serious injuries while riding in them - incidents which are not notified by the MoD. What we learn, though, is that 2-3 seriously injured soldiers are being evacuated every week in the specially equipped RAF Tristar transport aircraft, as a result of injuries sustained while riding in WIMIK Land Rovers.

It also appears that there are two distinct hazards. The first is from mine strikes, about which we have written, but the other is the lack of an armoured body, which makes it a magnet for the Taliban in a firefight or during other "contacts", which makes the crews vulnerable to rifle fire.

Staying with the mine hazard for the moment, under normal circumstances, the crew of a WIMIK will survive a mine explosion under the front wheel, as the vehicles do have limited underside armouring – and the hit, in the engine compartment, is some distance from the driver.

But, as one of our sources told us, the Taliban are "not stupid". The mines used have variable settings, so that they can be adjusted to detonate on the second, third or fourth "impact" and so they can be set to explode not under the front but rear wheels. This is presumably why, in the three WIMIK incidents of which we are aware, the (rear) gunners rather than the drivers have been killed or injured.

And, while the deaths are relatively uncommon, injuries are not. Here, as forces minister, Bob Ainsworth pointed out, the armour is allowing soldiers to survive when, previously, they would have been killed. But the price they pay is terrible injury, most often one or more leg amputations.

In terms of the rifle fire hazard, what is happening is that, where there are mixed vehicles in a convoy, some armoured and some not, the Taliban deliberately target the unarmoured vehicles, in the expectation of making an easy kill or of causing injury. And because the WIMIK is so often the most obviously unarmoured vehicle, the crews often find themselves the target of sustained, concentrated fire. Small wonder troops in theatre are seeking to add their own armour.

When it comes to exposure, however, not even the WIMIK compares with the new Supacat MV, where there is not only no protection from gunfire, there is no armour at all fitted to the vehicle by the manufacturers. In theatre, improvised armour is made available, in the form of Kevlar matting, which may give limited protection from gunfire but is largely useless against mine blasts.

Bought specifically for special forces in Afghanistan – but now to be issued more widely – quite why these grotesquely vulnerable vehicles were acquired remains a mystery. Branded by us as insane when it was first revealed by the MoD, it is not as if this was a British design or even intended as a fighting vehicle.

Although branded as a "Supacat" product, it is in fact built under license from Lockheed Martin which produces the vehicle for the USMC as a lightweight, high mobility gun tractor, known officially as the "lightweight prime mover". And even for this relatively safe role, the Marines have decided to provide armoured cabs (pictured).

Instead of buying direct, however, the MOD gave the contract to Supacat for 130 vehicles, rumoured to cost an eye-watering £250,000 each (six times the price of a fully equipped Land Rover) – as they did with the earlier Tempest contract. Dark rumours abound that the reason it went in this direction is that Supercat were in financial difficulties and this was the MoD's way of bailing out a preferred supplier.

Be that as it may, as are the Taliban not stupid – neither are our own troops. They have reacted with amazement to the lack of protection. Some have come to the same conclusion that we have – that the MoD and Army are still besotted with the idea of roaming the North African desert in armed jeeps in the manner of the SAS founder David Stirling. But, as one of our sources, remarked, "Afghanistan isn't North Africa, and we're not fighting Germans".

As far as the MV goes, the consensus is that it is a superb cross-country vehicle. If you want an off-road experience on the Bovington tank range this is the one for you – but no amount of performance is going to save you from a mine, or a bullet.

Neither are the mechanics happy with the beast. Spares are difficult to get and even minor but vital modifications take an eternity. Engine access is poor and, to change the oil, you have to jack up all four wheels and unbolt two cover-plates to get to the sump. Even though there are very few vehicles in theatre, there are always three or four in the workshop awaiting repairs. It is the very antithesis of what is needed in this theatre.

