The UK Armed Forces currently have a combined full-time trained strength of 127,036 personnel, according to the latest data from the Ministry of Defence.
In response to a written question from Carla Lockhart MP of the Democratic Unionist Party, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence Luke Pollard directed attention to the most recent personnel statistics, published on the government’s website.
Breakdown of Active Service Personnel
As of 1 January 2025, the UK Armed Forces’ Full-Time Trained Strength (FTTS) across all branches stood as follows:
- Royal Navy & Royal Marines: 28,085 personnel
- Army: 71,151 personnel
- Royal Air Force: 27,800 personnel
- Total Armed Forces: 127,036 personnel
These figures represent the number of fully trained and operational personnel available for deployment.
Reserve Forces Strength
Alongside full-time personnel, the UK’s reserve forces play a crucial role in national defence. According to the Ministry of Defence, the Trained Future Reserves 2020 Strength (FR20) numbers stand at:
- Total Reserves: 29,265 personnel
- Maritime Reserve: 2,610 personnel
- Army Reserve: 23,897 personnel
- Royal Air Force Reserve: 2,758 personnel
The latest personnel figures come as the UK Armed Forces continue efforts to modernise and address recruitment challenges. The Army has recently been working to stabilise numbers, while the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force are investing in new capabilities to maintain operational readiness.
The Ministry of Defence regularly reviews personnel levels, ensuring the UK remains prepared for emerging threats while meeting international commitments. These figures are updated quarterly and can be accessed via the government’s official statistics page.
When I joined in 1983 the RAF was around 88,000. How times have changed.
When I joined the army in 1975, Regs were 180,000 strong of which 55,000 were in West Germany, 5,000 were in Berlin, about 15,000 in N. Ireland. TA was about 60,000. Things have certainly changed.
Start your dream career from the comfort of your home today! No experience or special skills needed—just a strong drive and willingness to learn. Get paid weekly or monthly, based on your preference, and enjoy the freedom to work on your own terms. Take the first step towards a brighter
future now!…… 𝐖𝐰𝐰.𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐢𝐭𝟏.𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞/
Start your dream career from the comfort of your home today! No experience or special skills needed—just a strong drive and willingness to learn. Get paid weekly or monthly, based on your preference, and enjoy the freedom to work on your own terms. Take the first step towards a brighter
future now!…… 𝐖𝐰𝐰.𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐢𝐭𝟏.𝐨𝐧𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞/
I know a guy in the reserves who has done virtually no training for the past year. He lives in Northern Ireland. He told me he has done some training via zoom but no physical training, ie ranges etc.
The real figure will be around 68k-69k once the Med Discharges/CDTs/NTTs filter through by the end of the year.
You’re not taking into account the amount leaving under normal circumstances, as well as those that are joining. Although there are 14k ish leaving per year (army) with approx 11-12k joining. Our armed forces are screwed right now, and all of us worked to the bone with a lot of personnel doing multiple roles. It’s shocking.
J, good points. I think many also do not realise that around 30% of regular army personnel are not in the deployable Field Army… or that only about 25% of the Field Army is Infantry, the corner-stone of the army.
I think you spelt Andorra wrong.
The numbers are stark. How the mighty have fallen.
Well none of you lot will join up for a country you hate. So we gave.to rely on lazy white dudes who can’t be bothered either. If I were PM you’d all being serving two tears in the military!
3
To be fair the harassment that ex-service men have experienced post career by the ambulance chasing lawyers did great damage to recruitment. This has been caused by applying human rights laws to theatres of war (and even worse applying these ideas retrospectively which frankly is illegal). Moreover, the fact the UK is being invaded on a daily basis, and the country has gone to the dogs, has also made people ask the question why would you fight for our current career politicians? Morality has left this country and any semblance of a Christian nation is disparaged in the press and by our politicians. The left (Labour and Liberals) and those masquerading as the right (Tories) have done great damage to the country. I was born in the 1970s and we had a nation you could by-and-large be proud of coming from. Today I’m frustrated as are many about the state of this once great nation brought low by the sociopaths and psychopaths in our parliament. Ergo why fight for these charlatans when their own sons and daughters wouldn’t…. Conscription is for the birds as well…I know it has been suggested but it is completely unworkable. I always wondered what the end of nation looks like and what we are seeing is a slow motion car crash which is this nation.
