Defence Secretary John Healey has unveiled a sweeping reform agenda aimed at transforming the UK’s defence capabilities, declaring emphatically that “we must rearm Britain.”
In a speech delivered at the Institute for Government, he warned that the decisions made in the coming weeks will shape not only the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine but also the security of the world for generations.
He stated, “the decisions we make right now… will define the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine, but the security of our world for a generation to come.”
The speech outlined and reconfirmed plans to introduce four new senior leaders to ensure clear, consistent leadership and streamlined decision-making across the MOD. Additionally, effort will be made in terms reducing waste and duplication by consolidating finance functions and procurement processes, aiming to save taxpayers at least £10 billion over the next decade.
Addressing an audience both in person and online, Healey stressed his focus on results over appearances, saying, “I’m a defence secretary that’s more interested in getting results than photo opportunities and headlines.” He explained that while immediate challenges must be managed, reform is critical to prepare for a “new era of threat.” His remarks reflected the urgency for change within the Ministry of Defence amid rapidly shifting geopolitical dynamics.
Healey outlined the key structural reforms designed to streamline accountability and improve efficiency. He detailed the introduction of four new senior leaders who will report directly to him, including a new chief of the defence staff, a revamped permanent secretary, a new armaments director, and a chief of defence nuclear.
As he explained, “we’re introducing clear points of accountability at every level within UK defence… our new armaments director will fix procurement and drive growth.” He also highlighted plans to establish a new military strategic headquarters to oversee war planning and budget management.
Recalling his early days as Defence Secretary, Healey noted, “Exactly a year ago, I gave a little notice speech at the Policy Exchange on defence reform,” where he first stressed the need for a stronger defence centre. He continued by detailing the government’s achievements so far: increased defence spending by nearly £3 billion, a path to spending 2.5% of GDP on defence, a new industrial strategy, and significant improvements in service conditions—including the largest pay increase for over 20 years.
He described these measures as essential to fulfilling the government’s mandate for change and effective delivery.
The Defence Secretary also paid tribute to the outstanding dedication of armed forces personnel, highlighting the contributions of everyone from submariners returning from extended missions to apprentices working on nuclear reactor production lines.
He remarked, “extraordinary people doing extraordinary things within a system that very often doesn’t work in the way that we need it to,” underscoring that robust, accountable leadership is essential for providing the armed forces with the means to “deter, to fight and to win.”
Concluding his address, Healey reinforced his commitment to both investment and reform, asserting, “This government’s commitment to defence is unshakable.” He stated, “We will match sustained investment with serious reform. It will mean growing the economy. It will mean a more muscular defence for a more dangerous world.”
At the UK Defence Journal, we aim to deliver accurate and timely news on defence matters. We rely on the support of readers like you to maintain our independence and high-quality journalism. Please consider making a one-off donation to help us continue our work. Click here to donate. Thank you for your support!
Need to arm for today (next 24 months) not 10-15 years. The total defence budget needs to be orientated and prioritised around this –
Totally. Need to deal with the now. Surely there’s an even greater sense of urgency to focus their minds? Hope the UK and Europe stands by Ukraine and its people even if it means some disagreements with the US. 🇬🇧 🇺🇦
Quentin, the UK is standing by Ukraine. Starmer signed a 100-year Partnership or Pact with Ukraine only last month. In July last year, Starmer recommitted to pledging £3bn a year until 2030/31 and thereafter if required.
Don’t know about the rest of Europe.
Needs to be rearmed but the government won’t increase defence spending , lectures Europeans about needing to step up but the uk won’t step up, committing british troops to a potential peace keeping mission in Ukraine but won’t increase defence spending or increase troop number in meanwhile paying Mauritius billions for our territory and billions for this and billions for that all how embarrassing. Actions not words is needed
Unless we invest in hard power we will remain irrelevant
*become
The term “remain” was correct. Europe and the UK have been navel gazing for the past decade and now have very little international clout
Yes, more rhetoric as usual. Something needs to happen now not later. The writing’s been on the wall for at least three years and still the UK reduces its capabilities, Albion and Bulwark being the latest examples.
It’s all blah blah blah, until the armed forces are given the funding they need.
Whilst I agree that I’m tired of them talking big and doing nothing, realistically where is the money coming from? The countries finances are in a mess post mini budget etc and taxes are the highest post ww2. There just isn’t spare money floating around.
The sorts of amounts of money that are required to fund 2.3 – 2.5% tomorrow are a drop in the ocean.
If anyone is serious about this then that basic level of increase will be immediate. And that allows programs like stock levels to be increased rapidly.
Going from 2.5 -2.75% is a slower process as it takes time to ram up industry.
2.3 to 2.5% is not quite £2.5bn extra spend, not insignificant but doable if you are prepared to cutback elsewhere . Problem is the enemies of the government will attack them for cutting to spend, or for borrowing it. Frankly we need to be thinking along the lines of a multiparty agreement on defence spending. It is not a time for political point scoring and games.
Ya, Starmer has agreed to increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP.
It sounds like we are doing all the work as usual in Europe. We are not European or a part of Europe.
It’s time the Spanish and French stopped buffing their boots and got them dirty.
How can our military do anything with the 90 day rule!
Yes we are European. And we are part of Europe.
Please learn some basic facts.
I think he thinks you can redraw a planet’s geography to suit one’s political wishes. About as logical as being a flat-earther in reality.
No we are not, Ukraine is a problem for continental Europe, all 300M+ of them. It is not our problem, the very worst thingthat could happen is we get bogged down in another peacekeeping mission with UORs draining away money that needs to be invested in a navy expansion and and airforce because, wait for it…….we live on an island. This policy worked really well for 900 years.
Christopher, We are in NATO, a founder member. The AOR is Europe and the Atlantic. Anything that happens regarding security in Europe is our business.
Our island situation is totally irrelevant.
We are a few hundred kilometres from Russian soil a very short flight away.
As a European nation, maintaining the balance of power on the continent of Europe has been absolutely essential for the security of the United Kingdom (and its constituent nations) for many hundreds of years and is the reason we have fought so many wars there to exactly that end. Anyone that denies that (or even worse, that we are not part of Europe) is either completely detached from reality and incapable of coherent thought, or an adversary trying to sow discontent amongst us. Either way, not a credible person.
The “island nation” approach hasn’t really worked for 900 years. If one looks at the last two centuries for example and considers the Napoleonic wars and the First and Second World Wars, all were ultimately decided by armies including British armies fighting on the continent.
Badger, I agree. The army’s primary role is not the defence of the UK homeland – thats the falback position if everything went very pear-shaped.
It has always (since 1066 or thereabouts) been focussed on expeditionary combat operations and deterrence at distance from the UK base.
Indeed. Armies exist also to defend interests, not only homeland. Orherwise, that would be the swiss approach.
Being an island makes us more vulnerable, not less. Pretty much everything we need comes by sea, but most of it comes from the continent. And the “very worst thing that could happen” is a damned sight worse than just a peacekeeping mission…
No we are certainly not Europeans we’re British FACT…..
Calling something a fact doesn’t make it so. Even if you put it all in capitals.
Nice try, though.
Yes, we are Europeans. We’re not some magical continent of our own. We are part of Europe, and what happens in mainland Europe matters.
It’s funny how the right wing bleat on about how the ‘woke’ are apparently self-loathing towards themselves and their nation, yet it’s the right wing that can’t even accept basic facts about who they are. Sorry Nigel, we (you) are European, no matter how much online propaganda you’ve consumed and how much it hurts your head to think it. You can be British too, coincidentally, but that would require holding two thoughts in your head at the same time.
Hahahaha the average one brain celled Brexit voter has spoken. We’Re BrItISh nOt EuRoPeAn 😂😂😂😂. Did you ever study geography?
We are both. GB is part of Europe, that stretches to the Urals.
The term “Europeans” is often used to describe the continentals, but we are still European.
You’re a helmet. FACT.
We are on the European continent and what goes on in mainland Europe impacts us having the English Channel doesn’t change that
As usual? You got to be joking.
What is the 90 day rule?
That’s how long his education lasted.
He skived off for 89 of those days.
🤣🤣🤣🔥🔥🔥
So it’s obvious you failed both Geography and History at school.
We are actually part of Europe, you cannot change geography it’s an immutable fact in time and space. That means in time and space we are next door to a nuclear armed totalitarian far right dictator who likes to invade other countries and threat those he sees as is enemies with nuclear attack..(that’s us by the way).
A Kremlin insider has apparently stated that Trump has effectively given them the green light to attack European Capitals, London included so let’s all wave a flag saying we aren’t European that will do the job 😱.
I reckon that’s probably just another fear inducer but there’s always those nagging fears especially when we are shut out of the discussion that Trump might see that incapacitating of Europe and involving it in a war with Russia, economically just might be to their advantage. After all it made America Great the last time they were able to sell arms, extract wealth and take a competitor out of the equation stimulating their economy massively on the back of European IP, especially as he sees trade so out of kilter between Europe/US. What a way to ‘rebalance’ it eh, at least in his short term, simplistic mindset.
Exactly. the worry is that under Trump article 5 of the NATO Treaty is virtually meaningless. That perception is behind the Russian article.
Works both ways.
When they start losing ships against China and call for help, they can bugger off!
I love Trump he has poured cold water all over the European heads of state and made these freeloaders realize the emperor has no clothes (same for the UK). I’m sorry to say that 30 years of left wing liberalism has come crashing around the UK and Europeans. I’m from the UK but I think Trump is fantastic our leaders did need a cold shower in realism and stop freeloading on American tax payers. Moreover, this essential ends the net zero fantasy thank god as European and UK leaders can’t afford to both re-arm and pay for net zero. In addition, it will pour cold water on those wanting mass immigration as the costs of mass immigration won’t be affordable if we have to pay for our own defence. Moreover, diluting the presence of native Brits means trust in our society has collapsed to the point where only 10% would fight for the UK….suck it up left whinger….you reap what you sow….try asking the white working class to now fight the wars you wouldn’t send your own sons to….good that the delusion of throwing ourselves in far flung wars not in the national interest is long dead and buried.
