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These guys managed it OK

HMS Sheffield - not a carrier
HMS Coventry - not a carrier
HMS Ardent - not a carrier
HMS Antelope - not a carrier
MV Atlantic Conveyer - not even a warship

Basically these were ships operating in reach of shore airbases without proper air defenses. Something a carrier is unlikely to do.

http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/3412C18F-3DDE-4C30-B469-03B8AB5BE7B8/0/boi_hms_ardent.pdf

If the government of the UK didn't believe the US is protecting you from anything, simply ask your government to not renew the status of forces agreement. Here is the agreement from your government Nato UK Safo.

If you don't like the UK government's policies stop blaming Americans.

Funny. I've never heard of the USAF being referred to as "the Thinkers". Sorry, but I have little use for the Air Force. Anything they can do, the Army and the Navy can do. The Air Force can make no such counterclaim. I have higher regard for the Royal Air Force. Those boys get down and dirty with their sister services. The Royal Air Force even has it's own infantry, capable of securing and defending a base in a forward operating area. http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafregiment/ The USAF relies on the departments of the Army and the Navy to do that for them. Phhht. Thinkers. Even if that were true, while they are busy thinking, Army, Navy, and Marine pilots are out there waging war.

Get back to me when the Air Force actually deploys a fleet of attack craft, capable of getting down in the mud, the blood, and the gore, where they can actually support the troops who will win (or lose) the war.

As a former USAF Security Specialist, I'd have to respectfully disagree with you.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/United_States_Air_Force_Security_Forces

Funny. I've never heard of the USAF being referred to as "the Thinkers". Sorry, but I have little use for the Air Force. Anything they can do, the Army and the Navy can do. The Air Force can make no such counterclaim. I have higher regard for the Royal Air Force. Those boys get down and dirty with their sister services. The Royal Air Force even has it's own infantry, capable of securing and defending a base in a forward operating area. http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafregiment/ The USAF relies on the departments of the Army and the Navy to do that for them. Phhht. Thinkers. Even if that were true, while they are busy thinking, Army, Navy, and Marine pilots are out there waging war.

Get back to me when the Air Force actually deploys a fleet of attack craft, capable of getting down in the mud, the blood, and the gore, where they can actually support the troops who will win (or lose) the war.

When I was in Iraq, the Air Force SPs were securing the perimeter of the base I was on (with the help of Contractors), and some of them were knocking on doors in the local town looking for bad guys. So I'd say that at least some can get down in the sand at least.

As for attack craft (I assume you mean ground attack aircraft); have you ever heard of the A-10?

Funny. I've never heard of the USAF being referred to as "the Thinkers". Sorry, but I have little use for the Air Force. Anything they can do, the Army and the Navy can do. The Air Force can make no such counterclaim. I have higher regard for the Royal Air Force. Those boys get down and dirty with their sister services. The Royal Air Force even has it's own infantry, capable of securing and defending a base in a forward operating area. http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafregiment/ The USAF relies on the departments of the Army and the Navy to do that for them. Phhht. Thinkers. Even if that were true, while they are busy thinking, Army, Navy, and Marine pilots are out there waging war.

Get back to me when the Air Force actually deploys a fleet of attack craft, capable of getting down in the mud, the blood, and the gore, where they can actually support the troops who will win (or lose) the war.

The military has a certain structure to make sure VERY large scale things remain coordinated - thus the associated bureaucracy. Sure, it'll take decades for the Defense Equipment and Support to clean up the mess in procurement, but let's assume for a moment they could and hit a more commercial frame of mind and speed.

They would still lose the battle.

The problem is in the way security is now managed. For the last 5 years, everyone has settled down into a fine routine of process, patching and playthings: the same kit (with more bells under the guise of "upgrades" to borrow several chapters from the MS book on how to milk customers) , formalised processes using standards and patching ad infinitum - I am positive that apart from EDLIN.exe and the background graphics, all other WinXP code in C:/WINDOWS has been replaced at least 10 times by now, judging by the size of downloads over the life of an installation.