Out in the real world, troops do know what is good for them. As recounted by Vaughan Smith, soldier turned correspondent and recently returned from Afghanistan, they are heaping praise on the Mastiff. In a remarkable filmed interview on his blog, From the front line, he records a Corporal from the Royal Tank Regiment calmly recounting where his vehicle was hit by a mine. "Look," he says, pointing under the Mastiff, "you can see the slight blackening under the engine".

The MoD is relatively quiet about the merits of the vehicle, otherwise all the soldiers (and their relatives) would be demanding them. But, faced with an obstinate Army high command, and its refusal to divert funds from existing equipment programmes, only sufficient "new" money could be extracted from the Treasury to buy 108, split between Iraq and Afghanistan.

As a result, there are not enough of these life-savers to go round, "the safest vehicle I've ever driven," says Vaughan's RTR Corporal. So fierce is the competition to crew what few there are, one source told me he had witnessed fist-fights between soldiers as they vied for a seat in the only vehicle that they knew would get them back alive, with their legs intact.

So it is that the losers ride in WIMIKs. The really unlucky ones get to ride in Supacat MVs – odd how the name "mobility vehicle" also applies to those electric buggies, used by the disabled, which too many soldiers are ending up using for the rest of their lives. Yet, for the price of the 130 MVs, we could have had 65 more Mastiffs in theatre.

And, because the MoD bought these insane vehicles, while still relying on WIMIK Land Rovers as well, we will continue to have avoidable and culpable deaths - and wholly unnecessary injuries.

COMMENT THREAD

Action this day

Defence questions yielded considerable treasure yesterday, and it keeps coming. One such was interesting enough for the Daily Mail to pick up, heading its piece, "Basra tent troops 'sitting targets' warns MP".

Actually, they have been siting targets for months, if not years, but it is nice to have an additional warning from Labour's Chris Bryant, who recently visited tented accommodation for troops at the Basra Air Station (pictured top left). In Parliament, this is what he asked:

Four weeks ago, four hon. Members were in Basra with British troops as part of the armed forces parliamentary scheme. We saw the tented accommodation at the Shatt al-Arab hotel, which British forces were in until Christmas. It has been heavily bombed, and that is where several British troops have died. We also saw the new accommodation that the troops are now in, in the more secure circumstances inside the Shatt al-Arab hotel, but they will now all be withdrawn from the hotel to the British airbase. Does the Secretary of State worry that British troops will now effectively be a sitting target for insurgents? What is to be done to ensure that we have better ISTAR — intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance — support and that we have more secure accommodation, not just tented accommodation, for British troops?

This, of course, is something we have raised many times - and we did not even have to go to Basra at the taxpayers' expense to find out - such as here and here. The issue was also raised last month by Ann Winterton, and she has not been to Basra either. This time, however, The Mail followed it, not that Bryant got anything from the secretary of state that we had not already heard:

Des Browne: All the issues that my hon. Friend identifies are being actively pursued as we speak. The military advice that I have received is that, as we concentrate our forces back into the Basra air stations, it will easier, and we will be better placed, to defend our troops. There are a number of reasons why that is the case. I do not want to go into them in detail. I am constantly torn when it comes to giving details in the House of the steps that we take to protect our troops, because I do not want to undermine their security.

I make my hon. Friend the same offer that I have made to other hon. Members: if he wants a private briefing in relation to this matter, I would be happy to give it to him. I am not prepared to discuss in public the steps that we are taking, but he can rest assured that all the observations that he makes I have made myself on my visits. My top priority for our troops is their safety. Daily, I am involved with the chiefs of staff and others to make sure that we are doing everything that we can to enhance the troops' protection.

From what we can see, all that is being done is limited protection using Hesco barriers as blast containment walls, to limit the casualties in the event of a mortar bomb hitting a tent or building. The second photograph shows a "welfare village" opened only in January at Basra Air Station, and the principle can be seen clearly there. The building itself is unprotected, but the Hesco prevents shrapnel from mortars or rockets spreading.