@Matthew Thorne, you are a pillock. The left wing have rarely been in power for the last 30 years, not here and nor in France and Germany. Trump is a dillon, and the only people freeloading on American taxpayers have been rich Americans. Most of their military spend has sod all to do with NATO. Re-arming and and a drive for net zero are not mutually exclusive: indeed, it will be pointless having one without the other, as climate change is an even bigger threat in the medium to long term than the Russians, and will drive real-world conflicts as well as environmental damage. You have to haul it in to your thick skull that mass immigration is not a cost: it is the only way that Western economies and societies can function, given the demand for cheap labour in service industries and healthcare, and our demographic shift to an ageing population. A Faustian bargain, perhaps, but unless we are willing to start euthanising people as soon as they retire, one that we will have to accept. The decline of trust in our society has sod all to do with immigration (most immigrant communities have far closer community ties than ‘natives’) and much more to do with the decline of mass-employment heavy industries (Thanks Maggie!), the loss of lifetime employment, and the atomisation of society driven by rampant economic individualism (Thanks again!). If you want the white working class to join up, or anyone else for that matter, then the country needs to make it worth their while by investing in their future. Waving a flag and bellowing bullshit about Johnny Foreigner isn’t going to cut it.
As for my sons, I have three stepsons. Two are in the forces (regular and reserve), as is my younger brother (a colonel), who is the fourth generation of our family to serve in the army. I was a naval reservist when I was a young man. So I do have some skin in the game.
Spy, Why would Putin attack European capitals? He wuld unleash a NATO response if any of those Capitals were ENATO.
We can imagine various unpleasant situations that Kremlin will push forward with it’s hierarchy of nations theory. The stupidity of these concepts is rejected by countries like Finlande, Sweeden, Poland, Norway, Romania, Poland and many more. So what do we do next.
I whish UK, confronted to this kind of situation will understand that we are no longer on the same story than USA. I whish that your country and my country understand that the commonality of Destiny is way stronger within Europe than with the rest of the world. Otherways, I don’t know with who UK will play in Champions league or in the 6 nations tournament. I don’t see how we could welcom UK retiree in Dordogne. Let’s see
What would the response be if the usa isn’t helming , who has the long range strike ?
Is looking at a map beyond you? Where is our little island placed?
Have you ever actually looked at what the French Army does? I can tell you, we (The British Army) did A LOT of soul searching after their Mali intervention, because we knew we couldn’t have done it at that speed, with that level of effect. yes they needed our heavy lift and our Chinooks, but their Warning order to effect at Brigade level was 48 hours. Ok, so some force elements were already in Africa, but we could not have done it.
There is not a more operationally experienced Army in the world than the French. We love to joke about them but honestly, having worked with them, they are deeply impressive.
Well said Bob.
Too many jokes, cheap talks and bragging, not enough focus on the topic: that summarizes the british public debate about military affairs for too long.
We managed to launch the Falklands Task Force in a matter of a few days in 1982. Clearly things have gone backwards since then. Seriously, surely some of our forces such as parts of 16 AA Bde are at very short Notice To Move. My terminology is all out of date so I shall not say more!
Yes. We have VHR forces. Small elements here and there.
It all depends on the scale of what was needed.
If it is a re run of Corporate we do have the land forces to do that.
The issue is more the frigates and amphibs. Destroyers we are actually OK for in a limited theatre war like that.
RAF would struggle to support because of the AAR issue of not having any ability to AAR RIVET, C17 & P8 all of which would be needed as well as ferry flights for F35B which I don’ think we can support either. So there is a gap there for Marshalls to fix and not in the NIMROD ’82 AAR UOR manner that lead to Haddon Cave either.
Just to correct SBs comment on AAR – all F35B deliveries from the USA were carried with UK Voyager Tankers providing AAR support to the F35Bs which are only probe and drogue capable.
This is the sort of thing I’m here for…
Considering Spain and France have larger armies than we do….
French army will likely double in the coming 10 years, with the reserve and probably a conscription like in Norway.
Trump just served us 2 brand new nuclear submarines with M51-3 missiles plus 30 Rafales plus 3 frigates by opening discussions with Poutine very lightly. Germany just gave France allowance to increase budget to make a ground to ground version of a nuclear hypersonique and nuclear vector at the service of all European countries. Not per see, but these décisions are likely to emerge in coming days from the new posture of German foreign policy and from Mrs Van der Leyen reboot. Yesterday, UK prime minister was in Paris. The diplomacy is boiling.
I am now in London for vacation (beautifull country, I shall visit it again :)). I can just hope that we can cooperate better and better to rebuild the security architecture of Europe. EU and UK. So much has to be done. We have all played way to long as junior partners of large powers. Now, time has come to be independant. I don’t see this story with UK not being of it. Europe need UK. UK has just been way too long on the back foot. Europe will increase budget. The story is one in which UK can be a senior partner, with many countries eying for cooperation. Now, things will happen.
Wether you see UK as a distant outpost of USA or as an equal member of Europe will shape the future of the next 20 years. It is happening now. I can just hope and pray. Just remember on fact: the prééminence of UK trade network in the 19’s century made it extremely efficient to serve European market.
I do wonder around the European nuclear umbrella, I think the UK, France, Germany and Italy need a serious think about each nations contribution to a European nuclear umbrella..couple of points
1) trump has shown that he could pull the plug ion anything at anytime. This means the UK deterrent is at risk, if he decided he’s no longer maintaining UK trident missiles we in a bit of a mess and I could see him doing that.. in an arms agreement with Russia if Russia gave the US a Concession and asked in return for the US to pull support from Uk trident missiles I think he actually would.
2) US nuclear umbrella, in reality the French and Uk deterrents were adjuncts to the US deterrents..essentially triggers for MAD, but not providing MAD themselves…it’s very clear the US would never now us nuclear weapons unless there was an attack on US soil.
so what does this mean..it means that the core European democracies need to have a MAD level nuclear deterrent between them as that’s the only thing that would deter Putin from using nuclear weapons on European soil ( because I think unless he risks total destruction of the Russia state he could decide to chance his arm). In reality a true MAD deterrent needs to be a total stockpile of around 1000 warheads with around 500 deployed.. At present the UK has 230 and France 290 with maybe 50 UK and around 100 French warheads deployed at any one time
What actions could be taken:
1) the French and Uk deterrents need to become more integrated with the UK and France co-ordinating it’s ballistic missile submarine force..with 8 boats between them the UK and France should be able to pretty much guarantee 3 boats out at anyone time.
2) both French and UK boats need to move to carrying around 100 warheads each
3) France needs to fully deploy its 50 ASMP-A and R missiles, 10 back on the carrier and forward base the 40 into Germany ( Germany has to take some of the shared responsibility.
That’s moved the European deterrent up to around 250 active deployed warheads
So the next step would be for:
1) France and the UK to share all nuclear tec and both states manufacturing TNA warheads and France to start knocking out ASMP-R missiles.. these need to be funded by the other major European powers. Creating a pool of a few hundred TNA warheads and ASMP-Rs that can be deployed to Germany, Italy..each of these nations should hold 100 warheads and missiles.
2) intergration ASMP-R onto typhoon to increase the number of fighters that carry it..so Germany and Italy can deploy the missiles.
3) forward base 100 French ASMP-R into Poland with 2 squadrons.
4) UK to hold 50- 100 ASMP-R in Cyprus.
5) Uk to seriously consider if it needs to have a massive and expensive rethink around its SLBM missile programme and does it need to join France and instead use M51.2
Long term
1) joint UK and french project to develop a new generation SLBM as well as an IRBM.
2) joint UK and french project to develop a hypersonic air and ground launched nuclear capable cruise missile
3) Germany, Italy,poland, France, Uk to base hypersonic cruise missile IRBMs in some states as well.
4) for a total of 1000 warheads 500 deployed.
Essentially it creates 5 nuclear states in Europe with a combined MAD deterrence.
Let’s cross the finger, it is a finest hours moment.
Would completely agree with more cooperation with France, Poland, and Germany on MAD and think the idea of developing a joint France/UK SLBM and introducing a air launched nuclear tipped missile is the way to go.
well lets face it, the new Anglo-French cruise missile family includes a nuclear tipped variant for France. The UK has needed a tactical nuclear weapon since WE177 was retired. It would make sense for the UK to have a few of these new nuclear tipped missiles, but only if we put a small (in nuclear terms) warhead on it. Something in the region of 15kt to 25 kt. Like Redbeard. We need the UK to agree to the MoD demand of 2.65% GDP defence spending though.
I like you. You can come again! 😋
Thank you!
I am also very tickled by the mental image of ‘rebooting’ Mrs von der Leyen – is there a button somewhere? All politicians should have one!
Matt, love then idea of a reboot button on politicians… 🙂 🙂
Since posts by the way…
Cheers CR
How are we doing all the work?
We aren’t donating the most rare money to Ukraine, that’s Germany. We aren’t in the top 10 donating percentage of gdp of European countries
Our military is smaller than France and Italy with Poland rapidly catching up, well if you count troops numbers or armoured vehicles.
Where is all the work, other than in the uk media?
We are doing our part but in no world are we solo doing all the lifting.
Even not in the top 5 when counting overall military expenditure as percentage of gdp.
The size or equipement means nothing without training. UK and France pay 25% of budget for training, the same for aquisitions and 50% for salary and installations. In Spain, Germany or Italie, training budget is 10% at best, so Even if they have soldiers and equipments, none or very few are ready to fight (bersaglier in Italy and foreign légion in Spain are the troupes ready to fight. Other units seems doubtfull). I am not aware of combat troups ready in Germany. Does not mean there are none.
If the Government are serious about the urgent need to re-arm then the imperatives must be along the following lines:
Speed up the type 26 and 31 build to get them into the water quicker-double shifts and address bottlenecks
Order an additional new build 24 Typhoons and speed up the F35 delivery rate
Increase Regular Army numbers by 10 000
Boost funding for the Reserves and up the numbers
Sounds about right. That said I suspect the frigate builds are going pretty much at full tilt. Maybe also re-instate WCSP at some level and build new MCM and coastal patrol vessels.
