UK’s armed forces are in a sad state – and they have only themselves to blame | Defence policy
George Robertson, Tony Blair’s first defense minister, former NATO secretary-general and author of the last in a series of inevitable strategic defense reviews last year, accused Keir Starmer on Tuesday of a “corrosive indifference to defence”. He said the Prime Minister was not willing to make the “necessary investment”.
Lord Robertson could direct his fire elsewhere. He must know that no government department has been more complacent over the years in the face of devastating evidence of waste, wasteful contracts and policy decisions that fail to confront new but increasingly obvious security threats to Britain and other western countries.
The Mandarins in the Ministry of Defense and successive defense ministers have failed to confront the top brass of the armed forces—senior military figures interested in preserving the status quo and continuing the latest wars, reluctant to accept new geopolitical realities and new technologies.
Critics say many benefit from jobs at leading arms companies, maintaining a defense lobby that prevents them from being effectively scrutinized in Whitehall or Westminster.
The sorry state of Britain’s armed forces and their inadequacy in dealing with current threats has been revealed by recent photographs of HMS Dragon on Portsmouth docks, the navy’s only destroyer helping to protect British interests that could be potential targets in the conflict in the Middle East, including the RAF base at Akrotiri in Cyprus.
The crew hurriedly prepared the ship to join Britain’s NATO allies who had arrived in the Eastern Mediterranean, and the destroyer needed further repairs almost immediately upon arrival. Britain’s aircraft carriers and the navy’s largest and most expensive ships, Queen Elizabeth and Prince of Wales, were not available. They cost more than £6bn; this was well above the original estimate of £4bn.
It has already cost more than £1 billion to maintain and repair ships, which have suffered serious mechanical problems during their short lives. While useful for “flying the flag” on long missions around the world, as Navy spokesmen put it, they do nothing to fill gaps in Britain’s air defense systems closer to home.
Meanwhile, ministers face the prospect of the army’s planned new armored car, the Ajax, being scrapped, despite more than £6bn of taxpayers’ money having been spent on the project. Ajax is eight years late and its flaws are so serious that vibration and noise have made soldiers training there sick, some suffering hearing loss.
The Ministry of Defense is investing billions of pounds in obsolete weapons systems, including heavy tanks. Last year Starmer bowed to US pressure to buy 12 Lockheed Martin F-35 fighter jets at a cost estimated at £1bn and equip them with tactical nuclear weapons. (The possibility of a new nuclear weapons system for Britain’s armed forces was not recommended in Robertson’s defense review.)
The Department of Defense has been extremely slow to confront a growing – but increasingly distinct – threat from cyberwarfare and other much cheaper means of warfare, including drones.
Robertson accused “non-military experts at the Treasury” of “vandalism” and added that the country could not defend itself with “an ever-expanding welfare budget.” But it is hardly surprising that the Treasury is reluctant to agree to the Ministry of Defence’s demands, including the signature of the repeatedly delayed defense investment plan.
The MoD has shown little sign of learning lessons or even admitting mistakes. The Navy’s fleet of Astute nuclear-powered attack submarines has been repeatedly hit by mechanical problems, and a new fleet of Dreadnought submarines for Trident nuclear missiles is reportedly already facing the possibility of expensive delays.
The MoD has repeatedly ignored harsh criticism of its accounting procedures and procurement projects from the National Audit Office and the House of Commons public accounts committee.
Britain’s 2024-25 defense budget is around £60.2bn, with plans to increase this to £73.5bn by 2028-29; This corresponds to real term growth of 3.8% per year. The Ministry of Defense says it will need an extra £28bn over the next four years to plug the deficit and “become combat-ready”.
All the evidence suggests that the Department of Defense needs more, not less, scrutiny, whether in the Treasury or by “non-military experts,” including those more attentive to the opportunities and savings offered by modern, more adaptable weapons systems, as well as intelligence agencies responsible for anticipating and even helping to prevent military conflict.
Richard Norton-Taylor writes on defense and security for the Guardian. He joined the Guardian in 1973 as a European correspondent and later became security editor.
