Do you support the UK increase in the military budget?

[discokermit]

Nope. Not the Russian, Chinese, or Iranian ones.

They're run by serious people

you fuck up there, you end up dead. you fuck up here, you get directorships, lobbying jobs and a seat in the house of lords.

 

[Spymaster]

you fuck up there, you end up dead. you fuck up here, you get directorships, lobbying jobs and a seat in the house of lords.

Incisive stuff, Kerm. Definitely enough to base one's support for governments on, but 'fucking-up' needs defining here.

In Iran, "fucking-up" might be being homosexual, which can certainly still get you judicially (in the weakest sense of the word) killed. Women who "fuck-up" there by campaigning for women's rights have been rewarded with rape, imprisonment, disappearance, and execution. Russians who fuck-up usually do so by criticising the way Putin & Co have distributed state assets among their friends, or other aspects of the dictatorship, and end up falling out of buildings or poisoned in other countries. In China of course, you really don't have to try too hard at all to fuck-up. They execute multiple times more of their own citizens than the rest of the world combined, and things that might find you on the shit-list include being a member of an ethnic minority, LGBTI, criticising the government, otherwise showing dissent, or again, speaking out of turn as a woman or exploited worker.

Admirable regimes indeed.

 

[A380]

Incisive stuff, Kerm. Definitely enough to base one's support for governments on, but 'fucking-up' needs defining here.

In Iran, "fucking-up" might be being homosexual, which can certainly still get you judicially (in the weakest sense of the word) killed. Women who "fuck-up" there by campaigning for women's rights have been rewarded with rape, imprisonment, disappearance, and execution. Russians who fuck-up usually do so by criticising the way Putin & Co have distributed state assets among their friends, or other aspects of the dictatorship, and end up falling out of buildings or poisoned in other countries. In China of course, you really don't have to try too hard at all to fuck-up. They execute multiple times more of their own citizens than the rest of the world combined, and things that might find you on the list include being a member of an ethnic minority, LGBTI, criticising the government, otherwise showing dissent, or again, speaking out of turn as a woman or exploited worker.

Admirable regimes indeed.

Well yeah, but that’s all NATO’s fault.

 

[discokermit]

Incisive stuff, Kerm. Definitely enough to base one's support for governments on, but 'fucking-up' needs defining here.

i do not support them, nor do i think they are admirable. stop attributing to me things i haven't said.

 

[discokermit]

Well yeah, but that’s all NATO’s fault.

you've done the same shit joke a dozen times now.

 

[A380]

you've done the same shit joke a dozen times now.

No, much more like 20 or 30 I reckon.

 

[discokermit]

No, much more like 20 or 30 I reckon.

maybe by 50 it will stop being just boring shit and somehow magically become interesting.

 

[A380]

maybe by 50 it will stop being just boring shit and somehow magically become interesting.

I doubt it.

 

[Spymaster]

i do not support them, nor do i think they are admirable.

You're doing an astoundingly good job of convincing everyone that you do!

The fact that you've even mentioned those shit hole regimes on this thread, which has nothing to do with them, brings into question your motivation for posting on it at all.

 

[RD2003]

Incisive stuff, Kerm. Definitely enough to base one's support for governments on, but 'fucking-up' needs defining here.

In Iran, "fucking-up" might be being homosexual, which can certainly still get you judicially (in the weakest sense of the word) killed. Women who "fuck-up" there by campaigning for women's rights have been rewarded with rape, imprisonment, disappearance, and execution. Russians who fuck-up usually do so by criticising the way Putin & Co have distributed state assets among their friends, or other aspects of the dictatorship, and end up falling out of buildings or poisoned in other countries. In China of course, you really don't have to try too hard at all to fuck-up. They execute multiple times more of their own citizens than the rest of the world combined, and things that might find you on the shit-list include being a member of an ethnic minority, LGBTI, criticising the government, otherwise showing dissent, or again, speaking out of turn as a woman or exploited worker.

Admirable regimes indeed.

And increasing UK defence spending alters all this in what way exactly?

 

[discokermit]

You're doing an astoundingly good job of convincing everyone that you do!

The fact that you've even mentioned those shit hole regimes on this thread, which has nothing to do with them, brings into question your motivation for posting on it at all.

a thread on whether or not britain should increase its military budget has nothing to do with china, russia or iran? righto lol.

 

[hash tag]

Digressing slightly, but to be learnt from. Greece has spent a massive percentage of GDP on arms and also taken on massive debts to fund it. Look what a financial mess they have been in.

 

[Spymaster]

Digressing slightly, but to be learnt from. Greece has spent a massive percentage of GDP on arms and also taken on massive debts to fund it. Look what a financial mess they have been in.

Greece has been a financial basket-case for about a thousand years.

 

[hash tag]

Greece has been a financial basket-case for about a thousand years.

Bit before my time.

 

[dylanredefined]

What military threat does the Russian Federation pose to the UK?

Cyber attacks
Terrorist actions like the Salisbury incident.
Conventional and nuclear posturing and threats.

 

[bemused]

My son has just applied to Sandhurst, I'd like to see him paid well, live somewhere clean and tidy and have the right equipment. As long as the army has the cash for that I'm happy.