No more f35 . The yanks are shafting us . They will shaft us yet with the f35. We need to convert to cat and trap and but French jets. The yanks are users
Yes, but the treacherous sods will still take our money for the F-35, and it’s still the best game in town.
Short-term measures could be the retention of Warrior for peacekeeping in Ukraine saving Ajax and Boxer from that operation, thus allowing them to be built up as planned without arduous duties on the frontline. What’s now apparent is the Treasury’s stance on 2.5 GDP is going to have to rise but at what costs, unless income tax is increased to cover 3.0 GDP that will most probably be the least amount required.
Maurice, it would certainly be useful for each rifle section to have a 30mm cannon.
Well PM today said it wont rise even after the military has said it needs to
MoD is said to want 2.65% GDP.
Maurice, we don’t have any Boxer in service and only a handful of Ajax. Warrior were good peace keepers in FRY.
Look at wheeled robots with 30mm gun. Extremely light, firepower on the frontline. kNDS unweiled the new robot today.
Starmer visits the US. What are the odds that after his demand from Trump of a Ukraine ‘backstop’ , the SDR recommends an increase in army numbers sufficient to maintain a UK divisional force in Ukraine. Will Starmer be given a lesson in the art of the deal?
The current art of the deal consisting of “meh have what you want”
Well then a diversion to meet Claudia Sheinbaum should be in order, she eating Trumps lunch at the moment and with over 80% popularity levels to boot. Trump or indeed Starmer would love anything approaching half of that level of support even if the former claims 110%.
Girlpower 😂
Paul, Starmer won’t demand anything of Trump – he’s afraid of him.
Trump does deals. What would Starmer give him to get a US backstop?
The Chagos islands ?
He should have them. They’re no bloody good to us, despite what the loons say, and it would make all the bullshit and international opprobrium his problem.
Season ticket to Arsenal? But point taken. Trump will only provide a backstop to defend the US assets that he gains from the peace negotiations.
That said, if Starmer continues to lead the European pack in increasing defence spending we might get some trade benefits.
Season ticket to Spurs. He needs to feel pain…
So… does this mean that the main way they are going to rearm Britain is with £10 billion in cuts over over the next 10 years?
Yes it seems so, at least that’s what they are saying now.
They will need to raise more in tax or cut elsewhere to fund anything else. The markets are very jittery about our economy so we cannot spend anything significant without it being funded.
No it’s Trumpy that wants to cut defence by 50%, which is why he’s throwing Ukraine under a bus so that he can get a good deal on arms reduction with Russia and China…
It is Europe that is throwing Ukraine under the bus…
US defence is highly wasteful. US build thousand of M1 Abrams despite the Army saying did not needed them. But a senator had jobs to protect…
The issue is US debt plus competing with China. Things cannot go as they went in last 30 years. At least Trump admin recognizes it.
It is unacceptable an F-35 program again, much more must be produced by much less, see how Elon made space flights cheaper by several fold.
That’s very naive ‘Elon’ has made most of his money from Govt subsidies and certainly covering his own inadequacies by using other rather more knowledgable and bright people with actual qualifications. Tesla only makes money from carbon credits even then on twice I believe, Space X totally reliant on Govt contracts often received as does Bezos by legal threats that would cripple programmes if the Govt hadn’t relented. It’s why those two got the moon lander contract over the far more practical Alpaca the only one that has met all requirements so far ironically. Falcon is indeed his one big success story but even that hasn’t met its full original promises. Let’s see how Starship pans out it despite, Musks hype is facing years of delay and so far has achieved nothing that NASA hadn’t years back indeed hasn’t got to orbit yet and faces enormous challenges and enormous Govt subsidies if it is ever to fulfil its promises, it was after all designed for Mars so pretty much anything else is a compromise like not being to put anything above LEO without a kick stage.
Equally in this so called Govt cost reduction manoeuvres (which gain sensitive information giving personal advantage over competitors by the way) he has so far managed to to sack hundreds of staff he hadn’t realised look after the safety of US nuclear warhead stocks and when they realised it urgently tried to re-employ over 50 but as they had been frozen out of their emails had no other way to contact them than to ask around those who weren’t sacked to see if they could contact them. Then this genius and his dodgy High School rejects claimed that thousands of pensions were being paid to long dead people despite it seems being so ignorant of COBOL programming that under certain erroneous input circumstance or errors it defaults to 0 and a date in the 1900s, no it’s not fraud at all.
The actual purpose here is to install an ai super core over all Govt Departments that will control all information over all public employees so can sack any non MAGA compliant staff and further still know pretty much anything about anyone in the Country rather like in Person of Interest in case anyone saw that series. It’s why he made that massive bid for Open Ai, clearly Groc isn’t up to that job. His political conversion is fundamentally due to the fact that under a Trump Govt Tesla’s whole profitability would be extinguished if he were not manipulating from the inside or getting compensation elsewhere. Its whole stock market value is based not on its failing car business (unless he can manipulate matters to its advantage like he tried with the 400 armoured CyberTrucks Govt order to keep that particular paperweight going) but his hype over his robots which when analysed are not actually competing with US and western rivals let alone the scarily good Chinese ones. So no this isn’t about savings at all except cutting payments to the poor and workers to finance tax cuts to the super rich oligarchs (the last Trump cut legislation doing so just happens to run out this year) and to finance Musks vanity projects like Mars to plant a flag. Yes without change the US debt may go above 100% of GDP come 2032 but these efforts are to keep indeed expand upon the wealth of the Oligarchs not to make things more efficient as a priority, after all both have been throwing money around like it’s going out of fashion in 2025 all paid for by the average Joe, after all Musk and Trump pay practically no tax at all, that’s just for useful idiots and flags on Mars and lies about Departmental spending on condoms for Gaza with the added invention about them being used as bombs keeps them happy.
A really interesting piece. This is my first post on here, but I have been reading the comments section for sometime.
I am very conflicted when it comes to current events surrounding the U.S/NATO and European members “ponying” up. Yes defense in the U.K has been cut to an embarrassing level since I was in and the U.S is right to call us out on it. But I also believe this is the time to cut our dependency on the U.S and make our own way in the world whilst acknowledging that we are no longer a superstate and should act accordingly.
That was good, what musk is doing in the US government is very scary “big brother” stuff to be honest.
Alex, how is Europe throwing Ukraine under a bus?
Wasn’t he the guy who actually left Arms Control agreements last time around?
Trump can cut it a bit tho as he is sitting with thousands of fighters jets and hundreds of bombers etc
They have asked departments to model an 11% across the board cut, the Treasury is hinting at income tax rises. There is serious discussion of the UK joining a EUR 200 billion pulled debt fund much like the EU did for COVID and Green Technology.
Expect the answer to come from all three sources.
11% is far more cutting than needs to be done.
Unless you are talking unprotected budgets?
HOJ/HMCTS can’t take any more cuts justice has been on its knees for years and it is only getting worse. If you want more justice scandals that is the way to go.
So far all he seems to have done is increase the number of posts at the senior MOD/UK Gov interface and establish an additional HQ and created another Chief of Defence Procurement. i.e. more management and review inserted into the existing structure – it will not improve anything except create senior level posts all presumably funded from the Defence Budget. Their reviews will slow decision making and create more civil service jobs – very much a Starmer man who want more data to control over less and less. No increase in defence equipment (mass) and no new manpower targets. Clearly a rich hunting ground for the many Defence analysts and advisors making informed decision making almost impossible.
If those new posts take over responsibility for things from existing committees then the possible results could well be worth their salaries. You often get better and more timely decisions when responsibility rests on an individual rather than a committee whose members will pass the buck indefinitely.
New HQs and extra layers og government. Sir Humphrey will be pleased.
How are they “new” ????!!
The CDS, PS, and CDN positions ALREADY EXIST.
An Armaments Director could be seen as the existing head of DE&S rebranded with a new name.
Is he talking of yet another reorg within MoD which takes separate existing areas and merges them to create efficiencies?
To be fair, I think the Armaments Director will sit over the Head of DE&S and the directorate will incorporate other procurement functions besides DE&S
Morning Jon.
Thanks. So a super Tsar then,and another level of management.
What procurement functions, beyond the DNE, exist as it stands outside DE&S?
There are a load of smaller ones: digital, infrastructure, DSTL, Leidos, come to mind, and the FLCs have their own procurement sections for smaller stuff that doesn’t go through DE&S. I imagine the Defence Nuclear Enterprise, which has managed to carve out its own little empire over the last few years, will keep their procurement out of the hands of the NAD.
Ahhh, OK, so DD, DSTL, DIO do their own, thanks.
About time, but far too late. War is almost upon us. Putting a single new Frigate in the water is taking the best part of a decade.
The UK needs to switch to a war economy – NOW.
Talking tough but no money to back it up. 2.5% of GDP may just about prevent more cuts but there will be no rearmament without more money.
It seems they are hoping that saving money through efficiencies will give more cash to defence. I’m sure that there is waste, in fact I know there is through my own business dealings, but the MOD has shown itself to be incapable of reform. Fingers crossed this works but I won’t hold my breath.
It also shows the sorry state of our economy. They can’t borrow more without cutting elsewhere or raising more in tax.
Efficiencies is a Unicorn that MoD have deployed since 2010 that has made no difference.
So assume, as the DSC and NAO have pointed out endless times, they are doing it yet again and rolling the dice on their assumption it will work.
And then it doesn’t, and something else is cut.
Hi M8
If you want a head scratching exercise, go onto the DE&S website and look at the vacancy section. Plenty of very highly paid “Head / Director of” posts on £80 – 160 K, a couple of low paid OH and H&S jobs and then it gets stupid. They want a Submarine ship surveyor for less than £30K and a fully qualified Naval Architect on less than £40k.
Guess I know which ones they will fill and it will not be the last 2 as they are nowhere near Industry rates.
The Director Nuclear keeps rattling around – I’m not sure I’d want to touch it for the salary and the stress or the inability to actually change anything.
