Why I quit the army

Tony Blair tells us continually that the British armed forces are ‘the best in the world’. They are fighting fit, says the government, and straining at the leash to do battle with Saddam Hussein. It is all the more frightening, therefore, that in truth the Prime Minister is about to deploy a British military force as ill equipped for full-scale war as it is to provide the nation with adequate fire cover. Under New Labour, our soldiers, airmen and sailors are badly trained and woefully equipped, and their morale is being sapped by bad pay and humiliating and absurd exercises in political correctness.

I have spent the last four years as a squaddie (in army terms) in the Royal Marines. I served in Sierra Leone and on many high-profile operations and exercises elsewhere. My conclusions about the parlous state of our armed forces come from the bottom up, and directly reflect the attitudes shared in private by my fellow soldiers.