Options for Change was a restructuring of the British Armed Forces in summer 1990 after the end of the Cold War.
While the restructuring was criticised by several British politicians, it was an exercise mirrored by governments in almost every major Western military power, reflecting the so-called peace dividend.
[3] Total manpower was cut by approximately 18 per cent to around 255,000 (120,000 army; 60,000 navy; 75,000 air force).
[1] Other casualties of the restructuring were the UK's nuclear civil defence organisations – the United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation and its field force, the Royal Observer Corps (a part-time volunteer branch of the RAF), both disbanded between September 1991 and December 1995.
between the two regiments involved, and the uncertainty that many of those serving felt for their jobs in the light of two separate battalions merging into one, with the resulting loss of manpower.