Spot on. Who would be willing to fight for Stammer…….join the military and be sold down the river by weak career generals/air marshals and admirals. A once fine military gone to the dogs…
100% agree, when I went in in 1982 it really was a thing of pride and we had a nation, not a giant refugee camp
Matthew…..We have only ever initiated conscription at the at the start of or during a World War.
I think you have misunderstood my post. It was more broadly about what inhibits recruitment and I outlined the two major reasons (all linked to the failure of the three main political parties). The end two sentences relate to an article I read about Mike Martin (Liberal Democrats) talking about conscription in the event of a war with Russia. He may think they can conscript British people in event of our politicians going to war with Russia but the British people will not put up for it. I’m sorry to say but the Russian’s are not my enemy or something we in Britain should worry about. However, the regular military age invaders on our beaches are something we should worry about. I know I’m in the vast majority of people when I say we feel sorry for the Ukrainians but it is not our fight. We have our own problems that we are grappling with such as terrorism and a sinking economy caused by the Tories and compounded by Labour. More broadly, it does show that Ukraine was wrong to give up their nuclear weapons…much like most left wing people want us to give up nuclear weapons.
Matthew showing some true colours, oh well. I’ll be charitable for once and simply point out there have always been cowards and draft dodgers like you Matthew, it’s never gotten in the way of conscription when there was a war.
When you say “you lot” exactly who are you referring to?
Well no-one would do it , you are right though , I hate this country , I would never fight for this country as it is , take your immigrants and make them soldiers , unless they deport all illegals or constript them my and my boys are going nowhere , put me in prison I don’t care , they took my patriotism away when they gave our country away and turned people like me into 3rd rate citizens!!!
How can Gov even talk about deployments to Ukraine? They must be living in the past glory days!
Jack. True. Starmer clearly has no idea how small the army is. If the UK were to deploy a ‘peacekeeping’ force of armoured/mechanised elements for an enduring operation in Ukraine, then we could not deliver a regular army brigade group. It would have to just be a BG…and even then we would have to seriously debate whether we could also do the Op Cabrit task in Estonia simultaneously, or would have to cancel it.
Israel has a pupulation of about 7million, their defence budget in 2023 was roughly $25bn. For that the Israeli taxpayer gets 170,000 active personnel, 465,000 trained reservists, 2250 tanks, 530 artillery guns of 155mm and above, 340 combat aircraft, 150 attack helicopters, 5 submarines, 50 patrol and coastal ships and a highly effective air defence system based around their outstanding Iron Dome system
As a result the Israelis regularly wipe the floor with their adversaries.
The UK spent $68bn on defence in 2023. For that we have about 50 combat ready Challenger II tanks, about 100 guns, 50 attack helicopters, 30 combat ready Typhoon jets (and those without the latest radars), 25 F35b warplanes (with pilots in training) and roughly 14 frigates and destroyers – plus the carriers – which cannot operate without US Navy/Marines support. We also have six Astute subs with one in build – however only two or three are at sea at any one time due to shortages of RN sailors. And no homeland air defence system whatsoever.
We do, however have 65,000 MoD civil servants – only slightly less than the Army at 75,000. Clearly, our defence system needs root and branch reform to give us more bang for our buck
Israel spends over 5% of it GDP on defence ( and gets a big chuck of aid from the US) It would also seems that the avg Israeli army wage is USD35000 which is quite likely lower than the UK
Israel is a special case. They are living in constant existential crisis, and that shows on the general population. I was lucky to live there for 5 years in the early 2000s, talked about this a lot. The level of militarism and sense of duty/purpose to defend the homeland is trained into them from a very early age, in a debt that would be unacceptabe in the UK/West. The readines is almost manic. For example, an active duty soldier, on leave from the army, in civian clothes, carries his or her assault rifle with live ammo everywhere. Restaurant, pub, beach, shopping mall, playground, funfair, bus/train ride, you name it. It’s everywhere, it’s the norm. Try to imagine an average British teenager on leave, in the pub with his/her mates on a saturday night with an assault rifle and a few dozen rounds of live ammo!