We are losing the battle.

The reason goes back to something that especially the military ought to know: we have become predictable. Unless we change that, we have a problem that will only get worse.

Skynet went online on 1969. It continues to serve the UK military to this day. They're up to series 5, but it doesn't seem self-aware yet.

Note, this sounds very much like a follow on from the competition the MoD ran in 2008, focused on Afghanistan issues. £20m is chump change anyway. http://www.science.mod.uk/engagement/grand_challenge/grand_challenge.aspx

Please tell me then what the journalists know but the worlds best chemists don't.

Sidney Alford made the liquid bomb for the BBC that is in the video I already referenced He is a qualified explosives engineer, and the man behind explosives.net. He has a long history of contracting for governments and militaries in explosives technologies, including for the U.S. Army and for the Ministry of Defense in Afghanistan. Quoting from that article, "Staff Sergeant Snowy White, of the Royal Engineers Trials and Development Unit, described Sidney as a 'pure genius'". The MOD refer to him as an expert in IEDs.

So, a recognised and qualified expert in the IED field not only built a liquid bomb, but also detonated it inside a plane fuselage, filmed by the BBC. Such an attack may require a degree of skill and planning, but it is obviously possible.

eherr@quark:~$ HEAD http://royalnavy.mod.uk/
200 OK
Date: Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:51:01 GMT
Accept-Ranges: bytes
ETag: "0ee7b62b67dcb1:7904"
Server: Microsoft-IIS/6.0
Content-Length: 70
Content-Location: http://royalnavy.mod.uk/index.html
Content-Type: text/html
Last-Modified: Sat, 06 Nov 2010 13:27:40 GMT
Client-Date: Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:51:03 GMT
Client-Peer: 94.236.30.11:80
Client-Response-Num: 1
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET

eherr@quark:~$ HEAD http://royalnavy.mod.uk/
200 OK
Date: Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:51:01 GMT
Accept-Ranges: bytes
ETag: "0ee7b62b67dcb1:7904"
Server: Microsoft-IIS/6.0
Content-Length: 70
Content-Location: http://royalnavy.mod.uk/index.html
Content-Type: text/html
Last-Modified: Sat, 06 Nov 2010 13:27:40 GMT
Client-Date: Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:51:03 GMT
Client-Peer: 94.236.30.11:80
Client-Response-Num: 1
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET

Similar arguments were made by the Ptolemaic churches attempting to discredit Aristotle.

The UK acknowledges the phenomenon: Ministry of Defense
So does Mexico
oh, and so does the FBI
and the CIA.

UFO's are not just some hoojum bullshit. There is a serious phenomena of unexplained activity/objects, and rigorous scientific endeavor would get much more credibility if this area was at least explored from a rational and logical standpoint in educational institutions without all the hooting and hollering, even if what we discover is against our rational and logical assumptions.

and if your really interested, check out the NASA video of the STS-75 incident. Watch the video, and then read what NASA conveniently doesn't discuss.

The evidence for a foreign intelligence is here on earth. This evidence is overwhelming. Yes, there is no "hard evidence", but still: Everyone who has done deep *scientific* investigation of the UFO phenomenon won't deny the fact that there is a foreign intelligence on earth.

Documents

• Project Sign (USA, 1947–1949)
• 'Flying Saucer' Working Party part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6 (GB, 1950–1951)
• Project Blue Book (USA, 1951–1969)
• Condon Report (USA, 1969)
• Project Hessdalen 1984 - Final Technical Report (N, 1983)
• Project EMBLA: A Long-Term Scientific Survey of the Hessdalen Phenomenon. (I, 2004)
• Project Condign (GB, 1996–2000)
• Sturrock Panel Report (USA, 1997; PDF file; 572kB)
• COMETA Report part 1 / part 2 (F, 1999)
• Video: Press conference Disclosure Project“ (USA, 2001)
• Video: Press conference Neue Untersuchung des UFO Phänomens“ (USA, 2007)

If you haven't read those papers, please don't assert to know that UFOs (as in "foreign intelligence") don't exist.

