Donald Trump calling British aircraft carriers toys is not especially surprising in itself, he has said similar things about allies before and usually ties it back to defence spending or what he sees as weakness that week.
These handovers happen regularly, with ships rotating as deployments change, what stands out here is the pressure behind it.
Recent tensions over Iran risk damaging the UK–US ‘special relationship’, and responsibility lies with Washington rather than London, argues former British diplomat Greg Quinn OBE.
Western forces have concentrated airborne surveillance capability in a small number of high-end platforms, a more distributed model may now be required argues Justin Hedges of Prevail Partners.
Steve Barclay MP, former Cabinet minister and MP for North East Cambridgeshire, argues that expanding UK reserves offers one of the most cost-effective ways to strengthen national defence and access specialist skills.
Resilience underpins deterrence. Without secure supply chains, industrial depth and sovereign capability, Britain’s strategic autonomy is constrained in an era of systemic competition, argues Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst MP.
Controversy over operations, conduct and civil military tensions has cast uncertainty over Pete Hegseth’s standing at the Pentagon, Dorcha Lee, former Irish Defence Forces Provost Marshal and Director of Military Police, argues.
In this article, Lt Col Stuart Crawford argues that the USA is going to have to deal with Iran and its theocratic regime at some point, and it may well be that this point has now been reached.
Honour satisfied and British pride restored? Perhaps, but why say it in the first place asks Lt Col Stuart Crawford.
The latest US National Security Strategy signals a decisive break with the post-war order, argues Greg Quinn OBE, a former British diplomat, raising questions for Europe and its allies about power, dependence, and what comes next.
