As Europe falters Asia's defence spending grows and grows

North Korea, the US estimates the country's defence spending to be nearly a quarter of the size of its economy - compared with less than 3% for South Korea, or just 1% for Japan. Overall military spending in Asia has been growing while the West has been cutting back.

Especially in Europe, and here in the UK we have seen mass Army redundancies and the scaling back of our RAF and Royal Navy. Asia's top spender, China, has more than trebled its official defence expenditure over the past ten years.

Why is this happening? Don't we live in a world governed by the UN and diplomacy? Militarism has been dead for 70 years, it doesn't work. So why the arms race? Who is China threatened by? India and Pakistan have Nuclear Weapons, Iran wants one now too; China is feeling the pressure...

How long can we tolerate the rise in inflation while our Armed Forces salaries are capped and allowances slashed?

More Nimrod were scrapped

How long can we tolerate the rise in inflation while our Armed Forces salaries are capped and allowances slashed? It just seem terribly unfair that unemployment benefit and disability living allowance have increase by 5.2 per cent.

Many Military campaigners blasted Osborne for ruining morale among troops at a time when the Army, Royal Navy and RAF are already facing crippling cuts. Most of this occurred last year and here we are in 2012 totally powerless and impotent to do anything about it.

Defence Secretary Philip Hammond is trying to save £5 billion from the Ministry of Defence budget by axing battleships, fighter jets, spy planes, tanks and jobs. There is no way now we can commit to any military action in Syria.

The tax free bonus paid to personnel in Afghanistan seems a small tonic when inflation is quickly outpacing the current standard of living. The government tried to deflect attention away from the pay freeze by pointing out this tax break - but a very poor break it is.

However, it can't all be blamed on Tory policy as the Armed Forces engaged in no less than four military conflicts under New Labour - and remember Labour did not bother to have any defence reviews.
Politics aside, the question now is, what is the future? How are we going to cope with international security, how can we afford to? How do we protect the salaries and pay of our Armed Forces? It looks like the electorate will answer with their feet in 2 years time...

Royal Air Force (RAF)

The first RAF squadron (then as the RFC – Royal Flying Corps) was formed in 1912 and it upgraded to aircraft in 1914. The RAF is the oldest independant air force in the world with a long proud history, serving in all the major conflicts that took place during the 20th century, and continuing to do so in the 21st.

Now the RAF provide air support for a wide range of uses, both at war and in peace time. During the Cold War the RAF was an integral part of Britain’s nuclear deterrant.

HMForces.co.uk - What Does it Offer You?

It's a new online space designed exclusively for the UK military and naval community: The British Army, The Royal Navy, The Royal Marines and The Royal Air Force, to connect and develop their careers.

However, if you're also civilian and have a member of your family in the armed forces, are a spouse or a friend or have a general interest, then there's lots of info available for you too.

So, What’s The Score?

Do you need advice on landing a great civilian job once you leave the Forces? Curious if you’re claiming all the benefits you’re entitled to receive?

Or, just want to banter about which Service really works the hardest? Or want to taste the nostalgia of the old days?

This site isn't just about the serving folk but the ones who have already served in whatever service. In addition, if you're civilian you can find a lot of advice and jokes about the life that you're comtemplating joining - and it is a different life make no mistake. Check out all the best and most up to date joining instructions for the Armed Forces.

AND IF THAT'S NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU check out the COMPETITIONS, QUIZZES and MIND GAMES, and a MILITARY BOOK SHOP

for your intellectual side (but if you can't be bothered with your intellectual side there's some daft games in the FORUMS too), and a GEAR section where you can review the latest military equipment available.

However, since the site will always be a work in progress and as it is entirely about and for members of the Armed Forces – your feedback is crucial.

Please drop us a line if you have an idea for a new feature, want us to investigate something, or even if you’ve found a broken link.

Thanks!

Stewart Thompson

General Manager

Armed Forces Allowances Update

The Armed Forces (Navy, Marines, Army, Air Force) do give a number of allowances (despite what you hear about Armed Forces cuts etc).

There are specific lead allowances for service personnel assigned to seagoing units to compensate for the extra time spent away from home; Travel expenses can usually be claimed for duty journeys from a normal place of work for all the services; there is the Local Overseas Allowance (LOA) – Contributes to the additional costs of day-to-day living in an overseas county; Special Messing Allowance (SMA), and Overseas Furniture Provision Scheme (OFPS). These are only a few of them that are actually available.

There are many more allowances available and you'll find them here in our British Armed Forces Allowances section. Here's a few more:

General Allowances for Service Personnel

Travel Expenses In The Armed Forces
Travel and Subsistence when Living Overseas

Child Related Benefits In the Armed Forces

The links above take you to sections where you'll find articles explaining the different types of allowances open to you. However, in the previous 12 months there have been many changes.

This article describes some of those changes that directly affect the Armed Forces and their families.

As part of a comprehensive spending review, a direct consequence of 2010's Strategic Defence and Security Review, the changes all began end of 2010. It was announced that more than £250 million would be stripped from the armed forces' £880m allowances budget ordered by the Treasury.

Needless to say, the first to go, deemed too extraneous were perks for senior officers, such as payment for chefs and cleaners, drivers or gardeners.

Military personnel of all ranks have been asked to make personal financial contributions to allowances such as those which cover travelling from home to work.

