The United Kingdom must strengthen its air and missile defences to counter a growing threat, with up to 800 Russian missiles posing a danger to critical military infrastructure, according to a new report by the Council on Geostrategy.

The analysis by William Freer highlights the modernisation of Russia’s Northern Fleet, which, despite being smaller than its Cold War-era force, has significantly increased its missile capabilities. The fleet’s 26 submarines and 11 major surface combatants could carry a total of 800 land-attack capable missiles, posing “the most stark” missile threat to the UK since the Cold War.

The report warns that NATO has also undergone reductions in naval and air defence capabilities, with the Royal Navy’s frigate numbers shrinking from 38 in 1990 to just eight today. Meanwhile, the US Navy has completely phased out its anti-submarine warfare-focused frigates, raising concerns about NATO’s ability to counter the resurgent Russian missile threat.

A Need for a Smarter Defence Strategy

The report argues that while some advocate for a comprehensive Integrated Air and Missile Defence (IAMD) system, such an approach would be prohibitively expensive and impractical. Instead, it calls for a targeted and flexible strategy, with three key priorities:

  • Protecting key UK military infrastructure, which the report states is “currently too vulnerable” and must be prioritised to sustain the country’s military force.
  • Defending overseas bases, which are “crucial to projecting power” and ensuring the UK’s ability to operate globally.
  • Relying on allied missile defence capabilities for deployed British forces, who are likely to operate within “NATO’s broader missile defence network.”

According to the report, “decisions to improve UK IAMD should also come alongside actions to incur costs on adversaries and to decrease the threat from launch platforms.” Rather than focusing solely on defensive systems, Britain must also look at disrupting missile launch capabilities at their source to ease the pressure on IAMD systems.

Shifting Strategic Focus to Russia’s Northern Bastion

The report recommends shifting the UK’s strategic focus beyond the traditional Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap to the Svalbard-Tromsø gap, an area critical to Russia’s “bastion” strategy. This approach sees Russia prioritising the defence of its nuclear-armed submarines in the Barents Sea, allowing other assets to operate more freely.

By putting greater pressure on this bastion, the report argues that “the Northern Fleet [would be] put on the back foot,” forcing Russia to divert resources away from offensive operations. This proactive deterrence strategy could reduce the missile threat to the UK by limiting the number of “arrows” launched, rather than solely focusing on intercepting them in flight.

Balancing Costs and Capabilities

While the report acknowledges the growing missile threat, it warns that a full-scale missile defence system is unlikely to be a viable solution, as it would require “a vastly increased investment in defence to achieve.” Instead, it argues that funding should be spent more effectively by prioritising efficiency and adaptability in IAMD development.

“What is required to deliver strategic advantage is an improved air and missile defence capability centred on the efficiency offered by IAMD, tailored towards the most significant threats and prioritising the most important infrastructure to defend,” the report states.

Despite concerns over Britain’s military vulnerability, the report remains cautious about excessive spending on missile defence, advocating for “a balanced approach that maximises strategic reach, amplifies deterrence, and enhances operational efficiency.”

A Growing Threat Demands Urgent Action

The Council on Geostrategy’s report underscores Britain’s geographic advantages, but stresses that these alone are not enough to counter the growing missile threat. The UK must adopt “a pragmatic and cost-effective approach,” balancing missile defence investment with strategic deterrence efforts that limit adversaries’ offensive capabilities.

With tensions rising and the Northern Fleet modernising its arsenal, the UK must act swiftly to prevent Britain from being exposed to “one of the most significant missile threats in decades.”

George Allison
George Allison
George has a degree in Cyber Security from Glasgow Caledonian University and has a keen interest in naval and cyber security matters and has appeared on national radio and television to discuss current events. George is on Twitter at @geoallison
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52 COMMENTS

  1. But that intellectual genius and man of many aliases Grant Shapps said we didn’t need GBAD? Surely he wasn’t wrong? Surely he wouldn’t gamble with the defence of the realm?

    • I’m sorry, you are forgetting that he isn’t a real person but merely a marionette for the PM who wanted to make more cuts and didn’t previously have a compliant man in the defence ministry.

