Military Resettlement, Business, Training & Recruitment
David Cameron pays tribute to soldiers killed by bomb in Helmand province and says effectiveness of armoured vehicles will be assessed
The US and Britain not only bathed Iraq in blood, they promoted a sectarian war that now threatens the region If anyone doubted what kind of Iraq has been bequeathed by a decade of US-sponsored occupation and war, today’s deadly sectarian bomb attacks around Baghdad against bus queues and markets should have set them straight. Ten years to the day after American and British troops launched an unprovoked attack on a false pretext – and more than a year since the last combat troops were withdrawn – the conflict they unleashed shows no sign of winding down. Civilians are still being killed at a rate of at least 4,000 a year, and police at about 1,000.
With army reservists set to fill gaps left by military cuts, it is time to seriously address their mental health needs The government plans to reduce the number of regulars in the British army to 82,000 by 2018 and increase the role played by reservists, bringing their numbers up to 30,000.
Both the defence and aid budgets are too narrowly defined. Military presence needs to be backed up by civil aid Whatever his motives, David Cameron’s plan to switch money assigned to the foreign aid budget to defence peacekeeping operations must be applauded.