The UK’s armed forces are now less than half the size they were in the 1980s, following decades of reductions under successive Labour and Conservative governments, according to the SNP.
The party was citing new analysis it commissioned from the House of Commons Library, released as the UK marked Armed Forces Week, which it said set out the scale of personnel and equipment reductions over more than half a century. The SNP presented the findings alongside its criticism of the UK government’s defence plan, which it said was delayed and underfunded, and pointed to concern that the plan could face further delay following the resignation of Keir Starmer as Prime Minister.
According to the analysis, total active personnel stood at 315,000 in 1979, falling to 210,800 by 1997, 191,710 in 2010 and 138,121 in 2024, before reaching 137,966 on 1 April this year.
The figures also set out reductions in each service over that period, with the Army falling from 156,000 to 74,368, the Royal Navy from 73,000 to 32,516 and the Royal Air Force from 86,000 to 31,082.
On personnel based in Scotland, the analysis put the total at more than 19,000 in 1979, falling to just over 10,000 by 2024 and 9,740 by April 2025. The SNP said a number of historic Scottish regiments had been reduced and amalgamated over that time, including the Black Watch, which now forms part of the Royal Regiment of Scotland.
On equipment, the party said the number of Royal Navy vessels had fallen from 89 at the turn of the millennium to 57 by 2025. Over the same period, it put the number of destroyers at six, down from 11, frigates at 11, down from 21, and submarines at nine, down from 16.
The SNP added that defence spending had fallen as a proportion of GDP, from 4.6% in 1979 to 2.7% in 1997, 2.5% in 2010 and 2.4% in 2025.
Commenting, the SNP’s Westminster leader, Dave Doogan MP, said: “The Labour government is failing to take national security seriously enough – following decades of Westminster cuts to our armed forces, which have left the UK increasingly vulnerable.”
He added: “By failing to deliver the investment needed, Westminster is putting Scotland’s safety at risk. Keir Starmer lost two defence ministers, and his own job, over his long-delayed and underfunded plans. As he heads to the exit door, it is vital that the next UK Prime Minister urgently gets a grip, delivers the investment required and ensures Scotland gets its fair share.”
Doogan said the SNP had “consistently called for more investment in conventional defence capabilities, and more support for our forces, but instead Westminster has decimated them,” and said the party was urging the UK government to deliver the funding the armed forces needed as Scotland marked Armed Forces Week.
The biggest internal threat to UK national security bemoaning the state of UK armed forces to defend against external threats…..priceless hypocrisy.
Aren’t the SNP leading the innovation in unmanned command vehicles, like camper vans?
SNP have just cancelled a proposed new hospital, after 10 years of planning, as not cost effective for the public purse. First job of devolved government must be the protection of population in support of the UK support network. So how is the cancellation of a critical piece of national resilience infrastructure, to replace crumbling current hospital that the SNP have had oversight for 14 years, not important. Obviously planning to use the Camper Van as a mobile Health Clinic as a replacement option. Fuming!
First job of any Returning Goverment is to cancel any promises it can’t keep…!
All the Defence cuts over the last 20 -30 years have been well trailed and I don’t recall any of the UK political parties voting against the cuts or proposing cutting other spending to keep Defence spending as it was. Even Margret Thatcher, one of the most radical right wing Conservative Prime Ministers, believed that there are “no votes in Defence” and she was lucky the Argentinians only had to wait a few more months for planned cuts in the RN would have made the retaking of the Falklands near impossible.
Closer to one third of what they were in the early 90’s.
SNPs success difficult to Understand…!
Do they put Something in the Whisky 🥃 and Haggis up there ??
The rest must be Really bad…???
They make Starmer look almost Competent..!!!!
Paul, not sure where you get that from. The armed forces shrank dramatically following the end of the Cold War by the Options for Change Defence review. The regular Army of the early 90s was thus cut by 25% to 120,000 and the TA cut to 55,000 Established posts (not actual strength).
