There's no shortage!

Recently the Ministry of Defence admitted that it was cutting one fifth of aircrew who man the search and rescue service in order to send them to Helmand province in Afghanistan.

It seems that with the change in Taliban tactics from open skirmishes to roadside bombs travel and transport are more and more undertaken by helicopter. (How soon before the Taliban are equipped with the very latest surface to air missiles to replace the grenade launchers they have already?)

So the search and rescue service here will have a slightly reduced capability. The six RAF stations involved will still offer a service, but the promise to respond within 15 minutes 24/7 may be something that they will not always be able to manage. Of course there are also four civilian coastguard teams and two Royal Navy teams. Perhaps better integration of these can make up the shortfall in some way.

It seems that we may also have to hire helicopters on a commercial basis from other countries, for use in Afghanistan. We are short of helicopters as well as crew.

Not only did we go to war in Afghanistan and Iraq with canvas covered Landrovers and inadequate personal body armour. It seems that our Government and military planners did not foresee that we might actually need a range of different helicopters to back up troops on the ground. This has to be seen as a major blunder, but then when we sent extra troops into Helmand our defence secretar, John Reid, said that he would be disappointed if they ever fired a shot in anger!