Friday 8 March 2013

Reader's Letter Of The Day

From The Metro:

I find it astonishing Britain is to supply items such as body armour and vehicles to the Syrian rebels (Metro, Thu) when we can't even supply our own troops with essential equipment. We should look after our own troops on the frontline.

Lee Chambers.

3 comments:

john b said...

Category error from Mr Chambers. It isn't the case that the UK can't afford to provide adequate equipment for its troops, nor that it chooses not to.

Rather, in the (generally exaggerated, because tabloid-friendly, but sometimes genuine) cases when frontline troops are left without the right equipment, it's because MoD logistics are shoddy. The right equipment exists and has been paid for, but is sitting in a warehouse somewhere until someone with the right bureaucratic credentials signs something, or has been lost/stolen/detained by corrupt allies/etc.

There's no reason why sending an extra order of flack jackets to the Syrians would make the supply chain to British troops in Afganistan any less likely to stuff up.

john b said...

(or, more to the point, any more likely. Although both are true)

Mark Wadsworth said...

JB, agreed, the last sentence spoils the letter somewhat. The first one was more to the point, it's not that we don't want to or can't afford to, the MoD is just too colossally corrupt or wasteful or incompetent.