There is already enough evidence for a foreign intelligence, here on earth. Yes, it is no so-called "hard evidence", but in its entirety the evidences are just overwhelming.

You want to see it? There you go:

But before you say that all UFOs can or could be explained as natural phenomenons or secret aircrafts or any other explanation besides a foreign intelligence, you really should read these documents. I don't know anybody who has read them and still says "UFOs (as in "foreign intelligence") are not real". Every person who did deep scientific investigation into the UFO phenomenon comes to the conclusion that there must be a foreign intelligence behind some of the mass of UFO cases.

Documents:

• Project Sign (USA, 1947–1949)
• 'Flying Saucer' Working Party Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6 (GB, 1950–1951)
• Project Blue Book (USA, 1951–1969)
• Condon Report (USA, 1969)
• Project Hessdalen 1984 - Final Technical Report (N, 1983)
• Project EMBLA: A Long-Term Scientific Survey of the Hessdalen Phenomenon. (I, 2004)
• Project Condign (GB, 1996–2000)
• Sturrock Panel Report (USA, 1997; PDF-Datei; 572kB)
• COMETA Report Part 1 / Part 2 (F, 1999)
• Video: Press conference Disclosure Project“ (USA, 2001)
• Video: Press conference Neue Untersuchung des UFO Phänomens“ (USA, 2007)

Archives and data bases

• The Roswell Files - page about Roswell with some government documents
• UFO Evidence - Collection of documents and articles
• The Prufos Police Database - database with UFO sightings of british police officers
• The Black Vault/UFOs – collection with the help of FOIA documents

Britain "definitely does not have a Ministry of Defense"??? How about a "Ministry of Defence", then? You're either spectacularly ignorant, or a nitpicking pedant. In either case, you're full of meadow muffins.

http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/home

"or surrounding it with appropriately weaponized sharks."

or defending it with other ISO containerized systems:

Super Sangar

http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/Templates/NewsArticle.aspx?NRMODE=Published&NRNODEGUID={8F432B04-D3C9-419E-8365-5204663E648C}&NRORIGINALURL=%2FDefenceInternet%2FDefenceNews%2FEquipmentAndLogistics%2FSecuritySurveillanceAndsuperSangars.htm&NRCACHEHINT=Guest

As you will note[1], becoming Skynet is so frigging unlikely and demanding that it will never happen.

No. Never.

Trident missiles are not rented, they're paid for. The warheads are british, and the decision to fire them is solely the decision of the Prime Minister, or the submarine captain in the event of complete loss of communication in the event of war - there is no US veto.

Go to www.mod.uk (British Ministry of Defence), search for HMNB Clyde, find the official web site of HMNB Clyde http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/server/show/nav.3157, click on "Location", then on "View map on multimap.com", change to aerial view, move some 1500 yards north to the submarine docks, zoom in . . . much better resolution than google maps. OK so there weren't any submarines there that day, doubtlessly GoogleSats try to fly overhead only when the subs are there? Shoddy sensationalist tabloid reporting at a shoddy sensationalist tabloid, now that's news for you.

Hmm yeah, that's some good secret-keeping going on there buddy

The link to the official report from British Ministry of Defence is: http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/FreedomOfInformation/PublicationScheme/SearchPublicationScheme/UnidentifiedAerialPhenomenauapInTheUkAirDefenceRegion.htm

UFOs are called 'UAP' (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) by the Brits, and to save you the trouble, it concludes that:

* "Aerial phenomena of the type consistent with those reported as UAP, and with exceptional characteristic, certainly exists ..."

but

* There is no evidence that the phenomena is anything but naturally occuring.

