Save our Nimrod

[HeadingNorth]

It's not been widely reported, but we're finally going to pull out of Germany 65 years after occupying it. Good plan, we didn't need troops stationed there since the fall of the Iron Curtain. At the moment we have a ridiculous 43,000 troops who are stationed there.

 

 

It's served a useful purpose as an overseas break from dangerous duty; whether that purpose justifies the cost is another matter. Certainly there's been no military need for them since 1990.

[Rupert_Baehr]

The 'occupation' of Germany ended some years go. Since then, British Forces (and others) have been there as NATO forces.

 

I'm surprised you put the number of troops in Germany at 43000. - I thought the Rhine Garrison was nearer 23000, plus a couple of thousand civilian support personnel and about 28000 family members.

 

One reason for keeping so many soldiers in Germany is that if they are returned to the UK you have to find somewhere to put them. 53000 + people need quite a lot of houses, schools, hospitals, shops, hairdressers, pubs, cinemas etc, etc etc. That's just to meet the domestic requirements. In addition, you need land - lots of land - for training. The Stanford Training Area in Norfolk is heavily utilised already, as are the training areas on Salisbury plain and Otterburn.

 

The other planned force reductions will no doubt throw up some accommodation for the returning troops, but bringing them back will take a while.

 

Whichever area gets the returning troops will receive a fairly hefty boost to the local economy. - 23000 troops + families + support personnel would probably boost the receiving economy by in excess of £1 Billion a year.

 

Yorkshire could do quite well out of that, given that there may be one or two Air Force stations in the Vale of York up for grabs.

[Phanerothyme]

They might all end up at Lossiemouth. I'm sure it's lovely!

[Nagel]

The 43,000 figure I got from the Radio 4 PM programme. They said the full withdrawal of UK troops from Germany would be complete by 2020 and that the cost of withdrawal is estimated to be £800 million.

 

I wonder if the US is also planning on pulling out? They have the old SS R&R barracks near Berchtesgarten in Bavaria where Hitler had his summer residence.

[Rupert_Baehr]

 

I wonder if the US is also planning on pulling out? They have the old SS R&R barracks near Berchtesgarten in Bavaria where Hitler had his summer residence.

 

Yes they are.

No they don't

No he didn't.

 

In reverse order: The Kehlsteinhaus (Eagle's Nest) was built by Martin Bormann and given as a present by the State to Hitler on his 50th birthday. It was hardly his 'summer residence' - in fact, he only visited the place about 10 times and the average stay was 30 minutes. (Which is probably why it wasn't demolished at the end of the war.) It's now a privately-owned restaurant and is NOT a museum.

 

The Americans did have an R&R centre at Chiemsee (about 50 miles away) but that closed some years go. They now only have one R&R centre in Germany, the Edelweiß hotel and campground in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. I don't suppose that will close anytime soon, because it's on the same site as the School for Security Studies at the Marshall Center. (Which will be around for the forseeable future.)

 

They are reducing force levels in Germany considerably (the plan was formulated by Gen Jones when he was SACEUR In about 2004.) Under that plan, US forces in Germany are to be reduced by about 60,000 people (with a similar reduction of force in South Korea.) A number of installations have already closed, but the drawdown has slowed down - The plan involves co-locating some units and returning others to the US. In each case, the planners appear to have overlooked the cost (and time) to construct facilities for the people who are being moved.

 

The American Base at Rhein-Main was due to close in 1996. It did close. In 2006.

 

In 2004, the Americans told the locals that they would be pulling most of their forces out of Heidelberg by 2011. Don't hold your breath. They're not leaving anytime soon.

[mj.scuba]

I think it would be nice to keep one flying, just like the Vulcan. I'd even like to see Concorde in flight again, in the economic circumstances that's probably never going to happen.

 

Sorry to say I don't think the MOD/RAF should have invested in the Nimrod upgrade, should have gone for a new fleet of something like the P3 Orion or a conversion of a civilian aircraft like they have done with the ASTOR. I bet they could even task a drone to do a similar job.

[hitch_1980]

They might all end up at Lossiemouth. I'm sure it's lovely!

 

You may be closer to the truth than you think

[hitch_1980]

I think it would be nice to keep one flying, just like the Vulcan. I'd even like to see Concorde in flight again, in the economic circumstances that's probably never going to happen.

 

Sorry to say I don't think the MOD/RAF should have invested in the Nimrod upgrade, should have gone for a new fleet of something like the P3 Orion or a conversion of a civilian aircraft like they have done with the ASTOR. I bet they could even task a drone to do a similar job.

 

I believe they may be going for more un-manned aircraft.

[Phanerothyme]

You may be closer to the truth than you think

I heard it on the Radio, so it must be true.

 

 

Aircraft pilots are slowly becoming obsolete.

[CNCskilled]

I think a lot of people are missing the point here.

We are not talking about the old Nimrod fleet but the new project that is 90% complete which the taxpayer has already paid for to the tune of £3Billion.

One of the planes has already been delivered and another six are almost complete.

So what are we going to do with them now? store them in a hanger to rot? What a bewildering decision to axe it. Below is Robert Pestons blog entry on the matter...

 

Now you might assume that the cancellation of the Nimrod MRA4 programme, as announced by the prime minister, might be painful for BAE.

 

But what I see at BAE is mild bemusement rather than tears.

 

The point is that after eight years of delays and 200% inflation in the cost of each aircraft, the diminished fleet of nine reconnaissance aeroplanes is almost complete, at a cost to the taxpayer of more than £3bn.

 

As I understand it, one plane has already been handed over and another six are almost completed. Work on the programme is about 90% completed.

 

There will be a cost to BAE, in that it would have received a contract to maintain the aircraft once it entered service. So a limited number of jobs at BAE that would have been created will now disappear.

 

But BAE has been paid to build this aeronautical white elephant - a kind of hi-tech Dumbo - which is the big bit of the contract.

 

If the plane is finished, why on earth is it being ditched by the government?

 

Well apparently there will be useful savings in running costs. I'll let you know how much, when I can quantify that saving.

 

So what will happen to these unbelievably wizzy reconnaissance and intelligence-gathering planes, which are equipped with more than 90 antennae and sensors and can scan an area the size of the UK for military threats every 10 seconds?

 

The MoD will take delivery of them. But officials say that they haven't yet decided what their fate will then be.

 

The Nimrods could be dismantled, or put in storage (they'd need a pretty big shoe-box).

 

And I suppose they could be sold - although I am told that's unlikely, because they were designed with the UK's particular defence needs in mind, especially its idiosyncratic nuclear submarine fleet.

 

That said, if you have a few billion squids lying around, and you fancy the latest in aeronautical cloaking and monitoring technology, I know a prime minister who might well be open to offers.