Hi Daniele,
Agree about Efficiency as a general term, cover for cuts usually. However, I sense a shift its use. Normally, it is used to cover cuts to the services, “we seek to make our armed forces more efficient and get value for money for British Tax Payer”, that kind of rubbish. Been used for as long as I can remember and I have been following defence since I was a kid (a looonnnnggg time ago, now!). Healey applied the word efficiency to the procurement system and appointing named individuals as head of sheds means he has someone to kick when something goes seriously wrong (minor fails and he’d be kicking them to death in the first week 🙂 ). We’ll see if it works, but I won’t hold me breath.
Cheers CR
So we are going to reoranise the office staff with new bosses, revitalise industry without orders for new equipment; save a billion a year and get to 2.5 per cent of a depressed economy sometime in the distant future. Brilliant, yet another speech of nothingness.
Deck chairs on the Titanic anyone.. Britain must re arm but with what… Still waiting for any extra cash to do it with, last time I checked BAE aren’t giving artillery for free
No. But we could try limiting the profit they make so that our money goes further…
2.5% of GDP was the minimal requirement after Russia invaded Ukraine.
Now that USA under Trump has shown to be an unreliable ally, the % required is now far north of 3%…
When is Elon having a working holiday to the UK to sort out the shortfall in funding thats needed for this?
When he’s finished firing the guys who look after the USA’s nuclear weapon stocks not to mention clearing out the FAA…?
Speech to say we need to Rearm honestly where do we get our Politicians from 🙄 2.5% won’t make a blind bit of difference . 2014 should of woke the government up at the time , MR Cameron name springs to mind again 😟 .To be fair that said for the rest of Europe but . Then when Trump came to Power for is first term he warned all NATO members to increase spending a few did .But the majority sleep .Now the big man’s back and OOPS we need to increase defence spending. 🤔 And yet the government at present still cutting ships ect ,and wanting to put British Army in Ukraine who don’t have numbers or the resources .Please someone sit MR Starmer down and have a quite word with him. 😴😟🙄
I wish the interview at the end hadn’t let him dodge the tough questions. Are the armed forces hollowed out? Just say yes, Minister, then tell us your plan to reverse it. Anything that goes beyond rearranging the deckchairs would be good. Is 2.5% the right number? Oh, stop waffling, Minister. You cant pay for everything through efficiencies. How many troops can we afford to sustain in Ukraine without raiding the troops in the Baltics? Er…..
It’s always the same. Every bloody time they dodge. Put me in there to ask, please!!!!
Reminds me of Carters 2015 video explaining how wonderful strike was, the interviewer was utterly useless. I was ranting away in fury and my wife laughing her head off.
Problem is, it’s not funny.
Wish we could mate 👍 🍺
If you really want a session ranting at the TV, watch President Trump’s latest speech. Had it been anyone else I’d be looking for signs of a deep fake.
I don’t think all the statins in the world would let me get through it…
I’m reliably informed that present Government have been secretly following the comments section on here and will indeed be taking on board everything that has been mentioned to improve the various arms of the forces.
With immediate effect, we will be doubling the orders of T26, T31 and T32, in a addition, T83 will now number 12 Giving a grand total of 48 escorts thus allowing a follow on order of 2 more QE’s, In honour of your efforts, each new ship will be named after the most prolific posters on here, Top prize for the number of comments posted by an individual member will be rewarded by naming the 3rd QE after him/her.
HMS Daniele Mandelli,(Carrier) HMS Supportive Bloke,(F26) HMS Dearn,(T31) HMS Gunbuster, (T83) HMS Robert Blay, (T32) HMS Sailorboy (Rigid Inflatable untill old enough to have a T31 named after him) have already been allotted but don’t despair if your name isn’t on this list, It’s all in hand.
Graham More will be chief consultant on all things Army and…. Airborne will be tasked with reopening old airfields for housing the 600 plus additional Typhoons, Tempests and F35’s.
N.A.B. will be overseeing all warship design and construction.
JoninMK is deffo banned though.
Post of the year!
Poor Sailor Boy in his RIB! Lol. He’d be well at home considering that is what he does with his family.
Nice one Freddie. 😆 I can tell you’ve been around, under different aliases, for a long time.
And in other forums? I don’t recall NAB ever having posted on UKDJ?
We’ve all been around, under different aliases for a long time, including NAB…. You have managed to dodge the banishments though !
So far.
Airborne for re-opening fields??
More like storming them and taking names.
JoninMK now has better things to do, he was pulled away from Toretsk, to entertain the Dear Leader’s folks in Kursk and then parachuted into Trump’s negotiating team to write press releases for us and the Europeans just proving the point that UKDJ reaches the parts others don’t reach.
Last I heard was he and Ulya were getting married. Funny how they all disappear.
I am still here enjoying the narrative and comments, in fact it has become even more entertaining these last few weeks so I will have to pay more attention
I’m happy with a T32. But can I have a sqn of F35’s under my winter too. ha.
Don’t be silly, Not even a QE can have a full squadron…. Fat chance your T32 will have more than a few Drones.
I am deeply honoured by your proposed T26 B3 naming.
We need action now. Another 24 Typhoons, 24 F35b . Type 32 confirmed, 3 more P8 , and two more E7. Plus extra A400, sort out the Challenger 3 with at least 200+ and the artillery. Then they can sit back and brag
Can we also have a turret on some of the Boxers, please (or at least an RS6)? Oh, yeah, and a few tens of thousands of extra soldiers, sailors, marines and aviators.
The opportunity and threat from drones needs full focus. Ukraine/ Azerbaijan have shown the vulnerabilities of ground, air and maritime assets to drones/ FPVs. Unless this is tackled our ground forces will be as toast as those from NK.
With Starmer suggesting a commitment to peacekeeping in Ukraine I should think any rearmament would heavily involve the army, with the future of the Challenger definitely secured and in fact probably increased.
The only way to increase CH3 would be to reactivate a long gone Industrial capability, CH3 are just reworked CH2’s and any CH2’s not being upgraded are either in Ukraine or beyond economical viability.
I think I read somewhere that there was an offer to build new hulls for the CH3, so someone obviously thought that it was worth the investment.
We need to increase our industrial capacity if we are going to be able to stand up to Russia and any of its friends that might turn up. That is going to take sometime which obviously we do not have in abundance now. Personally, I’d like to see just get on and start ordering the kit we need and if that means rebuilding the necessary industry to deliver it then get on and do it as well. No one in Europe has enough industry in meet their own needs let alone the needs of eNATO.
Thanks to Donald Trump few people can be unaware that something is going on and that defence is now a major issue so Starmer et al should start selling the need to the country now. Russia is still fighting in Ukraine and when that ends Putin will need time to rebuild his army before he can even consider taking bites out of eNATO. So we have sometime, but not enough to waffle on.
At least the Sec Def. is talking about rearmament.
Cheers CR
Yes, there was an offer to fabricate more hulls from scratch.
Question is ‘is that way Army needs?’
OK UKR has got sucked into fighting Russia with Russian WWI tactics so the question is can UK keep mobile enough to use its undoubted mobile advantage?
I think one of this issues is we all forget the reality of south Eastern Europe and that is the mud seasons, twice a year you can not effectively manoeuvre, that means area denial becomes a lot easier..as long as you can hold out till the mud season you can essentially build massive area denial defences…it’s happened to both Ukraine and Russia, the Russians tried for a swift beheading campaign at the beginning, got bogged down in mud retreated all their prime units and went for attrition..Ukraine then went on an offensive..the mud season restarted bogged them down, Russia built up its area denial safety over the mud season..and the rest is history..
I think we have to take realistic lessons…manoeuvre warfare in that part of the world will always be limited to summer.
Hi Jonathan,
The two mud seasons in South East Europe basically shape the battlefield. The Russians have used the mud seasons to plant millions of mines across their frontlines making mobile warfare very problematic. As the Ukrainians found out, clearing mines under fire is a considerable challenge. If NATO wants to be able to exploit its manoeuvre doctrine we are going to have to find a solution to minefields that can be a few klicks deep!
Cheers CR
Rearmament must start with industry, equipment is useless if it cannot be supported.
Net zero means UK electricity for industry is twice as expensive as it is in France. Three times higher than the USA & four times more expensive than China.
I thought that extra £3bn announced in the budget was for Ukraine support?
It was
That wasn’t my recollection, but I might be wrong.
I recall the £2.9 bn as a “one-off injection”(made it sound like some sort of innoculation) next year needed to not quite maintain the current 2.29% GDP figure. So just an inflation_growth standing still measure. There was £3bn for Ukraine as well, but that was a full £3bn a year (raised from £2.5bn pa by Mr Sunak) and already integrated into the current MOD budget.
Thanks Jon for the update on the £2.9bn and £3bn.
Lots talk talk but they need to now undertake immediate action
1) bring forward the findings of the defence review and make it not conditional on spending. This would allow government and the people of this country to actually see the defence deficit and give a goal to achieve..not provide a goal that does not relate in anyway to the risk but government knows it can achieve it ( lying to ourselves) which is what every defence review for a generation has been.
It now needs a complete pivot as well:
The British army is now potentially “likely” to be fighting a European war. But not the European war it was planning for. There are now 4) likely areas the British army may end up fighting as it rubs up against Russia
1) the Baltic states. These are areas with a large number of rivers and lakes, bogs, upland and lowlands…crap bridges..woodlands..also a place where space cannot be exchanged for time as the depth is 100 miles and these is a very good chance the land rout out could be cut. Any forces placed in the Baltic liable to be cut off unless they are swift, will need to be lighter for the terrain..essentially Mec infantry with wheels with lighter IFV, APC, armoured cav and wheeled armour with direct fire and wheeled lighter type fires…slow and heavy armour may not be the best for the Baltic states.
2) south Eastern Europe..this is essentially muddy plains and forests.with the major on mud. Heavy wheeled vehicles are going to get bogged down and restricted to roads for a lot of the time..the mud sessions will stop mobile warfare and allow massive building of areas denial.
3) the high north ( Norway etc) same as it always was..for the marines and amphibious craft very specialist.
4) Not Europe, but a European war would kick off a conflict between Russia and Europe in Africa for resources and to protect aligned nations. Would require light probably air Mobile troops.