The army today is not at one third of those levels. Established posts today are 73,000 and 30,100 respectively.
Yes I joined an airforce of 95000 in 1982 it stands at 30400. Is someone going to tell that although I’m correct, the Airforce is twice as lethal now.
The post was about the Armed Forces in General ,not specifically the British Army.RAF Fast Jet Squadrons down from 31 to 10 (ie a third) RN Escorts down from 40+ to something like 12 (ie more than a third ) MBT’s down from 800 to 150-200 ( ie a quarter ) SSN’s down from 13 to 5 ( ie slightly less than a third ) other examples are available but these are some that most will recognise.
So your rebuke to Graham was that he wasn’t being broad enough by focussing just on the army rather than the entire joint force, and then cherry pick examples of specific systems (ie being much more narrow than Graham) yourself?
You only need to get on the Gosport ferry and look at the empty jetties. Back in my day (oddly enough, the 80’s) ships were tied up 3 deep in places
Stand up is not dead and buried in Scotland it seems.
I don’t see what this adds coming from the SNP? If they had their way they’d be smaller still and without the ultimate weapon we have.
Boring old chestnuts, no government has any interest in changing the situation, sadly.
Amazing. Has it just dawned on them?
Ah yes the champions of higher defence spending the SNP.
Don’t be Suprised…SNP know how much defence generates in SCOTLAND…this statement is not by chance…
try adding it all,..start with direct and indirect jobs plus the revenues…!!
Whisper it quietly ! the Scottish economy without the MOD would be a far more difficult challenge for any Scottish Goverment..
Not like any of us on ukdj would of guess.🙄
Says the nuc hating do not support defence firms, split up the nation SNP, They are for ever banging the drum for higher defence spending, every day, day in day out. More like more welfare spending to bribe its voter pool..
Is the SNP an irony free zone?? They would have cut the armed forces even further, I don’t recall them ever opposing any reduction in defence spending and I seem to remember one of their former leaders being an enthusiastic promoter of Russian propaganda on Russia Today platforms.
I doubt the SNP can even spell it.
BTW this was the party that was opposed to NATO membership right up to 2012…
Should they ever achieve their aim of independence up here they have just provided something to beat them with…
Much more likely imo that we would end up mimicking Eire (although they now seem to be awakening to the threats).
The US has over 700 thousand full time strength less today compared to 1980. So a complete none story.
Diffrence is America still retains a significant strength… we don’t…!
Our Armed forces have gone M.I.A. sadly…
Barely get a boat or a few ships to Sea…
And don’t get to Exited for the future.
.We don’t have the manpower or skill levels to run the small number that’s currently Available.!
We sent a carrier task group to the other side of the world last year for 8 months. A SSN has just returned from Australia and the Gulf. We have significant capability in Cyprus and across the Middle East. POW with F35s in the Atlantic as we speak. The Army in Estonia. OPVs in the Pacific and the Caribbean. Typhoon capability in the Falklands. And a Nuclear deterrent at sea. We have many gaps, and many issues to resolve. But our NATO allies are only just catching up to a force level and capability with have been at for years.
To correct your comment so it reflects reality …..
“We struggled to send a carrier task group to the other side of the world last year for 8 months. We could not have done it without ships from Allied nations. The previous deployment relied upon an air wing of USMC because we had so few aircraft to go on it. It left a capability gap in domestic waters, an aerial capability gap in our skies as the F-35B’s were with it and no SSN coverage while the government continued to slash the escort fleet without replacements.
A SSN has just returned from Australia and the Gulf – it was the only one that was seaworthy, so we had no submarines at sea anywhere near our own country.
We took weeks to rush a Daring Class Destroyer out of refit to play the Air Defence role to defend a remote RAF base with no GBAD.
We have little OPVs with almost no armament – one in the Pacific, one in the south Atlantic and one in the Caribbean – These would be better suited to home defence purposes such as fisheries protection, border protection and monitoring coastal waters (similar to how the US coastguard operates) rather than isolated in long deployments nowhere near the UK, especially given they lack hangar space for embarked rotary maintenance.
