Can’t see why not, they outsource a lot of jobs already in the forces already!

I should know, I work for one of the companies that is contracted to the Army Air Corps.

Well it sounds like Blackwater might have some labor going cheap soon!:D

I think its good that the religious aspect of the calendar is taken away, as there is unlikely any change for getting international calendar that isent based on lifeline of some fairytale figure.

world needs to get rid of all religions and all steps like these are welcome for the future;)

Go an tell that to Al Qaeda, im sure they will appreciate it, or Iran, or Saudi Arabia.:rolleyes:

The important part of the header is about wether people believe in the armed forces of this country.

When people hear that they are being sent to fight in (yet) another war do people actually believe they are going to make a difference?

Or do they think lack of proper equipment and a lack of troop numbers combined with possible morale problems due to poor kit and high death rates are seriously affecting how our troops are performing?

Its a vicious triangle, all the factors are linked. For instance, the shrinking of the armed forces means less people in them which in turn means less people connected to them or knowing people in them, the result is less people have an understanding of them. The more distant they are from the voting public the harder it is to press for the necessary funding. The as funding is reduced their ability to perform the missions on which they are sent. The biggest error this government has made is trying to keep a small military with little funding, whilst sending it on big military missions, you cant have both ways as is now being discovered, unfortunately there is not the motivation to solve the problem, hence why the rather insulting council tax rebates are going to come out of the existing MoD budget!

Deterrent.

To deter what?:confused: Certainly I think the Tu-160 could be turned into an anti terrorist bomber kind of like the B-2 has, but all this dettering the west cr*p is just ego. no body is planning on invading or nuking Russia.

Its been that way for a while. And yes it is absurd, if you are offended by a marking of time you need to ask yourself serious questions about your life. Especially in a world where the Christian calender has become the internationally accepted one. But hey we must avoid, at all costs, upsetting the people who despise every sing one of our values and thus feel the need to randomly blow us up.:mad:

To me it looked more like SLL was saying that:

– Dassault can’t design planes because they cant’ even make a propre retractable probe.

– The Rafale has the RCS of a B52 because of said probe…

Funny becouse I never said any of that.:rolleyes: Go back and read my posts, I never said that Dassault cant design a retractable probe and I never said anything about the RCS.:rolleyes:

Christ who yanked your chain….?

……………these are not my words they are Micks so just settle down a bit and keep a lid on those accusations.

You are right about Russia are you? How do you come to that conclusion? Do you use an all seeing eye? A chrystal ball? An ancient forgotten oracle? Don’t be daft you can’t make sweeping statements like that you have no idea wether you are right or not. They don’t need the same size population as Europe all they need is a single integrated command and control structure which Europe doesn’t have, despite NATO. If a war started tomorrow half of Europe would would be trying to run things ‘their way’, not knowing that the other half would be individually trying to discuss surrender terms with the enemy.

I’m not up for a fight I’m up for a discussion. You try to keep the BS to a minimum and I’ll try to do the same otherwise we’ll be here just promoting ill feeling whilst trying to argue (mostly) the same point. Which would be just silly. 🙂

You yanked my chain and with that post you are continuing the theme. Go google ‘Russia demographic crisis’. Then go and do in depth research into the state of the Russian economy, focus on the over reliance on the energy markets, at the same time look at the levels of defence expenditure of Russia and Europe and European countries, then come back here and take back your sarcasm and comments about BS.

Anyway, refueling probes are such a trivial thing really, it is pathetic that some people can not understand that facing a simple problem
(aerial refueling) with several solutions, different Air Forces will adopt different solutions…………… :.ohmygod:

Coming from someone who has yet to explain his point in anyway shape or form that post just further undermines your position here. Rayrubik points out very well that most modern aircraft now have retractable probes, without incident, Rafale does not. All you have given so far is the ridiculous ‘simplicity’ excuse.