If the Royal Navy’s so ‘vital’, why have you wrecked it, Theresa?

DO the Government want to lose the Falkland Islands again? They seem to be planning hard for this, or another military humiliation. I am astonished at the lack of outrage and protest over the current vandalism being visited on our Armed Forces.

This sort of behaviour always leads to bad and even tragic results.

Last Sunday my colleague Mark Nicol drew attention to an especially crazy aspect of this, affecting the Royal Navy. I have pointed out here before that the Navy is in a tragic state.

But the latest move is quite straightforwardly mad. HMS Ocean, the current fleet flagship, is so central to the Navy’s operations that the Prime Minister paid a visit to her in the Gulf last December, and spoke warmly to the ship’s company. She said: ‘Here on HMS Ocean all of you are a vital part of Britain’s global mission… and you can be very proud of everything you are doing.’

All I can say to the Navy is hold on to your tin hats if the PM ever says anything nice to you again. She would have been more honest if she’d just said: ‘Goodbye!’

For, four months after this flagbrandishing oration, Mrs May’s Government put the ‘vital’ HMS Ocean up for sale.

The Brazilian Navy revealed in April that it is close to buying her for about £80 million.

In return for that – a ripple in Whitehall’s ocean of debt – we will lose the only ship we have which can mount a large-scale amphibious operation. Just how ridiculous is this? In current values, the huge and versatile helicopter carrier cost about £300 million when she was launched from a British shipyard in 1995.

She is not worn out or ancient. In 2014 she completed an 18-month refit costing another £71 million of your money. I am sure the Brazilian Navy will be very grateful that we have taken such good care of her for them. Only weeks ago she was doing useful work in hurricane relief.

I rang the Ministry of Defence. Their once-mighty press office now repels callers by diverting them to an answering machine which takes no messages and cuts you off.

But with much persistence I got through, and asked this simple question: ‘Are you mad?’ I got no proper answer to this query, only some strange bureaucratic babble.

IAM reminded irresistibly of John Nott’s 1981 Defence Review, in which the carrier Invincible was to be flogged off to Australia and the carrier Hermes, along with the assault ships Fearless and Intrepid, were to be scrapped. The patrol ship Endurance was to be withdrawn from the South Atlantic.

If the Argentines had the sense to wait for us to complete this moneygrubbing scheme, most of the Task Force used to retake the Falklands would have been sold or scrapped, and the Argentine flag would fly over Port Stanley to this day.

I wouldn’t mind so much if the Tories didn’t pretend to be patriotic. You’d understand it if Jeremy Corbyn or Ken Livingstone wanted to do this sort of thing. It would be just as wrong, but it wouldn’t be so creepily dishonest.

Next time you hear Mrs May or any of her Ministers thumping the patriotic tub, think of HMS Ocean.