We have a nuclear deterrent at sea that’s so clapped out it has had to sustain record-breaking deployment lengths due to refit times being so extended as boats have aged beyond their projected service dates by years.
We have POW with no proper AEW, and a handful of F35s in the Atlantic as we speak – of the others, those F-35B recently delivered with TR3 are not even combat capable due to software glitches, something well documented. Also engine delivery for the F-35 program is so messed up Pratt & Whitney have been continually delivering engines late since 2017. The Rolls Royce engine should never have been cut from the program. Block IV software for the F-35 is years late, conveniently making us (and other nations) rely on American munitions for it in a very limited capability when you look at what it was supposed to have provided long ago.
We have a small expeditionary aerial fighting capability in Cyprus and across the Middle East, which would be easily neutered should Akrotiri’s Runway be taken out, which would be relatively simple given the lack of GBAD. The RAF’s Typhoon fleet is so small that it has to micro-manage airframe hours, and be supplemented by synthetic training (simulators) just to keep pilot’s hours current. 4 Typhoon’s in the Falklands who are currently without any air to air refuelling after the government withdrew their only Voyager. The RAF have had no AEW capability at all for years. The first Wedgetail is only just beginning testing at Lossie, with another due to be delivered for the same purpose soon, and the third and final one is still under build in Birmingham. It’s eventual numbers will be woefully lacking any credible capability.
The Army in Estonia has a few tanks and “up to” 1300 personnel – it’s not even capable of a proper armoured division, so the politicians have a new buzz word … Battle Group.
The government decided to upgrade Challenger 2, but the upgrade was yet another cleverly disguised cut in numbers, with only limited numbers of the upgrades getting the Trophy APS. It’s much the same as the newer Viking tracked IFV for the RM, RAF Typhoon Aesa Radar upgrades, and The Army’s Apache attack helicopter upgrades – all cuts in numbers . We have so many gaps, and many issues to resolve, but our politicians sit in Parliament more content to act like a bunch of 5 year olds in a playground taking cheap shots at each other.
It’s a stark contrast to some of our E-NATO allies who seem to have woken up and have no problem committing to spending more than we are, increasing personnel and actual front line assets while the British government and treasury buries it’s head in the sand about the actual capability of the nation’s defences. Meanwhile British defence chiefs are yes men protecting their pensions, so don’t speak about it until they retire.”
Even if we had 30 escorts, allies would go with a RN carrier strike group. Because that’s what working with allies looks like in reality. HMS Dragon is escorting the CDG. That ok with you? Typhoons are not hours limited. You’ve just made that up. 12 F35Bs are on the POW for an exercise. No other nation has 5th gen airpower at sea in those numbers. We don’t need AEW for a exercise in our back yard, and the capability wasn’t requested for the exercise. Cyprus is very well defended. Only one, very small drone hit the airfield that wasn’t the target. RAF Regiment shot down 100+ drones and missiles from Iraq. OPVs are armed and equipped to do the job they are designed to do. They are not designed for high end warfighting. All 107 Typhoons will be part of the 2.35bn upgrade package. Currently 40 will receive the E-Scan radar. That isn’t a cut. Its been the number quoted and contacted for years now. E7 is the best AEW platform money can buy. more than 3 would be nice. But still a very credible capability for the RAF. And networked platforms can share huge amounts of data. 4 F35s networked together can share a huge tactical picture to other air assets, ground and naval platforms and unmanned.
If we had enough escorts to put a complete carrier group to sea, it would be a statement of intent that we are capable and ready to deploy a sovereign carrier group if necessary. The fact is we are unable to. While it’s a nice luxury to have, you cannot always rely on Allies and the conflict in the Falklands in 1982 proved that. That’s why a soveriegn capability is required.
