July 6, 2004

Threat To Scrap Some Of Scotland’s Historic Regiments.

McConnell wants answers on threat to Scots regiments

..... Some Scottish MPs had warned of a threat to Scots regiments as long ago as last year, and the Conservatives said yesterday that Mr McConnell’s last-minute intervention suggested that he and Alistair Darling, the Scottish Secretary, had failed properly to represent Scotland’s interests in the government’s debate over spending.

"There has been a case over the last number of months for strong personal interventions to make sure that decisions were made in Scotland’s best interests," said Peter Duncan, the Tories’ shadow Scottish secretary. "Jack McConnell needs to be quite explicit as to how he has worked with Alistair Darling on this issue - have they worked together at all?"

As well as anger that the Treasury is driving through defence cuts at a time of global turmoil, some MPs are expressing frustration with the MoD. Inspired by the US, the ministry’s military doctrine is increasingly moving away from traditional land and air forces towards so-called network-centric warfare, where hi-tech weapons platforms and vehicles, many of them unmanned, are co-ordinated by central command posts, not front-line commanders.

Anne Begg, the Labour MP for Aberdeen South, who raised the future of the Scots regiments with Mr Hoon last year, said that military planners have the wrong priorities. "The sort of peacekeeping operations that we are so good at and should be concentrating on don’t need the latest technology, they need well-trained British troops on the ground," she said.

Bruce George, the chairman of the House of Commons defence select committee and a leading critic of the MoD’s new thinking, described the idea of cutting or merging regiments as "unacceptable" yesterday.

Speaking at a security conference in Edinburgh, he said: "You lose that regimental spirit which makes the British Army almost unique, and that is something that will only be tampered with at the peril of the government."

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Posted by Ithildin at July 6, 2004 1:48 PM | PROCURE FINE OLD WORLD ABSINTHE