THE toll on Britain's soldiers fighting two simultaneous counter-insurgency wars on an increasingly threadbare peacetime budget has manifested itself yet again in the news that more than one in five of those deemed deployable for frontline service is unfit, injured or tied down by vital administrative duties. The tempo of operations in Afghanistan and then Iraq since 2001 has been relentless and the cracks are beginning to show. About 13,000 UK military personnel are involved in operations overseas at any given time, with the army bearing the overwhelming brunt of commitments. Upwards of 11,200 soldiers are in the war zones alone, with others helping keep the peace in Kosovo or engaged in training roles elsewhere. The 20.7% shortfall in trained troops available for operations is almost twice the attrition rate of a decade ago.

At the height of the Cold War, with an army almost twice the size of the current 100,000-strong force, a 5% injury and sickness level was the norm. Although the Ministry of Defence has consistently denied it, the armed forces are overstretched and becoming dangerously so. The swelling exodus of experienced men and women is another indicator that all is far from well. The MoD has recruited 180 foreign officers to plug gaps in middle-management ranks, but seems to be more interested in spin and toeing the political line than in admitting there is a problem. Underlying the physical attrition is the fact that only 67,000 soldiers are theoretically deployable in the first place - about two-thirds of those in uniform. When that pool is reduced to just over 53,000, the equation becomes part of the law of diminishing returns. For every soldier carrying a rifle in Helmand or on the perimeter of Basra airfield, another has just returned home and a third is preparing to go. The 13,000 troops on operations are thus the tip of a manning pyramid 39,000 soldiers deep. The more they are deployed, and the less time off they have between tours, the more likely they are to sustain injuries or fall sick. Worse, the more likely they are to succumb to family pressure brought on by repeated absences and opt to quit early.

The Territorial Army has provided a sticking-plaster solution. But with 14,000 of its part-time soldiers out of the operational calculus because they have already been mobilised for six-month stints in hot and sandy places and therefore cannot be called to the colours again for at least three years, that well is about to run dry. The fundamental problem is that there are too few soldiers to carry out the tasks demanded by a government that lacks any personal experience of war and is notoriously reluctant to fund defence properly or to admit its interventionist policies have placed the armed forces on a shoestring war-footing. UK forces have sustained 4000 casualties since 2001, including more than 250 dead and at least 630 wounded on the battlefield. Although the army is not yet broken by over-use and under-resourcing, the day when it will be is coming fast. The young men and women who have already shed their blood, and those facing back-to-back tours, deserve better.