The first point is interesting, since it is the conclusion of many military reports (US, French COMETA, Soviet, Mexican, Brazilian...) published on the topic. It shifts the debate from whether UFO:s are real or not, to discussing what they might be.

//T

Update from MOD http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/DefenceNews/DefencePolicyAndBusiness/ModIssuesUpdateOnMissingEdsHardDisk.htm

Other countries manage to generate growth without being such warmongers. What is it with the US and this obsession with devising new and more efficient ways to wage war?

"Other countries"? Like who? The U.K.? The U.K. is the second-highest spender in terms of cash on defense in the entire world, second only to the United States. According the UK's Ministry of Defence, the FY 2008-09 budget for defense is £33.6 billion.

They are not a separate organisation, they are part of the Royal Navy. From their website:

Are the Royal Marines part of the Army?
No. The Royal Marines are an amphibious force and are therefore part of the Royal Navy.

"Of course Google is profiling what people do as they search, indexing everything is what they are about. The question is where this impacts on privacy and what limits we want to put on it."

*don's a decent sized tin foil hat*

There are no limits we can really put on it, the NSA is already sucking up the whole damn internet, ISP's are monitorign and recording you traffic and many I'm sure sell this data illegally to advertisers. There's taps on all the packets that go through the internet in different countries and different places, so trying to keep privacy on data without moving to something like Tor, etc, is not going to happen on how most of use the net today. The intelligence agencies of the world must be having a ball mining and capturing our packet data and reconstructing them into files on us using mathematical techniques to reconstruct what goes where, I'm sure this will get very good over time. Not to mention with the help of google, etc,

Copy that was temporarily put online:
http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/94A1F45E-A830-49DB-B319-DF68C28D561D/0/strat_trends_17mar07.pdf

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=2930944

This isn't terribly surprising. In the military you learn the principles of why things are seen. The entire concept is about understanding that perception is very much about expectation. For instance, one thing you're taught is that position has a lot to do with it. If you see a large object on a road, your brain will tend to see it as a vehicle, even if it's not. Similarly, you can open the door of your fridge and not "see" the ketchup on the shelf because you were expecting to find it in the door.

That name was already taken.

Thor, the very first US ballistic missile system, was deployed between 1959 and 1963 from bases in the UK. These were the days before intercontinental ballistic missiles. The missiles were controlled by the UK but the warheads were controlled by the US. A dual-key system was in place that required both UK and US authorisation to launch.

However, the situation has changed since the 1960s. The UK still leans heavily on the US for its nuclear capability, and today it uses Trident missiles which are shared with the USA in a common pool. However, the warheads on British subs are designed and built in the UK, and the UK has the ability to use its nuclear weapons completely independently of the US. The USA has not always been completely comfortable with that. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Trident_system http://www.mod.uk/NR/rdonlyres/E2054A40-7833-48EF-991C-7F48E05B2C9D/0/nuclear190705.pdf

So they translated it wrong to English too, it seems.

http://www.royal-navy.mod.uk/server/show/nav.1278

http://www.dict.pl/plen?word=Niezwyci%EA%BFony&lang=EN

??

CC.

Minor point: the airmen who were shot down and had the crap beaten out of them by the Saddam military during the 91 war were British. (Flying Tornados, in treetop-level bombing raids on heavily defended Iraqi airbases, so they were lucky to get out alive in the first place. Quite a few weren't so lucky.)

Since we all know /.'ers love digesting complex information and not taking data at second hand, I've included a link to the 106 page report:
Strategic Trends 2007

Elijah Chancey
www.elijahsadventure.com
nomadic IT consultant, bicycling across america
"all that you touch / and all that you see / is all that your life / will ever be"

I wouldn't say that the French are "the first country" to do this. The Brits seemed to have done something similar months ago by having the Ministry of Defense release all UFO reports it received from 2002-2006 under the Freedom of Information Act. Though I have no links to back me up, I believe Brazil has also freed up its UFO information, or at least is in the process of doing so.

