I should declare a prejudice. I have, for many years, viewed senior RAF officers with great scepticism. Of course, this is not based on any expertise on my part, just my general knowledge of WWII and, especially, the knuckleheaded leadership of the late, demented 'Bomber' Harris, a man who would have been right at home on the Western Front, circa 1916, hurling his men to their deaths in order to gain 500 yards of mud! In more recent times, Air Marshal 'Jock' Stirrup was, on the basis of the usual game of 'pass the parcel' which is the method by which our CGS is 'chosen', promoted to command our entire armed forces. Previous to that he had been a senior commander in Iraq and also in Afghanistan. That these were totally useless and unwinnable campaigns costing our country a fortune in blood and treasure seems to have penetrated his skull but rather than resign publicly and denounce government policy he, in the favorite phrase of our useless High Command, 'cracked on' which roughly translates as more and more and yet more 'Toms' killed and maimed for absolutely no purpose whatsoever. Well, there was one purpose and following his retirement, 'Jock' Stirrup achieved it by becoming Baron Stirrup of Marylebone and taking his seat in the Lords. Good pension, good perks and the missus was probably dead chuffed to become Lady Stirrup!
Today, the 'Stoopid Tendency' seems to continue inside the RAF. 'Vlad the Impaler', determined to 'strut his stuff' around Europe has taken to sending bomber aircraft very close to British airspace. Alas, my knowledge of current military aircraft is somewhere between nil and zero but even so, looking at the old-fashioned bits of junk he's sending over I can only assume that he has raided some old Soviet air museums. Well, I mean - propellers! They only come over every so often, usually alone or sometimes in pairs. Perhaps Vlad's credit card is maxed-out and he can't afford to fill the tanks! But consider the response of our Air Force commanders all desperate to be new-age 'Air Marshal Dowdings' - one of the very few truly excellent air force commanders we ever produced. With bags of gusto, crying "Tally ho, chaps", they launch one or on a good day, two, fighters to rush up to those lumbering old Soviet crates and ... er ... well .... and then do nothing actually! And the point is, I wonder? Well, the point is obvious. All this utterly useless air braggadocio provides the RAF chiefs with a chance to moan about how few aircraft they have, what a very real threat they face and please, Prime Minister, can we have some more pocket money?
It's all game-playing - by both sides and it is as pathetic as it is dangerous!
