Blog: Tomorrow in a statement to the House of Commons David Cameron will start spelling it out in real terms for the armed forces, and 24 hours later the rest of us will have a clearer idea of what it all means when George Osborne takes centre stage.

By golly, it’s been a long time coming, but the details of the £83 billion spending cuts the Coalition Government has planned over the next four years are within hours of emerging in two hugely important statements to MPs.

Last week the news agenda was dominated by the fantastic story of 33 men emerging, after 69 days of incarceration, from a hole in the ground in Chile.

This week our newspapers, television screens and radio news broadcasts will be dominated by the plan to dig the UK out of an economic black hole created, at least in part, by the last Labour government.

We’ve known for nearly six months that it’s coming, but, unlike the hope, faith and joyous anticipation of the people of Chile, the people of Britain have been locked into concerns that they will lose their jobs, see their benefits cut or be living in a more dangerous world because of cuts in the police service or the armed forces.

At the Prime Minister’s official country residence, Chequers, yesterday Messrs Cameron and Osborne put the final touches to the most-talked-about political package in recent history. For good measure, and to share the blame/glory, Deputy Premier Nick Clegg and his Liberal Democrat colleague, Treasury Chief Secretary Danny Alexander, were there too.

So if you are a soldier, sailor or airman/woman, you had better duck tomorrow as the Cameron jet screams low overhead looking for targets for his redundancy missiles.

If you are on the military or civilian staff at RAF Cosford, you will want to know whether the defence training academy at St Athan in South Wales has been axed.

If you are a civil servant, work in the town hall or for the police or prison service, Mr Osborne will be gunning for you on Wednesday.

If you don’t go out to work but could find a job with a bit of effort, or if you cheat the benefits or tax system, the Government will have you in its sights.

But if you are a doctor, nurse, teacher or carer, you can breathe more easily because the NHS, schools and elderly care budgets are among the very few which will escape the Cameron/Osborne top guns.

Fascinating (although very much a side issue), that Top Gun Cameron will be delivering the results of the Strategic Defence Review tomorrow, rather than Defence Secretary Liam Fox. Foreign Secretary William Hague was due to tackle the security side today.

Much to Downing Street’s annoyance, Dr Fox and defence chiefs have fought a hard and often public battle to limit the cuts in the armed forces.

So Mr Cameron will be at the dispatch box with Dr Fox, put in his place, sitting behind him. And what about those weekend stories about Dr Fox being a little too fond of “partying”? Despite pledges to stop the negative personal briefing which characterised the last administration, the “revenge” poison still seeps out.

Back to the substance of the cuts. We still haven’t heard yet, despite all their sniping, what Labour would be cutting in the £44 billion Alistair Darling package which the new shadow chancellor, Alan Johnson, says will be his starting point.

Nor are we likely to, it seems. Mr Johnson, who described himself yesterday as the “Saga section” of Ed Miliband’s new generation, said he would be revealing some of Labour’s strategy, but indicated that we won’t be hearing too many specifics.

“We are not setting out an alternative Comprehensive Spending Review. We are in opposition – it’s not our role,” he said.

While condemning the “economic masochism” of the Government, Mr Johnson remained his usual affable self on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show, in sharp contrast to Mr Osborne, whose serious tone on the same programme reflected the enormity of what’s to come.

The Chancellor stuck to his guns, refusing to give ground on the child benefit axe for higher rate taxpayers, or anything else for that matter.

He did emphasise that it was a four-year plan and that the cuts would not take effect overnight, but the message was as clear as the screen on a fighter pilot’s helmet.

“We have to see this through, and the course which I set in the Budget is the one that we have to stick to,” he said.

“People in this country know we were on the brink of bankruptcy, and if we are going to have growth and jobs in the future we have got to move this country into a place where people can invest with confidence.”

Can the Chancellor emulate St George and slay the £83 billion deficit dragon? This time, there’s no question of the dragon being a myth. It’s real all right, and this week we are at last going to see where the blood will flow from the cuts made by George’s sword.