The Ministry of Defence is working towards starting the British Army Training Unit Suffield commitment in April 2027, and funding is still being allocated through the department’s planning cycle, according to an answer given in Parliament.
Ben Obese-Jecty, the Conservative member for Huntingdon, asked when the annual funding profile would be determined, following an answer of 7 September.
Louise Sandher-Jones, Parliamentary Under-Secretary and Minister for the Armed Forces, said: “Funding is currently being allocated through the ongoing Strategic Planning Cycle as part of the Department’s routine planning and budgeting processes, with the ambition to start the BATUS commitment in April 2027.”
April 2027 is given as an ambition, not a firm date, and the question about when the annual funding profile will be settled was not answered.
The British Army Training Unit Suffield has been the Army’s armoured manoeuvre training base since 1972, occupying part of a Canadian Forces training area in southern Alberta that runs to around 2,700 square kilometres.
The space allows a battlegroup to manoeuvre and fire live at distances that cannot be reproduced on Salisbury Plain or at Otterburn, and tank and infantry fighting vehicle crews have traditionally completed their collective training there before being declared ready.
Safe money short term then spend more fixing the error, the MOD run by utter morons
It really, really is a sad state of affairs when we have an “ambiton” to start training. TRAINING for the love of God!
Totally. The apathy in Whitehall towards defence is palpable.
Batus was the basic building block we always did. Then the wise people came around and said armoured warfare was dead. Oh how we laughed. Hey presto whats old is new again.
I understand that armoured warfare manouevre training at BG level using live firing phases and Simfire type systems stopped 3 or 4 years ago…. and that much, if not all, armour including tanks, were withdrawn back to the UK.
Will that BG training (Ex MEDMAN) restart or some training that is rather less than that?
Apparently it will be for drone and electronic warfare training. Civil aviation regulations make that training difficult in UK. Doing that training in Suffield should also make it more difficult for ‘electronic eavesdropping’.
It seems very unlikely that Battlegroup training can recommence there, given the acute shortage of equipment in the British Army. BATUS had over 1,000 vehicles in its pomp. But it certainly should because the Suffield plains are very similar terrain to large parts of Ukraine. Russia is a land power. Any overt aggression against a NATO member will come by land. I have zero confidence that NATO is in any way ready to recapture territory seized by Russia from any NATO member.
We have forgotten the lessons of recent history:
‘An Atlantic community paralyzed by its military inferiority in Europe could only wring its hands…even if one believes that an attack on Western Europe is not a very likely scenario, (one) still cannot view the growing strength of the (Russian) Army in Eastern Europe without a certain uneasiness. For that Army not only serves the (Russians) legitimate security interests, but it also exercises an influence on the Atlantic Community that could be in the long run as fatal as naked aggression…it is the role of the Atlantic army to replace the strategic nuclear deterrent as the instrument with which the attack option is foreclosed to the Soviet Union. But that is a bare minimum. In a modern strategy the Atlantic army must provide for the West a sense of security to a degree that will encourage it to act and react in respect to global events with confidence. That forecloses to (Russia) the options of intimidation, blackmail, and political leverage.’ 1977
Graham.
I understand that some also moved to Ayrshire Bks Germany to the CHE storage there, and that using the ranges at Ras Madraka in Oman was also proposed.
I understand that BATUS will now be used by lighter forces and for Drones.