Steps within that south Eastern Europe ( Ukraine after a peace) this should be focused around 3rd armoured division ( tracked ) with 3 fully deployable heavy brigades and one mec brigade…essentially 3rd Uk division becomes the UKs contribution to south Eastern Europe.
1) convert every challenger tank we can get our hands on to challenger 3 ( that should involve getting any back from ukriane when there is a peace)…these are modern MBTs at 5 million a pop, that’s less than the cost of an IFV or boxer. Essentially ensure there are 3 armoured regiments so one is always in south Eastern Europe and one is ready to deploy on a month.
2) Modernisation of every warrior we can get, this will be cheap as chips..if a challenger 3 costs 5 million a warrior life extension could be done for way less. Then rebuild up to 6 armoured infantry battalions, 2 based in south Eastern Europe, 2 at one months notice.
3) heavy Mec brigade of 4 Mec battalions..1-2 based in say Poland with combat support to allow fast response either to Baltics or Ukraine.
4) these 4 brigates would need organic Combat support, armoured cav, tracked self propelled artillery, long range precision fires, medical, engineering, logistic.
Steps supporting the Baltics, 1st division needs to transition from a global responce division to a Mec divisions sculptures around the Baltic battlefields.
1) 4th and 7th need to be proper mec brigades, 4 battalions each in a decent mid weight Stanag 3-4 APC, each with full Combat support, light cav, wheeled fires ( just order archer ). These mec brigades will also need some form of wheeled direct fire plaform ( as the french and Italians have)
2) the hard swallow will be another mec brigades same as above..this needs to be formed from the extra battalions that undertake the global deployments.this would give three mec brigades one of which would be deployed to the Baltics, one on 1 months notice
3) 16 air assault becomes an mobile brigade, would essentially be the one ready to deploy globally and potentially you would Base the ready battalion in Cyprus. You would see this expended to take all the world wide deployments. Including Falklands and Bruni, both Gurkha regiments placed in the air mobile brigade. You would also ensure access to protected patrol vehicles for the brigade.
4) ensure each brigade has organic area air defence ( camm) and each battalion has organised close in air defence and anti drone defence.
5) ensure each battalion has organic drone warfare operations offensive and ISTAR, ensure each brigade has long range done based ISTAR, linked to its fires.
You’re looking at a lot bigger army for what is really now needed in Europe if this realignment is real.
Airforce wise. The move to essentially 4 front line typhoon and 2-3 F35 b will need to end and there will need to be a significant increase in mass, with the most efficient aircraft front line fighting, which is typhoon.
1) move to 8-9 front line typhoon squadrons ( with Falklands flight, OCU, and test evaluation) that’s around 150-160 single seat typhoons or an order for an extra 60-65 aircraft.
2) stick at three squadrons of F35b it pains me to say it but 3 squadrons and OCU will be enough to deploy one carrier battle group and we need mass so more typhoons.. so 78 aircraft.
3) AEW we need to purchase a lot more, this is fundamentally important. Probably 9 in 3 squadrons
4) more ASW martime patrol..probably 12 + drones across four 3 squadrons
5) look at a tactical lift Platform that has pan European range.. 900-1100 miles. Basically the Uk needs lots of tactical lift that can get to and from the Baltics in one go.
6) move the medium lift rotor to the army as they know what they need and the RAF are just playing at it. ( personally I would move the heavy lift rotor as well because range wise it’s essentially an army in theatre asset).
7) reconfigure the RAF regiment to GBAD for core military infrastructure and have its entire primary focus on that.
NAVY
It must focus on, supporting the northern flank, attack of the Russian bastions ( up to an including penetrating the Kara sea ), protecting the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Red Sea, gulf and Indian Ocean sea lanes as well as protection of our south Atlantic interests..the pacific is no longer our problem.
1) moving back to a 30 large surface combatant fleet of 30 ships 30% ASW, 30% AAW and 30% GP.
2) developing a 10+ strong patrol and Mine warfare fleet, 2000-3000 tone autonomous vehicle mother ships with self protection. For local infrastructure security and mine warfare.
3) amphibious vessels that can project the RM into the northern flank ( Norway ) up to max brigade level. 6 assault ships that can carry up to 2 companies each. These assault ships should be dual purpose and be able to act as mother ships for autonomous vessels to help with local infrastructure security and mine warfare if not supporting amphibious operations, they should have self protection and be able to provided long range fires for marines.
4) carrier battle group should now be sculpted for battles in the high north and attacking Russian bastions as well as supporting sea lane protect in the Indian Ocean area.
5) RFA to be able to support a single Indian occean carrier battle group as well as Atlantic and northern occean opps. Provide strategic sea lift for a brigade into or out of the Baltic states.
6) RM reconfigured to fight a peer in the high north with all required combat support.
Nuclear forces
provide 30%-50% of a European MAD capability ( 1000 warheads with 500 deployed would provide MAD ) should consider expanding triad to air launched weapons sharing i. The French new development of air launched weapons and..with air launched options for typhoons based in Eastern Europe. Work with France to ensure 3 European ballistic missile armed subs on patrol at all times, increase warhead load on each ballistic missile sub to 100.
Home defence
Redevelop civil defence infrastructure.
All necessary.
It will never happen with any government save until it’s too late as war is already underway.
They’re only interested in welfare, health, education, as they’re the vote winners.
And on top of that, party and personal political survival.
I’m not getting excited or my hopes up.
Sadly I agree..
Also even if our politicians somehow get a grip, the Germans are essentially a lost cause, they have literally no will whatsoever and most worryingly they are the leading lights of the EU… and are essentially ambivalent around confrontation Russia.
To be fair, germans are what we all wanted them to be in 45: eunuch.
I don’t know.
The Donald has shaken everything up and woken Europe from its cozy slumber where it wakes up and takes a bit from defence and gives it to social/environmental to feel better before snoozing off again.
I think some of your conclusions about the terrain are a bit questionable. The High North is unlikely to feature Norway much now. It has traditionally been a focus and we’ve been slow to focus away from it, but Norway is really no longer on the frontline. The High North now means Sweden and Finland, so the emphasis on Amphibious and Mountain Warfare is heavily reduced. Instead it’s fighting in open Taiga and Tundra, where you are going to need mechanised Infantry and armour, with a good logisitics train. Light Amphib forces will sit in Norway and have little effect unless the Russians overrun Sweden, at which point holding Norway becomes difficult. I’d also argue that the idea that you need fast mechanised forces for the Baltics is what lead us down the strike path and I’m not sure I agree with it. The British Army has about a decade worth of training with heavy armour in the Baltics and don’t seem to think it’s inappropriate for the terrain, and we are probably going to reach a point where we can move heavy armour into the Baltics with a lot more operational speed than we used to thanks to Rail Baltica.
Putting a Brigade in South East Europe doesn’t strike me as a good idea. If we have a Mechanised and and Armoured Division
Hi Dern i did say the focus of the north would be the Baltic Region with a needed focus on mec… but in reality there is still the Norway Russian border and so there needs to be a plan around interventions in that area, but the RMs are more than adequate.
As for an armoured brigade in south Eastern Europe, if there is a peace treaty with a European security guarantee and troops around Ukraine that will need to be heavy brigades from the major European armies. It’s the only really effective way to help deter another attack..it would essentially need to be UK, Germany, Italy, France, Spain,Poland and smaller armies providing two heavy divisions for Ukraine security.
As for not having heavy brigades in the Baltic, that’s more about the fact that you only have 100 ish miles of depth of territory to play with as well as the likely way Russian would attack the Baltics. Russia would first go with political warfare and work to destabilise one or more Baltic state, supported by little green men in operations that can be denied and very large ethic Russian populations in which to hide insurgents. There is a very high risk that Russia could isolate heavy forces in the Baltic region. so if you know your fighting an existential peer war with lots of domains of attack in a very isolated region,that can easily be cut off there is a high risk that you could loss those forces to loss of logistic lines. Because essentially at the very best we will only ever have 3 heavy brigades, losing one of those because it was exposed in the Baltics would essentially cripple the British armies core fighting strength. If you have a medium wheeled mec brigade it’s more use against the insurgency operations you would get in the early stages of an attack on a Baltic state, you have a better chance of manoeuvring out of any trap and recovering the brigade and to be blunt as long as you get the troops out it’s easier reconstruct a medium mec brigade than it is a heavy brigade that has equipment that could not be replaced. Remember rail Baltica will probably be cut as a strategic requirement of isolating the Baltics.
We shouldn’t be putting troops into a peace keeping role in Ukraine. That’s an American idea and if they want to force that peace treaty they need to foot the troops. The way to actually deter an attack is to get Ukraine to win the war. Having to split British Forces (or anyone else’s) between fighting in Ukraine and fighting in the Baltics is very bad juju (also if a war between NATO and Russia breaks out and Russia doesn’t declare war on Ukraine suddenly that whole strategic depth argument is much worse as a British Brigade gets destroyed in a narrow demilitarised zone on the Ukrainian border).
By comparison the risk of British forces being isolated in Estonia are much more minimal, with large allied forces very close to hand and room to manuever, and many ports to the rear. (Also rail Baltica is unlikely to be cut. When the route was chosen, either by accident or design, they picked a route that is physically as far from Russia as you can get. If Rail Baltica is cut, then so is every road in and out).
(Also wheeled mechanised brigades are not “more use in counter insurgency operations” than armoured brigades, there is just in general a preference for them because they are cheaper and the extra punch that an armoured brigade brings isn’t needed. But a Mechanised Brigade doesn’t fundamentally bring more to the table in COIN than a Armoured Brigade.
Ultimately you are either going to defend the Baltics or abandon them. If you are going to fight for them, then that’s where our Armoured Division (not brigades penny packeted some to Ukraine, some to Poland, some to Finland) needs to go. If we are not going to fight for them, and are expecting them to be over run then sending Mechanised Brigade or two is a waste.