On the finances, as it has been mentioned, the level of US aid is probably eyewatering in reality. But do remember why they are getting that money for! Israel are the lightning rod for the US in the Middle East, and they know it. They are the chewy toy, tossed on the front of the Islamist extremists to keep them busy and distracted from the West/US. And Israel doing a great a job trimming them regularly, and soaking up damage and walking it off in ways that unimaginable in the West.
We could talk hours about how an entire society can be kept in the constant state of preparednes from active military personnel, through actually trained and equipped resevist all the way to working, prepared civil defense. The level of discipline required would be a non starter for the British society. Or anywhere in Europe.
If the USA would donate 10x (roughly the additional size of UK population compared to Israel) of what it donates to Israel for military aid to the UK then we could definitely scale up our numbers!
u gotta be shitting me not enough sailors haha 😆 i tried to rejoin the military after leaving maybe theyll let me join to be a submariner always wanted to do that and pilots id give my right hand to of had the chance to fly jets i remember being told we were lucky to even have a herc to parachute from at brize 1 aircraft lol
The defence review needs a stepwise approach, rather than merely ordaining how things are going to be like previous ones.
We know budget will grow but won’t be hugely generous to start, so setting milestones like filling current capability gaps and starting to grow the regulars and reserv s should be the initial goal, inc more munitions and training facilities.
Later stages could add or increase capabilities (e.g. new or more platforms) and further grow the numbers to the overall end state.
I believe the Gurkhas are not included in these figures. They are of increasing importance and more sub units are being formed.
A small crumb of comfort mate….
Question: Isn’t there talk of a new Gurkha artillery regiment being formed?? and does that mean that more Gurkhas will be inducted into the army??
Yes, I mentioned that here the other week.
Apparently, it will not be a formed Regiment that is self contained. Rather, it will be like the QGS and QGE, with Batteries split between 1 RHA, 4 RA, and 19 RA. Not with Guns, but as TAC Gp Battery.
Yes, I think Gurkha posts will increase. As long as they do not cut corners on the suitability.
Meanwhile we lose tens of thousands of recruits just by not calling them back for 6+ months.
Gurkhas aren’t cheaper than UK sourced troops, they also aren’t, despite the stories, superhuman and any that decide to settle it’s extra homes, hospital places etc needed (which if they serve they deserve).
An increase in Gurkhas if absolutely needed (no one’s signing up or meeting requirement) fine, just to hide gaps because of the Army/Capita/MODs utter failures in recruitment is another. Same with “Commonwealth” recruiting.
Just shocking numbers. About a year ago, I predicted the numbers falling to between 60/65,000 by 2030, without a fairly prompt change, that’s exactly where we are going to be.
Regulars and reserve together are less than 100,000!!!
Sobering stuff, we are reaching an ineffectual point, talk of deploying a ‘full fat’ War fighting Division is now just laughable, unless it was a general war situation.
We will struggle to deploy and maintain a large Brigade level deployment now.
John, I think we could deploy 3(UK) Div, our ‘warfighting’ div in terms of manpower. Where certain units are understrength, the army is a past master at ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ by and moving people in from elsewhere. It has always had to master this dubious art. Some other commitments may have to be dropped, possibly.
The biggest issue is kit, meaning platforms. There are many capability gaps and shortfalls, especially but not limited to 155mm artillery.
Another issue is the size of stocks, of ammunition, missiles and spares etc. Some former senior officers talked last year of certain stocks only likely to last for 2 or so weeks in intense peer-peer warfare.
Nothing will change. All bluster from govt. No interest in defence only in paying benefits of all kind and supporting the beloved NHS which is a bottomless pit regarding money. Here in wales , our government has ruled for 27 years and the state of public services and nhs are a complete joke. Joe public takes no interest in what’s going on.
