From: Adam 

Shows the diff with the US mil...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/6159061.stm

"Soldierly complaining is down to such a fine art that they have a
special word for it; to "grouse".

Somewhere up on Hadrian's Wall, perhaps modern archaeologists will uncover
evidence in scrawled Latin of a Roman Legionary's grousing.

Records show us that in the 1640s, Civil War troopers groused about their
pay, their food, and their commanders. It had not changed in Wellington's
day, when the punishment for supplementing your rations with looted
livestock was death.

In his army, footwear was a popular subject for grousing - which is
understandable when you realise that soldiers were not issued with a right
and a left boot, but a pair of lasts that you wore into a right and left
(unless you could afford to buy a pair of smart boots named after your
commander - Wellingtons).

Ignored

In the Crimean War - which ended 150 years ago this year - all these, plus
clothing and sanitation were causes for grievance. The need for warm winter
clothing was partly solved by cardigans and balaclavas (named respectively
after a commander and a battlefield). "


"So when Rudyard Kipling wrote his poem "Tommy" in 1892
about a soldiers' grumbles falling on deaf ears, until he was needed to
defend his country, his readers would have understood exactly why Tommy
grumbled, and how he was usually ignored.

Kipling wrote:"... You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an'
fires an' all:
We'll wait for extra rations if you treat us rational. Don't mess about the
cook-room slops, but prove it to our face The Widow's Uniform is not the
soldier-man's disgrace.

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the
brute!" But it's Saviour of 'is country, when the guns begin to shoot;
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please; But Tommy
ain't a bloomin' fool - you bet that Tommy sees!..."

Today, although operational security usually means that Tommy - and his
female counterpart- cannot write to a newspaper like the rest of us, they
have more voice than ever before.

This is because technology has come to their aid; e-mails and blogs tell us
almost immediately of duff ammunition, poor footwear, shortages of drinking
water, outbreaks of sickness. "




Adam

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