Lets switch things around: Because we are always looking at it from a Russia is attacking PoV, but let’s assume that Baltic and Finnish defence plans do what they where supposed to, and do what the Ukranians have done, and make the Russians advance at the most snails pace of paces, paying for every mile in Blood… where would a NATO armoured corps do the most good ATTACKING.
Koenigsberg is 20 miles from the Lithuanian Border. Minsk is 80 miles on a good road. St Petersburg is 70 miles from Narva, and 80 from the Finnish border. The Baltics represent a high risk for us, but also are the place where an armoured breakthrough and manuever warfare can REALLY hurt Russia. Baisically this is where the Schwerpunk will have to be for both sides.
Ooh, you’re good!
Norway hasn’t lost its border with Russia, nor will the Russian Northern fleet sail past Sweden or Finland, Baltic countries. Surely the High North is very much still a Norwegian issue, with Arctic islands increasingly targetted.
Okay so 1) What will stop the Northern Fleet sailing is NATO maritime power, not occupation of Norway. 2) Open a map. Now look at the Norwegian border with Russia. It is not Fjords Mountain and Light Infantry country, it’s the same open Taiga and Tundra as the Finnish and Swedish border regions. 3) While you have that map open, imagine trying to invade and occupy the difficult terrain of Norway without occupying Sweden first, it’s not happening. The fate of Norway will be decided in Sweden.
So no, I don’t think operating large amounts of light infantry reinforcing Norway is something we should be focussing on, instead mechanised and armoured forces further East in Sweden and Finland are what’s important.
Agree with much of this except for Dern’s quibbles. Note though that our subs may be in the Pacific. The Americans will squeeze us hard to get them down there. They know how good they are and they will want them there.
They can go whistle then.
Good thinking
Can’t take anything these bunch of clowns say seriously. And not just this government but previous ones as well
“Must be re-armed”
While;
Cutting pumas next month
Cutting Albion and bulwark next month
Cutting watch keeper next month
Cutting 2 rfa supply vessels next month
Reduction in wedge tail orders from 5 to 3
Still no decision on further f35
Cutting off the c130 fleet
Laughbly small army
I could keep going on, when are they really gonna read the writing on the wall and actually act instead of this all talk nonsense.
If they do I hope they at least stop the sale and recommission hms bulwark and hms Albion.
There are 2 big problems with Healy’s ambition, assuming it is sincere.
First, funding will be problematic. Reeve’s budget, intended to reduce net borrowing, has already hit growth and may result in recession from April. Further tax increases will exacerbate the problem. So the government will have to cut other spending by significant amounts to pay for an increased defence budget.
Second, even if the budget were raised immediately to 3% of GDP, from @£59b to @ £75b, it couldn’t deliver much in the short term. It is taking 5-8 years to build a new frigate, 8 years+ to build an SSN. Even an additional order of 25 Typhoons would take 5/6 years to complete. With many existing programmes scheduled to reach FOC in 2030 or later, the best that might be hoped for is a solution to the manpower problems and an expansion of weapon / ammunition stocks across the board.
A minor step would be to stop cutting equipment which, whilst not perhaps cutting edge, is still perfectly functional. For example, Tranche 1 Typhoons which are still capable air defence aircraft.
Agreed, yet this should have been a thing in 2014, all the signs were there, here we are 11 years later and 3 years into Putin’s “Special Operation” and still we dither and debate.
Just look at how much hardware and Personnel have been axed since 2010 and I’m not just talking Nimrod here, I’m sure someone on here could provide a detailed list of equipment we have lost over the last 15 years, I’ll bet it will be depressing reading though, Quite how we could get back to even 2010’s levels is beyond my comprehension.
Lets just see how many Aircraft have been lost in that time frame ? C130, Tornado, Hawk, Sentinel Seaking, Lynx, Gazelle, Vulcan ( it was still airworthy !) What is it we have now 98 Typhoons, 36 F35B’s, 22 A400’s, soon to be zero Puma’s. 54 Merlins. ?
Dont forget the 7 E3Ds sold or scrapped, the extended Capability Holiday all to be fixed at some time in the future with 3 E7s.
Lots could be delivered in the near term in terms of improving the platforms we have and increasing the numbers of soldiers, sailors and aviators. We could save the LPDs and buy back Argyll. Fix Ft Victoria, refit Cardigan Bay, look to upgun the Type 45s more quickly and more potently (adding quad-packed capable VLS). Speed up the introduction of Peregrine into the Navy. There’s the T2/T3 Typhoon upgrades we could start on next year. If you recall, the upgrades were going to be ready by this year if Finland had ordered Typhoons. When we heard they weren’t, we slowed down the upgrades. Overhaul the RAF training proigramme. I will let others wax lyrical about saving and upgrading Warrior and the glacial plans to replace Bowman.
Even new platforms need money now! If we order T4 Typhoons this year, we need money this year. It doesn’t matter if the last one won’t arrive for six years, we need an increase in the budget this year to pay for it. Same for two more Wedgetails, extra medium helicopters, munitions, drones, etc. I know you aren’t, but too many people argue that’ll it’ll take years so we shouldn’t do it and therefore we don’t need the money. Of course we need to start right now.
At 3% we may even have enough money to fix the perennial accommodation issues.
If a conflict is likely in 3-5 years yes then some here and now actiobs are needed. If i can add to your list, the T31s could be upgraded, up gunned, with maybe a hybrid mk41/CAMM farm mix and add a few to the production line. Mk41s or ExLS on the T45s might be too late but they could try and expand the 4×6 CAMM silos beyond just 24. And some extra stocks of NSM and the AShM/JSM for the P8s might be useful.
“We could save the LPDs and buy back Argyll. Fix Ft Victoria, refit Cardigan Bay, look to upgun the Type 45s more quickly and more potently (adding quad-packed capable VLS). Speed up the introduction of Peregrine into the Navy. There’s the T2/T3 Typhoon upgrades we could start on next year.”
Line by line
We could save the LPDs – maybe but for what specific role? OK, to keep in an active reserve so we can if we need to. I don’t believe scraping them was worth a £9m/yr saving.
Buy back Argyll – is she sea worthy to Naval standards?
Fix Ft Victoria – is the fixing the issue or the crewing or both?
refit Cardigan Bay – totally agree worth every penny.
look to upgun the Type 45s more quickly and more potently (adding quad-packed capable VLS) – quickly is a people problem – MoD are pushing quickly here but it is a lot of work and a balance of where you want people…upgrading T45….upgrading T23….fixing SSN…building SSN….building T26…..building SSBN….building T31. It is all essentially the same smallish group of skilled people who can build and fix our warships and subs….where do you want them working? Priorities! No point in changing T45 specs now. Add Sea Ceptor, add NSM, continue upgrading Sea Viper Evolution finish PiP and focus on getting T45 to sea.
Speed up the introduction of Peregrine into the Navy – yes, at some point we have actually deploy drones mass and stop perfectionism.
There’s the T2/T3 Typhoon upgrades we could start on next year – indeed but a small number if skilled techs have a carefully managed workflow to keep them just busy enough. People, manufacturing people and assembly testing people are all in short supply because of decades of glacial ordering.
Industry are “managing” workflow because they don’t believe MOD can afford to keep the work coming, and they won’t train people for boom and bust. If there was a budget increase to say 3% of GDP and a guarantee it would stay for at least the next 20 years, industry would happily increase capacity accordingly. It’s the inconsistency of demand that comes with a low budget that’s the killer. (Months to kill, years to restore, but we can make a start right now.)
I agree with some of your points. I have no idea if Argyll could be brought back to full naval standards. If it’s safe to run, I’d be willing to take a little bit substandard for five years — it can be a home-based GP to give us some hull numbers during the switch over from T23, and it would be a lot better than the rubbish that we’d convert at speed if we got into another major war. The LPDs are the core of the Littoral Strike Groups, and a core around which JEF naval groups can coalesce. With the uncertainty of US commitment and the dithering of Central European Powers, having command ships in the JEF is essential (and yeah, £9m a year!). I don’t know what’s happening with Ft Vic, but it needs to be fixed so we have options. I’d still be ordering a first FSSS from abroad if I had money and could get it quickly enough (there again I’d have bought all three in Korea a decade ago). Maud is nice and thank you Norway, but it’s underspecced for UK needs and we need our own asap. Navantia won’t deliver for six or seven years at best. If we can’t integrate Peregrine, we won’t be able to integrate Proteus, and Cetus is another ballgame.
I agree that a strong market signal – funding & contracts – is needed to recruit and train!
That said BAES and Babcock are already recruiting like crazy.
Hi SB,
“That said BAES and Babcock are already recruiting like crazy.”
Yeh, they have been for sometime as well. Given 5x T26 and 4x T31 are already in various stages of build I have been wondering why are they still recruit at such high levels – churn..? Unlikely.
So the hopeful side of me is wondering if they have been given the nod about future orders. Norway buying 5 or 6x T26 is the obvious plus for BAES, but I have not heard about any UK build export orders for T31 (Poland and Indonesia being local builds with UK support). So I wonder if Babcock, for example, have been given the nod to expect further RN orders in the event of a Norwegian order delaying the arrival of RN T26. Companies are often given pre formal order funding to get the supply chain to build long lead items, so may be they have been given notice that the Norwegian order is likely? If not why are the primes recruiting?
I can understand BAES and RR submarine related businesses recruiting – AUKUS. Maintenance teams for AUKUS boats are a long way off yet but I suppose Babcock could do with more folks now given the workload they have to catch up on Astute and Vanguard classes.
I just think there is something behind the scenes that is encouraging them to recruit, or may be they just guessed what was coming from Donald Trump better than anyone else 🙂
Cheers CR
If the Government is serious about this it must increase defence spending NOW. And 2.5% will not be enough…..
Pie in the sky, the best we can hope for is uplift to 2.5% this year but as GDP will doubtless fall, that will still be a cut. The Army will shrink further but “lethality” will be increased over th tiny bit of the frontline we are being lethal in. Note that half of Europe couldn’t even be arsed to go to Paris. Once Trump lifts sanctions against Russia we will have 2/3 years at best before Mad Vlad tries again.
Only the ‘major players’ were invited to Paris.
Denmark was invited to act as representative for all the Scandinavian nations.
