British Military Procurement Mysteries
The British Military has a habit of procuring and adopting, usually at great expense to the taxpayer, many things that either:
- Aren't needed
- Don't work
- Are obsolete before they're introduced (or even designed in some cases)
- Are crap
- Work eventually but cost the GDP of a mid-sized African country to fix
- Are not squaddy proof
- Are more expensive and worse than civilian equivalents that can be bought off-the-shelf
Or avoid all of the above, and so are cancelled just before going into service.
We're not alone in this; but at least American Military procurement mysteries don't completely stuff the Defence budget for everything else. Examples include:
- SA-80
- Nimrod AWACS - so embarrassingly crap that it is featured as a case study in MK2
- TSR-2
- BOWMAN
- Eurofighter Typhoon
- Enfield No.2 Revolver
- Combat 95
- Chaingun
- Clansman - although to be fair, when it was introduced in the early '80s was pretty good. The problem is that it is still in service some 25 years later.
- SA-80 bayonet
- Boots, Cardboard (several patterns)
- Straps, utility
- .303" ammunition
- Future Lynx
- L81A2 Cadet Target Rifle
- Churchill Tank - obsolete the day it was designed ... did make a valiant return as the basis of Hobarts AVRE Funnies
Near-misses that were almost foisted on the army include:
- Pattern 13 Rifle
- EM-2 Rifle (was supposed to work OK but it's still a bullpup)
- Burton magazine (ok, so this was a very long time ago)
- .402 Enfield-Martini ammunition
The opposite of the above are British Military Procurement Successes - these are very rare! When they do happen, generally something else gets in the way of effectiveness, such as cocking up the issue process or even getting rid of such items well before their time. Foreign Military Procurement Successes do happen occasionally, though.
