There are some very personal elements in the spat between retired senior officers and the Government, but the underlying issues go back to the Blair years.

The forces have been engaged in major combat operations since 2001. While troops are being drawn down now in Iraq, the commitment there is still substantial, currently at 4,500 troops and due to go down to 2,500 only by spring. The Afghanistan commitment is not only growing to 7,700 troops but is proving to be extremely demanding.

Constant combat stretches the Forces, leaving inadequate time for recovery between tours and often for basic training. It also stretches the contract between the military and its civilian masters.

When lives are at risk, equipment and conditions, which might be irritating but tolerable at times of peace, become unacceptable. The media is far less ready to explain combat deaths as the natural hazards of war and more ready to assume that better support and kit could have made all the difference. There are also, quite properly, higher expectations with regard to such matters as quality of medical care and home accommodation.

These problems have been aggravated by pressures on the defence budget. The Government is right to say that the defence budget has had more regular growth than at any time in postwar history, but the critics are also correct that the growth has struggled to keep pace with the needs of forces in constant combat.

The Government might also say that it is still suffering from the legacy of past procurement decisions, many taken during the Cold War, and the inability of any government to manage the delays and cost overruns that plague major equipment programmes. It has had to shift resources to look after frontline land forces while maintaining credible capabilities for the RAF and the Royal Navy.

After the Comprehensive Spending Review, officials at the Ministry of Defence have been scrambling to find sufficient cuts, facing the familiar choices between spreading the misery or axeing some large, single items so that everything else can be properly funded.

The Prime Minister has insisted that defence remains a high priority and that he admires and supports the Services, but he does not yet have much of a track record on which to build. With Des Browne also looking after Scotland, and the abrupt recent departure of Lord Drayson, who was admired widely for his work on the Defence Industrial Strategy, the Government is struggling to demonstrate its commitment.

The Forces are not at breaking point and are used to coping with less than they deserve, but if the Government wants to avoid, not so much criticism from former officers, but disillusion and demoralisation among those on the front line, it needs to find some way soon to show that it cares.

Sir Lawrence Freedman is Professor of War Studies and Vice-Principal (Research) at King’s College London.

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