Equipment failures: Poll

[Vermin]

Sky News is holding a poll titled; Equipment failures: Is the Army ready for action?  ???

It currently stands at YES:26.91%  NO:73.08%  

Its a rather damning indictment, the publics perception of the Army is not good, clearly the voters and tax payers have less confidence in our equipment as we do!

http://www.sky.com/skynews/home/0,,,00.html

Politics out of procurement, you know it makes sense!

 

[Nige]

This just proves that the public is as ill informed as they always are. They'd rather listen to crap in the media written by 'experts' than find out the facts for themselves.

The HQ Land decision not to desertise eqpt prior to Oman must rate with the decision to charge unlimbered artillery at Balaclava though

 

[DangerMouse]

OK then, the public believe the media, which is to be expected.  As you say, though, LAND did screw up on the ES front when they didn't desertize the kit for Oman.  Granted, Afghanistan kicking-off didn't help because the ES priority went to the submarines and aircraft supporting that, but I'm wondering - I wasn't in for the Gulf War, so my experience of ex/ops in desert conditions is limited to SAIF SAREEA:

After the first phase of the ex (DESERT RHINO, I think it was) the AOR was an armoured graveyard, with REME spending about four days collecting about 70 u/s A and B vehs from around the area.  I know that 4 Armd Bde, who were being tested in preparation for their high readiness year, took months to recover, because their A vehs, particularly 432 variants, were trashed.

If we do deploy on Op IMPENDING DOOM/Op CERTAIN DEATH  , will the kit be there to support us?  ??? In other words, was the ES cluster on SAIF SAREEA an anomaly or an omen of things to come if we try to do it for real? Comments from those with experience appreciated...

 

[Nige]

If it does go pearshaped, money will be spent doing the right thing.  The trouble with SS2 was that it was only an Ex.  
Money is tight, so the big cheeses don't want to waste dosh on mods which would only be required for 6 weeks.  

If it's for real, the money will be spent. (I Hope ???)

 

[Plant-Pilot]

That would be a fair point Nige, however if they had made the mods, the final overall cost of the required repairs would have been significantly lower and the available training significantly higher. After all, crews don’t get good training sat waiting for recovery or sat on a tank park because they have to save the filters for the final phase.

Once the troops have to be somewhere and do the job is too late to start spending money on the right kit. They need it before then to do the training and to find faults. Like the SA80 A2 fiasco, having spent all that money on improvements, they have to wait until the weapon is in theatre before they find the improvements aren’t as good as they thought. Then they blame it on the Marines not cleaning them properly because they are different from the A1s.

Sounds like a bad excuse for bad management. Either they are trained on the new weapon or what the hell are they doing with it in an operational theatre?

And that is my point, is you only start spending the money when you have to you are asking for problems, and in that situation, problems can quite easily mean lives!  

 

[modacs]

You may all be pleased to know that I have found out how to fix 351's at least 80% of the time when they mysteriously stop working. A rudimentary tool kit is all that is required.

1. Take it off your back
2. Find a piece of rock the size of half a housebrick (or half a housebrick)
3. look around to ensure you are alone.
4. beat the main body of the radio with the rock
5. Da Da! All fixed.
6. Dents can be explained away by suitable stories involving vehicles, climbing through windows, falling over etc. etc.

NB
Do not use your boot as  a substitute for the rock. It really hurt last time due to the force needed to repair the radio.

Alternatively- Pretend your radio doesn't work, if by some miracle it isn't broken, and do your own thing.

 

[PartTimePongo]

Many thanks for that Modacs, and such a time-saving tip too. No need to return for overhaul, and think of the associated cost-savings  

Reminds me of the series some time ago, about Australian girle soldiers, and the course oxygen thief.

They'd done an assault course (Wet)  the previous day, and said OT went to her section commander, and complained that "She couldn't get the breech open, there was something wrong" (SLR)  No prizes for guessing what had happened.

Corporal says one or two shouty things, then looks at the cameraman and says "What's that down there?" pointing down the corridor.As the camera swings in that direction, and off the NCO , there was a KA-CHANG, and all of a sudden , the working parts enjoy full and free movement again -lolololol

 

[Ford_Prefect]

Whilst we'd all like to think the equipment would be up to the task the Army is simply too reactive to problems.  Did the introduction of high leg combat boots help those people who had to endure trench foot in the Falklands?  Put simply I hope we have taken on the lessons of SS2 and that some high ranking people have lost their name in a big way..........any one know of anybody?

 

[Fozzywozzy]

F_P

You must be joking.  No doubt, in the time honoured tradition of the Armed Forces, the blame has probably come rolling down to the poor "Toms" on the shop floor.

I wonder if the term "Executive Responsibility" will ever stick in MOD and Government circles ?