Of chairs and helicopters

At a time when every day seems to bring a new story of military equipment shortages, I was amazed to see 'The Telegraph' report that the MoD has been amusing itself by buying paintings and over 3000 chairs at £1000 a time.

Taken together with The Register's report on Chinook helicopters ".....even though British troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan are crying out for helicopter lift, eight big brand-new choppers have been sitting in storage in the UK, grounded by MoD idiocy, for six years" it makes you wonder.

This, of course, pales into financial insignificance when you read The Register's article on our latest destroyers (a mere billion pounds a pop). Oh, and they use MS Windows as well. So do I, but the consequences of the blue screen of death are not quite the same for me as for somebody with a missile coming at them.

The best quote from this is on the second page "Sea Dart did shoot down an antique Silkworm missile fired by the Iraqis in 1991. What's less commonly known about that engagement is that the Silkworm had already gone past the destroyer which fired the Sea Dart. Normally it's better to shoot the flying things down while inbound, rather than outbound; often they hit one of your ships while passing through.".