"Of course the last Government was idiotic. It demanded that the British fought two complex counter-insurgency wars in two countries while simultaneously cutting the defence budget. Yet much of the blame for the MoD's grotesque overspend lies with senior officers and civil servants ... ". Sam Kiley on the programme he's made for Dispatches tonight at 8pm, headed "How The MoD Wastes Our Billions". God knows how many times, and for how long I been saying this, but my constant theme has always been that there is no shortage of money in the MoD.

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Very kind of you, Richard—I was rather proud of it.

And I think that I used only one more swearword writing it than you did recommending it...!

DK

That is truly, profoundly amazing!

Well, it's all part of my new, clean(ish) image...!

DK

That TV programme was rather disappointing. Although it harped on the relatively minor matter of having too many senior officers too plushly provided for and not having enough helicopters, it didn't put the situation into context or make comparisons with other countries. Do others manage greater effectiveness, efficiency and economy? Hasn't Britain had a long history of bad designs, and political vacillation and cancellation and contraction of projects? If our defence industy is so great at exporting why can't it make enough good modern products for our own troops? Is the industry OK, but the bureaucrats and politicians just rubbish? How can the industry be better than the people it's recruited from the politicians, bureaucrats and generals? What is the point of aircraft carriers without aircraft to carry? Why do we have a pretend-local industry which is not independent but relies on assembling American components, probably in more expensive and less effective combinations than the Americans? If other countries can buy from the Russians as well as the Americans, why can't we? If our unit costs are high because we don't buy large quantities, why don't we buy lots of cheaper standard tanks, planes, ships etc which will be mediocre but at least available, and only hassle over a few top quality items which will give some additional capability. The overall impression was one of resigned hopelessness, as if everyone has given up on their nominal defence functions, and are just going through the motions, only really interested in extracting the maximum amounts of money from the public purse.