Military

British fighter jets will police the skies above Ukraine under proposals being discussed by Sir Keir Starmer’s coalition of the willing.

The Telegraph understands that key military planners discussed sending British Typhoons to Ukraine to provide air cover for troops when they met at Permanent Joint Headquarters on Thursday.

It comes as Emmanuel Macron explores alternatives to his plan with Sir Keir Starmer to put European boots on the ground to protect a future peace deal in Ukraine.

We really, really, don’t want to go to war.

Sigh.

Trans people are twice as likely as US adults overall to serve in the armed forces. But we’re regularly told our careers and lives aren’t worth saving

More true would be that people in the armed forces are twice as likely to become trans. After all, trans enlistment has only been legal since 2021 and now isn’t again.

Emmanuel Macron said the future of Europe and its security “cannot be decided in Moscow or in Washington” in a clear criticism of US-Russian talks over Ukraine.

After all, the last time we all went toe to toe it was the Russians and the Americans who won. Yes, yes, plucky little Britain fought alone and all that. But it was really that vast steamroller of the American economy wot won it. Even the Russian army moved in US trucks.

In his televised address to the nation on Wednesday night, the French president called for “long-term support to Ukraine”, which may include “sending European troops to Ukraine” in order to avoid a “fragile ceasefire”.

A peace agreement for Ukraine would be backed “perhaps, by the deployment of European forces”, Mr Macron said. “They won’t go to fight today, they won’t go to fight on the front line, but they would be there once a peace deal is signed, to guarantee it is fully respected.”

Oh. Right.

A better approach, surely, would be to make a case for what is actually needed, and in relation to which concrete threats.

That’s Owen Jones mimbling about defence budgets.

What he means is that if we insist everyone talk about specific threats then every specific threat claimed can be mimbled away and therefore the defence budget doesn’t rise. When, of course, we still face that same threat of the French and we have to recall that they did win, twice*, in the last millennium.

But the answer is easier. Venning’s Law: The correct answer to any question contining the word “surely” is “No”.

The real point of a military is to have enough hulky blokes with bang bangs that no one decides it’s worth trying to become a threat.

*Yes, King Louis

Donald Trump paused all military aid to Ukraine to pressure Volodymyr Zelensky to agree to a ceasefire with Russia.

Of course, if you do want to insist on everyone coming to heel and having peace then you might have to be fairly aggressive about it…..

The Israeli military has presented the UN and aid organisations with a plan for running Gaza that involves Israel having tighter control than it did before the war, according to humanitarian officials, casting doubt on whether Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has any intention of carrying out a military withdrawal.

Making sure that they don’t launch another bloody raid at a music peace festival seems fair enough, no?

How long did we have troops – as an occupying force – in Germany after 1945?

Sir Keir Starmer has announced he is “ready and willing” to put British troops on the ground in Ukraine to enforce any peace deal.

So, the Rooskies have 250,000 troops on the ground? The Ukies 200k? Those numbers are wrong, obviously, but they’re of the right sort of order.

British Army is 25k troops all told? 50k?

So British troops would be a tripwire. Kill any of ours and we’ll send a really stiffly worded letter you know. Because international law really does mean something. No, really.

It’s abject nonsense, no?

The country’s wealth fund is being depleted, with the liquid portion of assets now down to just $38bn (£30bn), from roughly $100bn at the start of 2022.
…
Almost three years into his war in Ukraine, the Russian president is increasingly concerned about the state of the economy.

If there’s a big pot of money lying around some politician will only find a way to go and spend it.

Slowly then all of a sudden:

Rebels fighting on the frontlines were not so certain. “The first line of defence fought hard. They were made up of Hezbollah and Iranian-backed fighters and they resisted, hard,” said Abu Bilal, a rebel who fought alongside HTS in north-west Syria. Once they broke through the first line of defence, however, “the army just ran away”.

The rebel advance was at first met with silence from Damascus. Then the defence ministry spoke of a tactical retreat designed to spare civilian lives. Syrian state media said that videos of opposition fighters entering formerly government cities were staged photo-ops: rebels were entering towns, asking residents if they could pose for a few pictures and then withdrawing.

