Defence

Tuesday

Daniel Korski

Commemorating the victims and the survivors

Seventy years ago today, and only a week after the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact had been signed, a Nazi German battleship opened fire on a Polish fort on the Westerplatte peninsula outside Gdansk and began the Second World War. For my family living in Poland, the onslaught of war would change everything. Henrik and Karolina Finkel, having seen their parents and siblings wiped out not long after the German invasion, disguised themselves as Catholics and lived a make-belief life outside the Warsaw Ghetto. Henrik, an inventive man who was born in Vienna and originally named Heinrich (his brother was, believe it or not, called Adolph), changed the family surname from Finkel to

Monday

David Blackburn

But he did for the both of them with his plan of attack

The tension between defence ministers and senior officers has been a running story throughout the summer, perhaps at the expense of the opinions of troops on the ground. The Times’ war correspondent, Anthony Loyd, wrote a piece today describing soldiers’ views in the wake of the Prime Minister’s visit: ‘One can only hope that if Mr Brown had braved the journey northwards from Bastion to Sangin (he didn’t), where British infantrymen are getting killed or wounded at a rate directly comparable to that of their predecessors in Western Europe in 1944, his media men would have first whitewashed the graffiti in the latrine third from the left on the northern wall. ‘“I

Sunday

David Blackburn

Negotiating with the Taliban is fantasy

Lots of photo opportunities for the Prime Minister in Afghanistan, looking almost louche in shirt-sleeves and tie, but he’s attempted to provide some much needed direction for the Afghan mission. Last month, David Miliband said that Nato must talk to the Taliban and the Guardian reports that Brown is considering reconciliation also. Here are the details: ‘A source close to Brown suggested negotiations with insurgents sympathetic to the Taliban, persuading them to switch sides, now formed a key component of Britain’s war effort. He added: “The more reconciliation, the better.” Diplomatic sources in Helmand suggested such efforts could be on a large scale: “A large part of the Taliban are

Thursday

David Blackburn

The case for naval investment

Over at ConHome, Tim Montgomerie debates Will Inboden’s review of the main themes of the Tories foreign policy. I urge CoffeeHousers to read both articles, but the section on the relationship between energy and defence struck me particularly, recalling Liam Fox’s 2006 Chatham House speech on the subject. Here’s the premise of Fox’s argument: “We are all competing for the same natural resources to feed the economic system. The potential for terrorists or even nation states to interrupt this supply to cause widespread – rather than just local – disruption increases enormously.” Fox pointed out that global energy competition requirements had evolved beyond Britain’s defence strategies and capabilities. Nowhere was

Sunday

David Blackburn

Thank God they’re not running a war

Last week, defence maestro Kevan Jones launched his master-strategy to smear General Sir Richard Dannatt. It was ingenious. An FOI request would reveal the General to be a spendthrift, abusing taxpayers’ generosity by lavishing their money on his grace and favour accommodation and on raucous parties for his army mates. To borrow a phrase, there was just one small flaw in the plan: it was rubbish. The Mail reveals that General Dannatt’s grace and favour apartment is a stable block, not a palace, and that he pays tax on it because he views it as a perk. His other claims are modest. Audiciously, Sir Richard secured £19,270.77p in expenses between 2005

Wednesday

Alex Massie

Richard Dannatt is “playing politics” too

General Richard Dannatt may well be correct to demand additional men and equipment for the Afghan campaign and the military has certainly been ill-served by this government (though not only by this most recent ministry). But when the accusation of “playing politics” is thrown around let’s not forget that the good General is perfectly adept at playing that game himself. Perhaps it really is the case that he can only tour Afghanistan in an American helicopter. Perhaps it is even “self-evidently” the case that he’s only using a US chopper because there aren’t any British ones. As I say, this could all be true but it is also most convenient

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Adventures in Defence Procurement. Plus, Do We Need the RAF?

