The Defence Sector must be royally fed-up with the UK

I have noted before that it seems rather pointless being a defence company in the UK, when the government in said country is doing everything in their power to stop you from being just that a; a company. Over the past few months a lot of contracts have gone out in excess of £15 billion pounds worth of equipment. There is of course the issue of where this money is going to come from but what is more interesting or disheartening, to put it another way, is to whom the contracts have been awarded. They were all given to American companies.

I hear you screaming and shouting about the free market principle and certainly I embrace it with my fullest compliments. But this country is royally fucked right now, and I know that might sound crude but we really really are. I do not need to convince you of this, the mere fact that you made it to this blog in the first place means that you are fairly informed person in the first place. To repeat: Labour has introduced 111 tax rises since 1997, taken a trillion pounds in additional taxation, and still left us with a Greek-level deficit: 12.6 per cent of GDP and rising. Of every four pounds Gordon Brown spends, one is borrowed. Our national debt is rising by nearly £6,000 a second. We can’t afford another five weeks of this, let alone another five years.

The manufacturing industry is a means to an end for the next government as is science and technology. £3.5 billion a year currently spent on publicly funded research generates an additional annual output of £45 billion in UK companies. Labour's response is to cut the number of university places. Good and bad I suppose (I think there are far too many students and far too many shit universities which should be deleted but I can see Boris' argument as well). But if we relate this to defence technology there is a really weird picture. In times of dire need, as these, a person of honour and stature and genuine regard for this country would say, 'right, chaps, fuck the rules' and they would go and do just that. £15 billion in defence contracts is a lot of money and it would do hell of a lot more in this country than over in America.

Politicians no longer care about the long game, as in what is good for the country, they care too much about themselves and popularity much in line with celebrity culture. Look at where Government spending goes (Just ignore the fact that £1 in 4 is borrowed) short term social projects that are popular and likely to give that lovely ego and popularity boost. I’m not against that, far from it, but a massive percentage is pure waste and could be much better spent elsewhere or spent more efficiently while still doing the same job. Next to that there is still a trickle of money to do actual good for the country things such as infrastructure investment and research spending in various things. Instead of taking tough decisions and sticking too them for instance getting on with building nuclear power stations or legislating that newly built houses must be much more environmentally friendly using less energy. They instead shy away sometimes saying that It is not the role of government when in fact it’s bloody hypocritical to say so when they are trying to socially engineer the population.

Ignore the arguments for a minute about buying of the shelf - I am not entirely convinced by all of them, though there is certainly merit in a few. If you buy stuff from this country you can expect long term invest in infrastructure, jobs, test ranges, factories, tooling, supply chains, supply companies, land development, several thousand dependent jobs and trades etcetera. Nothing, not a single one of the previous will happen since the development is taking place in another country and they will at the very most have a workshop here and that is that. When Rolls Royce a few years back were choosing a country to place their new labs in they settled on Germany, because the UK had such, and has such, unfavourable business environment.

Why would you come here as a defence company, or any company, you might as well head to any other country but the UK for the simple reason that you will make so much more money elsewhere. I say all of this for the simple reason that we are not winning right now. Those of us who are part of the right-wing spectrum of society who believe in a free market (yes I know that contradicts this post, but please read my reasons for putting aside the free market principle just this once), a small state and a strong foreign policy. The left have this country clenched within an iron fist, so ignominious has reasoned debate become that it is pointless to even attempt to start one. The Armed forces have become entrenched in a bloody political war which will lead to them sustaining even more casualties on the battle field because some fucking minister decided that he was lobbied enough to award a contract to the highest bidder, setting aside his duty to Queen and country. Contracts are being rushed in, quicker than ever before (more than £15 billion in little less than five months) to harm the Tories when the Strategic Defence Review does come around. I am no massive fan of the Tories, but this is so wrong but obviously it is not below Labour -nothing seems to be- but they are literally willing to offer lives to save their political skin. This is no different from blood money albeit blood contracts. I think it is so fucking disgusting that I am honestly struggling to write this post, for it is making me physically angry and putting together a string of words with a hint of intelligence is proving quite the chore. New Labour really are a dangerous party and there is no wonder that only 7% of the armed forces would vote for them if there were an election today (compared to 52% for the Tories). And perhaps the Tories wont be better but I think, at the very least, they have enough ethics and ideals to realise that you do not put a human life before short-term political gain (I would like to say 'long-term' but that would contradict the entire history of warfare so I wont).

(The comment section over at Think Defence is raging right about now). Finally to add insult to injury now the fucking super-mong Mr. Moonbat has entered the defence debate (why, god why?) - you know the guy who has been the mouthpiece for the AGW industry since the dawn of AGW, who has been subsequently been ripped to pieces by everyone with an ounce of common sense. Since he failed in adding journalistic value to that sector he has now decided to tarnish the defence vestige as well, fuck...