    • Cos everyone knows the system of defence…. so our security flaws are in plain sight …don’t be silly…….only when attacked would the attacker find out what’s there if yee knar thas 80o thas 3000 n if u think there’s less anti sub defence there more …. why would anyone say how much any anti sub or missile defence systems are available the whole point Is the opposite

  2. I agree about the change in focus and going after the Russians in their bastions, the Russian armed forces are such a joke now we no longer have to play defence on the GIUK.

    Not only can the navy go after them in the bastion but we should be looking at 16AAb and 3Com launching assaults from Norway and Finland to grab Murmansk.

    For UK defence using an integrated land based air defence system to shoot down subsonic cruise missiles is daft.

    This is literally the job typhoon was born for. Go out and buy 100 more typhoon and 4 more E7 then the UK air defence is fine. We need to look at GBAD for point defence and anti ballistic missiles while making sure the navy can track and sink any Russian vessels firing missiles.

    • Exactly. This was who the RN always favoured ocean going warships over coastal defence ships. You fight the enemy in their waters, with a sea/ocean to fall back across if necessary. You don’t plan to fight them in your waters.
      Similarly with the Army. We always fought expeditionary wars in other countries, never wait until they rock up on Blighty’s breeches.

      So the strongest air-defence is going after the enemy’s launchers – which are more expensive and difficult to replace than the missiles themselves. The biggest threat is from submarine launched cruise missiles, which Russia has used in the Ukraine war. Bottle them up, hunt them down, and level all their support facilities.

      Typhoons and GBAD for any submarines that survive.

      • I agree.
        Which is why, some months back, I was concerned that we don’t hamstring ourselves going too UK GBAD at the expense of offensive, expeditionary assets.
        Both are needed, not one or the other.

      • Fine in theory but can’t see us sinking Russian assets before they start firing so there will be plenty we need to take down before we can start taking out their ships and submarines.

        • Yup, Russia isn’t above starting a war with an opening barrage and then spouting a bunch of lies to justify their aggression.

          Nevertheless, we cannot build an impregnable defensive shield it is just not possible. So the stated strategy is not a bad suggestion but we would have to accept that any surprise first wave is going to get through at least in part. So our defences would have to include civil defence and a degree of civil resilience e.g. Nightingale Hospitals, back up generators and specialist, trained repair teams to deal with damage to the national power system… In other words, our keys supply chains will need to start to plan for their systems being hit and disrupted. The key areas would be health, food, water, energy and telecommunications many of which are privately run and non of which are very resilient at the moment.

          Cheers CR

          • If you remember the attack on Israel a few months back, they shot down >>90% of Iran’s missiles..that’s what we should be capable of matching today.

  3. Just needs 3 missiles before it’s game over aimed at officers mess at Brize, Lossie and Coningsby! Another 3 or 4 aimed at Faslane’s mine hunters and Astutes…and it’s game over for a long time.

    • More likely one at Barrow, one at Scotstoun as well. Kill the sole remaining manufacturing capability in the same strike and it really is game over. If they want to be massively overzealous then Filton and Warton to kill off aircraft production. Not a lot of eggs, even fewer baskets.

    • That’s probably not far from the truth, no country has ever experience the destructive power of modern weapons, the Russian Arsenal if to be believed, have the largest yields ever constructed. The Tzar Bomba was de-tuned to a mere 50 MT’s from a possible 100 Mt’s. Just 3 of them would pretty much destroy the entire UK. All UK planning for such an event ended many decades ago when It became clear that it was futile.

      • “Destroy the UK” equals destroy most people in the UK. Mothers, fathers, children, babies. All destined to die a most horrible death.
        The “defence” industry should supply us with the means to end our lives without pain. Just a little pill to take before Armageddon.

  5. In reality it’s not just about GBAD it’s about killing and defeating the Russian navy, if there was ever a war between Russia and the UK it would be a navel and air engagement. If Russia was trying to knock the UK out of a war or deter the Uk from entering a war it would be with Sea and Air power.

    So GBAD is fundamentally important, but no nation in history ever won a war or prevented a war with a good defence. Nations prevented wars with a “Deterrent” and a deterrent is all about showing how much Pain and suffering you can and will do to your potential enemies. And in the final case they won wars by the destruction of the enemies ability to fight or in modern warfare a nations political will to keep fighting.

    So personally priority should be Deterrent first always.

