Ben Wallace also has an Iran-shaped problem in his Defence in-tray. One of the complaints about the British government’s handling of the tanker crisis is that the Navy’s capacity is too thin. It is a long-established complaint from defence chiefs that there isn’t enough money for the Armed Forces, and they are now expecting Johnson to show his true blue Tory credentials by turning on the spending taps.
Jeremy Hunt pledged during the leadership contest to double defence spending, and there has been a regular drumbeat from Tory backbenchers on the need to push spending up. The Joint Committee on the National Security has warned that ‘the cornerstones of UK national security are being undermined’ and that the Nato target of spending two per cent of GDP on defence might not be enough.
The trouble with defence spending is that turning the taps on doesn’t immediately lead to a visible boost in the capacity of the Armed Forces.
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