Not forgetting their *heavy* transport
The Toyota pickup truck.
Blighty's top general - hotly tipped as the next head of the armed forces - has hinted strongly that the British defence industry can no longer expect to rely on sweetheart deals from the Ministry of Defence (MoD). He adds that modern warfare has now left the tank behind as surely as it has the horse. General Sir David …
Strategic planners are tasked with maintaining political control, possession of the territory (i.e. not having to concede London, Paris, etc. to an enemy) and the safety of the population.
There isn't a strategic planner in the world who deploys heavy armour in a mountain fastness (see WWII Yugoslavia) against partisan forces with an idea of ready advantage (see Soviet-era Afghanistan).
Or who predicts victory based on a sub-Vietnam troop-native ratio.
American Presidents don't order the evacuation of troops in under ELEVEN months from a country, take nine months to dispatch the requested reinforcements, and fire two generals and demote a third (without evidence that any of them are actually falling below expectations) in the belief that Afghanistan is a proper subject for strategic planners, no matter what was said during the campaign (which was just cribbing from confidential Senate briefings and hewing to unannounced Bush White House policy shifts as a safety play for the length of the campaign). Basically, he wanted a Third World country which didn't matter to call for being bombed to excuse the fact that he had called for withdrawal from a country that did matter as a strategic counter-weight to Iran. Just for looking tough in the election. And again crib from Bush - escalate pre-withdrawal - with a heavy publicity twist on deaths and casualties (these casualties need to be severe and remorseless - hence dropping the media ban on filming the body-bags of fallen soldiers and dropping the discreet night-flights for the dead and wounded) That way withdrawal is politically safer. The President, it would seem then, has two objectives:
(1) break the US public will for the Afghan war (to limit the credibility damage and political risk of conceding a war to the Taliban that hosted al-Qaeda training camps and, in fact, recognising their government of the country).
(2) follow a Carter-era policy of proxy warfare, assassination, and shadow armies, prosecuted by one of the men from those Carter days.
So it all sounds grubby and cynical and prone to failure. Unless, of course, the President, behind all the manoeuvres, actually has in mind a few object facts:
There are plenty of people who would prefer a southern-oriented Taliban reaching out from a Pakistani border to a Russian-oriented "Northern Alliance" reaching down from ex-Soviet Republic and Chinese borders.
On two conditions:
(1) Pakistani stability and security (inclusive of its arsenal)
(2) the Taliban understand that governments installed in luxury and power can be flattened by strategic forces in a way that tent-dwelling guerilla leaders may not.
As an aside, the sort of heroin production volumes coming out of Afghanistan must be absolutely killing the Golden Triangle and Bekka Valley types. That must take the floor out of supplier prices. Try funding Middle East mayhem now, fellas.
Basically, the plan is to create an Afghan government. Then take it hostage. And ten years is a nice round number for a punitive expedition that wouldn't have looked out of place in the Salisbury-era Hindu Kush.
And the next time we're around: we'll have helis that operate in thin air, hypersonics that can operate from forward bases well away from the ring of Soviet and Chinese territory, communications and observation platforms that can operate well clear of sat-killers, troops that have been bumped out of expecting McDonald's on-base and treating a volunteer army as a sinecure, and politicians who understand what an air bridge is for and just why the Army stacks millions of things "it doesn't need" over and over in locations far and wide (saves on logistics and production and delivery lead-times, chaps).
Expensive boon-doggles are dead. Troop run-downs are over. Instead, we will ramp up on mass-producing classics with silently upgraded internals, have an expeditionary air-force that, yes, includes jump-jets (ideal for ground-support and fluid front-lines) and superiority fighters.
With ground troops that can launch artillery and planes out-of-their-pocket (or very close to it)even if central command is down or over-stretched.
All you have to do is forget the dead people and the screaming children.
If the Governement spend £100 million in the the UK, that's money that will go towards paying UK citizens, who then pay that money back into buildings, shops, good and services in the UK which then pays UK citizens, and so on, and so on, that money is re-used over and over again to keep people employed and the economy churning round and round, and a good degree of that comes back in taxes;
£1 salary to a UK citizen (30p back as NI/Tax etc.)
Of the remaining 70p let's say 65p is spent on goods (15% tax, about 10p)
Of the 55p that goes to the shop or service provider they pay salaries and taxes.
So on the first round of spending half comes back as taxes, the remaining half is spent again (and again half comes back as taxes, and so on etc.)
When you pay £1 to a UK citizen the money will be recycled over and over and over again.