So HMS Dragon is escorting CDG …. what’s the significance of that? Where are the other Daring Class destroyers? Still laid up like all the SSN’s … which I notice you neither commented on or acknowledged.
Typhoons do have their airframe hours micro-managed and pilots do rely upon synthetic training. It’s far from made up. Perhaps you just don’t know anyone in the know. Google it and open your eyes.
You might not need AEW in our own back yard (who mentioned that? I didn’t) but you do need the capability (I did actually mention that) and the RAF has been without it for years thanks to successive governments failing to maintain and upgrade the E-3 fleet to the point they were canibalising spares from 2 jets to keep the other 3 just about operational. More than 3 is required. Perhaps you’re unaware of the rule of three. It a fact that having only 3 aircraft means you can only sustain a capability of one to be available at all times. Look it up. You might learn something.
“No other nation has 5th gen airpower at sea in those numbers…” USMC and US Navy both have more capability. It’s also true that we don’t have enough aircraft to maintain an OCU and two full squadrons at complete readiness. There will be a number of airframes in deep maintenance at one time, and with current F-35 availability rates, engine issues and software faults my statement is fact. By the rule of 3, there is theoretically an availability rate of just over 15.
So the POW has 12 F-35 on board? That’s just a few as I stated. It’s not a full air wing. That was only done in one exercise when the Carrier came back to the Med from it’s Pacific Deployment, and it was for a short time. It’s capable of more than 24 at surge capacity. Fill one QE Carrier up and there is not enough airframes to fill the other. That’s a fact.
You say about OPV’s being armed and equipped to do the job intended … Well that’s not
Of the 107 Typhoons the RAF has, 67 are Tranche 2, and only 40 are Tranche 3. Those 40 Tranche 3 are the only airframes due to get advanced avionics and AESA Radar. This means 67 will remain Tranch 2 jets and be less capable than the ones being upgraded, no matter how long it was decided that only 40 will get the upgrades. It was a stupid decision in the first place. The fact is the whole fleet should be upgraded and more should be ordered.
If Cyprus is so well defended, why was there a need to send a Daring Class Destroyer there to defend it? It was only after the base was hit that the MOD deployed air defences and even then it was woeful. Every base should have a layered air defence to protect the assets, especially as the MOD closed so many bases down and now we have all our eggs in just a few baskets. It’s a fact they do not. Your claim about the RAF regiment shooting down drones was not from Akrotiri, they shot down drones from Iran in Iraq, and the only press release was about them shooting down 10 in one night.
You say that 4 Typhoons networked can share a “huge tactical picture …blah blah …” Well the Falklands Islands have very little of what you are blabbing on about. Do try to read what I wrote instead of just skimming it and missing what was actually said, and while you’re there, look up the things I stated instead of trying to claim everything is ok. By the look of it you have been hiding under a rock and are just as bad as the politicians for burying your head in the sand about the capabilities of the British military. Just listen to fromer defence chiefs and maybe a few sessions of the Defence Select Committee. It might open your eyes a little bit and it might stop you making laughable claims.
Every fast jet in service in NATO uses simulators for training. Initial fast jet training and for the frontline. Be it a Typhoon an F35, F22, F15E, F16, F18, Rafale, Gripen. All of them. So using that as some sort of criticism just shows you haven’t a clue what you are talking about. Yeah, let’s put 36 F35s on POW for an exercise in the north sea. Or let’s use 12 which is more then enough for what’s required for that particular exercise. The Americans haven’t deployed 36 F22s or 36 F15Es for it, so it seems a little bit pointless for what’s required. You also haven’t looked at my comment properly. I clearly said the RAF Regiment were in Iraq. And I said 4 F35s networked together, not 4 Typhoons. And Typhoon hours are not “micro managed”. That’s just not a term engineers use. They monitor the airframe fatigue index. Like every Airforce does for every fast jet. Flying hours are not an issue with Typhoon. They good for well into the 2040s and beyond. I would hope the US Navy and the USMC does have more F35 capability than us. We don’t have a US sized defence budget or economy. But they don’t have 12 F35s at sea today. And they haven’t put more than 24 at sea like we have, not matter the duration. As for the rest of your comment. It reads like a AI tool did it for you.