    1) the ability to smash Russian European infrastructure with significant numbers of sub launched and surface cruise missiles. Unfortunately this is a big weakness in the Uk we have never built our SSNs or surface ships as Deterrence of this nature. So actually having the ability to fire 1000km range cruise missiles from navel platforms in numbers back at Russia is a very good way of making sure Russia does not shoot them at us…difficult one to sort in the short term..but there needs to be a real focus on this in the long term.

    2) air launched cruise missiles..the ability to attack with large numbers of air launch cruise missiles..so this means typhoons and enablers.

    3) The ability to destroy Russian strike platforms…GBAD can kill the missiles but being able to destroy the launch platforms is a deterrent. This is where the ability to push at the Barents Sea and Kara sea bastions and hunt Russian SSGN and surface strike platforms is important. So lots of martime patrol aircraft, SSNs, ASW platforms and AirPower with Air launched anti ship missiles.

    4) very good air defences that can detect and attack russian aircraft well into the Norwegian Sea. So AEW and BVR fighters with enablers.

    5) GBAD to manage what gets past 1-4.

    So what can be done immediately

    1) giving typhoon an air launched anti ship missile pretty much immediately…the intergration is pretty much done on one already.
    2) more AEW platforms
    3) more Martime patrol platforms
    4) more air to air refuelling
    5) re open the storm shadow production line and keep it ticking building the numbers
    6) GBAD for core military infrastructure
    7) good civil defence process
    8) a plan to fit strike length silos to all major surface combatants ( longer term) with a buy of cruise missiles to fill them.
    9) a plan to increase the number of front line RAF typhoon squadrons.
    10) develop the CBG into a specialists artic CBG that can essentially act as a massive deterrent in the Norwegian Sea area ready to hit the russian bastions.

    • I agree with Putting a Anti-Ship Weapon on Typhoon such as JSM would fill that gap until FC/ASW reaches IOC, but doubt anything will be done about this

    • I agree but SSN launched cruise missiles are an expensive way to attack a major land power. They have a terrible defence economic footprint in a large conventional war.

      Reopening storm shadow production is a no brainer especially creating an ER version, I would supplement it with a cheaper OTC cruise missile solution. I would then develop a Rapid Dragon style launch capability.

      Doing this we can quickly get up to a position where we can launch 500 cruise missiles at a time. These missiles could devastate Russian industry or nuclear forces or take out Murmansk or the entire Northern fleet in one go in a couple of minutes.

      This is the kind of power we need to act as a deterrent now. We could do it cheap as well if we spent our budget better.

      Unfortunately some wanker from sandhurst will be dribbling in Lord Robertson’s ear about how we really need tanks and artillery ammunition like we had in the 1980’s to repel the soviets and it was really the tiny BAOR that stopped the Cold War ever getting hot. While some other tosser will be saying that what we really need is Cyber blah blah blah to take the Russian out and that clearly the British Army is the best institution to run such a force.

      • Politicians right now are ready to put boots on the ground.
        Not navy boots, not air force boots

        Perhaps that wanker at Sandhurst has been around for the last twenty years and has seen what happens when one puts ill-equipped soldiers boots on the ground.

      • We are developing a subsonic cruise missile to replace Storm Shadow so I doubt we will reopen production. We are developing that missile for FC/ASW, while the French are developing the supersonic ASW.

        From what I have read, the cruise missile has already been built and will move to testing soon. 2028 integration into MK41 VLS is still the aim, with Typhoon cleared around 2030. They were the last target dates I read.

        If push comes to shove, then I imagine this can be accelerated.

          • The productuion line is long closed France Uk Italy then export orders to India Greece Qatar and others. The production line is long closed. All they do is maintain and upgrade them. Re opening now would be harder than producing a new missile.
            The so called Scalp Naval is a totally different missile I believe.

          • There is an active UK Production ( Assembly ) Line for Storm Shadow – there is even a picture of Grant Shapps in it.

      • There seem to be a lot of wankers about. Conventional deterrence requires a credible combined arms approach. Silly petty inter service rivalry simply stokes calls to disband the RAF. The RN provides the strategic deterrent, strategic air defence and, with the AAC, CAS.