Nowhere do we see the layered measures that would constitute effective protection so, on the face of it, this is very far from "doing everything that we can to enhance the troops' protection".

Browne has been personally warned, in Parliament, three times now, - if one includes Gerald Howarth - so he cannot hide behind his generals and say he did not know. If it were Churchill at the helm, I am sure we would be seeing an "action this day" memorandum. Churchill, Browne clearly is not, but he is going to have to do a great deal more if he is to avoid having blood on his hands.

COMMENT THREAD

And so to Gerald…

I promised to respond to Gerald Howarth's e-mail, which we published on the blog yesterday. The exercise is useful and valid, not least because Gerald, as shadow minister for defence, is a senior Tory politician and his views give a remarkable insight into the mindset. So, here goes.

From the outset, it must be said of the man that it must take a real in-depth understanding of the political process in order to send an e-mail in which you have insulted the co-editor of one of the leading British political blogs, and then give the recipient carte blanche to circulate it. Not that I have any problem about being insulted in such a way as clearly, in Gerald, we have a master at work, and we can only stand back and admire his political skills.

Actually, that is a bullshit, clever-dick response which is not true. I wrote it in the first draft of this piece, but I have left it up as an example of the line I could have taken – jokey and sardonic. But I mind very much indeed being slagged off by this low-grade example of a politician who cannot even be bothered to get his facts right.

Yes, we know he launched my pamphlet on Galileo at the House of Commons, as he is prone to tell everyone at every opportunity, and we acknowledged this fulsomely. From July 2004, when he hosted the launch, through to November of that year, we mentioned Gerald no less than five times on the blog, each time in glowing terms. During that period, he also enjoyed two favourable mentions in the Booker Column.

But, declares Gerald, "Richard North has some good ideas but gives no credit to anything anyone else does". Well, we gave him ample credit for his action on Galileo and much else. In all, this blog has made 32 mentions of Gerald Howarth (not including this one), most of them favourable, right up to May 2006 when, in a general commentary about defence issues and MPs' involvement, we noted:

It has been left largely to the likes of shadow procurement minister Gerald Howarth and back-bencher Ann Winterton to make the running. Admirable though their efforts have been, they have not been enough, without the support of the wider House.

However, there was another aspect to the way the blog treated Gerald. We have been known, on occasions, to be pretty vicious about some of our subjects, but until recently, Gerald got off exceptionally lightly. For instance, we found it extremely difficult to keep quiet in April 2005 when the government announced an order for over £1 billion-worth of MAN-Nutzfahrzeuge trucks for the Army. This was an order which went to the German firm despite the trucks not meeting "defence planning assumptions" and the home-built vehicles being better, but did Gerald Howarth complain? Well, not exactly. He complained that the MoD had not bought enough of them.

I really had to bite my tongue on that one – this was and remains a betrayal of the Army, dumping substandard equipment on it, for what were evidently political reasons. And Gerald dropped the ball.

Perhaps he might have been more on the ball if he concentrated on his two jobs – the one as constituency MP and the other running his portfolio as defence procurement shadow. But a man who, by his own admission, is far too busy to read EU Referendum, manages to find time to do other day jobs, including having worked in the role of "consultant" for a brace of executive jet charter brokers, Aircraft Zone and European Business Jets Ltd.

Still, if he really was that busy, he could always have asked his assistant Mike Wood to brief him on the essentials - which would have been one way to get publicity - from The Independent on Sunday, at least.

Anyhow, the fact that the Tory group has been so bad at projecting it agenda has not stopped Gerald laying the charge that I have "little understanding of the - often extremely frustrating - political process, or of the power of the Opposition to get the media to focus on the issues we are tackling." Leaving aside his observations about my understanding of the political process for the moment, I readily concede that I have not (recently) got myself on the front page of the Independent on Sunday but who was it that got "Snatch" Land Rovers on the front page of The Sunday Times, to say nothing of several mentions in the Booker Column?