But one after another, cities held by Assad’s forces fell to the opposition.

It doesn’t always happen of course – just like not everyone goes bankrupt. But when it doe4s it’s the same way. If this unit here is not sure about whether the unit to hte left and right is going to stick then they withdraw. And if the unit to the left and or right thinks the middie will withdraw then…..

Similar to the Prisoner’s Dilemma in game theory. When it happens the collapse is swift….

Ana Tsivilyova, the reported daughter of Putin’s cousin and a deputy defence minister, said that the Kremlin had received tens of thousands of appeals from relatives looking to track missing soldiers.

“The ministry of internal affairs takes [DNA samples] absolutely free of charge at its own expense, and enters into its database for all the relatives who have applied to us. I’ve already said 48,000,” Ms Tsivilyova said in a video at a meeting with lawmakers.

We take DNA. For free! So you can identify the conscript’s rotting corpse! Aren’t we the lovely ones?

A New Zealand naval ship that sank after smashing into a coral reef in the South Pacific was left on autopilot, an inquiry has found.

An interim report into the incident said human error was to blame for the sinking of HMNZS Manawanui, the first ship that New Zealand has lost since the Second World War.

Yvonne Gray, the vessel’s British-born captain, is originally from Harrogate, Yorkshire, and previously served in the Royal Navy before moving to New Zealand with her wife.

She became the target of online trolling in the wake of the £48-million ship’s sinking on Oct 5, prompting New Zealand’s defence minister to criticise “armchair admirals” and stress that Commander Gray’s gender was not to blame.

However, the report has revealed that the crew failed to realise the vessel was on autopilot. They wrongly believed that its failure to respond to direction changes was because the thruster control had failed.

Sigh.

Rybar, another prominent pro-Kremlin Telegram channel, said that as well as providing inaccurate reports, Col Gen Anashkin had thrown poorly prepared and ill-equipped units into battle, unnecessarily killing hundreds of men for little apparent tactical gain.

So Russian tactics haven’t changed since 1942 then? Since 1915, even since 1812?

A senior Russian general has been sacked for faking reports of battlefield successes in Ukraine, according to Russian media and war bloggers.

At least this time there seems to be at least some mild disapproval.

Russian training of infantry has always been appallingly, horrendously, bad. A great belief in quantity not quality….

The departments have informed military parents they will receive more information about the CEA uplift ahead of the tax raid coming into force on Jan 1 2025.

The internal memo to military families earlier this week admitted the Government will only be able to offer military families “some protection” from fee increases.

“Whilst the CEA cap uprating will provide some protection from fee changes as a result of the VAT exemption being lifted, the parental contribution may also increase [if] schools choose to pass this on,” the memo said. “Some claimants may need to consider this before the policy takes effect.”

No, it’s worse than not paying the higher fees:

Budget documents said the Continuity of Education Allowance (CEA), a form of taxpayer-funded support to pay up to 90 per cent of service families’ private school fees, will instead receive extra funding.

The Government, however, has not yet spelt out how much this will be

It’s ignorant twattery.

Sure, you can say no upgrade in hte subisdy to oay fees. Tehrefore kids change schools. OK, maybe not a good idea but, you know. Or you can upgrade it. OK.

But months after insisting you’re going to change VAT not to have an answer for the troops? What sort of fuckwit is actually in government these days?

He said: “Over 300,000 miners and their families have been punished to the grave, men who fought in two world wars and helped rebuild the country afterwards.

Mining was a reserved occupation. You couldn’t get conscripted if you were a miner. More than that I think – they’d not accept you volunteering either if you were? In fact you could get conscripted to be sent down the mines…..

A senior female officer in the Royal Air Force (RAF) was awarded a £2,000 payout after she was told by male colleagues to “grow a pair”, a High Court judge has revealed.

Squadron Leader Anne Rubery first submitted an official complaint of “bullying and discrimination” in her unit in September 2018, an Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) heard.

In the complaint, she alleged that she had been “mistreated, undermined, unsupported and mismanaged in the workplace by her chain of command”.

She also alleged that senior officers used “discriminatory and sexist language”.

