I suspect Canadians understand their military even less

Do Canadian politicians, or bureaucrats, have any greater personal understanding (and not because they themselves are "chickenhawks")?

1) ...
"Of those available to be recruited to the public service, including the police and local government, only a few register notions such as duty and service of the community and the state for the common good."

It has become customary to blame the Labour Government for this - for misusing our Armed Forces, for failing to supply them properly and to show enough appreciation for what they do. I have said as much, and there is something in it, but it is less than the whole truth, which is that for the first time in a century - or longer - we have almost no one left among our rulers or in Parliament who has experienced war service...

2)...
I was struck by Bill Deedes's Notebook on Friday that no one in power understands the military that they command and deploy; they fail "to supply them properly and to show them enough appreciation for what they do". I wonder if Lord Deedes heard Des Browne's appreciation on the Today programme this week?

The three successive defence secretaries who have been hauled on to the airwaves to speak on behalf of the military have all been toe-curling in their own way (John Reid whittering about "birdsong" in Basra was a favourite in our house). But Des Browne was beyond parody. He'd been called in on the theme of John Prescott's sex life/housing difficulties/joblessness etc., but broke in to say, no wait, the first thing he had to do was "express my condolences to the family and friends of the two Queen's Royal Dragoons who were killed on Sunday night, blah blah".

Who briefs this idiot? There are no "Queen's Royal Dragoons". The families whose lives were broken last Sunday are mourning two soldiers from the Queen's Dragoon Guards. Mr Browne's inability to get the name of their regiment right, in the 10-second "condolence" soundbite on which he insisted, is pitiful...