Radon360 notes that France has become the first country to open its files on UFOs.

Because Radon360 is a twat.

May 2006:
http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/FreedomOfInforma tion/PublicationScheme/SearchPublicationScheme/Uni dentifiedAerialPhenomenauapInTheUkAirDefenceRegion .htm

These sort of collaborations need serious planning, and in the UK such projects are handled through the MoD DPA (Defense Procurement Agency). The model they work with is called IPT (Integrated Project Team) who handle such projects, and there are (AFAIK) quite a few that collaborate with the US on various things (the simplest example is the adoption of the DODAF framework into what they call MODAF).

Now, I have just one, very simple question:

Why the hell wasn't this requirement flagged up and secured at the very beginning of the project? The IPT leader for JSF should have his nuts removed for dropping such a major stitch, but I guess the real culprit has already silently wandered off in the 2 year rotation that people enjoy there.

Result: millions of UK Pounds of tax money at risk, and they're in no position to negotiate either - the US knows they've got their backs against the wall as there is no Plan B (despite what the politicians want - it takes years to get something like this off the ground).

The ability of people to walk off after 2 years without ever being held to account for cockups during their reign (however much later they emerge) is IMHO the single biggest risk to everything the MoD does, and it needs to be fixed. But I guess that would be rather painful politically. Better waste some more tax payer money because that's free anyway, or that is at least what Tony Blair and cronies seem to think..

These sort of collaborations need serious planning, and in the UK such projects are handled through the MoD DPA (Defense Procurement Agency). The model they work with is called IPT (Integrated Project Team) who handle such projects, and there are (AFAIK) quite a few that collaborate with the US on various things (the simplest example is the adoption of the DODAF framework into what they call MODAF).

Now, I have just one, very simple question:

Why the hell wasn't this requirement flagged up and secured at the very beginning of the project? The IPT leader for JSF should have his nuts removed for dropping such a major stitch, but I guess the real culprit has already silently wandered off in the 2 year rotation that people enjoy there.

Result: millions of UK Pounds of tax money at risk, and they're in no position to negotiate either - the US knows they've got their backs against the wall as there is no Plan B (despite what the politicians want - it takes years to get something like this off the ground).

The ability of people to walk off after 2 years without ever being held to account for cockups during their reign (however much later they emerge) is IMHO the single biggest risk to everything the MoD does, and it needs to be fixed. But I guess that would be rather painful politically. Better waste some more tax payer money because that's free anyway, or that is at least what Tony Blair and cronies seem to think..

Where exactly did I state I hate the military? All I stated was my Uncle's firsthand impression of the American Army as he saw it when he was engaged with them in war games whilst serving in the Blackwatch backed up what the original post said was unfounded. And this was in the late fifties! American troops have a long tradition of bringing toys to the battlefront to distract themselves.

From their website, http://www.army.mod.uk/blackwatch/ , the Black Watch lay claim to being "one of the most famous fighting forces in the world. We combine the proud history and tradition of an organisation that has been soldiering for over 250 years, with the skills and professionalism of a front-line unit in a modern Army." So you might understand why he was unimpressed by the yanks and he'll go on and on about how easy they were to beat and how exactly they went about taking advantage of the 'lazy, spoilt Americans.'

My Uncle is an expert marksmen. He represented his country in the Commonwealth games. Additionally he has served in Honour Guard for the Queen. I have the greatest respect for the military, but not all military. Respect is not given, it is earned. Those who fail to hold true to Duty, Honour and Country have no respect in my book.

The American soldier never lost a battle in Vietnam!? Who's the revisionist, exactly? The biggest battle American soldiers in Viet Nam lost on the terms of Duty and Honour was My Lai. Militarily, they didn't have much success with the Tet Offensive either, did they? I also remember a bit of a dodgy showing in Hanoi.