And so to the substantive part of Gerald's critique.

He starts by claiming that "the Opposition has been doing precisely that - opposing." He adds, "Not mindlessly, but intelligently where we believe the Government is wrong." And right here, we fall out with the man. Even in their Parliamentary tactics, we see them fail but, even more fundamentally, they fail on any number of key issues.

Take for instance, the issue of the shortage of helicopters, about which the "Opposition" has been voluble. Yet, although the shortage is here and now, in June last we got a government announcement about the Future Lynx committing the government to a long-term £1 billion project to buy 70 helicopters – averaging £14.2 million each. But, incredibly, they will not be in service until 2014. This was at a time when the Army was down to six Lynx multi-role tactical helicopters in the whole of Iraq and desperately needed (and still needs) more capability.

We had therefore, a situation where the Army was having to wait nearly eight years (longer than the Second World War) for new helicopters. And, while the US Army was paying £3.6 million each for their OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopters, we were to pay four times as much. And did we get any complaints from the Opposition? Not a murmur.

The British Army policy on helicopters (largely enforced by a dog-in-the-manger RAF) is insane - the insistence on a single, multi-role aircraft type with the airframe shared with the Navy (combined with an industrial policy of home design and build) means you end up with a camel of an aircraft that is really too expensive for some jobs, too big and heavy for others and not big enough for other roles. In the final analysis, this means you end up with a £14.2 million Rupert taxi which is not big enough to carry a fully-equipped section.

If ever there was something which cried out for full political examination and debate it is this - and this is directly Gerald's responsibility. Yet, as far as I know, he has not asked a single question on the validity of the Future Lynx (even though he hopes it will be his party in government when it comes to paying for the machines). In my view, in addition to a sustained questioning campaign, he should have been pressurising for a Select Committee investigation, forcing the (Conservative) chairman to get off his backside.

Then there was the episode of the Vipir thermal imagers, the lack of which was causing serious complaints amongst our troops in Afghanistan. Did we get any complaints from the Opposition? Well, the Lib-Dems intervened. But we heard nothing at all from Gerald Howarth, or any other Conservative.

Take the appalling episode of the four service personnel killed by a bomb while being transported in an unprotected water taxi, subsequent to which it was established that the passengers were highly vulnerable, not least because there had been 16 previous attacks. But did Gerald or any other Conservative complain? Once again, silence.

We raised the issue of the unarmoured WMIK Land Rovers in Afghanistan, leaving our soldiers dangerously exposed, while other national contingents benefited from armoured vehicles, even the Estonians. Did we hear anything from the Conservatives? Not a thing.

Yet this here is not our only litany of complaint. We set out one here, remarking on Conservative silence on FRES, on their silence on the government's disastrous record on unmanned aerial vehicles, on Gerald's lacklustre performance over the "Snatch" issue and his promotion of the dangerously inadequate Pinzgauer Vectors.

There was also the continuing issue of the Army's inability to deal with hit-and-run mortar raids. Howarth was more than informed. He was invited to supply this blog with a 1000 word piece setting out the Conservative policy on this and allied issues – with a promise that it would gain a reference in the Booker column. Promise there was but response there was none.

Against all this, and much, much more, Gerald tells us that Liam Fox held a press conference on Tuesday which was extremely well-attended, including by George Jones of the Telegraph. He then complains that "very little coverage followed, the Telegraph running not a single column inch."

Yet I set out in this piece how you, as a minority party, set about getting publicity. The one thing I would not do is waste my time with a press conference. Except on very rare and special occasions, they almost never yield results. Despite that, according to the great Gerald Howarth, I am the one that "has little understanding of the … power of the Opposition to get the media to focus on the issues we are tackling."

If I had been handling the publicity for the Conservatives, over Christmas I would have published a wish list. If it had been issued in the name of the Party, instead of this blog, the media would still be talking about it and it would be dominating the agenda.