Padre, the phrase Battle Group or Battlegroup is not a fancy new phrase in the army. I recall being taught about BGs in Sandhurst in 1975.
It is an all-arms group based on a unit (a Lt Col’s command), usually an infantry battalion or an armoured regiment. Components from other arms (from other units) are added as attachments or sometimes components are also detached.
Thus you might take an armoured regiment as the core under its CO and detach a squadron of tanks but attach an armoured infantry company. You might also attach a detachment of AD missile artillery, and a det of combat engineers.
You end up typically with a BG of 800-1000 under the CO of the core (or framework) unit. The BG in Estonia is multinational with the UK providing the bulk of the troops.
Surprising that you think we should have a whole division in Estonia – these are tripwire forces. Our troops on Op CABRIT are part of NATO’s enhanced Force Protection (eFP) mission. Other nations provide BGs to other ‘frontline’ countries. Some are upgrading to brigades (even if they might not be at full strength).
I’m sorry, where did I say that there should be an entire Armoured Division in Estonia? I only said The Army is not capable of deploying an entire Armoured Division and that was where I made a mistake. What I actually meant to say was armoured Brigade. It may be able to deploy a Brigade for a short time, but sustaining it is another thing as it will need to be rotated. I’m sure I don’t need to explain that to you?
You also might have been taught about the phrase Battle group in 1975, but it is indeed a current buzz word for politicians when talking in the media because the hollowed out numbers in the British military mean they can’t use anything bigger. They talk about deploying to Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping force in the event of a ceasefire, but as many have said, the numbers they claim they want to deploy simply aren’t sustainable.
Its even funnier when you look at what actually defines an “Army”. With less than 100,000 men, technically the Army is a Militia.
Carriers Reliant on our Allies to leave Port…? Broken down on deployment in the high North with just 4 helicopters for most of the time..!!!
A deployment East of Gibraltar every
2/4yrs…? With Reliance on allied Stores Ship and Escorts..!
F35bs Normally a hand full on a 70000t carrier with little Stand off strike
Capabilites ..
ssbn.. that are on their last legs with
6 mths deployment now the Norm..?
Ssns only one Appears deployable at any one time the rest appear to be dockside Paperweights..!
5 very dubious t23 frigates don’t let them go to far…!!
6 t45 Destroyers of which 1 was Eventually Available during IRAN Dabacle…
A handful of Valiant OPVs some on them on way soon to South America…??
And some minehunting assets..
.
Are you British Nig e??
To be honest, as an example, the T45 has maybe 10 times the firepower of the destroyers it replaced so I’m not sure of the relevance of their statement.
Logic…The potential Enemy Destroyer is also 10 times more lethal as their Predecessor’s…!!!
Once heard a Goverment Minister compare a modern day Destroyer to wwii destroyers… if only they were likely to fight them hey..!
Destroyers aren’t meant to engage destroyers, but it terms of how many missiles and aircraft, over how large of a range, a Type 45 can engage vs a Type 42 it is actually kind of a relevant point.
There are many more missiles today and rom many more countries today. And even non countries have them.
Sure, but there’s only 6 of them, even if they didn’t have engine problems that’s what 2/3 likely to be available at any given time? Numbers do matter, even when the tech has improved.
Sure good point and I’m sure the T42’s had similar availability issues as with every other ship in the RN.
This if anything proves my point. It is not just numbers we should be measuring, it is lethality.
In the Falklands conflict indeed the T42s could not cope with the new missiles it was facing.
Sunday newspapers are reporting that approved DIP (to be announced on on Tuesday) will cancel both the Type 83 destroyers and the Type 32 frigates. A total disaster for the RN. Burnham supposedly was given sight of the final plan and raised no objections.