The whole mindset of the UK has changed unfortunately. From mass migration with new ethnic populations with zero interest in uk affairs . A whole young generation been bought up on the negatives of Royalty and Britain’s illustrious past , with the BBC constantly apologising for uk past history when in reality we should be proud of our history. A benefit culture mindset . It’s going to take a concerted effort with a dollop of nationalism to get all of UK regardless of race religion thinking in the same direction which is self preservation .
That about sums it up…a nation living in the past.
Rob, I think very few these days ‘live in the past’. Certainly none of today’s politicians.
Utter nonsense ok 👌 Who are you to know that ? You forgot Cyprus ,,Gibraltar,,etc etc UK troops ? You counted them all in UK yes ? Must of been hard! Get real ok 👌 Stop your lies and mega nonsense ok 👌 A Clarke ,,a ex forces veteran ok 👌
Alan, who is your comment aimed at? It would help if you prefaced your comment with the name of the addressee.
And yet these clown politicians still don’t get it.
Military service risks becoming a dangerous hobby rather than offering a credible defence force for Britain
When I joined the RN 28.ooo were those numbers in shore bases including HK Gib Malta Bermuda. There was 100.000 including Booties And Kaiser Starmer better put his big boy pants on and get people too join on merit not DEI get the best not the box tickers. .If you employ the best they are those who will do their time
It’s called free NHS
Shouldn’t have tried saving money by laying off all the people with years of experience because they chose the wrong pension plan!
You made your bed, unfortunately it’s the nation in general that has to lay in that massive swamp patch!
The traditional recruitment model might have to change for the less physical roles. Instead of the usual join at 18-20 and maybe do until 40yrs old. The mid age jobs – those 25-35ish could be recruited but employed maybe more like a traditional civvy job. Loads of role that don’t need the fitness of youth in the RAF/Navy especially.
16-20 years old seem to be trying to join. Waiting 12+ months in limbo changes focus and is enough time to settle into an entirely different life path.
The model does have to change, 3 meals a day and a shower with the possibility of travel is no longer a huge selling point, it’s accesible to someone on the dole living with parents. World travel is within reach of someone with a part-time tesco job.
You do know that the army doesn’t just recruit 18-20 year olds right? Recruitment into the Regulars as an OR is available until the age of 36, and as a Reservist OR until the Age of 42. And that’s regardless of job role.
Well yes . Ukraine is a great example of conscription soldiers in their 50s and not conscripting anyone untill after University age . And they have done pretty well with a middle age army
Old blokes can be tough plus we have the years of experience to fall back upon. Ask a youth to dig a fox hole then ask a man in his 50s. The one the man in his 50s builds will be bombproof and comfortable.
When you see the corruption in politics, the destruction of our society, what are you fighting to defend??? and when it comes to Ukraine..what have they ever done for the UK??..let the EU defend them ..
Look in you local grave yrd and check your facfs
Exactly
What a ridiculously small number for a country that is 5/6 largest economy in the world and has circa 67 million people.
We need to follow France’s example and double our military by 2030.
You’ve said this several times but I’ve not been able to verify it anywhere. I’ve seen some vague reports of them seeking to double spending or double the number of reservists, but not double the size of their military (which you’ve stated in various forms across several articles).
Can you provide a source for this?
Bring back national service, get the young and restless off the streets and something to focus on. teach them respect and discipline.
Bolster our armed forces to somewhere it once was.
Stop the free handouts and we would have more money in the pot for the pensioners,NHS, armed forces.
Need I say more.
Well said. That’s exactly what we should be doing!
And how many are actually fit and ready to deploy? Less than half I’d wager, and that’s coming from an Army unit where I’m in the 1/3 of fully fit and deployable personnel – scary. And I leave for good in May.
DandD, that figure shocks me. Why is only one third of your unit deployable?