Payments to cover travel to sports events and training facilities are also considered to be vulnerable to culling. Military travel allowances last year cost the government £54 million.

Defence chiefs accepted the cuts with regret but also claimed it could 'seriously damage troop morale'.

Some senior defence sources have criticised the move but others have welcomed it - our opinion is that the Armed Forces cannot be compared to MP's claiming expenses. However, cuts have to be made, and naturally expenses and perks are always the fist to be culled. This is replicated right across the private sector too. In fact some within the Armed Forces have claimed many officers are 'living beyond their means' and that the cuts will prevent fraudulent claims.

One issue however that has thrown up opposition is the examination and possible culling of the Continuity of Education Allowance, which helps pay for the private school fees. CEA costs the taxpayer £180m a year and is claimed by 5,500 service families.

As well as allowances, all forms of the armed forces specialist pay – which makes up a significant proportion of the salaries of pilots, comms crew, divers, bomb disposal experts, submariners and members of the special forces – is also to be examined and it looks like there will be inevitable cuts to these looking towards 2012. However, in our view the cuts cannot be too severe for specialist pay, as part of the remuneration for taking on extra duty and skills is the specialist pay rate in the first place. Take too much of that away and how can recruiters attract candidates into the specialist trades?

Qualified aeroplane and helicopter pilots, as well as specialist aircrew, can earn up to an extra £40 a day on top of their salaries even if their job does not involve flying.

Politicians argue that Pilots for example should only be paid the extra specialist pay when they are flying.

Under the current allowances scheme pilots are still paid the full "flying pay" for three years once they have left a "flying job". SDSR considers this too 'generous', the extra pay is worth millions of pounds to pilots who do not fly and submariners who no longer serve at sea. George Osbourne described this as 'staggering'.

Local Overseas Allowance, is paid to troops serving abroad where the cost of living is more expensive than the UK, will also be reduced (but the number of places that are more expensive than the UK are disappearing). In 2009/10 LOA cost the MoD £224m.

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When dealing with expenses you must pay up front and then claim back what is owed by providing a valid receipt. Otherwise, if you can't provide the receipt you'll get nothing.

There are still many good allowances available to the Armed Forces but in these unsettling economic times those perks are slowly disappearing. However, some essential perks will stay but don't let all this put you off, the Armed Forces still offers what many jobs in the private sector cannot.

Benefits of Joining the British Armed Forces: Why Would You?

In a nutshell... why on earth would you join the Armed Forces? It's rubbish pay, and you could get killed.

Not only that, you're a bit left wing and believe in a protest against imperialism (you might even be one of those nutters from Muslims Against Royal Familes or whatever nonsense they are called) and speaking out for the British common man, therefore you don't want to join the UK Armed Forces. You could be a disaffected former member of the Or you might not believe in war at all despite the UK Armed Forces being primarily an expeditionary defence force for at least the past 250 years. It hasn't embarked upon any sort of conquest for centuries (you might argue Empire existed BUT that was started by trading companies NOT the Armed Forces).

Whatever your objections, and they are many, they'd be against everything you believed in.

Besides, you never voted for the ConDem government nor even deputy Nick Clegg nor even the PM David Cameron. So why should you join?

Well, to put it into perspective - your oath of alligence is to the Head of state, in this case the Queen and your Regiment not to the government. Utter tosh you might say as the British head of state is powerless. The Commons runs things. True.

But none can deny that indeed you do swear your Oath of Allegiance to the Squadron or regiment, most of whom are your fellow Britons; and often in the case of the Army people from the same town or county. These are the good folk that you back and protect in a conflict. Most of which are common men and women. The heart of industry of this country.

Secondly - the money is not THAT poor. It's lower yes initially but not in the long term. Look for an equivalent job as a civilian that has the benefits of the military equivalent and pound to a penny you actually WON'T find one.
A Chef on a cruise ship won't earn £16k PA when they start but one on a Royal Navy ship will - but that's just one insignificant example.

The basic benefits included in most armed forces jobs are:

1. Free medical and dental care

2. Good rent for often decent accomodation

3. Job security which is poor in the private sector. Albeit until 2011 the public sector was safe but ride out this financial storm and things should be right again by 2013.

4. 6 weeks paid holidays plus bank holidays. You'll never find this in a civilian company (maybe if you work in a highly paid financial job in the city or are a banker however).

5. Despite the public sector cuts, Armed Forces still has of the best pension plans on the market.

But be realistic

The UK's Armed Forces are one of the largest in the world in terms of power projection. Deployed in a number of serious armed conflicts throughout the globe, it's likely that you might find yourself in one of these conflicts.

Which you may not take to as much as the next person...

A Show of Gratitude to our UK Armed Forces

Well, it's about time we got started on this - long over due indeed.

But firstly, a big thank you to all the troops round the world, all the services for the work they are doing - it's a mostly thankless task mainly appreciated by close friends and family, and a few in the media. Other than that, the UK Armed Forces acts with what it can and with what it does, depending on the need and requirements of the time - Whitehall and the Treasury hold the purse strings and it just never seeems enough.  And in this time of cuts to the defence budget and commitments just about on every major continent - our troops need your support more than ever before.

Not only those that come back home but those that continue to suffer and those that never make it.

Thanks