The Other Chris

Follow @TotherChris

15 Feb, 17 tweets, 2 min read

Boxerman
----------
(Sung to the tune of Wellerman)

[A Musical Thread]

🎵
There once was a plan for an AFV
The name of the plan was the MIV
There’s more to the tail than you may know
Brew that bivvie boys, brew
🎵

(Hurr! 💪)

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

🎵
They must deploy two kay from shore
Fit two to a Herc or maybe more
We envied all that Soviet Cav
And soon was born MRAV
🎵

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

Before MRAV had hit Main Gate
A straight eight by eight was second rate
The brass had seen another crate
The answer was less weight

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

🎵
Reqs now decreed a squadron oughta
Fit inside an air transporter
OPFOR snatched a bloody slaughter
The answer was more weight
🎵

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

🎵
General speakers in denial
Ignored truths sourced from fair trial
Robots, last mile, such a farce
You can shove Cyber up your
🎵

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

🎵
As far as I've heard the Tracks still on
The budget’s been cut and the turrets not done
The Boxerman strikes a welcome call
Remember FFLAV, TRACER, OUVS and all
🎵

(Hurr! 💪)

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

🎶
Soon may the Boxerman come
To bring us armour and tea and gun
One day, when the fightin’ is done
We’ll take our wheels and go
🎶

/FIN

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More from @TotherChris

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

10 Feb

Sustaining sovereign defence manufacture in context of UK defence is not about profit or ROI, though that's ok too. Its core is maintaining that critical mass for training the next cohort and maintaining both the theoretical and practical design/build/operate feedback loops.

Arguably, if sovereign defence manufacturers cannot sustain themselves with UK defence work, the MOD should be taking on an element of their functions and bringing them back in-house. Foreign kit and TTP's may not always fit our needs and that's a security issue in of itself.

We should be considering this in the likes of the IR directly and if cuts need to be made to accommodate it then this what to save - it is arguably more important to preserve an ability for long term design/regeneration when we are looking at having to cut back in the short term.

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

23 Sep 20

A fast and loose thread on the broad history for the *sensible* reason why Nimrod MRA.4 was scrapped.

WARNING: Nimrod MRA.4 is an emotive subject. There is a lot of genuinely good work, blood, sweat, tears and lost lives behind the Tweets. Tread sensitively please.

We'll skip to the point at which BAe's (not BAE's) proposal for Nimrod 2000 using Comet airframes had been accepted, but after the point at which tooling for new-build fuselages had been rejected in the 1990's.

There was a requirement for 21 aircraft to replace Nimrod MR.2 and without building new airframes as proposed there was a shopping trip to buy up all of the remaining Comet husks we could. Numbers vary, but we'll settle on 21 assumed complete kits plus bits for convenience.

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

9 Sep 20

A quick thread on the challenge the Army has in describing itself to decision makers and the public in order to secure funds for projects. A little tongue in cheek...

💬 “We need to replace an ageing squadron of aerothings. Our purchase will support our aerospace sector worth £34B in exports.”

- Royal Air Force

💬 “We require five warboats to replace our well worked vessels. We’ll need to place orders now though, for long lead items that warboats clearly need, such as radars, guns, rockety missiles and engines.”

- Royal Navy

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

14 Aug 20

Observation: So this morning when it was just Apple who'd kicked Fortnite off their App Store because Epic provocatively breached their T&C's, the narrative was on Apple's cut. Now Google have also kicked Fortnite off their Play Store for the same, the narrative is on Epic's cut.

It's quite clear that Epic did not expect Google to also ban Fortnite from the Play Store. The social media campaign, gifs and animations they released about Apple minutes after their ban, yet are absent following the google ban hint at this.

It also seems Google and apple have either coordinated or are at least following the same tack.

Note the similarity in these two lines in their press releases:

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

23 Jul 20

Thank you to all of you who have Followed, Listed, Liked, Retweeted and Replied over the years. You teach me at least six new Things every day! In gratitude, here's a mini-Thread of a few Threads that I have posted up over these years for your nostalgic pleasure. Grab a cuppa.

A thread looking at the Royal Navy's cancelled plans for a 155mm deck gun:

https://twitter.com/TotherChris/status/1184057560732753920

A thread with an opinion on Type 31 armament:

https://twitter.com/TotherChris/status/1156574449103179776

The Other Chris

@TotherChris

29 Jun 20

This is the new US Army Infantry Squad Vehicle...

(Chevy ZR2 Bison).

1/

...only in a stripped down and more Military looking form. A key requirement is the ability to be transported by sling-load underneath a Black Hawk.

2/

Meanwhile, Ricardo are pushing a militarised Ford Ranger (T6 platform) for the British Army's General Service Vehicle....

3/

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