The 32 has never existed in the first place, hell still think it was the RN trying to run with Johnson being hungover that day. The 83 is a larger choice of course, guessing its going to be spun as “drones will do it” and hope…
Hmmm … wonder whether there will be an appendix to the DIP, a ranked and costed but unfunded wish list. Current HMG may have won this battle re rearmament but not necessarily the war. Confidently predict continuing relitigation of the plan as storm clouds gather in the East. Eventually most MPs will accept geopolitical reality, hopefully sometime before the Orcs occupy East Anglia. 🤞
To be fair it’s HMT that will have won. HMG and the current cabinet not so much.
Jon,
Fair point, guilty of some imprecision in the thesis argument. Mea culpa .
Hi F/USAF, I understood that the RN input to DIP does included aspirational projects, but that the Army input did not. No idea about the RAF approach.
From what I understand the DIP is an incredibly ambitious and complex document and covers Structures, Infrastructure and 10 year equipment funding plan all in one book. No wonder it has taken so long to draw up.
We used to have a Long-Term Equipment Plan (10-year plan of funding for each project) that was linked to a Defence White Paper (the strategy piece). Quickly constructed. Much better.
With the emphasis on rapid decisions and rapid procurement nowadys, our staff work is too slow. The SDR took from 16 Jul 2024 to 2 June 2025 – 10.5 months. DIP has taken a further 13 months. About 2 years from the GE. Our Parliamentary Terms are nominally 5 years. All very crazy and totally unacceptable.
Is it all a plot to put off spending the really big money for a couple of years?
GM,
Thanks, understood. Confidently predict periodic revisions of this opus. 🤔😉
Let’s try a cocktail here. Laughably, pathetically, hypocritically, ignorantly, moronically typical of SNP. Bloody hell, kind of tripe Spock would come out with, and so enough said.
The SNP telling Westminer about defence LOL. If the SNP had its way iScotland would have no defence at all, and they would blame rUK for that!
DIP ‘leak’ says no new surface combatants for RN, T83 and T32 kicked into the long grass to die.
We’re going to have a very small navy and all these dreams of ‘growing numbers’ remain dreams
British total active personnel 137,966, 2026. MoD civil servants 55,000
U.S. Marine Corps 170,000. USMC civilians 21,000 + U.S. Navy Department (USMC dedicated) 35,000
Royal Navy: 62 ships. British Army: 73,000. Royal Air Force aircraft: 642
USMC aircraft: 1200. USMC ships: 32 amphibious warships, 17 prepositioning ships. USMC troops: circa 60,000
USMC One star and above: (Capped at) 64. Britain: 472
I wonder whether a certain amount of reorganisation and reform might be offered up in return for necessary budgetary increases? In particular, the Royal Air Force, at 126 one star and above for 150 strike aircraft, appears overstaffed?
What about the Royal Navy? They famously have more Admirals than capital ships.
What about MP’s expenses? Provide adequately (not lavishly) furnished appartments with basic amenities like a hotel room would be. There are many government owned buildings in the capital capable of being used. Don’t let them profit from a second home at the taxpayers expense. Give them a rail warrant and stop their food and drink expenses. At the moment all they do is ride the gravy train, milk the system and are encouraged to do so by the civil service so they can increase their own bloated department.
I have to pay for my own drinks/meals and travel to work on a significantly lesser income. Why should it be any different for them?
Speaking of the Civil Service, that’s one gluttonous herd on the gravy train that needs thinning. Abolish NI, add a few percent on income tax and you get rid of a whole unnecessary department while retaining government income at the same level. Abolish senior Civil service posts in all departments and have governments appoint their own senior managers responsible for overseeing the implementation of government policy. That would end the deep state nonsense and make government more accountable. When a new government is elected, they bring in their own Civil Service managers who have the ability to hire and fire those who refuse to implement policy.
