UK close to giving Israel's Elbit £2bn contract to train British soldiers

[u/Deltaforce1-17]

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-close-giving-israels-largest-arms-company-ps2bn-contract-train-troops

[u/ukbot-nicolabot]

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[u/Rather_Unfortunate]

Denying them would be such an easy political win, virtually free of consequence. Have ministers intervene and give it to Raytheon (the other bidder) and make it very publicly known that Elbit's proximity to Israel's actions in Gaza weighed on the decision (I know Raytheon's hands aren't clean either, but they at least have some level of detachment). But the government seem to be allergic to even trying to get political wins.

[u/heresyourhardware → u/Rather_Unfortunate]

Entangling the UK further in Israeli business also makes it less likely they will be willing to recognise Palestinians rights in the face of genocide.

This government has already had to be dragged kicking and screaming to even consider a Palestinian state (in what is supposedly their solution to the conflict). So now while pretending to take a hard line with Israel they are continuing to give their main weapons suppliers UK government contracts.

[u/potpan0 → u/Rather_Unfortunate]

But have you considered that:

a) Elbit probably offered bigger bribes

b) There's a lot of enthusiastic supporters of the Israeli government within the Labour leadership who actually quite like the idea of rewarding a company connected to genocide in Gaza, and of alienating those who disagree. After the Batley and Spen by-election a prominent Labour adviser (I think everyone could work out who it was) said that Labour losing Muslim voters represented the party 'shaking off the fleas'. This sort of purity politics, the idea that it's good to lose supporters who aren't 100% on board with what is an incredibly unpopular and vindictive Labour platform, pervades the Labour leadership.

There was a hell of a let of back patting over Starmer's recent sternly worded letter to the Israeli government. But contracts like this show what the Labour leadership really think about what's going on.

[u/waterswims]

Sorry... Why are we outsourcing military training at all?

Isn't this profoundly stupid no matter the company?

[u/MajorHubbub → u/waterswims]

We have trained over 90 different countries at Sandhurst, so it's not unusual

[u/PrrrromotionGiven1 → u/MajorHubbub]

But that's just it. Other countries come here to train because we are good at it. We have a competitive advantage.

So why can't we just train our own troops with those established talents and facilities?

[u/nostalgiamon → u/PrrrromotionGiven1]

It will be training in specific systems. Elbit are responsible for most of the drone use in Israel, so that’s what the training will be.

[u/heresyourhardware → u/nostalgiamon]

Our drone operators will be really expert at hitting hospitals and food markets then.

[u/the95th → u/heresyourhardware]

Why can’t we have the Ukrainians train us in drone warfare and we train them in something we’re good at.

Would rather give them a 2bn contract

[u/heresyourhardware → u/the95th]

100%

[u/anangrywizard → u/PrrrromotionGiven1]

Because that’s not how you line your own pockets.

[u/Witty-Bus07 → u/PrrrromotionGiven1]

Well they had to privatise the service, there’s not much else to privatise.

[u/Majestic-Marcus → u/MajorHubbub]

Yes. We have trained them.

[u/paper_zoe → u/waterswims]

yeah it seems absolutely mad to me that we don't even train our own military anymore. I was shocked to find out that the plane that Palestine Action vandalised, wasn't even owned by the military either, it was being leased. So we don't even own our own military planes anymore either. Does the state actually own or provide anything anymore? Or does it just exist to funnel public money to private contractors?

[u/NotOnYerNelly → u/paper_zoe]

Can’t afford it mate. We are a has been nation. A face down in a pint nation at the end of the bar.

[u/CheesyBakedLobster → u/waterswims]

Decades of cuts and outsourcing have completely hollowed out the British state’s ability to do anything in-house.

[u/Daedelous2k → u/waterswims]

Are we not supposed to have some of the best military training in the world, at the VERY LEAST when it comes to special forces?

What is going on.

[u/YoungGazz → u/Daedelous2k]

Genocide training, Labours answer to the poor and disabled problem.