As a force, American soldiers have dwindling respect worldwide. They are seen as greedy, lazy, arrogant and more likely to die from friendly fire than enemy (although this is an exaggeration it is the perception, for example in the original Gulf War only a third of US troops who died were killed by friendly fire and that is hardly a majority is it?). Episodes from My Lai to Haditha do little to improve their image worldwide either.

Although the article does mention that the guys on the frontline are more worried about enemy attacks than big screen tv's and I am sure they are doing a solid job, it is unfortunate that the guys who are good soldiers are sullied by so many bad apples.

The US way of a separate aviation service in the Air Force and the Navy is not the only way. In the UK from 1918 until 1939, the Royal Air Force provided flight crews for planes that flew off of Royal Navy carriers. In 1924, the Fleet Air Arm was created with both RAF and Navy personnel, and in 1939, the Admiralty took full control again for the Fleet Air Arm. See: http://www.royal-navy.mod.uk/server/show/nav.3859 And of course, both the US and Royal Marines also have combat aircraft.

Here is the "Armed Forces Pay Review Body Report" with all the details you could want (note: PDF).

Some of the higher ranking offices are paid over £80,000 ($140,000 / Euro 116,000), although they are obviously relatively few, but glancing over any of the ranks that you could reach after a few years in the service a salary of £20-25,000 ($35-45,000 / Euro 30-36,000) is not unusual. Plus, as has been mentioned, there are the food, housing, clothing and laundary, training, and no doubt other costs I haven't thought of...

The British Military are world leaders at outsourcing.

Mod parent up.

I'll add to that list; the automotive industry is full of them. First of all there's the night-vision cameras (arguably invented by the Germans pre WWII), radar parking aids, and heads-up displays.

At home you can cook using a microwave oven (invented by a researcher at Raytheon), which probably itself uses a Liquid Crystal Display (much of the development of which was done at the UK Radar Research Establishment at Malvern, formerly the Army Radar Establishment). Or maybe you'd like to listen to some music on a set of flat-panel loudspeakers (offshoot of research done by the British DERA into quiet 'stealth' helicopters).

A list like this could go on practically forever; in fact it's hard to find a product -- any product -- which hasn't been touched by military R&D at some point in its history. To be honest, dollar for dollar, I think it is quite possible that the American public (and other countries too, but particularly the U.S. because we consume so much technology) gets as much if not more out of the money spent on military research by contractors, than we do out of pure research at universities. Not to say that pure research doesn't have it's place, and is almost always inventive in nature, military research is usually directed and innovative, and produces useful devices in relatively short timescales.

Take a look around your home, unless you live on an Amish farm, you're probably surrounded by things, the initial development of which were paid for with defense dollars.

References:
http://www.achtungpanzer.com/ir.htm Infrared and Night Vision Scopes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_crystal_displa y#Brief_history LCDs
http://www.mod.uk/issues/diversification/diversifi cation_gp.htm#The%20Defence%20Industry Flat Panel Loudspeakers (and many others)

Ive actually spent a lot of time down in Burlington - its pretty easy to get into and several parts have housed private companies before.

Corsham (about 3 miles from me at the moment) is actually home to quite a few massive bunker complexes, including Spring Quarry, Box Tunnel, Monks Park Quarry, Rudloe Manor , Monkton Farleigh and they are all interconnected while maintained (or not) as seperate facilities. Good site for this.

Here is a report on the bunker with many photos. It is actual the "Burlington" bunker in Corsham, declassified by the MOD (==DOD). More photo's here.

The argument that we somehow owe Africa because of slavery is pretty bogus. Slavery was ubiquitous all over the world in ancient times, practised in every society, including Africa and Europe.

In Europe in gradually disappeared in the middle ages as societies moved from feudalism into capitalism. Africa stayed at the feudal level and so still had slaves. Once the Europeans could build ships and travel they world they bought African slaves, but it was in Britain that the movement to abolish slavery started. So the British abolished slavery, first in their own societies and then eventually in the whole world.

http://www.royal-navy.mod.uk/static/pages/5801.htm l

And yet 200 years later, there are still slaves in Africa.

http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft9605/articles/gr egory.html

As Voltaire put it

"While it was difficult to defend the conduct of Europeans in the slave trade, that of Africans in bartering each other was even more reprehensible."