    • Agree- the Swiss air force are integrating Taurus mark 3 cruise and anti ship missiles- these would be a shoe horn in for the typhoon fleet and an excellent investment. range over 500km, stealthy, more powerful warhead- what’s not to like?
      cost – will be reduced as Sweden just ordered them into mass production and they are already in service with German typhoon fleet – the Neo version/ Mark 3 is superior to any air launched cruise missile the Russian’s have.
      More AEW platforms- easily resolved quick win- put the wedgetail order back upto 5 as we have the radar sets already and prepare to order a further 5 for delivery before 2031
      More MPA platforms- agree we need more Poseidon- ideally another 6-8 with additional A400M fitted to undertake the AAR role- scrap or abolish the rubbish value for money voyager tanker programme as our tanker fleet cant even refuel the aircraft we need them too.
      5) storm shadow- yeah ok if we fit them with a seeker head for anti ship work or get NSM air launched version or Taurus Neo from Sweden
      6) GBAD- SAMP/T batteries needed and additional land ceptor and then inner defence of 40mm bofors radar guided
      the rest of list- totally in agreement- I think between your list and mine weve improved the UK armed forces by 40%

    • GBAD should be prioritised to provide an umbrella for our deployed ground forces before we start trying to create a missile shield for the UK.
      I would agree, Typhoon for air defence and a more ‘foot forward’ deterrence/ active defence in the form of MPA (manned and unmanned) and surface vessels should handle the majority of the risk to the UK mainland from surface and sub-surface threats.
      As far as air threats, I would say that AEW should be provided as much by Norway and the other Nordics, but they can cue our QRF Typhoon onto targets handily enough.

  6. ”Britain must also look at disrupting missile launch capabilities at their source to ease the pressure on IAMD systems” quote from above

    There is one available already for a small USD$288m tech costs that will disrupt missile launch capabilities at their source. Go to http://www.intercommonwealthinnovationclub.org tab defence.

    It causes fatigue reading the reports, where the decision makers are living in la la land without adopting said AI/Rob new tech.

  7. This “warmonger” has been arguing the case for GB air defence based on Aster since the T45’s entered service.

  8. There’s a tangible change of gear in Westminster, where defence is commonly regarded as an annoying necessity that should always be batted down the priority list. However, once the British get on message, no one responds quite like us. The skies over the UK are in urgent need of protection, and I feel sure we will see real progress in the coming months and years.

    • I would love you to be right, but I don’t think the government has got it yet. They are talking the talk. However, I’ll only believe they’ve understood, when they say “We are moving to 2.5% immediately” AND “we’ll get to 3.0% before the end of the parliament”, even though that’s still not enough. The word immediately is crucial here. Only immediate money talks seriously and it’s the best deterrent there is, combining a show of government will with future capability.

      At least 0.5% of GDP in the current budget is not going on military capability (and by 2027 that’s going up to 0.6%). That’s how much we need to discount before we even subtract the ever growing proportion of the remainder that is Defence Nuclear. Finally we arrive at the real budget for conventional forces, for both current and future effect.

    • They will but for some reason the Russians truly believe the UK is at the center of all things anti-Russian. Despite cuts it’s also one of the two (possibly soon to be 3 with Poland) militaries in Europe that can scale up and provide anything posing a conventional resistance to a re-armed Russia.

      eNATO as a whole yes, more than a resistance, but I don’t know if that’s as solid an alliance as we hope. Germany is fantastic at supporting the defence industry, the part where anyone or thing is put at risk though…

  11. Defense can never be wining a strategy, but it is a big tactical advantage, especially if you care about your civilian population lives, Russia BTW doesn’t, so you must have both, a GBAD and strong attack capabilities, especially ALBM, far better than air launched cruise missiles

  12. What aload of rubbish you write its the the sun or the mirror newspaper sure yiur trying to get us in a war and bombed

  13. Most of those are from America if you don’t understand their nuclear doctrine to remove all potential adversaries

  14. Why are you posting this nonsense.

    Any threats to the UK or NATO are problems we created ourselves.

    Russia will defend itself so out bragging about being ready for an offensive in ,2027 is just idiocy of the highest order.

    Our general staff and puppetitions have lost the plot and all need sacking

  16. I’d the missiles start flying you don’t need to worry for long anyway humanity will probably be cut in half or more in less than 8-12 minutes the rest will die of starvation later. So having less or more missile defences is irrelevant WW3 will be Humanities last war.

    “Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds”
    – J. Robert Oppenheimer

  18. Maybe if we just worry about our own country and stay out of others business, but no we have to put our fucking nose in.

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