Sometimes you can achieve more by having fewer people in the room.
So say Trump & Putin…
The hard fact is that we are down a hole militarily and it will take years of serious additional defence funding just to get our small forces and gapped equipment up to some minimal level of mass and capability.
We all know the scale of the equipment gaps. Just as important is the need have a serious uplift in forces’ pay and conditions, housing, recruiting approach, rewards for long service, restoration of resources for field training, adventure training, sport and unit recreational activity, which have always been key elements in retention.
We will not solve very much with a small addition to the defence budget, which will inevitably be put into new equipment capabilities/shiny new wonder weapons that we can’t afford.
An increase in defence budget from the proclaimed 2.34% of GDP to 2.5%, is just £5bn. That is peanuts really spread across the three services. If HMG more honestly started from the core budget – I.e. leaving out the £3bn aid to Ukraine from the Treasury, which Parliament was informed is 2.175% of GDP, that would be about £11 bn a year, which might at least scratch the surface.
At the absolute minimum, it needs a 25% boost just to keep what we’ve got, increasing manning by 10% and Gill in some of the many equipment gaps. That would equate to 2.7% of GDP. Interesting to read from the Telegraph and Times that the service chiefs are asking for about the same sum, 2.67%.
I would give a 12% increase to personnel numbers – Army 9,000, RAF 2,500, RN 2,500, a 20% increase in pay, conditions and housing and a 25% increase in equipment budgets.
The most urgent needs for me would br:
Army:-
Raising of a sixth all-arms combat Bde and bringing 4 Inf Bde up to regular strength
An increase in the Challenger 3 total, by cannibalising and rebuilding some of the many hulls in store
An immediate order for a tracked 155mm howitzer to fill the big gap where AS-90 used to be – the Boxer RCH 155 could be issued to a Boxer Bde and this DRS artillery Bde.
An early and urgent replacement for the Watchkeeper UAV, which is being withdrawn from service with no replacement in sight
A further batch of 18 Apaches, so that at least 3 Brigades have a small attack squadron
A second Sky Sabre regiment, to support 1 Infantry Division.
And that is still scraping the surface of the need.
The RAF and RN need a similar boost.
There is an important strategic decision to be made here, which affects priorities and cash. Can we persist with trying to be a world power, with expeditionary naval forces lined up for the SCS? We have neither the ships nor aircraft to do so, should we not be concentrating on the European theatre and the threat from Russia, rather than parading the bulk of our small fleet around the world’s oceans? Should we not just leave the SCS to Trump’s USN and concentrate.on the real 5hreats closer to home?
The core number we need to maintain/increase to stop/reverse the hollowing out of the conventional Armed Forces, is the amount we spend on UK conventional defence capability. Remove the spend on pensions and Ukraine, on operations and on CASD, all the things that don’t go to increase our capability to fight a conventional war, and we are probably at less than 1.5% of GDP right now, and I believe the number is falling year on year, causing further hollowing out.
I say “I believe” because the figure isn’t published and the Defence Select Committee who keep groping for it never quite get a straight answer.
Defence Secretary John Healey….declaring emphatically that “we must rearm Britain.”
How I wonder? What are the details?
‘The speech … reconfirmed plans to introduce four new senior leaders to ensure clear, consistent leadership and streamlined decision-making across the MOD. Additionally, effort will be made in terms reducing waste and duplication by consolidating finance functions and procurement processes, aiming to save taxpayers at least £10 billion over the next decade’.
Wow! That is rearming the nation? Four new bosses and an efficiency drive…..
You forgot Graham that they will each be armed with a pen clipboard and proof have the correct school ties…..
Hi Graham,
Churchill appointed one production czar, Lord Beaverbrook who promptly ignored the RAF’s top brass and Air Ministry demands for more bombers and built Spitfires and Hurricanes instead, and thank goodness he did. He was given the responsibility and the authority by the PM and he used it effectively.
Appointing capable people into the right job can be very effective. Of course, there is the rub – right people into the right job… Even if we are lucky enough to have the people thing right do they have the responsibility and authority! Even less likely would be my guess.
We’ll see, but recent experience doesn’t leave much room for confidence.
Cheers CR
We need to see action not words.
Bring the LPDs back into action instead of getting rid
Fix up the RFA vessels
Seriously speed up current vessel builds and better arm T26 and T31 and order another 2 T26 and another 3 T31
Speed up T83 decision making, order a minimum of 8-10 and don’t cut any during the process!
Cut the total commitment to F35 to around 60 jets so that 36 can be onboard one carrier.
Fits cats and traps to the other carrier and order a bunch of F18s for it.
Order another 50 Typhoons and do not get rid of the T1 aircraft
Commit to more Challenger 3
Obviously increase pay to attract more soldiers, sailors and airmen
Reactivate Portsmouth, Belfast and Birkenhead shipyards to increase the national efforts on shipbuilding.
£££
Does anyone feel like bringing back conscription was a good idea?
Seems 38% of Gen Z have some mental health issues according to a survey, good luck with your conscription!
No.
Brian. No. We only ever initiated conscription to boost the army’s strength to fight world wars.
No for a whole host of reasons. But also don’t forget that a very large amount of young people in this country are of foreign background who would doubtless refuse to serve, causing major civil issues
Perhaps if they weren’t constantly belittled and told they’re not really British, they might feel more strongly that our country and society was worth defending? In any case, what evidence do you have for the belief they would be unwilling to serve? Obviously a proportion of all people would be conscientious objectors in wartime, as is their right, but our forces – especially the army – have always drawn from populations outside the white British culture. But what you say underlines the vital necessity of so-called ‘woke’ and ‘DEI’ initiatives in the military that many here mank on about. If we don’t demonstrate that the military is a welcoming and rewarding employer of anybody who can make the standards, regardless of their ‘foreign background’, how can we expect them to want to join? Why would they accept being conscripted into the forces of a country that hates them?
But no, conscription in peacetime is a non-starter, unless it is accompanied by some serious rewards for young people to demonstrate a national investment in them. Free higher education, small business grants, that sort of thing. We’ve been screwing the young for far too long, and if we want them to defend us in future we need to start doing better for them.
I see that as very idealistic. Take a walk round where I live – Peckham – and tell me any of its residents have even the barest semblance of connection to British society. I could say the same about a whole host of towns in the Midlands and NW
You’re right: the damage done to social cohesion has been going on for decades, but it’s not only in the ‘ethnic’ communities.
Seems 38% of Gen Z have some mental health issues according to a survey, good luck with your conscription!
Whilst the older generation are all alcoholics pretending they fought the wars their grandparents fought? Seriously, get a grip. The youth of today is far more robust and dynamic in an exponentially changing and complex world than any generation before it. Whilst they are inventing the technology of the future the older people are retiring early, owing to not being able to keep pace with progress, whilst simultaneously complaining about other people not wanting to pay their energy bills. Maybe the older generations should cut back on all the Werthers Originals on toast and Iced Bingo Cards if they’re struggling to pay their bills? Easy this twitter-meme fuelled generational conflict nonsense isn’t it? The youth are also the future of the nation and I can’t think of many countries that are a better place to be than the UK.
Yes gen x and the baby boomers grew up where mental health concerns were considered shameful and there were no real services for diagnosis other than when they completed popped and either tried to kill themselves or had complete psychotic episode..were as now we understand the upstream care requirements and there is far less sham attached to getting help.
Bravo. Triple-locked pensions should be cut to help pay for the nation’s defence. Boomers have done very well out of this country, extracting far more than they ever paid in. It’s about time they ponied up for the common weal.
Matt, you do know our State Pension is amongst the lowest in Europe?
Really? Most of the analyses I’ve seen suggest we’re somewhere in the middle. We also have by some margin the lowest rate of capital gains rate tax among the major western European nations.
Interestingly from a metal health point of view it’s Gen X that probably suffers the most really nasty organic mental health issues..from lead and heavy metal toxicity..there are some very good studies that show Gen X essentially got hit by profound levels of lead poisoning from petrol..a respected style in the US estimated that the U.S. population was hit ( and we would have the same).
“Their latest research estimates that 151 million cases of psychiatric disorders—including depression, anxiety, and hyperactivity— from the past 75 years can be traced to childhood lead exposure.” And another study showed that the U.S. lost 824 million IQ points in total due to lead in petrol…
Another interesting one is bottle feeding, there is some good evidence to suggest that mental health disorders in mothers are increased by about 50% when they bottlefeed babies and there is very good evidence that babies that are Breast feed grow into children and adults with better social communication ability and well as some evidence on wider cognitive development..
Basically lead in petrol and bottle feeding has made us less mentally robust and a we bit thicker than we would have been.
I think there are some folk on this board who must have been drinking the petrol…
Leaded petrol was banned a long time ago [2000] in the UK. Most cars ran on unleaded form the late ‘80’s.
Environmental lead levels have generally massively dropped.
The bigger issue in the UK could be the very fine particulates from the dash to diesel?
The comparator could be California where lead was banned ages ago?
Lead like other heavy metals sticks around, the effects of lead poisoning are essentially not reversible..the damage lead did to the grey matter of us old gits in childhood will stick with us for ever. Lead in bones has half life of 30 years so you can easily track exposure and map casualty.
Heavy metals actually stored in fats.
I agree that heavy metal damage once done is not reversible. That will be me working in a lab with lots of strange transition metals a long time ago!
Mapping causality is really a thing here. You can map correlation between various embedded heavy metals and various health outcomes. You can then suggest likely mechanisms but you cannot state absolute causality unless you are dealing with refined isotopes.
Present high levels of poor mental health is around the fact it’s now acceptable and we actually look for it and treating it..poor mental health in in the boomer gen x timeframes was considered a stigma, we did not look for it and did not have any services to treat it
I did read some people spouting about that fact we are not Europeans and the security of Europe is not our problem.. let’s just get a couple of thing straight.
We are Europeans, the British isles are an archipelago of islands on the European continental shelf, that geographically makes us European. But why does this matter ?