Albeit a minor unit – physical, mental and welfare related. Broken old boys, troubled and without incentive newer personnel and those generally unfit. Although I can only speak regarding my very small corner of the army, having seen the fitness statistics we are the unfittest we’ve ever been and I would still take a bet that only around 1/3 of the Army wide are truly physically fit. Just my two pence.
I am really shocked by these figures, how can the English send thousands of men to Ukraine with so few soldiers, if they want to send 15,000 permanent men, there are 15,000 for training and 15,000 for rest, so if we add it up, there are 45,000 men for an operation to go well…. that’s 1/3 of the British army!
No it’s worse than that. It’s the majority of the available army and a third of all our armed forces personnel. Shocking state of affairs
There is a name for it. GRANDSTANDING.
Well first change The education system on food an fitness, make a youth fitter and more likely want to joint up and then sort the boats ie stay helping get ashore.
Who in their right mind would want to fight for this country now.
Always amazed that the Brigade of Gurkas are not included in the British Army count of personnel, even if they had a separate column at least it would give a more realistic number of actual soldiers in the Army. It’s like 1 Para, who don’t seem to exist anymore because of their “special role”.
It has always been the case that the Ghurkas were counted seperately. I guessed it was because they are not fully usable across the full spectrum of military operations ie Ghurkas did not serve on Op Banner.
There are more illegal migrant fighting age males in the UK than in the Armed Forces.
Let’s hope no hostile nation decides to smuggle guns and ammunition in through ports where these fekkers have been given work placements eh.
Then we’ll deffo be trouble
Agree this is a serious strategic issue and a huge problem of mass migration .
There seems no pride in our country because of our governments.destroying our way of life seeming not to care about THE BRITISH PEOPLE. all starmer goes on about is ukraine.hes obsessed,as if we dont exist.As someone who was married to RM commando twice.1 who did tours of NI in the 1970s troubles and another who was in Iraq in the 1990s.who where thrown on the scrapeheap..WHY would he try to send soldiers to most certain death…HE has no idea..
There is indeed a minoriy we should be worried about. They infest every public forum and, regardless what the subject is, chunter on about ‘immigrants’, which is usually their code-speak for non whites, and how the country has gone to the dogs under Labour, which has not been in power for 14 years and is just getting its feet under the desk. They swamp the btl forums on the Telegraph, Mail, Mirror etc and seem to be out in force here today.
It is an agotprop lobby left by supporters of one political party. It is as pervasive as Russian bots and should carry a health warning.
Their stuff has virtually f-all to do with defence.
The armed forces establishment levels (the numbers sought, authorised and budgeted for) total 137,000. That figure includes the 4,500 Ghurkas. What Pollard’s figures show is that we are understrength by 5,464. [RAF 2,200, RN 1,915, Army 1,349].
We know that the biggest single problem is outsourced recruitment for the army, where literally thousands of keen young applicants give up, because it takes months and months to get through Capita’s bureaucratic, labyrinthine online process. I gather the other two services largely do their own recruiting. It’s no surprise that recruiting is now hard work – so many have been pushed out of the forces by successive rounds of cuts, while far too little has been done to improve service accommodation and pay levels, while opportunities for operations, travel, adventure training etc have been scaled right back to save money. Not many of those made redundant over the years are going to.encourage their offspring into a military career.
I get the impression that HMG and MOD turn the recruitment tap down to free-up money for the equipment budget, such as the General’s ‘three times more lethal’ nonsense. Whatever, our armed forces are far too small.
To be of much use, we need to increase MASS before rushing off to spend the cash on the MOD’ latest equipment fad.
We should be looking at an immediate boost in service numbers viz
Army: + 9,000 (12.5%)
RAF: + 2,500 (8%)
RN: +2,500 (8%)
together an increase of 10% over current establishment numbers. That is just the immediate increase needed now, but practically over the next 2-3 years.
A lot of work will be needed to fix the recruitment pipeline and this is the urgent first priority.
Much more needs done to rebuild the voluntary reserve to more useful numbers. That is a separate post for another day.
only been in .
