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The UK armed forces visit thousands of schools each year. They offer school presentation teams, ‘careers advisors’, lessons plans, away days and more. While they claim that this is not recruiting, the Ministry of Defence itself states that the activities enable them to “provide positive information to influence future opinion formers, and to enable recruiters to access the school environments.” Their youth policy, including school-based cadet forces, aims to create “the conditions whereby recruiting can flourish.” This is a long-term approach to recruiting young people both as supporters of the armed forces and, for some, softening them up for actual enlistment.

Photo: ssafa

Letter to The Times (see all signatories below)

On this day 100 years ago, Archduke Ferdinand of Austria and his wife were assassinated in Sarajevo in an action that led to the First World War. Unchecked militarism in Europe was also a major factor. 

Today is also Armed Forces Day, one of the clearest indications of the re-militarisation of British society. Established in 2009 to increase public support for the forces, there are over 200 public events, many billed as 'family fun days'. This week also saw Uniform to Work Day promoting the reserve forces and 'Camo Day' in schools. 

You may have seen some symptoms of an increasingly militarised society over the past few years. Soldiers on a train in uniform. The change in tone of Remembrance Day, from ‘never again’ to ‘support out troops.’ Michael Gove’s determination to get the military into schools so ‘every child can benefit from the values of a military ethos.'

I had been noticing the trend for months when I met with Emma Sangster from Forces Watch, a tiny NGO focused on the issue of unethical military recruitment. She confirmed that there is a conscious strategy for a more militarised society, outlined in a 2008 report by Quentin Davies MP and senior defence officials Bill Clark and Martin Sharp.