Last stand of a dying government

This week's announcement that Gordon Brown is contemplating a new national holiday to celebrate the armed forces marks a new low for a government whose cynicism and hypocrisy often seems limitless.

The idea is one of various proposals in the 'National Recognition of the Armed Forces' review conducted by the millionaire Tory defector, Quentin Davies MP. Other suggestions include encouraging servicemen and women to wear their uniforms in public; making it a criminal offence to 'discriminate' against or insult them; and creating more cadet forces in comprehensive schools.

Many other countries have their own version of Armed Forces Day, including the United States, China, Israel and Burma. But the idea represents an innovation for Britain, which generally expects its armed forces to maintain a low-key presence during peacetime. So what explains New Labour's

sudden infatuation with the military?

The main aim of the review, according to Davies, is to redress the 'divergence' in understanding between the British public and the military. This statement ignores the discrepancy between what New Labour says about its armed forces and the way it actually treats them.

This is a government that sends its soldiers to war without ensuring that they are properly equipped, that cannot guarantee them proper treatment or compensation when they are wounded, and that provides them with sub-standard accommodation leased to the MoD by private companies. Only last week, a staggering internal report submitted to the head of the Army, Sir Richard Dannatt, revealed that many soldiers are so badly paid that they are obliged to take out food vouchers to pay for their meals to get through the month.

All this has taken place against a background of foreign military adventures that have left a trail of death, destruction and political chaos in their wake. Far from serving the interests of the nation, these wars