I was thinking much the same thing Cripes. The tune hasn’t changed since the 1930’s sadly.
An uplift in numbers across the board will be the litmus test for the forthcoming SDR but I fear more marketing speak, lots of talk about future platforms and a very small increase in the Army as an aspiration. I am sure this will have Putin quacking in his boots and allow the man across the pond to further distance himself from the European basket case.
The stakes are very high.
@cripes, I don’t know how old you are but issues with the levels of immigration did not become a mainstream concern until the mass immigration of the Blair years, when there was a concerted effort to rub the rights nose in it.
The current unprecedented levels of immigration continued and made worse by the Tories are unsustainable with public services, infrastructure and housing at crisis point. They artificially push up our GDP but overall GDP per capita is going down.
We have a demographic problem like the rest of the western world but after 25 years of mass immigration the U.K. economy is in a worse shape than before it started but HM Treasury still promote it.
It is a giant Ponzi scheme with many low skilled and low paid economic migrants stifling the need for innovation to improve productivity, which the country desperately needs. Theses individuals with their families will not be net contributors to the U.K. economy in their lifetime.
That out of this influx some fail to integrate and others have hostile intent only makes things worse. I will assume you like me have not lost a love one or friend to a home grown terrorists but the impact must be devastating and it didn’t exist before the turn of the century. (The troubles cannot be considered to be comparable).
I never intend to vote for Reform and have never done so but sadly the mainstream parties have lost the trust of a large part of the population and for many good reasons.
It isn’t just me as I have some good ethnic minority friends and they think the same way about it needing to be dramatically curtailed.
I try and read from as many sources as I can and reconcile myself to thinking, if my views are somewhat left of the Mail and right of the Guardian I am probably still fairly middle of the road.
But please don’t confuse a real concern about the levels of immigration fundamentally changing the country for no discernible benefit, a view thought by many (but too scared to openly express) and the racist bile espoused by a few. They are not the same.
That is a perfectly valid point of view that could be debated at length sjb. Others might argue that the vast majority of immigrants are – rightly or wrongly – needed to pay for our universities or wanted by business for skills or low-paid labour or to staff the NHS and care services. The number of illegals, which we are trying to crack down on, constitute a relatively small part of the total and the stuff about ‘the enemy within’ is greatly exagerrated.
But this is a defence forum and, unless anyone is proposing to send the Ghurkas back to Nepal, views about immigration really have sod all to do with.defence. if we ever have to introduce conscription, British-born non whites and first generation immigrants will be pounding the parade square along with the rest of us.
Thank you for your response. I might have a different perspective about immigration but I share your frustration about the quality of the debate, which seems to have been captured by the extremists from both left and right.
To get back to defence matters I hope your increase in personnel numbers becomes reality but I fear the defence training establishment has also shrunk to where we might need to address infrastructure upgrades and enlargement including for accommodation before any real uplift can be considered.
I think a concerted ten year plan agreed by a cross party convention is required to reflect the national importance of the endeavour is needed. That’s means the main parties coming together and acting like grown ups. Are they capable of this type of thing?
My position exactly. Very well said sjb.
Cripes, Need to incentivise. Yes up the recruiting and sort out the timescales for such. The forces are not massive, radical idea…….on joining you are tax free, that tax however is automatically placed into secured acct for you and will build up. Flog the arse off advertising the good elements of service will bring you, skill sets , trg etc. Whilst you are in and gaining experience etc you will be building up a nest egg that is released on leaving which will help with getting your feet on the ground. God knows how anyone can get on the housing market nowadays.( Should not be beyond the realms of man that the fund generated should not be invested and gain additional income for each individual similar to folks buying units into investments) Most nowadays are incredibly material so money talks. Taking the size of the forces involved and the varied timescales folks serve, the loss on tax take should not be that massive. A nasty note, if you did get slotted it goes to next of kin along with any other “normal” pay out as exists. And above all, keep the jingoism down with the advertising as it just does not compute with them, you can hit them with that when doing the inculcation into service. In addition no lies or bull.
