[lit-ideas] Re: British Navy to cut its fleet in half
- From: David Ritchie <ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 5 Jan 2007 11:59:02 -0800
On Jan 5, 2007, at 5:04 AM, Lawrence Helm wrote:
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<x-tad-bigger>It was shocking to hear that Britain is no longer interested in ruling the waves the waves – any of them, but at the same time I could imagine the reasoning behind the decision. What is the clear and present danger Britain faces?
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I recently had dinner with the Lord Mayor of London and the commodore charged with seeing one of the two new aircraft carriers into the water. We about three hundred, attending a dinner for the Worshipful Company of Engineers, one of London's guilds. The commodore was assigned a place on my right. We chatted about safe topics for a while: differences among the Forrester, O'Brian, Kent novels, when commodore became a substantive rank (it used to indicate a captain who was given temporary command of a fleet), whether admirals still are given flag color designations "of the white" etc. (they're not). When I asked how long it would be before the new carriers were in the water, he said that the launch date was a secret. Now I see that he may have been dodging controversy.
I thought an engineering question was a safe bet: why were British carriers built on a smaller scale than American ones? Weren't they, in the coming years, going to be flying the same planes? The answer revealed both pride and hints of despair.
"Yes," he said, "we're all going to be using the new joint attack fighter." (No secret here). The difference in size of carrier, he asserted, was because the British had a long history of carrier innovation; they invented all kinds of bits and pieces of carrier technology--he ran off a string of examples--and so were just more efficient in their designs.
"But could it also be," I asked, possibly pushing beyond what is polite on such an occasion, "that Americans just have bigger budgets and so build on a more extravagant or ambitious scale?" This question touched a sore spot. The Labor government ...starved for funds... civilians and their bloody mindedness... And come to that, why did I live in America? Why wasn't I doing the patriotic thing and returning to Britain to offer my skills to Queen and country?
I said that I liked living in America and that I didn't think the Queen was particularly missing my skills. He turned to engage on his other (starboard) side.
It was a window into another's world. Now, it seems, there's a possibility that his new boat and his patriotic dreams will be gesumped by a couple hundred tons of NHS bandages and the pressing need for more speed cameras. Or whatever it is that newly non-imperial powers spend money on.
Carry on.
David Ritchie,
Portland, Oregon
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