Thin Pinstriped Line

Its been an extremely challenging few weeks in the international arena. Developments in Russia and the Ukraine have brought about the biggest challenge to regional security for nearly 25 years and seen a decline in Russia’s wider relationships with the West to a level not seen since the end of the Cold War. Across Europe there has been growing concern amid calls to raise defence budgets to meet the emerging perceived risk. In the UK, some areas there has been criticism of the UK response, suggesting that the predominantly diplomatic solution sought by the UK, coupled with wider defence cuts means that the UK is no longer capable of defending itself, or exerting influence on the wider global stage to help lead in the situation. Perhaps most prominently, the former Chief of the General Staff Sir Richard Dannat has said that the UK should consider leaving a brigade of some 3000 personnel in Germany to act as a visible symbol of British commitment to Europe.  But is Russia r...

Humphrey is currently travelling on business, and is unable to do any blogging updates. The next article will probably be posted around 28-30 March, jetlag permitting!

Its been a quiet couple of weeks for newsworthy items on Defence blogging front. Humphrey has very deliberately not commented on the situation in the Ukraine, believing that his ability to comment meaningfully on it is limited, and that its far better to avoid adding idle speculation to what is a delicate and tense situation. Two items of news though did catch the authors eye, and are worthy of brief comment. Firstly there was news last week that the Armed forces are to get a 1% across the board payrise in the current financial year. The reason this is interesting is the actual report written to underpin this, which contains a lot of really interesting insights into the current state of the Armed Forces – the full report can be found HERE . The pay award for the UK Armed Forces is perhaps unique in its implementation, with a truly independent group of individuals spending the year studying the military, visiting them and hearing their concerns and looking in depth at specifi...

Well it seemed Humphrey picked a bad week to go out of the country on business – Russia and Ukraine are dragging the West into arguably the worst crisis of the post-Cold War era. In the Gulf tensions are mounting between Qatar and other GCC nations, with ambassadors now being withdrawn. Venezuela appears to be on the verge of near chaos as a result of riots between opposition activists and the Government. Meanwhile in the UK the worry seems to be that some Army officers have adopted ‘barbaric’ eating practises. Yes, ‘that’ memo is the subject of the latest article, mainly because it is so much more than just a ‘light hearted email’ but is in fact, to the authors mind at least, a fascinating insight into the quiet social revolution going on in our officers messes. The story so far is that a memo written by the General Officer Commanding (GOC) 3 (UK) Division-  Maj Gen Cowan, and sent out to a fairly small list of 1* officers has been leaked to the media. In it he complains in...