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1 juillet 2014 2 01 /07 /juillet /2014 07:50
photo Royal Wessex Yeomanry

photo Royal Wessex Yeomanry

 

28th June 2014 Dorset Echo

 

SOLDIERS from Dorset will celebrate becoming the UK’s new Armour Reinforcement Regiment with a parade in front of Prince Edward.

 

As part of the Army’s new 2020 design, Dorset’s Royal Wessex Yeomanry, based in Bovington, right, together with squadrons in Dorset, Wiltshire, Devon and Gloucestershire, will take on the new role.

 

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12 juin 2014 4 12 /06 /juin /2014 16:50
Army reservists on a training exercise on Salisbury Plain [Picture: Shane Wilkinson, UK MoD]

Army reservists on a training exercise on Salisbury Plain [Picture: Shane Wilkinson, UK MoD]

 

11 June 2014 Ministry of Defence and The Rt Hon Philip Hammond MP

 

The National Audit Office has published a report into the progress of Army 2020, the transformation programme for the British Army.

 

The report examines the development of Army 2020 and the progress in implementing it. It also examines the main risks to successful implementation of Army 2020 and its dependencies with wider defence change programmes.

According to the National Audit Office report the MOD’s decision to reduce the size of the regular Army and increase the number of trained Army reserves was taken without appropriate testing of feasibility.

In response to the report Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said:

The MOD has always been clear that the numbers in the reserves would fall before they increased, but we have now seen the trained strength of the reserves climb for the first time in nearly 20 years. The well publicised IT issues in the Army Recruiting Centre are being addressed, the application process has been simplified, medical clearance procedures have been streamlined and the Army is running a high profile recruitment campaign. While there is much still to do, we are confident of achieving the target of a 35,000 trained reserve [across all 3 services] by the end of Financial year 2018.

The Armed Forces are being restructured to ensure they can defend against new and emerging threats to our security. In future, they will be smaller, but better equipped, able to deploy rapidly to protect our interests anywhere in the world and supported by an integrated reserve force.

After years of neglect, the reserve forces are being reformed and revitalised, with £1.8 billion being invested in better training and equipment to fully integrate them with the rest of the Armed Forces. Although there have been a number technical challenges, the programme is on track and the reserves are now growing in size for the first time in 18 years.

While increasing the Army reserve from around 19,000 to 30,000 won’t happen overnight, there is no longer the decline that has plagued the UK’s reserve forces previously. The MOD is confident of delivering a reinvigorated reserves by 2018.

General Sir Peter Wall with troops in Afghanistan [Picture: MOD, Crown copyright]
General Sir Peter Wall with troops in Afghanistan [Picture: MOD, Crown copyright]

General Sir Peter Wall, Chief of the General Staff, said:

The NAO report fails to capture the nature of the national austerity we faced at the time these decisions were made. The Army has designed a novel and imaginative structure which best meets the challenges we are likely to face within the resources made available. Thankfully, most of the structural change for our new model, which we call Army 2020, is now behind us. We are recruiting regular and reserve soldiers for this new Army avidly. I am confident that, having made such significant changes, the Army 2020 model will endure.

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11 juin 2014 3 11 /06 /juin /2014 12:50
UK Defence Organisation – Levene and Army 2020

A post from a new contributor, MartinR

 

The Levene Report on changes to the MOD sensibly pulled a number of defence organisations into one central joint forces command. However it also appeared to push the three armed services into deeper silos than before, each with their own budgets, etc.

I believe that an opportunity was missed to bring the three armed services together at the operational level. I would like to discuss this.

Annex I is a rough sketch of how I suggest that HM Armed Forces should be organised. It does not show everything, as I do not know everything, but it provides a framework. I have not included training organisations, establishments or units.

I suggest reducing the number of 4 star officers to four, as the numbers of service personnel do not, in my view, warrant more. Each 4 star officer should be a member of the Defence Staff, rather than the Naval, General or Air Staffs.

The 4 star officers should each command elements of all three armed services and the civil services to achieve their shared aim of defending the United Kingdom’s people, territories and interests.

I consider that the three armed services should remain separate entities. However they must always be looked on as parts of the whole; rather than as independent services that cooperate when necessary but otherwise go their separate ways.

Each armed service should be headed by a 3 star officer, who is the head of his service, and who concentrates on his service to ensure that it is always ready to play its part in defending the nation. However he must be subordinate to the CDS & VCDS.

The present system resembles a battalion where all the company commanders are lieutenant colonels, rather than majors, who consider that they can do as they wish, with just a nod to the CO & 2IC every now and then.

If the Navy complain that the RN cannot possibly be headed by a Vice-Admiral they should be reminded that Lord Nelson was a Vice-Admiral and if that rank was good enough for him…..

 

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