Sqd Ldr Rubery’s allegations were dismissed by two Wing Commanders, named only as Wg Cdr Bradley and Wg Cdr Ward, who said she was “ballsy” and that she should “grow a pair”, it was heard.

A RAF investigation was subsequently opened into the comments made by her male colleagues, but it dismissed her complaints, concluding that their comments could be applied to “both genders equally”.

All her allegations of sex discrimination and harassment were dismissed by the Decision Body.

It also found that the comments did not meet the threshold of bullying, adding that Wg Cdr Bradley had made some “poorly judged comments” but they were not discriminatory.

Ombudsmanfound ‘overly masculine culture’
At this stage, Sqd Ldr Rubery received an apology and was told that the RAF would share “lessons” from her complaint to its diversity team, but she was told Wg Cdr Bradley left the service so could not be counselled.

However, she was “dissatisfied” with the outcome of the Decision Body so an Appeal Body was appointed.

The Appeal Body dismissed her case.

Sqd Ldr Rubery, a serving RAF officer of over 30 years, then took her case to the official Service Complaints Ombudsman for the Armed Forces (SCOAF).

Equiv to Major after 30 years is not “senior”. It is, rather, dead end. You got as far as seniority and (one) exam will take you and have been found wanting for any higher rank. Missed your promotion band and you’ll not be promoted again before retirement (at 55?). That is, good enough not to get fired but a duffer all the same.

That, perhaps, is rather more of this than being told to grow a pair.

A British chip factory involved in sensitive military projects has been nationalised by the Ministry of Defence following warnings that it was at risk of closure.

The Government confirmed on Friday that it had purchased the site in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham, from US company Coherent.

The deal is understood to be worth around £20m and will secure around 100 local jobs at the company, which is being renamed Octric Semiconductors UK.

A statement described the factory as the country’s only secure site capable of producing gallium arsenide semiconductors, making it “critical to the defence supply chain and major military programmes and exports”.

Ga/As, yes, OK. But one of the things about defence uses is that they’re always vastly behind the curve. Chips advance in 18 month or so cycles. Well, Si ones do, Ga/As might have its own cycle. Defence projects take 15 years to get going and last for decades. The electronics is always vastly behind that bleeding edge.

So, you know, maybe not as militarily important as all that. On the other hand it’s £20 million, in the current contecxt, pfft.

The Canadian military has admitted that new sleeping bags issued to troops last year were not suited to “typical Canadian winter conditions”.

Sigh.

The British Pacific Fleet, which included vessels from Canada, Australia and New Zealand, had been formed in late 1944 and was the biggest fleet ever assembled by the Royal Navy. It included six major aircraft carriers, four light carriers, two aircraft maintenance carriers and nine escort carriers, with a total of 750 aircraft, as well as five battleships, 11 cruisers, 35 destroyers, 14 frigates, 31 submarines and nearly 100 other warships and supply vessels.

Not sure even the Americans could produce that these days.

Yes, yes, obviously, modern carriers are larger etc. But do they have 6 at sea at one time?

The commander of a nuclear-armed submarine has been sacked after filming a sex video with a junior sailor.

The officer of the Vanguard-class submarine, who was awarded an OBE, had a relationship with a younger sailor while on patrol. The commander was also accused of sharing explicit photographs, The Sun first revealed.

It’s sex up or down the chain of command that’s the real problem.

Labour backs Greens’ call to end ‘emotionally harmful’ Edinburgh Tattoo flypasts

Whose emotions? When?

But now Edinburgh’s Labour council is considering calling for an end to the Royal Military Tattoo RAF flypasts.

The aerial displays have come under attack over claims they cause environmental damage and inflict “emotional harm” on residents.

Scottish Greens have won cross-party support to scrap the flypasts over Edinburgh Castle, with Cammy Day, the Labour council leader, writing to military chiefs to express “concerns” over hitting net zero targets.

Campaigners are now calling for this year’s flypast to be the last.

Oh, the emotions of the people on hte ground. Well, tough tittie really, no?

Not that any of these arguments are to be taken seriously. Just the usual ghaslty types wanting something to whinge about. If it wasn’t this it would be kids playing football in the close.