Contrary to popular belief 30 miles of water does not insulate you from the geostrategic realities of the continental shelf your stuck, on so you have to be part of that reality and sculpt it. All you need to do is look at history.. up until about 1160 ( that’s when the last load of nasty people from the mainland, conquered and essentially enslaved these islands decided they were actually British..which is a big you know “hint” for why you need to be involved) the population of the British islands were essentially powerless to control the geopolitical power dynamics in Europe and pretty much spent the entire time either being invaded, conquered or just having all their stuff nicked and houses burnt down, it was only really from around 1200 that Britain decided that it needed to take a hand in its defence by actively engaging in the Geopolitical’s landscape of Europe…and boy have we been involved for the last 800 years ( just ask the Spanish, Portuguese, french, Russians, Dutch and anyone else that got a bit big) …and why did we do that, simple, what has happened is these islands have never been invaded or conquered since we started sticking our noses and armies in Europe..but the price for that has been pretty much continuously being actively engaged in warfare and geopolitically on the main continental land mass..almost every major war has seen British involvement, we have been in conflict with every major European power that has existed as they waxed and became a danger to the UK…its essentially been a fundamental part of British geostrategic aims for 800 years to attack or undermine the largest most aggressive European power, and that was when everything was transported by sail power and it took effort to get to the Uk..because we always knew that if Europe is controlled by one power we would be buggered over a barrel. So that’s history..
For the now, It’s worth remembering that we are around 1 hour flight time from russian soil being 800 miles away…that is no distance, if the Uk isolated itself from Europe Russia could easily decide to pick a fight with an isolated Northern European island nation and we would have a big problem if that happened because we could never bring Russia to the peace table..it’s to big, they could lob missiles at us and there would be sod all we could do about it..because Russia can hide its industrial complex’s 6000 miles from us..we are never more that 900 miles from Russian soil… so in the end we would probably get the soggy end of any peace deal… if we were isolated ( but we are not and that is important). Don’t get me wrong Russia is never “conquering the UK” but we would end up getting pissed off with a war before they did.
Also we are only 30 miles or 3 mins flight time from continental Europe and if in some horrible future russia did slowly creep across Europe taking the east and we did not help its very likely Western and central Europe ( the core EU) would by necessity become highly militarised, probably a bit authoritarian and far more right wing ( the more you push a nation the more either right or left wing it becomes)..then we would be 30miles away from our worst nightmare a authoritarian European superstate that we are not allies with ( and is probably proper pissed at us for being neutral) …there is a very very good reason the UK needs to stay geostrategically engaged with Europe and that’s for our future survival and to make sure we have a Europe that we want ( that’s a continent made up of independently minded small to medium size liberal democracies that we can trade and be friends with, that are not missmatched with us….its one of the only real reasons I think we should have sucked up our independent natures and remained part of the EU..to make sure it never becomes a superstate).
Nicely put, mate.
Just looks at all the comments about Irish neutrality whenever that comes up. Ironic that some are suggesting we do the same..!
Being an island has advantages and disadvantages. Main advantage is that any would be invader needs a fleet to lift their army… Main disadvantage is we need a fleet to ensure we don’t starve. Our geographic position (and Ireland’s) means that we are always going to be on the target list of anyone wanting to dominate Europe. We sit astride most of the main shipping lanes to western Europe as well as sitting under a significant number of air routes. Both of which put a huge target on us.
There has been a lot of talk of capability improvements, I would add two more. Air Defence of major population and production centers or risk morale taking a serious hit over time as missiles come our way from Russia – just look at what is happening in Ukraine and what Ukrainians are saying these days. We also need way more RN escorts. While 30 is definitely better than the current state, it ain’t enough if the USN gets drawn away to the Far East.
I would set capability targets that we would need to chase and ask how much, arty, tanks, fighters, strategic lift, escort, subs, etc, we need. I would prioritise them so that we built out our capabilities over the short, medium and long in some kind of sensible order so that we would have no excuse to take our foot of the throttle once we get to some short term fix. There would still be the medium and long term delivery capabilities to produce. We need to deter our enemies if we can, but I fear that we don’t have enough time for that anymore so we are now in an arms race and the risk of us actually having to employ those weapons and troops just got a whole lot worse.
Lets be clear Russia is a clear and present danger with the rest of the CRINK nations aiding and abetting. Europe is up against it and we need to rally to common cause.
Cheers CR
Excellent takes, both of you. Too many people forget that we don’t need to be invaded to be neutralised. As for the EU, it was always better to be inside the tent pissing out, than stood outside in the rain desperately trying to piss in.
We all need to remember this speech about Britain rearming then when SDSR finally published unless the UK does get some serious firepower we should all write to him and ask him what happened???
In reality the previous government refused to tackle any and all issues. The UK has been fast asleep for the last 3 years when we should have been undertaking a crash rearmament programme the minute Mad Vlad the Impaler went into Ukraine.
Now he will repair, re-equip and go again, really hard in 1-2 years. He will be that time have an army of around 1-1.2 million, equipped many of whom (possibly upto 500,000 will be combat hardened troops from the Ukraine war.
I wouldn’t give the Baltics a 10% chance of surviving the next 3 years unless ENATO knuckles down and seriously rearms.
As for Trump’s USA, they can go swing from the nearest tree if they think any European nation should send military help to them when the inevitable Sino-American war begins.
The USA will sit on its arse, like they did in WW1+2 whilst Europe burns before they will do anything to help.
Seems Polands massive military expenditure was a very very wise move and something the UK may live to deeply regret, the last 3 years of wastage and continuous cuts.
Is an SDR a good thing if there’s no new money? Any new capabilities, such as GBAD, will have to be paid for out of cuts to the army, navy or air force. We’ll be told these are the priorities, but no responsibility will be taken for the cuts.
The SDR was completed just before Christmas apparently. However, their recommendations would cost too much so they were told to go away and rewrite within a budget set by HM Treasury, allegedly. So just brush off the original report and publish it… It will do for the next five years anyway and will be way better news than the butchered version currently being produced.
Cheers CR
Well start doing it. Stop cutting vital troops, kit & capabilities. And stop creepingup to that Quisling, delusional Trump.
Until any of us in Europe is prepared to provide boots on the ground & airpower Putin will continue to kill, steal & destroy, all the while telling the world it’s all UKR’s fault. We must not allow Trump to stab UKR & NATO in the back while joining in the plundering. Putin is only stopped by strength or his time running out.
Yeah, maybe we’ll get lucky and the shifty sod will have a well-timed aneurysm, like Lenin.
Putin too…
Trouble is, trump is just a chancer who has no real understanding of geostationary or geopolitics, the vice President I think is an actual fascist. I’ve alway been cagey about using the word fascist, but I now think we are seeing the rise of it again. Like moves to like, Russia is a Fascist state and essentially a good test of a political party is how they view and want to work with Russia and what other parties they move towards. Vance prioritises a meeting with the Alternative for Germany party at the same time not meeting the actual German chancellor. This party could be reasonably described as Fascist, it also leans towards and supports good relations with Putin. Vance also told the centre right European parties that they were the threat he worries about not Putin
Now I’m going to leave the moral judgement aside, but I do think it’s time we started to acknowledge where we are with western politics…after all fascism does not come along and smash you in the face with untold evil ( the particular brand of profound evil that was the third Reich was a hyper extreme version of fascism..everyday fascism is what was seen in Spain until 1975 ) it is infact its all quite appealing, that’s why Democracies under stress fall to it. I will leave you with the words of Michael Rosen.
“I sometimes fear that
people think that fascism arrives in fancy dress
worn by grotesques and monsters
as played out in endless re-runs of the Nazis.
Fascism arrives as your friend.
It will restore your honour,
make you feel proud,
protect your house,
give you a job,
clean up the neighbourhood,
remind you of how great you once were,
clear out the venal and the corrupt,
remove anything you feel is unlike you…
It doesn’t walk in saying,
“Our programme means militias, mass imprisonments, transportations, war and persecution.”
Well, as they say, ‘it takes one to know one’. Churchill could see the evil in Hitler because he struggled with it inside himself. Churchill and Roosevelt did a deal with Stalin at Yalta. Maybe we are seeing an action replay.
As regards J.D. Vance, Jewish poets have a certain perspective, as do French advocates of mutual liberty. Alexis de Toqueville contrasting secular republican France with a religious US wrote that ‘America is great because America is good and if America ceases to be good it will cease to be great.’ Woke US ceased to be great under Obama and Biden. Under Trump it is coming back.
No, the US is no longer good and is going the right way to cease being great. ‘Woke’ has nothing to do with it, you lemon.
Great and good are never and have never been linked, to put any moral equivalency on a nationstate never really works…the US has never been good, neither has the UK or any nation, at their very best the are amoral entities that support the idea of mutual interest at their worst the unthinkingly do vast evil to support their own interests alone.
Yes, it’s a great poem and a stark warning. The scansion in the last stanza’s a bit odd, though.
You might be conflating fascism with Christian gospel.
In America, the two things are converging, and now a dominionist as SecDef.
@ Paul the difference between fascism and the gospel is the gospel does not means militias, mass imprisonments, transportations, war and persecution.”
Have the PM and Treasury approved the money?
Trump is telling Zelensky to hold elections in Ukraine. And in response to Zelensky’s complaint about not being at the table in Saudi negotiations he chided him for not making a deal in the 3 years of his office. The golden age of America has begun!
The downfall of America more like
Trump, MAGA, Elon … in bed with Putin !!
Spewing out their twisted lies
The USA demanding return of 500bn in minerals for their aid.. which by the way Zelensky siad NO, as US money and equipemt aid is nowhere near that amount
Trump plucking numbers and miss-information from thin air
Europe is going to move away…US is now being seen as an adversary
Rumours of big cuts in US defence! Elons got free reign
Europe cant trust the US anymore and that why you have seen all the EU meetings
No it hasn’t.
Trump is the worst US President in living memory.
Healey has a Phd in “stating the bleeding obvious” especially given we now have three dictatorships to deal with. I hope we can make good use of the Yankie bases when they bugger off back home as they surely will soon.
And trump has just called the leader of Ukraine a dictator…wow, the US really is lost to the west for at least the next 5 years..