As Andrew reminded us in last week’s Footnotes, Sunday will see Salisbury, together with the rest of the country, celebrating Armed Forces Day, with a town parade and Market Place entertainment.
The day is an opportunity to recognise the service of regular personnel, reservists, veterans, cadets and military families, with strong meaning in the city shaped for generations by its proximity to Salisbury Plain.
Not long after I moved to Salisbury, almost a quarter of a century ago, I attended a dinner party.
It soon became apparent that I was the token civilian.
Everyone else was either serving, married to someone serving, or had offspring, parents or relatives in the Forces.
Armed Forces Day was first observed, as Veteran’s Day, in 2006 to recognise the contribution that former servicemen and women had made, the date linked to the anniversary of the first Victoria Cross investiture, held in Hyde Park in 1857.
Renamed a few years later, its focus widened to include all those connected with today’s Armed Forces, marked across the UK on the last weekend in June, with flag-raising ceremonies, parades, services and community gatherings.
For Salisbury, the connection is more than ceremonial; Britain’s most important military landscape, Salisbury Plain, is on our doorstep.
Acquired by the War Office in 1897, it is the largest military training area in the UK.
A clutch of garrisons nearby, now consolidated into a ‘super garrison’, have helped to shape the region’s identity, economy and daily life.
The historic association can be seen in local museums, such as the Rifles and Salisbury Museums, and in charities, cadet units, veterans’ groups and the many families whose lives have been connected to military service.
Recently, military leaders, pointing to the fracturing of traditional international alliances and abandonment of a ‘rules-based’ world order, have suggested that we should become more prepared for armed conflict and invest more in defence.
The current number of active service personnel is the lowest ever, about 147,000 (that’s one and a half World Cup match attendees), halved in 50 years.
Drones and modern technology are changing the way wars are fought and won.
But as the USA has recently discovered, there’s a limit to what you can achieve by waging war remotely.
Its reluctance to commit troops on the ground has left it attempting to spin a humiliating settlement.
We call on our service personnel to protect us; to be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice.
As we clap and cheer on Sunday, we face a question.
Are we prepared, in the midst of a cost of living crisis, to make further financial sacrifice to ensure that there are sufficient of them, properly equipped to deter or go into battle?
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