Defence procurement is difficult. It’s hard to design and build new weapons systems and predicting what kinds of equipment and force structure will be needed in 20 years time is a necessarily tricky business. Mistakes and blunders don’t just happen; they’re inevitable. Still, despite the Eurofighter and the looming problems with the Royal Navy’s new carrier class, it’s not clear that there’s anything on the MoD’s books quite so daft as the US Air Force’s F-22 fighter*. It’s not merely a matter of cost – though as nearly $200m a pop the F-22 is no bargain – but that, apparently, the average F-22 only flies for 1.7 hours before developing

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Public in favour of ringfencing defence spending

A timely poll from PoliticsHome which finds that two-thirds of the public think defence should be protected from any spending cuts.  Here’s their graphic with full results: The question, of course, is whether this kind of public pressure forces any of the main parties to actually shield defence from cuts.  With the debt burden as it is, its difficult to see them doing so while also sticking to their current commitments in other areas. UPDATE: Ok, just to provide a bit of context in the wake of some thought-provoking comments from CoffeeHousers below.  Yes, there could well be two extraneous factors at play here: a) the prominence of Afghanistan in

Daniel Korski

Time for a British Manley Commission?

If the government wants to stem the haemorrhaging of elite support for NATO’s Afghan mission, there is one major thing it can do at this stage: establish a British version of the Manley Commission. In Canada, ex-Deputy Prime Minister John Manley was asked by the Harper government to take a hard look at Canada’s role is Afghansistan, and lay out a clear plan. Its work effectively rebuilt Canadian support for the war effort. The Brown Government is simply not trusted to give an honest assessment of what is happening on the ground or give the military what it needs. The Defence Secretary is an unknown entity outside of Westminster (and

Peter Hoskin

Defending his own premiership

The Times’s story of how Bob Ainsworth came to be Defence Secretary is equal parts extraordinary and disheartening.  Here are the key passages: “Mr Ainsworth’s predecessor, John Hutton, had indicated to Mr Brown in mid-May that he was thinking of leaving the Government. Mr Hutton, recently remarried, had a compelling family reason for wanting to step down. But Mr Brown, preoccupied with the elections and the possibility of a leadership challenge, appears to have spent little time thinking about the vacancy. It wasn’t until around noon the day after the polls that he began to focus on who should oversee Britain’s military and its engagement in Afghanistan. In the midst

Monday

Peter Hoskin

What did Mitchell mean?

Andrew Mitchell is doing the media rounds to discuss the Tories’ new policy paper on international development, and he seemed to let slip with a major claim on defence spending to the BBC earlier.  Here’s how the indispensable PoliticsHome reports it: “Mr Mitchell said that it was not a question of choosing between the budgets for defence and international development, adding that the two departments would work much more closely under a Conservative government. ‘I don’t think that defence will face cuts, but it’s not a question of either or, you have to do both,” he said. ‘The development effort in Afghanistan which hasn’t always gone well and so to

Sunday

Daniel Korski

The UK “surge” debate

The support for Britain’s involvement in Afghanistan is, for the first time, showing major signs of fraying. Nick Clegg broke ranks with the other party leaders last week, and this weekend the total number of British deaths went beyond the number of soldiers killed in Iraq. Understandably, the Sunday papers are filled with stories about the lack of troops and kit. The Observer reports that an emergency review is taking place in the MoD to see if more soldiers need to be sent out. So what to make of it all? First of all, it is clear that there were too few troops and civilians deployed to start off. I

Peter Hoskin

So who’s really “playing politics” over troop numbers?

Just when you thought Brown’s government couldn’t sink any lower, you go and read the Sunday Times’s lead story today and the comments it contains from “senior Labour figures”, including a minister.  Here are the first few paragraphs: “Senior Labour figures accused the head of the army last night of playing politics as he said that there were too few troops and helicopters in the Afghan war zone. One minister expressed fury that General Sir Richard Dannatt, the chief of the general staff, had attended a private dinner with Tory MPs and suggested an extra 2,000 troops were needed in Helmand province. The general’s remarks put him at odds with