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

Asking us whether we think more defence spending is a good idea is more than a bit weird. Whether we say yay or nay. We won't be actually asked how such money would be spent, who we'd buy stuff from. We won't be consulted on who our government allies with, what military interventions we get involved with, which weaponry gets used where. Whether or not our military is used at home. None of that. We've just had 14 years of corruption, sleaze, inefficiency and ineptitude at the helm. Plus dickhead world viewpoints, warmongering politicians and lies. So what is this extra spending for?

 

[Chz]

My son has just applied to Sandhurst, I'd like to see him paid well, live somewhere clean and tidy and have the right equipment. As long as the army has the cash for that I'm happy.

The Army has the cash for that. Whether they spend it that way is another matter entirely.

 

[bemused]

The Army has the cash for that. Whether they spend it that way is another matter entirely.

Sadly that's the issue, I guess.

 

[ska invita]

Asking us whether we think more defence spending is a good idea is more than a bit weird. Whether we say yay or nay. We won't be actually asked how such money would be spent, who we'd buy stuff from. We won't be consulted on who our government allies with, what military interventions we get involved with, which weaponry gets used where. Whether or not our military is used at home. None of that. We've just had 14 years of corruption, sleaze, inefficiency and ineptitude at the helm. Plus dickhead world viewpoints, warmongering politicians and lies. So what is this extra spending for?

theres a new arms race developing, so you either think that taking part in that is a good idea or you don't.
if you don't then its the same old struggle of trying to affect the political system we live in.
if you do then you're in luck

 

[kebabking]

Procurement is a mess - because requirements are a mess, careers management is a mess, program management is a mess, budget is a mess, industrial strategy is a mess....

No government has taken defence seriously for decades - generations - and no government has been prepared to put in place the mechanisms to rectify that because, broadly, it means not being able to pull rabbits out of hats, whether that's spending/not spending, operations, procurement - and to be frank, defence simply hasn't been seen as the place to put your most able, thoughtful ministers.

The Tories had Williamson - a man who refused the Army's request to start building up munitions stockpiles instead of whatever new pointy thing procurement because (and I quote) 'i'm not having my photo taken in front of a fucking warehouse..', and Labour had Des Browne - a fucking part time defence secretary while we were fighting two wars.

Until that changes, little will.

 

[izz]

Taking a more dispassionate view of current and possible future threats, and putting that case to the public appears to be impossible. I think we have a right to know, to some degree and in general terms, what's out there but the powers that be think of the public as stupid children, so much so that we couldn't fight a war in Europe (for instance) any time soon as the country as a whole isn't culturally prepared for it, so we simply can't judge what an appropriate level of defence spending is

 

[hash tag]

Does defence spending include R&D at places like Porton Down who must be soaking up a lot of money.

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

theres a new arms race developing, so you either think that taking part in that is a good idea or you don't.
if you don't then its the same old struggle of trying to affect the political system we live in.
if you do then you're in luck

But you don't know if any extra money will be spent on horses or nukes or cyber warfare or intelligence or more squaddies or misguided interventions in Bhutan and Svalbard. So our opinions mean very little.

 

[Elpenor]

Maybe the defence budget can be a bit like the EU common agricultural policy, pay the army to decommission weapons, reduce fighting strength etc

 

[Silas Loom]

Does defence spending include R&D at places like Porton Down who must be soaking up a lot of money.

Why shouldn’t it? Part of the DSTL empire these days.

 

[kebabking]

Does defence spending include R&D at places like Porton Down who must be soaking up a lot of money.

The defence budget includes absolutely everything the government could almost plausibly include under the heading 'defence' - the key thing to remember is that for the government, the objective is to have the biggest possible number it can say 'this is what we're spending on Defence..', it's absolutely not about buying the greatest possible capability to defend.

When NATO agreed the 2% thing in 2014(?), the UK spend was under that, so they reclassed both the Intelligence and Security budget, and military pensions, as being part of the defence budget, and wahay, suddenly the 2% is met....

 

[ska invita]

I think we have a right to know, to some degree and in general terms, what's out there but the powers that be think of the public as stupid children, so much so that we couldn't fight a war in Europe (for instance) any time soon as the country as a whole isn't culturally prepared for it...

we've been involved in countless wars the last thirty years, including in europe. the "country" has been dragged along for all them

 

[DotCommunist]

I'll never forget reading the blurb to 'Eye of the Storm', Peter Storms bio, during my SAS bios spree. On the back it boasts bout how the counter insurgency war in Oman was kept so secret that it wasn't known to the opposition until labour took power. This is proudly boasted of, considered a success to have hidden it from the opposition and the wider populace. When does anyone ever mention cyprus or remember the malayan 'emergency'? all the really dirty ones are kept quiet and then they boast in memoirs about that.

 

[izz]

we've been involved in countless wars the last thirty years, including in europe. the "country" has been dragged along for all them

yes of course you're correct, and I made my point badly, I wasn't thinking of an Iraq-type 'war' but something more like WW2, when the populace as a whole had roles to play in it.