£1 salary to a foreign citizen (all gone)
It's irrelivent if the government is paying 10 or 100 times more for something UK based, pay someone in the UK and that money goes round many, many times, pay for something from abroad and that money is lost forever.
Why do you think China is so cheap fro goods? why do you think other countries are demanding that China revalue their currency? why do you think that the Yuan will become the new global reserve capital? it's because China isn't stupid (but our Government is).
The outgoing goverenment paid (and planned to pay) lots of money that we didn't have on UK projects, given that 50% would come back via tax and keep UK people employed that's not such a bad thing, the incomming government is going to "save" money by buying abroad and canning UK projects, it will look good for four or five years and then implode.
"It's irrelevant if the government is paying 10 or 100 times more for something UK based, pay someone in the UK and that money goes round many, many times, pay for something from abroad and that money is lost forever."
Excuse me but I'd think *most* UK taxpayers would be pretty p&*ded off if they had to pay 10x or 100x the price of a UK version of *any* existing product. BTW in the arms biz (screw this "defense" b*&&cks) part of the deal is often part (maybe all) the work is done in the client country. Case in point the recent AFV contract lost to part of BAe (vickers?) in the UK but won by (IIRC) General Dynamics. What happened. GD mfg product in *same* UK factory (probably with *same* staff) as looser. I doubt the work force was outraged by this "loss" of UK capability and the "threat" to the loss of UK jobs (always a popular defense biz tactic. "Think of the innocent workers." Why? They never did for any other major UK industry).
BTW your argument can be made about *any* product that is mfg (or was mfg) in the UK. Why should defense *really* be *any* different? Does *any* other UK govt dept do this?
Why do UK defense products seem to have *such* a poor foreign sales record. The UK *is* in the top 5 of arms mfg countries but I bet it make nowhere near the foreign *sales* revenue that others do. does that mean HMG is willing to pay through the *nose* that the fact the UK arms biz sales team is poor does *not* matter, as HMG will pick up the tab?
Historically a *lot* of UK industry has been dependent on government contracts. Commercial engineering is *tough* and competitive. There has certainly been a perception that UK defense work (once you knew the right people) was high margin, low volume easy money.
Put bluntly perhaps HMG should consider *what* parts of the UK defense industry are really needed. The UK *seems* to do some subsystems *very* well. Torpedoes are *highly* specialized and a sub is useless without a supply of them. Their are about 3 major standards in torpedo tube design (most set IIRC prior to WWI).
Seriously *how* independent (or "local") does your defense mfg capability *have* to be. In the Cold War what good was having a nuclear hunter killer submarine mfg capability if the build takes 7 *years* and WWIII is likely to take 7 days (6 1/2 for the final tank battle on the North German plain then 11 1/2 hours to decide to go nuclear and 1/2 hr for the all out nuclear exchange). The UK *has* retained that capability. The Astute class are huge, take 7 years to build (all those lovingly hand welded joints) and were 4 years overdue and several £100m over budget. If the "threat" is now more likely to be sub national groups of terrorists why would they give a s^&t if you can detect another ship 1000 miles away. SFW. Their weapon of choice is 10Kg of fetiliser and a liberal mixing of fuel oil to add color
One *key* lesson drawn from areas such as satellite and defense mfg is that the 2nd copy of something is a *lot* cheaper than a 1 off and that systems with *very* long lives (like the B52) are *not* ultra ultra specialized to 1 job (seen any B58 Hustlers in service lately?). This suggests 1) Get as big a first order as possible 2) Make it as standardised as possible in the *structural* design. 3) Make *specific* provision for variability. The Danish "multi mission " ship with a whole *deck* plumbed for various services which can convert from an armed vessel loaded with missiles to a hospital ship by loading different modules in roughly 30 minutes. The equivalent for aircraft would be bays and carriage points plumbed and cabled for everything from fuel (drop tanks) to weapons (missile guidance update) to sensor or comms packages.
That way there is 1 *core* design. Every buyer knows what spaces and services *their* bits have to fit in. If they can't get their latest super duper Rader/IR/mutispectral scanner/SigInt/Whatever in the earmarked bays they just have to dump some of the planned fuel or weapons.
>>Excuse me but I'd think *most* UK taxpayers would be pretty p&*ded off if they had to pay 10x or 100x the price of a UK version of *any* existing product.
Yes, that's because *most* UK taxpayers don't understand economics, if they understood that keeping money within the UK is critical to the economy maybe they wouldn't be so p&*ded off, they complain about tax and then complain about fortnightly rubbish collections, complain about going to war and then complain about petrol costing £1.20 a litre, they complain about the welfare state and then complain that jobs are scarce, all these things are related *most* UK taxpayers want their tax free cake and want a subsidy to eat it.