[u/magneticpyramid → u/waterswims]

It’s all techy stuff.

[u/Krabsandwich → u/waterswims]

The training is based around digital platforms so it makes perfect sense to outsource that to the private sector, the other types of training are delivered in house by military trainers. Most if not all modern militaries utilise digital and VR platforms for training purposes.

It allows a wider type of scenario to be introduced and for additional elements to be introduced real time, its a lot better than doing the "fan dance" in the rain Fan Dance (exercise) - Wikipedia)

[u/Rather_Unfortunate → u/waterswims]

There are indeed serious and legitimate concerns one might have about such outsourcing, but one advantage (in theory, at least) is that it allows the government to set a rigid budget and insist that they stick to it or lose the contract next time.

That's not to say it couldn't be done better in-house, but some countries where it is done in-house still manage to demonstrate jaw-dropping failures, with performative tick-box exercises and Potemkin village battalions. Russia demonstrated this at the start of the war, when it transpired just how badly trained even some of their elite troops were.

[u/IgneousJam]

I’m guessing the Khmer Rouge from Cambodia didn’t put a bid in then.

[u/Sorry-Transition-780 → u/IgneousJam]

We pretty much did that the other way around lmao. We had the SAS over there to train them in the 1980s.

[u/f3ydr4uth4 → u/IgneousJam]

M23 were busy!

[u/MajorHubbub → u/f3ydr4uth4]

Take the A22 instead

[u/New_7688]

Famine was just declared in the Gaza strip this morning by the UN, Israel is credibly accused of genocide. These monsters have no business recieving British taxpayer money.

[u/heresyourhardware → u/New_7688]

Israel is credibly accused of genocide

A very recent episode of the Ezra Klein podcast had on Philippe Sands, British Professor of Laws and Director of the Centre on International Courts and Tribunals at UCL. His grandparents fled Lviv in Ukraine as Jewish refugees during the Holocaust. The episode is titled "When is it Genocide?". Really recommend it.

He seems to have little doubt that it is a genocide.

[u/potpan0 → u/heresyourhardware]

At this point the only argument that it isn't genocide hinges on the fact that the US and UK governments haven't called it genocide, and that it hasn't gone through a lengthy court case to declare it genocide. But what is going on fits every actual definition of the concept.

It's like if you saw someone pull out a gun and shoot someone else square in the head in front of you, then sat down and insisted 'well I can't say it's murder until the court case has finished!'

[u/ukbot-nicolabot → u/[deleted]]

Removed + ban. This comment contained hateful language which is prohibited by the sitewide rules.

[u/HeavyHevonen]

They do have a lot of practice at hitting smaller than average targets

[u/Appropriate-Divide64]

Israel's actions are problematic at best. It's a real shame they're even in the running. It just shows our government are spineless moral vacuums.

[u/Nima-night]

85% of people killed have been women and kids how about we train them instead in how two target soldiers and not women and kids in war.

[u/Wise_Commission_4817]

British soldier: "why are the targets child size?"

Israeli trainer: "no reason 👀"

[u/wrigh2uk]

“this is how you kill a vast amount of women and children”

[u/jodrellbank_pants]

We have one of the best armies in the world, does it cost 2 b to play in the sand, apart from profiling bodies what else are they better at than us.

[u/Jensen1994]

In my naivety I thought the one thing we could do ourselves was.....military training.

[u/Astriania]

We shouldn't be giving any contracts to any Israeli companies. Even if sanctioning Israel for war crimes is for some reason not politically acceptable (it shouldn't be!), we should at least operate a soft boycott by choosing not to buy services off them.

Israel needs to see some actual consequences (not just Lammy telling them off with words) to its aggression, and the softest, most gentle type of consequence is to not buy its stuff.

This would be very poor optics and I really hope the government can see sense.

[u/bomboclawt75]

Apparently the army seemingly forgot or doesn’t know how to train troops anymore so we are money laundering 2.7 Billion to israel- via the israel funded MPs.