The Ten Guilty Men

Senior RAF officers were urged to resign last night after a damning independent review of the Nimrod disaster over Afghanistan three years ago found it was 'entirely preventable'.

The report named 10 top brass and defence industry chiefs -some of whom have already retired - as personally to blame for events leading up to the fire and explosion that destroyed flight XV230 and killed all on board.

Review chairman Charles Haddon-Cave QC criticised the people involved at every level in keeping the ageing surveillance planes in the air and accused the Ministry of Defence of sacrificing safety for cost cuts. He said a review of the Nimrod fleet had been a 'lamentable job' that was 'riddled with errors' and failed to identify key dangers.

Fourteen servicemen (pictured above) died when XV230 crashed near Kandahar in September 2006 because, he said, of a "systemic breach" of the military covenant that require those expected to risk their lives for their country to be treated fairly.

He said financial cuts within the MoD in the wake of the 1998 strategic defence review - ultimately the responsibility of Gordon Brown who was chancellor at the time - had resulted in a cascade of organisational changes that led to 'a dilution of the airworthiness regime and culture within the MoD'.

He also turned on BAE Systems, saying Britain's leading defence manufacturer bore "substantial responsibility" for a safety case that was "poorly planned, poorly managed and poorly executed".

Mr Haddon-Cave also said defence firm QinetiQ bore a "share of responsibility" because it had been "fundamentally lax and compliant" in carrying out its role as independent adviser to the MoD.

Yet we continued to have Defence Secretaries insist the Nimrod was safe to fly after the crash, despite the coroner's call for the entire fleet to be grounded. Some RAF flying personnel decided to leave the service because it was well known the aircraft was not safe and they were also disgusted their bosses supported the government's lies.

QinetiQ was brought in to be a smokescreen for the MoD's cost cutting measures which Gordon Brown requested. They were the MoD's 'yes men' and were happy to be so as long as the cheques continued to flood in.

As yet I haven't read the review as it is several hundred pages long, but I certainly think the ten men, five from the MoD, three from BAE systems and two from QinetiQ, should be tried for manslaughter, but of course that will not happen.

Two of the named officers are still serving - Group Captain George Baber, now promoted to air commodore and Wing Commander Michael Eagles - although they have been moved to different posts. General Sir Sam Cowan and Air Chief Marshal Sir Malcolm Pledger have since retired.

Source: Times

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Most Expensive RAF Aircraft Ever Takes to the Skies

Now, I confess to knowing nothing about RAF hardware, but I thought this may interest those who do.

A painstakingly restored De Havilland Comet airliner outfitted as an anti-submarine patrol plane, has made its first flight.

The Nimrod MRA4 programme was initiated back in 1996 by TV presenter, one-time dirctor of BAE Systems and former New Statesman theatre critic Michael Portillo, who was defence minister at the time.

Under the original deal, BAE Systems would be paid a 'fixed' price of £2.2bn to rebuild, rearm and upgrade the RAF's fleet of 21 Nimrod MR2s, the last De Havilland Comet airframes left flying in the world, to the point where they would effectively be new aircraft. This would have meant a cost of just over £100m per plane.

As time went by (remember it is 13 years since the beginning of the project), it became clear that the price was not fixed and the MoD now estimates the programme's overall price tag as £3.6bn, an increase of more than two-thirds. The name was changed to Nimrod MRA4. In fact the situation is much worse than this as the number of planes has had to be slashed to prevent even worse cost overruns. The RAF will now receive just 9 aircraft instead of 21.

As a result the cost per plane has actually quadrupled: each MRA4 will now have cost the taxpayers £400m and this is without allowing for the fact that the original planes, supplied for upgrade by the government, had already cost a substantial sum.

This makes the Nimrod MRA4 not only the most expensive British military aircraft ever made but one of the most expensive aircraft in the world: you could buy a flooet of space shuttles or stealth bombers for the price the UK is paying to have restored 1950s vintage airliners.

Sensible or silly use of money? You choose.

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