So, we are supposed to be impressed that Liam spelled out forcefully in a series of PowerPoint displays the extent to which the Armed Forces have been betrayed by this Government? Big deal. Where was Liam months ago – where was he on the detail?

And so far out of touch with the debate is Gerald that he asks us to approve of Fox, when asked if he would increase defence resources if he were Secretary of State today, replying emphatically "yes", thus pre-empting the Prime Minister's remarks. Yet, read The Sunday Telegraph today. Remarkably, Rayment has managed to write something halfway intelligent (it happens occasionally), citing both Maj Gen Julian Thompson, and Col Tim Collins, both agreeing that money must be found from somewhere to upgrade the Armed Forces. But Collins argues that that doesn't mean there is not enough money in defence. “It is just not being spent properly," he says.

We would tend to agree with that. When you have a defence establishment spending £14.2 million each on light attack helicopters, when you can actually buy them – if you are really pushed – for less than £1 million. Throwing money at defence is not the answer. First we have to look at the waste, and the gross overspending.

That sort of makes the rest of Liam's little homilies rather flat and redundant, and it is not surprising that he got little publicity on them. From the sound of it, he had very little of interest to say. But, on other things said during the press conference, it looks like Liam made a bit of a fool of himself, so much so that he got himself in a spot of bother.

However, Gerald feels he could "go on and on" giving examples of what we – the team - have been doing, but confined himself to let me give you just three specifics.

He claims he was the first to raise the issue of armoured vehicles. This he did on his return from Iraq in September 2005. He told John Reid privately that he had to do something to get better protection for the troops facing roadside bombs (privately because he represents a garrison town and knows how careless politicians can cause increased anxiety). According to Gerald, Reid said they (the MoD) were aware of the problem and actively seeking solutions, but would not be specific. Since then, he claims, "we have raised the matter repeatedly."

It is true that once pushed, the Conservative team did have an effect, but it took some pushing, without which, doubtless, the Conservatives would have achieved nothing. That apart, Gerald cannot resist a snide little dig about my expertise, on the comparison between the RG-31 and the Mastiff (actually, the Mastiff is far superior in protection afforded) and he preens himself about establishing that only four have been delivered.

As far as the Pinzgauer Vector is concerned, Gerald is more than a little disingenuous. The vehicle is potentially a killer and has no redeeming features. Yet, while he has given the marque a puff, at no time has he raised the dangerous vulnerability of this machine with the minister, or at all in parliament.

Gerald's second claim to fame is the problem of troop air transport. The RAF is operating clapped-out 40 year old VC-10s and 35 year old Tristars half of
which, he says, we have just established (through Parliamentary Questions, our principal means of trying to get information) are not fit for purpose. That is as maybe but, in raising the issue with the Telegraph, he got it wrong.

We can give him the third issue – the procurement failure of the Landing Ships Docks project, and the appalling management by the MoD. But, in terms of the immediate concerns for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, the issue is an irrelevance. One commends the work, but not the sense of priorities.

However, says Gerald, the brutal truth is that we are not in power and not responsible for today's calamitous defence policy. But there he is also being more than a little disingenuous. Which government ordered the Eurofighter? Which government ordered the Storm Shadow – the "million pound bomb"? Which government ordered the EH 101, now called the Merlin, and under whose watch was the disaster that is the Type 45 Destroyer first set in train? Much of the current procurement budget, you will find, is dominated by decisions which were made by previous Conservative governments.

Thus while, say, one would like the opposition to oppose the continued purchase of the Eurofighter, Gerald is not only in favour of it, he is also hopelessly compromised and, therefore, silent. Not from him, therefore, would you get calls for the purchase of, say, a number of AC-130s. In fact, not ever can I recall any Conservative politician coming up with ideas for new kit that had not already been suggested by someone else. And not ever has Gerald pointed out the amount of money wasted on European projects. He simply does not agree that our defence priorities have been distorted by pursuing a European agenda.

