chockhead819
War Hero

On the teletext that the Red Arrows could be scrapped to save money.
Karma said:Although not on the same scale cost-wise we could reasonably say what was the use of the Field Gun and Mast Manning at the Royal Tournament.
benjymo said:Exactly and where is the Royal tournament now!
Absolute crap KarmaKarma said:benjymo said:Exactly and where is the Royal tournament now!
Whoosh
*note to self, avoid subtlety*
The point there is that the whole Royal Tournament went, so there was no justification for an independent existence of the individual events within it to continue. However the value as a recruiting tool was immense.
Without getting into a long and tedious staff course diatribe, the services in general need to have a profile with the sponsors. Those sponsors who would much rather see government buying more and more hospitals that can stand empty because of staff shortages than more and more defense when we're involved in unpopular and poorly understood conflicts. The same sponsors that sign off consent forms for our recruits coming through the gate at Raleigh, a stream of people we couldn't survive without.
The Red Arrows may not have a military purpose as such, but they keep the RAF in the public eye in a reasonably benign way. A very expensive way of doing it, but it manages. I'm not sure what the return on investment might actually be, but the crabs in general seem to think it is worth it, and in a way I'd agree. the more we distance ourselves from the sponsors the less likely we are to actually get the money out of Treasury that we need to continue doing the job.
In comparison the RN has an annual Brickwoods competition at Collingwood and a presentation team who speak to WI meetings around the country. And Loose Page..........
Well there are another 6 tied up to the wall what are we waiting for lets book Earls Court for the last 3 weeks in Julyclanky said:IIRC the manpower bill for the FGT was equivalent to manning a T22/42 for a year.