Last week, our political editor, Tim Shipman, revealed a recent meeting between Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, the Chief of the Defence Staff, and the three heads of the services to discuss the defence investment plan. This plan governs the day-to-day armed forces’ budgets and follows the recent Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR), which sets our military aims as a nation. The chiefs agreed to write an unprecedented letter to John Healey, the Defence Secretary, explaining that the SDSR couldn’t be delivered without the requisite funding. That money was not forthcoming in the Budget, so they are forced to contemplate a bleak alternative: immediate cuts to both our forces and ambitions.
These looming defence cuts could not come at a worse time. The Prime Minister knows this. In February, Keir Starmer promised to increase ‘the resilience of our country so we can protect the British people, resist future shocks and bolster British interests’. At the time of the SDSR’s release, Starmer declared that the ‘threat we now face is more serious, more immediate and more unpredictable than at any time since the Cold War’.
Far from responding to proliferating threats, however, the government is missing in action. Last month the Labour-chaired Defence Select Committee was scathing. It suggested that Britain was ‘nowhere near’ being able to defend itself and its allies and condemned the ‘glacial pace’ at which the government was improving our war–fighting readiness. We are falling ‘far short of [our] claimed leadership position’ in Nato, remain far too reliant on the US and are not spending enough money. Such a damning assessment would be worrying at any time. But coming while Vladimir Putin steps up incursions into European airspace just as the US wearies of cross-Atlantic commitments, Labour’s failure is a dereliction of duty.
Indeed, instead of strengthening Britain’s defence posture, Starmer’s preference has been to sound the retreat. Labour’s repeal of the Legacy Act has shattered morale, especially among our special forces, who are fearful of being placed in the dock for pursuing the King’s enemies. Our elite forces are disheartened and our global posture is a defensive crouch. Starmer’s largest defence-related bill is the billions of pounds pledged to Chinese ally Mauritius, not to mention the sovereignty of our island base on Diego Garcia. Meanwhile, negotiations to join an EU defence fund have collapsed, despite the alacrity with which ministers surrendered fishing rights to buy goodwill in Brussels.
How can Britain lead a ‘Coalition of the Willing’ when we would struggle to muster a force of 5,000?
Ministers will plead that they were dealt a poor hand. Labour inherited an army whose numbers had fallen below 73,000 for the first time since the Napoleonic wars. Defence procurement was an ungodly mess. The Ajax armoured personnel carrier, supposedly the very model of a modern fighting vehicle, does more harm to our own personnel than it will ever inflict on the enemy. After the Ajax was deployed in training exercises, 31 soldiers fell ill, shaking and vomiting from its vibrations. The project to develop the Ajax has taken more than 15 years and so far cost £5.5 billion. Procurement has been largely incompetent and our stocks have run low, although at least the latter has been for good reason. Three years of supporting Ukraine has denuded Britain’s stocks of ammunition and artillery. That deployment has been noble and right but the stocks have been run down without proper replacement.
The government can legitimately point to multiple inherited difficulties but it must be judged on its response and so far it has been in the form of Churchillian rhetoric and the policies of Ethelred the Unready. How can Starmer suggest that Britain will lead a post-peace ‘Coalition of the Willing’ in Ukraine when we would struggle to muster a brigade-sized force of 5,000? How can we command the confidence of Nato when ministers are reportedly considering selling one of our new aircraft carriers to cover a £2.6 billion military funding shortfall? How can we innovate if ministers are unwilling even to keep funding at pace with inflation? It was revealed in June that the army had been able to order only three drones since Labour entered office.
The Budget provided the opportunity to give our armed forces the resources they require to keep us safe. But instead of recruiting fighting men and investing in the material modern warfare, we are subsidising idleness at home, as our economics editor, Michael Simmons, writes in his article this week. We may not be able to give our troops the tanks and armoured personnel carriers they need but we’re world leaders in providing citizens with mobility scooters and payments for anxiety.
This is decadence. Democracy is dying by inches in Ukraine. Putin’s war economy grows more aggressive by the day. Beijing’s leadership seeks to strangle Taiwan and dominate Asian sealanes. Our enemies grow bolder, not just on land, in the air and at sea, but in space and cyber and through terrorist proxies. Meanwhile, we pay to sap our own strength, spending more than ever on welfare while allowing the military to wither. As a former editorial board member of Socialist Alternatives, Starmer will know his Trotsky. The Prime Minister would do well to remember his observation that: ‘You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.’
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