Last night, Admiral Sir Mark Stanhope, the First Sea Lord, said that the aircraft carrier and
the jump-jets that were scrapped in last year’s strategic defence review would have made the mission in Libya more effective, faster and cheaper. His comments follow Robert Gates’ assertion that Britain and France were struggling to lead the
Libyan operation without substantial American support. It follows, in the mind of Stanhope at least, that defence cuts are impeding Britain’s military capability.
This morning, Rear Admiral Parry (rtd) supported Stanhope. He told the Today programme:
“I believe that he should have said that the Strategic Defence and Security Review was flawed – it defied strategic logic, it’s incoherent, and it didn’t prepare us for the challenges of the future. We have unevenness and unbalance in our defence programme where we’ve got money in the wrong places and I think that’s the issue and, just as with the NHS, we just have to see where the money needs to be to provide good value for money and military capability that will be suitable for a very uncertain future. The Prime Minister said he’s got a lot of love for the NHS, we’d like to see a bit of love for the armed forces now.”
Parry’s threat suggests at what Sherard Cowper-Cowles meant when he wrote about the overbearing military in this week’s issue of the Spectator. (Subscribe here.) But it also reveals the dangers of political withdrawal. Now that the government has retreated on something as vital as NHS reform, expect vested interests to intensify their resistance across the political battlefield, from welfare to national security.
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