>>BTW your argument can be made about *any* product that is mfg (or was mfg) in the UK. Why should defense *really* be *any* different?
Yes! the whole "buy british" thing was here for a reason, however there's a big difference between the man in the street buying something from abroad and the government doing the same, the government should *always* buy british (assuming it's a similar product).
Lets be sensible about this 10x or 100x the cost may seem hard to understand, so lets start small (I'm generalsing, so don't be too picky), imagine a destroyer built in the UK at a cost of £500m compared with the same built outside the UK for £250m, it seems a no-brainer to go for the non UK one, but given that £500m staying in the UK (and half coming back in taxes, corporate and personal) means it only costs £250m, those that get the £250m will keep UK people employed (more jobs) and be able to support other services, they have money to spend on other UK "things" like shops, houses etc. the money is going round, back into the UK, suddenly £500m spent in the UK is the far more sensible option, an that's at twice the price.
So how about 10x or 100x the price?, works exactly the same way, the more you keep the money in the UK the more that the money is "worth", the more you send abroad, the less it's worth, at 2x the price the knee-jerk reaction is to say it's too expensive, but in reality it costs the same, and that's if the money only goes round once, if it goes round five times then it actually costs a 10th of the original price, in the destroyer example, a healthy UK economy where money doesn't go abroad means we can build destroyers for £500m which work out cheaper (for the taxpayer) than a £50m one from abroad.
You may not understand this, but as I said before, the Chinese do.
btw, I agree with much of what you said, I'm not arguing for buying (or not buying) anything in particular, however if we (the UK government) do buy something then we should buy it locally.
"Lets be sensible about this 10x or 100x the cost may seem hard to understand, so lets start small (I'm generalsing, so don't be too picky), imagine a destroyer built in the UK at a cost of £500m"
That I don't understand your argument. I understand it *very* well. What I don't actually understand are 2 other things.
Why the arms biz *should* be treated in such a very special fashion. Why should it have its own cozy, protected niche environment?
Your argument applies to pretty much *any* other areas of manufacturing. BTW From memory defense equipment has one of the lowest ratios of direct to secondary employment ratios. You spend a hell of a lot of cash to create (or sustain) a *very*small number (relatively speaking) number of jobs, hence the not infrequent comments that you could shut down Westland Yeoville, hand *every* employee £500k (more than 1/2 their *lifetime* salary in many cases) and the government would *still* come out ahead of the deal.
Why can't the companies that make it up (or rather the bits of BAe Systems as they mostly are now) deliver it at a price anywhere *near* foreign suppliers. If these companies *really* are "world class" manufacturers (as they *never* tire of telling journalist and politicians) WTF can't they make it at prices at least as competitive as USA, France, Germany or for all I know Japan. None of these are exactly "low wage" economies. If they are *so* good why doesn't anyone else buy them *but* the UK government?
If you've followed my postings you'll know I doubt deeply that buy American is the correct answer. My objection to these companies is most of them seem to do *only* defense work. With no UK government orders they would *die*. they have *no* civilian work. That's stuff *real* people buy to other use for their own enjoyment or make money from. They appear to exist in a symbiotic/parasitic (depending on the cynicism of your POV) relationship to the MoD.
"healthy UK economy where money doesn't go abroad means we can build destroyers for £500m which work out cheaper (for the taxpayer) than a £50m one from abroad."
I think you have an Economics degree from Alan Johnson U. The money for your 10 (or 100x) over priced bit of defense hardware comes *from* taxpayers. The *cheapest* destroyer the UK government could get would also be the lowest ID card running costs.
IE Don't get one at all. A Navy which has more Admirals than ships. The MoD having more staff than the Army. This sounds like an institution with as many staff issues as Leyland in the 1970's and 80''s, with *less* incentive to sort them out.
The question you have to ask is what are you *protecting*? British defense manufacturing jobs? British defense design skills?The British defense industry supply chain? Either these are good enough to appeal to customers abroad as well or they are not. If they are not perhaps those staff and those skill might make a better living designing or making other more useful things.
One idea you *might* like to consider. Split the businesses into 2 parts, Design and Mfg. Accept they will *not* always be prime contractors but see if they can get to mfg large parts of the winning companies design in the UK (all major arms biz companies seem to know *plenty* of politicians and the sort of senior civil servants who whisper in their ears) . Alternatively the design side enters foreign competitions for foreign projects that will be *made* in those countries.
If they succeed great. If not perhaps it is time for their staff to look for a less precarious line of employment.