How true all above input , regrettably this Country is facing a similar situation that it faced prior to the 2nd WW which would ultimately lead to one this Country’s greatest capitulations on the beaches of Dunkirk but miraculously that defeat would lead to Victory with the involvement of ‘The Little /ordinary/working class Men and Women ‘ who would form ‘The Little Boats Flotilla ‘ and by their actions would become known as ‘The Bulldog Spirit ‘ today however I as many before me have expressed I have to say with heavy heart you could and possibly are correct that this once proud Nation does not have the necessary leadership qualifications required to sort this unholy mess out .
Holy Chat GPT generated dross.
“Capitulation on the beaches of Dunkirk” yeah someone is clearly using big words they don’t understand. (Also the Little Boats Flotilla? Yeah those where manned by Royal Navy crews, not the “ordinary/working class men and women”)
I think the state whch the British Armed Forces have been allowed to deteriorate to is so appalling that we’re going to need some sort of intervention to publically reveal why this occurred, place blame on the individuals responsible and put measures in place to prevent it happening again. I want to see Cameron, Osbourne and Hammond dragged infront of a public enquiry, be embaressed and watch their reputations burn. We need a political morality tale to ensure this doesnt happen again.
And Blair. And Brown. And Major.
This started from 1995.
The British army is rubbish now 1 royal Anglia the Vikings
When I was in they were just bullying everyone they could
Heard many of my brothers have taken there lives due to the unprofessional harshly act of the British army
Weird thing about the army I started drugs cocaine in the army
Have no respect for the army
Now iv been told you get 2 chances of getting caught with drugs in your system due to everyone leaving the shit leadership ….not aimed at any CO
Sure thing Walter.
Doesn’t the AGS ETS teach recruits to use full stops?
Compared to Russia with about one million active-duty personnel and close to two million reservists we are sitting ducks 🦆 in the UK.
REALLY need 2 yrs National Service for 16+ year olds. It would teach them team work, respect for others and self, discipline AND pride in our country once more with a view to serving, I’ll say that again SERVING their own country and citizens as a solid foundation for their lives. Everything went down hill when the Government chose to do away with discipline. Without fair leadership, appropriate male and female roles, kids and teenagers so many run riot and wreck their lives now before they are adults.
Instate 2 yrs National Service for UK 16+ year olds please Starmer, you’ll save thousands of lives!
Are we? Are we really? Because last I checked we were in NATO, and even without the US, European NATO has about 2 million active duty personnel, and if you want to start factoring in Reserves and Paramilitaries, then the difference is even more stark.
And then there’s this stupid idea of national service. No. First of all there’s nothing that would be gained by taking 16-18 year olds out of school and out of the workforce to sit in a barracks for a few months. British forces need to be expeditionary, and large conscript armies are generally not. Nor do the armed forces want to have to churn through conscripts being forced into jobs they are only too keen to leave… oh wait I just noticed t he sexist “male and female roles” comment. If you want to strip women of their rights: move to Saudi Arabia.
Matthew, Your post March 16th, 1738 had no reply button, hence my answer here.
We would only conscript in the event of a word war. You say the British people would not put up with it, but the British people put up with much curtailment of freedoms in the Covid era. If the law set up conscription because a world war was coming…or had started, the people would have to comply. There are no examples of mass non-compliance with the law in this country.
You think that the Russian’s are not your enemy or ‘not something we in Britain should worry about’. Well, we are in NATO which is a collective deterrence and defence organisation. Our NATO remit extends from Russia’s western border with Europe to the western seaboard of the US and Canada. Believe it or not. Russia threatens Europe, very clearly. We should be concerned at any Russian attack on Europe (they have committed assassinations (actual and attempted) in the UK with chemical agents and carried out cyber warfare on an industrial scale. Many claim they have interfered with elections in the UK and USA).
They also initiated and constine to prosecute brutal war at the edge of the NATO area, in Europe. How can you not be bothered?
Your talk about the ‘regular military age invaders on our beaches’ is a whole different subject and one that has no bearing on HM Forces.