Fact is, the Finnish dude is right, most African societies are on short bus to nowhere. And before I get a load of people calling me a racist, it's the society that's retarded, not the people. Africans in Europe/America/anywhere but Africa behave in a civilised way, and I suspect Europeans in some lawless hellhole will turn into barbarians pretty quickly.

And you could probably find some way to bootstrap a civil society in most of the direst parts of Africa, given a bit of ingenuity.

I can't speak to the rest of your assertions, as I do not know enought about the details of the American involvement in the latter parts of the War.

Wow, I didn't expect a hard-core gun discussion on Slashdot : ) my two cents:

The British Army is looking at replacing their L85A2s with G36s

No they're not. They were thinking of it when they upgraded their old weapons for reliability, but now there are no plans to switch, AFAIK. Lots of people on the internet want them to switch, but no official source has said they're even looking at other designs. There are no trials for new weapons at present in the UK, like the US XM8 or SCAR trials.

they've already replaced their bullpupped SAW, the LSW, with the FN Minimi

Because the LSW was magazine-fed, while the Minimi is belt-fed. Most armies that can afford better are ditching magazine-fed SAWs. The German army is replacing their G36 SAW with a belt-fed weapon from HK similar to the Minimi, for example.

the Bundeswehr replaced their early-adoption G11s with G36s;

Because it was just too expensive, especially coming at the end of the cold war. They could not justify the expense to the public, esp. since the rifle was rather experimental and would have nessecitated a new, non-Nato standard ammo. When it came time to replace their aging G3s, they chose the safe, conservative not to mention cheaper G36. The fact that G11 was bullpup was the least of its problems.

the Brits have already moved their Paras and SAS to the M4

Source? I just looked on the mod.uk website, and there are no listings of the M-16/M-4 as part of their kit. I looked on the images database, and I can only find pics of paras with L85s, in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some of them have AKs while they train locals, but no M-4s, M-16s, or C7s.

the Foreign Legion has moved to the M4; the Australian SAS has abandoned the (bullpupped) Steyr AUG for the M4;

Okay, Australian SASR seems to have gone M-4, but looking around on the web I can find no confirmation of the others. This gallery shows French SF in Congo with both FAMAS and M-4, while this shows French FL with FAMAS and no M-4s in Ivory Coast, this gallery shows Indonesian special police with a mix of AKs, FNCs, AUGs, and Uzis.

I think a lot of the above are just examples of how special forces people get more choice in arms, and some carry different arms because of personal taste or tactical circumstance. Many SF soldiers will carry AKs, MP5s or M-14s, that does not mean they are superior weapons to equip a whole army with.

Sorry, piss poor link in my post:
http://www.royal-navy.mod.uk/static/pages/1469.htm l

hell the deck probably has 40 or 50 sitting on top

The mail servers went down for a couple of hours last Friday morning - mail couldn't be sent or received. About an hour into the outage, the sysadmins sent a Windows Messaging service message to all terminals saying that the problem was a 52Mb file called "Amarillo Video" (or something like that) which people were e-mailing internally and please don't do it any more! That was it, essentially - a short-term nuisance, nothing more.

As for why this happened - well, our computer infrastructure is pretty old and cranky. The systems that fell over were mostly head office ones in London - there are literally hundreds of separate corporate networks currently in use, held together by duct tape (or so it sometimes seems), so only a fraction of the MOD was affected in the first place. They're all due to be replaced by a shiny new Defence Information Infrastructure (http://www.mod.uk/dcsa/organisations/dii/) which will be all singing, all dancing, capable of dealing with huge files etc etc etc. (Also all Windows, but you can't have everything.)

BTW It's arsehat.