Therefore, he tries to ignore the issue and, instead, tells us that the Tories understand the challenges which face our Armed forces and are incomparably best placed to meet them. He claims 14 MPs and Lords with military experience of one sort or another. But, what have they done? The list of the things they have not addressed is endless.

So, coming to a conclusion, Gerald tells us that the team will not always get it right and must be subject to criticism if we get it wrong. But, when he gets criticism, he either ignores it or, as in this case, rejects it outright – not conceding one single element of error. Where, from the torrent of material produced by this blog, has Gerald actually admitted – even once, on one issue, that his fabulous team got it wrong or could have done better?

Yet goodwill he wants. But where is the reciprocation Gerald, the famous quid pro quo? You actually had a great deal of support from us – more than you deserved. You frittered it away, you ignored us, behind the scenes you briefed against us and now, publicly you deride and insult me. And you want goodwill to support and encourage you?

Thus you tell us that the most disastrous outcome would be for the UK to have inflicted on it a Labour Government led by a dour Scottish redistributive socialist who has consistently starved the Armed Forces of the resources they need to do the job and who until recently has distinguished himself by his complete lack of interest in our servicemen and women. That outcome, you say, will be assured unless people get behind the Tory party and rally to our flag.

We have answered you on that. But the odds are, you will not read our answer and, in the unlikely event that you do, you will not accept what we say and act on it. And because of that, Gerald Howarth MP, Member of Parliament for Aldershot & Shadow Defence Minister, you will be a loser.

COMMENT THREAD

The shadow minister responds

My latest piece on defence was forwarded by a reader to shadow defence minister Gerald Howarth, to which he responded with some alacrity. We publish this, in its entirety (barring one tiny edit), below:

Richard North (whose pamphlet on Galileo I launched at the House of Commons) has some good ideas but gives no credit to anything anyone else does and has little understanding of the - often extremely frustrating - political process, or of the power of the Opposition to get the media to focus on the issues we are tackling. Let me make a few observations which you are entirely free to circulate:

The Opposition has been doing precisely that - opposing. Not mindlessly, but intelligently where we believe the Government is wrong. You are probably not aware, but Liam Fox held a press conference on Tuesday which was extremely well-attended, including by George Jones of the Telegraph. However, very little coverage followed, the Telegraph running not a single column inch. At the press conference not only did Liam spell out forcefully in a series of PowerPoint displays the extent to which the Armed Forces have been betrayed by this Government, but when asked if he would increase defence resources if he were Secretary of State today, he replied emphatically 'yes', thus pre-empting the Prime Minister's remarks yesterday. He also said he saw no reason at all to close either of the South Coast dockyards, currently under threat from Labour. And he was honest enough to acknowledge that the last Conservative government's cuts in defence went too far, although of course not as far as Labour, let alone the Liberals, wanted at the time.

We are constantly pointing out that Brown has betrayed the Armed Forces by failing to fund the endless military operations undertaken at Blair's behest and it was nauseating yesterday to see the Prime Minister promising increased defence spending when we know that every aspect of military activity is currently under threat and having to make cuts in advance of the Comprehensive Spending Review now underway across government.

I could go on and on giving examples of what we have been doing, but let me give you just three specifics: I think I was the first to raise the issue of armoured vehicles which I did on my return from Iraq in September 2005. I told John Reid privately that he had to do something to get better protection for the troops facing roadside bombs (privately because I represent a garrison town and know how careless politicians can cause increased anxiety). He told me that they were aware of the problem and actively seeking solutions, but would not be specific. Since then, we have raised the matter repeatedly (see my website, www.geraldhowarth.com which carries my views on the issue), as have many fellow MPs. As North suggests, the RG-31 (on which I was briefed at the Farnborough Air Show in July) is one of the most robust, but the Government has rejected this solution and gone for the US Cougar, known in the UK as the Mastiff, which I understand (I am not an expert in this field, nor I suspect is North) is similar in performance. In July the Government announced it would acquire 108 Mastiffs which would be 'fully operational' by the end of the year. It is we, the Opposition, who have established that this has not happened, only 4 being delivered into theatre. We told the press about this latest failure this week, and I gather The Sun carried the story prominently on page 2 yesterday, but it was downgraded in the final edition.