Friday

Daniel Korski

National security priorities: your say

Watch out: it’s security review season. The Brown government is about to issue a second version of its National Security Strategy. You can expect Pauline Neville-Jones to put out a revised version of the paper she did for the Tories a while ago. The Obama administration is set to launch a new “Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review,” to be headed up by Deputy Secretary of State Jacob “Jack” Lew and Policy Planning chief Anne-Marie Slaughter. While NATO has just begun work on its Strategic Concept, and Russia recently updated its National Security Strategy. Oh, and the EU disseminated a new Security Strategy under the French EU Presidency, which also saw

Daniel Korski

The Lib Dems threaten to go AWOL 

Though Nick Clegg has greater pre-existing international experience than either David Cameron or Gordon Brown (having worked in Brussels), he cannot help but see international affairs through a narrow political lens. Last year it was Israel’s targetting of Hamas, now it is Nato’s Afghan mission. Clegg wants the British troop contribution to ISAF either massively expanded or for the boys to come home. Simple enough. But it is also a sign that the Lib Dems, despite having such foreign policy luminaries like Ming Campbell on their benches, lack depth. It would be great for the number of British troop in Helmand to be expanded. But with almost 9000 troops already

Thursday

Daniel Korski

Is General Jones on his way out?

With Obama’s administration gradually filling up, problems appear to be brewing at the centre. Though picking ex-General James Jones as a National Security Adviser was seen as a smart move, associating the general’s wide experience and bi-partisan appeal with the young president, it may be turning out not to be so clever after all. President Obama continues to rely on his campaign advisers, principally Denis McDonough, nominally one of Jones’ deputies, and Mark Lippert, the Chief of Staff of the National Security Council and a confidant of Vice-President Biden. Both aides have a close personal bond with the President. General Jones, in turn, is often out of the loop and

Wednesday

Daniel Korski

Obama’s bear-hug

Presidents Obama, and Medvedev (and Prime Minister Putin) seem to be having a good summit. Nuclear talks look like they have gone well, there has been mention of expanding NATO’s transit for its Afghan mission through Russia, and the mood – crucial at any summit – has been reasonably good. Nobody stared into any one else’s soul, but the leaders nonetheless agreed, as Bush and Putin did a few years ago, that the US and Russia can do business. But is a rapprochement between the US and Russia really possible? Dmitri Trenin, of Carnegie Russia, says the West and Russia share many threats. But he also says that anti-Westernism is

Tuesday

Daniel Korski

Defence review: your say

So, a Defence Review has been set in motion even though the Government has for a long time said they would hold off from ordering such a study. But with the operational pressure growing, the financial situation dire, and clamour from the likes of George Robertson and Paddy Ashdown for a security rethink, the Government has been left with little choice. Kick-starting the review process also has the advantage of robbing Liam Fox, should he become Defence Secretary, of a “Bank of England moment” – i.e. a quick, early governmental decision that delivers some new momentum for Team Cameron. And Defence Secretary Bob Ainsworth needed to do something to stem

Daniel Korski

NATO navel-gazing

Right now I’m sitting at an event in Brussels to launch NATO’s new Strategic Concept, featuring ex-US Secretary of State Madeleine Allbright, the current and future NATO Secretaries-General, the senior NATO military commander, Admiral Stavridis, and 400 of NATO’s Best Friends Forever. The Strategic Concept, what is that? It is the alliance’s main strategic document, meant to update NATO’s view on threats and challenges. The last one was agreed more than a decade ago. But implementing out the new strategy isn’t going to be easy. The alliance is divided into at least three. Those who fret about Russia’s agressive behaviour. Those who think expeditionary operations are key. And, finally, those

Friday

Alex Massie

What about the Ministry of Defence?

Via Facebook, a friend makes a very good point: John Hutton’s successor as Secretary of State for Defence will be the fifth person to hold that job in the last five years. No wonder there’s a total lack of continuity at the MoD. This is, to put it mildly, no way to treat what should be one of the most important jobs in government. And this at a time when, however fitfully, we’ve been fighting two wars. One trusts that the next government will treat the MoD more seriously. But, as I’ve suggested, when it comes to Tory defence policy there seems to be quite a bit of heavy-lifting that