Very well said, Padre. I could not have put it better myself…except get rid of RAF as well. Rename AAC as RFC (150 strike aircraft is three wings, requiring only three Wing Commanders/Lt Col.). That gets rid of an entire service with substantial savings! Per Ardua Ad too many Astra!
The problem with your plan for the country getting rid of the RAF is that we would end up in a situation where the Army squabbles with the Navy over who should be responsible for Strike aircraft and Air Defence and then they will spend the budgets on more tanks and more ships, leaving us without adequate aerial capabilities.
Inter-service rivalry and infighting is exactly why the RAF was created in the first place, as Generals and Admirals argued more about that than they did the job they were supposed to do!
You make a very interesting point. But the lines of demarcation are already clear, need not change. The AAC already provides Close Air Support, without which its manoeuvre elements cannot function. The Fleet Air Arm already provides Air Defence, long range interdiction, without which the Royal Navy cannot function. Furthermore the Chief of the Defence Staff now directly commands the service chiefs. I cannot imagine, for example, Alanbrooke allowing much in the way of petty rivalries. It is simply a question of grip…
With the Navy mostly far from our shores as in both CSG deployments to the pacific or other global taskings, with an aircraft designed for strike missions (albeit with an A2A capability), or with ships in port awaiting refit, it seems they are incapable of defending our shores. They are only really capable of fleet defence, and even then, they couldn’t stop hypersonic missiles or saturation attacks.
Certainly the availability of the F-35 is in serious doubt, with its decade long delays to block IV software release increasing the weapons availability for the aircraft, problems with engine supply meaning engines delivered consistently late since 2017 and the new TR3 aircraft not even capable of combat operations due to software glitches.
The Army’s current CAS capability is seriously limited, with only the Apache, a battlefield helo. It cannot prevent enemy air assets attacking troops and nor could it stop long range artillery, stand off missiles or drone saturation attacks. Conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq demonstrated the need for fast air to respond to requirements which were mostly provided by the RAF or Allied fast air, with the only problem being the shrinking fleets (thanks to successive governments) struggling to maintain enough aircraft airworthy to maintain capability.
It’s literally been the RAF who has been intercepting long range nuclear capable Bears and Blackjacks on a regular basis as they head directly towards UK airspace since the very early days of the cold war, right up to the present. It was also the RAF who defeated a vastly superior Luftwaffe in 1940. Even the Maritime patrol aircraft of the RAF have protected the seas around the UK, something the Navy with no seaworthy SSN’s available cannot do.
The defence of the nations airspace is in the safest hands it could be in.
Britain’s Service Chiefs should be thinking creatively.
The diminutive size of all three services demands rationalisation…of staffs.
The very same squadrons that protect our skies, our seas, could very easily be regrouped under Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm Command (if necessary renamed Joint Air Command) which performs exactly the same function for the Fleet.
Battlefield air defence is layered. The British Army should be equipped with counter air defence systems to deal with ultra low and low level threats. Joint Air Command should deal with the rest, as it always has done, first as the RFC and then as the RAF/Fleet Air Arm.
Nothing against the Royal Air Force. Their fast jet pilots are outstanding.
It is at staff level that systemic reform is required across the piece within Whitehall and elsewhere.
The first line of your response will never happen. Britain’s defence chiefs prioritise one thing … their impending pensions. They are essentially yes men to the MOD and government, that is until they retire and speak about what the problems really are.
As for your suggestion about “Fleet Air Arm Command” it is almost already there, with the RN and RAF fast air assets at RAF Marham grouped under Strike Command of the RAF, while air defence is grouped separately with the Typhoon force, who are also multi-role. Moving it from one service to another makes no sense, as I explained already.
If any of the air assets are given to another service, then the other services will prioritise their main role for requirements of new assets and the air defence of the nation will suffer. It will also cause infighting among the Army and Navy as to who should be responsible for air defence, both competing against each other for the budgets that come with it. It’s happened before and will happen again. Who would run the space domain? This is why you need a separate force, one focussed on the job at hand. Land, sea and air/space are entirely different domains.
