Is the UK near an end as we know it? The writing may be on the wall

I think SUBMAN1 has it right. Guns (weapons systems of all sorts) or Butter (social welfare of all sorts). The current disparity in weapons development is a very good deal for the US and not such a good deal for other 'western' nations.

As an example, currently the Brits deploy Trident D-5 nuclear missles on its Vanguard class boomers. Fine and dandy, but the US retains all control over those missles. The UK in effect leases them, and perhaps cannot use them w/out US permission. There is no transfer of technology nor a homegrown technology base to manufacture or maintain a submarine deterent.

I'm sure this is good for Britain b/c no R&D nor expensive construction or MX costs allow for more social programs which further makes it citizens reliant on the government for their lives.

I used Britain as an example but many of the western democracies work on the same paradigm.

[Oberon]

Bradclark and Xabba are spot on, it's the fact that for the first time in ages Europe is pretty much at peace, aside from terrorist strikes which you can't really fight properly with a standard organised military, Europe has nothing to worry about, Russia is rattling its sabre but hasn't tried reforming the USSR yet, Germany isn't suddenly building up a military machine, France isn't readying a large navy to take over the seas. To the average Joe in the streets, Iran and North Korea are the other side of the world and thus not a threat to mainland UK. The NHS is sucking in funds and creating MRSA, most of central England is a lake, and there's corruption and scandal wherever you turn...

Now imagine that Brown announces he's going to put more money into the military by taking funding from something like...I dunno, public transport, or the multi-million pound draining NHS, can you imagine the headlines? The press would have a field day, and heads would roll quicker than you can say 're-election', just look at all the hoo-haa created over the Trident Replacement scheme. If the threat is not on the doorstep, Britain won't arm itself against it, as I said once before in a post about the new Astute class, we can make excellant machinery, you only have to look at the Astute and Type 45 to realise that...but we only do so under pressure, and since the end of the Cold War, that pressure has evapourated. People just don't see any threat any more.

Just because a threat isn't visible...doesn't mean it's not there, or won't rear its ugly head in the future, that's a fact that many people out there on the street or in the government don't seem to realise.

If the world was a more peaceful place then I'd be the first to advocate disarmament...but the world isn't any more peaceful today than it was fifty years ago, and as a saying goes...those who beat their swords into ploughshares shall be ruled by those who don't...

[mbthegreat]

we can kill foreigners or we can look after our own sick/poor/needy

I'll go with the latter thanks