As far as the Pinzgauer is concerned, this (now) US-owned British company makes - in Guildford - an all-terrain troop carrier widely in service with the Army. I have indeed driven it at Long Valley in my constituency and it seems to me an excellent vehicle. However, it has no armour and therefore suffers from the same limitations as the Land Rover. In his July announcement the Defence Secretary also said they were ordering 'uparmoured' Pinzgauers, to be called Vector. This is a brand new vehicle but it does not pretend to have the armour of the Mastiff. It is my view that a range of armoured vehicles is required and that where the Government is guilty of betrayal is in failing to order off-the-shelf available heavily armoured equipment, such as the RG-31.

Secondly, there is the problem of troop air transport. The RAF is operating clapped-out 40 year old VC-10s and 35 year old Tristars half of which we have just established (through Parliamentary Questions, our principal means of trying to get information) are not fit for purpose. We have repeatedly raised the issue in Parliament and tried to get the press interested. In fact, The Telegraph did eventually run a story last week, so after 9 months of bashing away we obtained some coverage.

Thirdly, on procurement failures, it was we who were responsible for exposing the abject failure on the Landing Ships Docks project, praised by Blair yesterday, where the cost of the 4 ships has doubled thanks to appalling management by the MoD who awarded the principal contract to Swan Hunter. We ran a high profile campaign together with the Daily Telegraph. Last year, I asked the National Audit Office to investigate which they agreed to do and they will be reporting later in the spring.

The brutal truth is that we are not in power and not responsible for today's calamitous defence policy. Nor can we spell out today how much we will spend on coming to power in 2009 - 10, not least because we do not know what Labour will have bequeathed us in terms of commitments or the state of the public finances. All I can say is that the entire Tory Defence Team, led vigorously and determinedly by Liam Fox, are resolute that we shall not ask our magnificent soldiers, sailors and airmen to undertake tasks for which we are not prepared to give them the kit, the manpower and the training.

I know UKIP are trying to appeal to disaffected Tories, but they are not going to form the next Government. I hope that we are because I do believe that we understand the challenges which face our Armed forces and are incomparably best placed to meet them. On our benches we have MPs who have served recently (Andrew Robathan, formerly of the SAS, Hugh Robertson, Mike Penning, Tobias Elwood, Patrick Mercer (former CO of the Sherwood Foresters) and Adam Holloway, not to mention IDS. Others, like Desmond Swayne (PPS to David Cameron) and Mark Lancaster, who are TA officers, and Dr Andrew Murrison, former RN surgeon, have all served in Iraq and Afghanistan whilst being MPs. Lord Astor (who leads for us in the Lords) served for 4 years in the Life Guards, Julian Lewis MP (who leads on the Royal Navy and is the foremost exponent of the need for the nuclear deterrent) served for 3 years in the RNR, I was commissioned in the RAFVR and lead on the RAF, and of course Liam Fox spent 10 years as a civilian Medical Officer to the Army. Compare that record to the other parties!

We will not always get it right and must be subject to criticism if we get it wrong. However, I do ask that all those of goodwill will seek to encourage and support us. The most disastrous outcome would be for the UK to have inflicted on it a Labour Government led by a dour Scottish redistributive socialist who has consistently starved the Armed Forces of the resources they need to do the job and who until recently has distinguished himself by his complete lack of interest in our servicemen and women. That outcome will be assured unless people get behind the Tory party and rally to our flag.

Yours, Gerald
Gerald Howarth MP
Member of Parliament for Aldershot & Shadow Defence Minister

We have, as always, opened up a forum thread and tomorrow we will post our own response, building in the best of the comments posted.

COMMENT THREAD