Patrick Gildart Jackson

Communication adviser, consultant and spokesman; Ex safari guide; Conservationist; Interest in military affairs. Views are my own. 🇬🇧🇺🇸

[Greg Bagwell @gregbagwell]

The Operating budget is almost always under pressure in the MoD. Salaries and pensions are fixed costs and the equipment programme always demands more. The only available counter balance is to cut the operating budget. That’s not a resigning issue, it’s how the MoD is wired. 1/7

[Shashank Joshi @shashj]

I’m delighted that Alex Turner will succeed me as defence editor of @TheEconomist later this year. Alex, who is currently an army officer, is highly experienced, an accomplished military historian and a talented writer. He will be a fantastic journalist.

https://t.co/kqgT3E39uz

[Zac Goldsmith @ZacGoldsmith]

“When Trump insisted the war would only end with ‘unconditional surrender’ it never crossed my mind he meant his own.”
It’s almost unbelievable how profoundly the USA has been outmanoeuvred by the IRGC

[Tom Sharpe @TomSharpe134]

⛵️Yacht incident dying down as it should

Final thoughts

Layered causes:

➡️Deep - poorly run Russian surface fleet (see black sea fleet in particular). Under resourced Royal Navy

➡️Intermediate - Dark fleet activities, Smyrtos boarding (plus everything else)

➡️Precipitating

Poor Russian seamanship:
Loitering in (v busy) westbound shipping lane
Engines not at immediate notice (for whatever reason) for manoeuvre (esp in low viz) = 🤡
Not transmitting on AIS. Fine but increases onus on proper lookout🙈
Terrible threat appreciation
Poor/panicked escalation…just drive away. If you can’t, see terrible seamanship

➡️Gunnery
Rounds will ricochet out to many miles over a wide ark in v busy shipping area.

➡️Yacht could have helped:
Respond immediately on ch16
Alter by (much) more than two degrees
Having said that 500 yards CPA would normally be ok

➡️Warship positioning interesting:
What was it doing there?
Waiting to escort Russian mil assets
Waiting to escort dark fleet ship
Messaging near Smyrtos
‘Other’ activities😳

Entitled to be there (just about) but doing so with engines and AIS off is poor

🚨Overall a very simple Colreg/Force protection issue made worse by incompetent Russian seamanship and behaviour, exacerbated (often exaggerated) by everything else. A case study in how a simple incident at sea can escalate if cool heads don’t prevail

➡️Postscript:
Nice that they keep doing this sort of thing as more cuts are imminent

[Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom]

None of this makes any sense, except as desperate rationalizations from a man who cannot face facts and admit defeat. The president of the United States seems to be losing his grip on reality itself.

https://t.co/Yy5bQKxqAC

[Andrew Neil @afneil]

It’s basically a surrender document. Suck it up. And, take this from a ‘lesser journalist’, the IRGC is a massive corrupt enterprise. The people will never see the revenues. The generals will snaffle them. As they always have.

[Kateryna Lisunova @KaterynaLis]

Very emotional moment from the interview with Zelenskyy. You should watch this.

JOURNALIST: Do you miss being an actor?

ZELENSKYY:?I miss being a good father.

JOURNALIST: When your children were little, what did you tell them the most? What was the thing that you told them the most when they were small?

ZELENSKYY: I love you.

JOURNALIST: And what do you tell them now that they're older?

ZELENSKYY: Oh, I miss you.

JOURNALIST: When was the last time you cried?

ZELENSKYY: I will try to do it after our interview. No, I mean this, between us. I'm a normal man and then there are a lot of different moments, between us, almost each day, a lot of losses on the battlefield and civilians, and there are absolutely crazy attacks on our people.

And I'm just, it's… I mean, It's very difficult really, when I give orders (medals). I said about it. It's always difficult for me when I give orders (medals) to the mothers and fathers, who lost their children. In such moments, really, I often cry.

JOURNALIST: Are you a hero?

ZELENSKYY: No.

JOURNALIST: So who is your hero?

ZELENSKYY:?My hero? My children, my army, our army, and Ukrainian people. So I'm a part… I'm also a Ukrainian, so I'm a part of our nation. But now our nation, I think, that our nation is absolutely heroic.

[Robert Lyman 🇺🇦 @robert_lyman]

As all sensible people know.

These people support terrorism, plain and simple.

Want Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon? You’re a terrorist supporter too.

[Robert Lyman 🇺🇦 @robert_lyman]

Stop Blaming Churchill

By @James1940

https://t.co/gTUZ7IevNQ

[James Cleverly🇬🇧 @JamesCleverly]

According to this Labour Government 16 and 17 year olds are mature enough to vote, but not to serve on a jury. That is an "adult duty" apparently.

They are old enough to vote, but are now subject to a government-mandated social media curfew at 8.30pm.

The only consistent thing about Labour's votes at 16 policy is the blatant party political self interest.

[Chatham House @ChathamHouse]

The disconnect between UK policymakers ambitions for Ukraine – or the Strait of Homuz – and the resources available suggests a level of self-deception about the UK's capabilities. https://t.co/amxmR88ClV

[Robert Lyman 🇺🇦 @robert_lyman]

The only thing to come from disarmament is war, you intellectual pygmy….

What do you think history teaches us about what happens when the good guys give up their defences?

That’s right: the bad guys make hay.

Tell us what you want, what you really really want, or have I guessed correctly?

[Don Winslow @donwinslow]

Dear @SecWar Pete Hegseth,

I am really glad all this is on video because otherwise no one would ever believe you are this stupid.

[WG RumblePants @WG_RumblePants]

So much cricket is played in coloured kit these days, whether it’s franchise cricket, international white ball cricket and even a lot of league cricket.

So there’s a lovely symmetry to the fact that Test cricket (the most elite form of the game) and Sunday afternoon village cricket (the most rustic) are still both played in whites with a red ball.

[Rt. Hon Ben Wallace @BenWallace70]

@TiceRichard you’ve got a border force for that. People dont join the armed forces to become some pathetic MAGA ICE walter mitty crowd.

[Gandalv @Microinteracti1]

Gentle reminder!!! Don’t let Trump reframe this war as a campaign to “free” the Strait of Hormuz. The strait was open. It was open right up until the US and Israel attacked Iran.

Trump didn’t ride in to open a closed strait. Trump’s war is the reason the strait is closed.

[Andrew Neil @afneil]

Simples:
Release tens of billions from Ed Miliband’s net zero follies for defence capital investment.
Release billions more for day-to-day spending by some tough love for the 10m of working age not working and living on benefits. Plus abandon triple lock.
Go through current defence spending like a dose of salts to root out current waste and inefficiency (which is mega). Cull legacy programmes for platforms soon to be obsolete.

[Andrew Fox @Mr_Andrew_Fox]

A tale in three parts.

Analysis to follow on Substack tomorrow, but for this evening, my thoughts are with the people of Iran and the families of those murdered by the regime.

[Ameer Kotecha @Ameer_Kotecha]

Wow. The Times hasn’t held back

“a parliamentary Labour Party that is the most unserious and most intellectually arid ever to attain power."

Spot on.

[Deborah Haynes @haynesdeborah]

“We feel like window dressing for a government that doesn’t actually care” - that’s the verdict of one defence industry source after about 20 companies were invited by the Ministry of Defence to showcase their kit at the launch of a vast drone-testing centre in Swindon.

At a minimum, those who attended had hoped to meet the new defence secretary.

Instead, many were left disappointed as Dan Jarvis rushed in, gave a short speech, looked at a few stalls and then sped off.

“I don’t know why we bothered” said another source.⬇️

https://t.co/RiGRmHkaKJ