Two things from (fG)Britain

First, an actress who gives a crap about troops:
Lumley has that rare thing in public life: a simple and uncluttered sense of principle which tells her that if a man is willing to die for a country, then surely he has the right to live there. No ifs, no buts, no 'five conditions that need to be met'.

Indeed, it is this very principle which still seems to elude Mr Brown, whose understanding of words like 'loyalty' might be judged from what he said recently about the Damian McBride email scandal.

'I take full responsibility for what happened. That's why the person who was responsible went immediately.' Yes, he really did say that.

Second, the Brits are losing their tank-building company:
They have fought alongside British soldiers for generations, playing heroic roles on historic battlefields such as the Somme, Cambrai and El Alamein. They have carried famous names such as Centurion, Churchill, Cromwell and Crusader.

But now, nearly a century after inventing the first armoured warhorse - to storm through German lines in the First World War - Britain is to stop building its own tanks.

In the week British troops formally ended their military operations in Iraq, BAe Systems, which makes the Army's Challenger 2 tanks, revealed it was closing its tank-making operation at Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

It is also shutting its armour business at Telford in Shropshire and at other locations because it sees no prospect of new Government orders.
Why?
Defence Secretary John Hutton has declared 'a rebalancing of investment in technology, equipment and people to meet the challenge of irregular warfare'.

He said he planned to strengthen and enlarge Special Forces but gave no hint of even a medium-weight tank in the Army's future.
One of the things I've read a number of times is how important armor, including tanks, can be in counter-insurgency work. One of the lessons somebody noted some time back was that in city combat tanks turned out to be very helpful; yes, they've got weaknesses, and they've got strengths that made a big difference. If the Brits lose the only domestic operation they've got that can build the things... not a good idea, guys.