Why so negative?

One of these days I'll actually get back to writing about defence. Ah, those happy times! But for now I want to talk about that tired, worn, endlessly repeated subject that appears to dominate the daily headlines, the conversations by the water cooler, the conversations down the pub, the conversations with the family, and just about every conversation two or more people seem to have in the UK today. 

I may be exaggerating the impact of the subject on modern conversation slightly, but it does seem like a day cannot pass without someone talking about it, so I intend to basically stuff out some of my current thoughts on the subject for you to read/ignore at your leisure and be done with it for the next few months at least, while I instead go back to talking about ships and planes and things that get blown up or blow other things up.

The subject in question is of course brexit, which dominated the Queens speech.

The life of a centrist

With all this talk of the election and manifestos, Brexit and dementia taxes, young vs old, poor vs rich, it's easy to lose a sense of where people stand on the political spectrum. I noticed this in a discussion I had the other day with friends about the result. By the end of it I realised I must have sounded like somewhat of a Theresa May supporter, which is about a million miles (some political hyperbole might have been injected there for effect) from my actual opinion of that "bloody difficult woman" (bloody incompetent perhaps?). It is merely a testament to just how much I disagree with Corbyn and his bonkers plans that I ended up virtually defending May, though not quite.

My thoughts on the election

I've just been out running through the wheat fields to boost my street cred, so this whole election thing then. Who won?

The DUP I guess. It certainly wasn't Theresa May, who lost her commons majority. It wasn't Labour, who gained some seats but still failed to earn a majority, or even enough to form a coalition. Not that you'd get that impression listening to Labour supporters today. They're celebrating coming up 46 seats short of the Conservatives like England has just won the world cup, such is the dire state of Labour right now and the level of pessimism that surrounded Jeremy Corbyn. 

Javelin anti-... infantry?

Been a lot of politics and economics talk lately so let's go with something a little different today. Namely blowing shit up.

Because a thought occurred to me recently. No, not that I shouldn't start sentences with "because", though I've never understood quite why that's considered such a grammatical faux pas. Nor that I overuse quotation marks or use them inappropriately. It came when watching a series of videos showing anti-tank missiles like the US TOW series being used in places like Syria and Iraq as an anti-personnel weapon. I've seen lots of people complaining about this as a waste of resources, though I doubt the groups doing it are overly worried about the financial cost to their sponsors of such a use. But it did get me thinking about the possibilities of using such weapons in the anti-personnel role.

Putin the Mastermind?

If there's one thing that has struck me over the last year or so with all the focus on Russia it's this idea that Vladimir Putin is is some kind of genius strategist; part chess master, part Napoleon reborn, part the second coming of Alexander the Great. He's often portrayed as a slick operator who manipulates the strings of global politics to make others dance to his tune, always ending up with the dominoes falling exactly as he had planned. And of course in this Internet age it's spawned meme after meme with Putin characterised as the cool poker player who bluffs and raises his way to jackpot after jackpot, leaving everyone else at the table fumbling and arguing over a handful of chips while he quietly accumulates a stack that towers over all before him.

And it needs to stop.

Trump, Korea and the Royal Marines

It's been a fair old time since I've had the chance to sit down and properly type some stuff. Today I just want to touch on some recent events that I feel are worth addressing.

Economics with a 'C': The Treasury, Hard Brexit and the spring 2017 budget

I don't know about you but I had a most entertaining read this morning* while drinking my coffee. The source of my delight was a fantastically hysterical article by the Independent (and its associated comment section) regarding a supposedly leaked document from the Treasury warning about the dangers of a "hard Brexit", that is to say the UK leaving the EU without an agreement and reverting to World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules.

Britain: World Power?

Sparked by a debate the other day on Twitter and given added emphasis to write again by the pressure of Think Defence recommending me, I'd just like to muse today about the idea of Britain as a world power. It's a subject that comes up fairly frequently in UK defence circles and at times seems to take on a life and importance all of its own. Can't perform mission A? Never mind, at least we're a world power don't you know. Need new equipment or a force structure? Well, what would a world power look for, etc.

Air combat over Vietnam

As Exercise RED FLAG kicks off once again in the US, I thought this would be a good time to finally getting around to finishing an article I started over a year ago and have sporadically returned to at times since then. A primary reason for it taking so long was the research required, the extent of which will become evident shortly.

The Trump Card?

Since the victory of Donald Trump in the US Presidential election the Internet has been ablaze - unlike this blog - with articles about the possible defence ramifications of his win. Indeed the Internet in general has gone into utter meltdown about Trump, but it's the more extreme ends that have amused me the most, those touting the end of the world as we know it.