If anything the RN should have it’s carriers sold off and have more destroyers and Frigates to guard the high North or for other taskings such as Gulf, Med, Caribbean or South Atlantic. You have big slow and vulnerable ships travelling around at snails pace, carrying a lot of assets, requiring huge amounts of stores to maintain them and thousands of personnel in a (CSG) to operate them and taking weeks to get anywhere.
It’s part of the reason 16 Air Assault Brigade became the Rapid Reaction Force after the Falklands. Every conflict in history has shown how Amphibious Assault ops on a big scale costs lives and assets. The carriers could not survive hypersonic missile attacks and the magazines of the escorts would expend very fast in any saturation attack and all assets on the carriers and their escorts would be lost too. In fact the easiest way to disable a carrier group is to sink it’s stores ships as they trundle off to resupply. The carriers are just a liability and a white elephant. In any case, aircraft can be tankered just about anywhere in the world with less risk to large amounts of people, at a fraction of the cost and in a fraction of the voyage time. The coalitions we are in can provide basing if need be, or we can use one of our many outlying air bases such as Akrotiri, Wideawake, or Diego Garcia.
Battlefield air defence is already layered. The Army have several capabilities, but adequate numbers are lacking.
The main problem is that defence budgets are not adequate, for either service. Compromises are made in the name of penny-pinching by people in parliament who are clueless, while the civil servants in the MOD waste millions of pounds every year, not least in delaying projects and making them cost more.
Assets are retired or given away before replacements are sourced leading to a gap in capability (think C-130, MPA, AEW, SPA). Assets are purchased and the capacity to maintain them are not put in place (Typhoon, SSN). Assets are purchased in low numbers and then a capability cannot be used when needed (T45, SSN, F-35b, Voyager) and then a crisis happens and the military cannot respond.
Incidentally I agree with your comment about reform of Staff. A Navy with more Admirals than ships, RAF bases commanded by a Group Captain, not a Wing Commander. I’m pretty sure there will also be many Brigadiers without Brigades in the Army. The services are top heavy. Too many chiefs and not enough indians.
Another thing to consider is contractors. How is it cheaper for a private company who needs to make a profit to staff a particular job on a military base? The RAF’s Voyager has already cost more than it would have to buy the aircraft, operate and maintain them in house. PFI’s and contracting should be cut out and it done by service personnel as it was before.
Having one service, as with the USMC, only 64 one star and above, will solve all the staff infighting problems that you identify. Strike Command used to be Fighter Command and Bomber Command. Strike Command no longer has the infighting between those two separate Commands.
PFIs are a disaster pretty much everywhere. Having said that, the PSA was quite dreadful as well.
The fundamental problem lies with Whitehall/Westminster willing the mission but not the means.
Democracy:the least worst form of government.
Despite its current war status, Russian forces only have @ 25% of the numbers they had in the 1980s. Most of their equipment is outdated.
But if the SNP are worried, they could offer to give up the Barnet formula/ subsidy to help fund increased defence spending.
And yet still they attack…Chechnya (twice), Georgia, Ukraine (twice).
Deterrence is a great deal cheaper in blood and treasure than war.
Britain must rebuild a verifiable and credible conventional deterrent.
Duncan Sandys thought all we needed was missiles.
We must not make that mistake again.
Let me get this correct just in case I have had a senior moment -the SNP are bemoaning the reduction in the strength and capability of the UK i.e. BRITISH armed forces well we are all doing that BUT and correct me if I am wrong here the SNP plans to be independent from the UK so why would a weak southern neighbour be of any interest after all Scottish forces will be incredibly strong so Scotland will be secure. What happens in England, Wales and NI has and is of no interest to the SNP ever so why the outrage? Sorry I have a fit of the giggles –the idea that the SNP has any interest in defence of the realm has cuased that.