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Gurkha veterans: should they stay? Updated following 2011 defence cuts


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And now it's on the BBC - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14746224

 

To me it makes sense to make Gurkhas redundant and keep British jobs in the army.

 

Why only Gurkhas? People from across the Commonwealth have served in British armed services for a long time, can't see it changing. As far as I'm concerned if they're willing to volunteer for the armed services, they're welcome.

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Well dont wee yourself with excitement. The Frist Ghurkha brigade was stationed a few miles from ours in Malaya. They were/are fine soldiers and were held in high esteem by us British Regulars.

Good drinking buddies too

 

My father in-law served in Sarawak with them. He had nothing but praise for them as soldiers and men.

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No one got my point. :confused:

 

My point is that the Gurkhas were a source of cheap labour for the British army.

 

Once they got equality there was no reason to employ them.

 

Hence the disproportionate cuts to the Gurkha regiment(s). I'll be surprised if we still have Gurkhas in the British army in the future, why would we?

 

So were National Servicemen until it was halted. I was one of them. We could have stopped a bullet as good as the next man at half the pay :D

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  • 4 months later...
No one got my point. :confused:

 

My point is that the Gurkhas were a source of cheap labour for the British army.

 

Once they got equality there was no reason to employ them.

 

Hence the disproportionate cuts to the Gurkha regiment(s). I'll be surprised if we still have Gurkhas in the British army in the future, why would we?

 

And so it came to pass...

 

Joanna Lumley has a lot to answer for -

 

"Gurkhas will bear the brunt of 5,000 armed forces job losses being unveiled next week, Whitehall sources have told the BBC."

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16537787

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Excellent points Kingmaker.

 

The Ghurkhas are owed so much by our government. They may sell their loyalty, but they do so through an international tradition of service and nobility - theirs is a noble cause, and they have always supported it with great nobility. Their families – and their children – would indeed be a positive influence for discipline and personal standards compared with many of the scrotes who are freely entitled to citizenship.

 

And you are right about the Falklands. Approaching Stanley, the Scots Guards completed the capture of Tumbledown, and 2 Para took Wireless Ridge. With the Ghurkhas posed to make the final assault on Mount William before our troops could march unopposed into Stanley, the Argentines dropped their weapons and ran – quite literally. The Ghurkhas were denied their moment of glory in that conflict, but few in the British Army would dispute that the Ghurkhas are the finest infanteers in the world, bar none. And thoroughly likeable people to boot.

There has been little mention of their service in Malaysia, in action against the Indonesian Dictator Sukharno during the sixties. Superb jungle fighters carried into action in Borneo by RN Wessex helicopters operating from jungle patches close to the front.
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Give over, cuts are being made right across the MoD, what has Joanna Lumley got to answer for exactly?

 

I should have explained better.

 

These cuts are mainly amongst the Gurkhas. As soon as they got equality with British troops then their days were numbered. I'd be surprised if there are still Gurkha regiments in 10 or 20 years time.

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  • 2 months later...
Those pesky foreigners taking jobs off British people innit? Or is it that they're all here on benefits?

 

It's neither Mecky THEY ARE NICKING OUR PARK BENCHES!

 

That's right, uber Thatcherite Gerald Howarth and MP for Aldershot complained on BBC Surrey radio this morning that

"I was walking around in Aldershot on Saturday and everywhere I went there were Nepalese just basically sitting out in the open … sitting out on the park benches.

You may find this bizarre, but some of my constituents say ‘if I go into town, I haven’t got a park bench to sit on because they are all taken by the Nepalese’."

http://liberalconspiracy.org/2012/03/26/tory-mp-complains-of-nepalese-gurkhas-sitting/

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