Military chiefs are considering reducing Royal Marines by 1,000

[R]

I guess the undermanning is making alittle more sense now link.

 

[arny01]

I guess the undermanning is making alittle more sense now link.

Cutting a line Infantry Regiment would make more sense?? As you get more bang for your buck with Marines and Cherry Berries!

However politically it's easier to target a "Corps"

Makes me want to spew to be honest!! Pathetic politicians!

 

[Chelonian]

Obviously there is no suggestion that partisan service favouritism will prevail but...

"A range of “views” are being presented to Air Chief Marshal Sir Stuart Peach, chief of the defence staff, and Stephen Lovegrove, the defence department’s permanent secretary, on the UK’s military capabilities and what could be cut to save money."

 

[Guest]

Please forgive my ignorance here but how abouts would the numbers be reduced by a fixed number, do they reduce the intake of new recruits or make standards higher? When I looked online and on here There was romoured to be a recruiting shortfall for some areas of the armed forces at the moment and they were going to fund a recruiting drive.
cheers

 

[R]

As RM is the main supply pipeline for a lot of SF and SB I'm not sure how much wiggle room they would have for further reductions? Especially given the current state of the world...

 

[Caversham]

It would be nice to think that they would bin a battalion of woodentops, but the MOD will just roll out the normal crap and say it's down to the RN what they do with their resources. When you have two new carriers to man, then the Corps becomes an easy option.

Alan

 

[R]

It would be nice to think that they would bin a battalion of woodentops, but the MOD will just roll out the normal crap and say it's down to the RN what they do with their resources. When you have two new carriers to man, then the Corps becomes an easy option.

Alan

Remind me how many support vessels we have for the carriers

 

[cc1]

Why have 1000 Commandos when you can have just 1 Seagal...

 

[ThreadpigeonsAlpha]

Just axe the RAF Regiment. Job done.

That's over 2000 including Reserves. They are just infantry now. The RM has a bigger footprint of Air Defence than the RAF Regiment. They handed Rapier over to the Royal Artillery.

The RAF don't have traditions. They have habits. The sprogs.

 

[westy]

Just axe the RAF Regiment. Job done.

That's over 2000 including Reserves. They are just infantry now. The RM has a bigger footprint of Air Defence than the RAF Regiment. They handed Rapier over to the Royal Artillery.

The RAF don't have traditions. They have habits. The sprogs.

With an Air Chief Marshal as Chief of Defence Staff, I can't see that happening anytime soon

 

[Caversham]

The current CDS has been elected to be the new chairman of the NATO Military Committee and will assume the role in June 2018. The current Vice Chief of the Defence Staff is General Gordon Messenger: KCB, DSO & Bar, OBE, ADC, former RM.

Whether he is given the job remains to be seen. If would be the first RM if he was, but all CDS tend to toe the party line until they are retired, when they suddenly find a voice.

Alan

 

[cc1]

Just axe the RAF Regiment. Job done.

That's over 2000 including Reserves. They are just infantry now. The RM has a bigger footprint of Air Defence than the RAF Regiment. They handed Rapier over to the Royal Artillery.

The RAF don't have traditions. They have habits. The sprogs.

Got something to get off your chest dude?

 

[ThreadpigeonsAlpha]

Got something to get off your chest dude?

I took 2 protein servings in the galley once.

 

[cc1]

I took 2 protein servings in the galley once.

Noticed you were walking with a limp...

 

[ThreadpigeonsAlpha]

Noticed you were walking with a limp...

Royal knows how to play "hide the sausage".

 

[Ninja_Stoker]

I think it's pretty lame of the defence chiefs to blame a long-planned aircraft carrier on a need to reduce the number of Royal Marines. For starters the Navy is already undermanned by a thousand because they jumped the gun at the last SDSR and made too many redundant and we have struggled to recover sufficient numbers since.

The two aircraft carriers each require less manpower than three smaller aircraft carriers we just got rid of, so there is no substance or logic to the whoppers being declared by the chiefs of staff.

As stated, 40% of special forces are streamed from the Royal Marines so there will be a definite knock-on effect if the Corps reduce numbers by a massive 14%. Incidentally the Corps is still "over-manned" to the tune of 180 trained ranks.

The cheapest way to reduce numbers incidentally, is to throttle-back on recruitment. Redundancies cost lots.

It makes zero sense to reduce our most effective fighting arm and would make more sense to reduce manpower from the military tail rather than the teeth.

 

[RobFOB]

How likely do you think it is for such a drastic cut to actually go ahead? After all this comes after the last defence review which specifically stated that the corps would remain the "premier" spearhead force. Obviously my knowledge is rather limited on this but it just seems far too drastic even for a line infantry regiment let alone on the corps which is the effective backbone of the SFSG/SF intake.

 

[john lewis]

Surely spreading it across the entire navy making small cuts in a larger area than mass cuts in a single area would make more sense

 

[Illustrious]

The navy and RM will escape any such cuts I believe, as the navy is having to use RM personnel to man the new aircraft carriers so cannot afford to lose any more. The public is not keen to see any more coffins coming through Brize and so sea borne ops along with air borne ops will be the vote winner for the foreseeable. Any such axe will fall on the army in my opinion.

 

[ThreadpigeonsAlpha]

Or cut the foreign aid budget.


The government really need to take its own Debt management advice.
If you can't pay the mortgage, then you stop spending money elsewhere.