Australian newsreaders call the Pakistani cricket team 'the P@ki's' and it is not said nor taken as being in any way derogatory, and in context it isn't, as they shorten every name. Here in Britain we are all so used to bending over backwards being politically correct that we suck our breath in with horror when someone uses the word in ANY context.
Lets save our condemnation for people who call others names as a form of persecution, intimidation, incitement, bullying or as a deliberate act of hurtfulness, not members of the British forces who are working in hard and dangerous circumstances and shouldn't be having to guard thir tongue 24/7 to save falling foul of the PC brigade at home.