last week, in this column, I was somewhat sceptical about imminence of a war with Russia.
Nevertheless, it is a growing danger that we cannot ignore, together with the increasing threats to our vital national interests, including freedom of navigation in the Arabian Gulf and the South China Sea.
But defence is expensive: despite the 6th highest defence budget in the World we have seen very significant reductions in our armed forces.
The Defence Settlement announced by the Prime Minister during his tenure as Chancellor in 2020 provided an additional £24.1 billion in cash terms over four years, exceeding UK’s NATO pledge and represented the biggest increase to UK defence spending since the Cold War.
More recently, the Chancellor announced in last Spring’s Budget that the Government will invest an extra £5 billion in defence and national security over the next two years, and will be spending another £3 billion across the defence nuclear enterprise, allowing us to improve our nuclear skills programme and support the delivery of our AUKUS partnership for the Indo-Pacific region together with Australia USA.
Defence spending is set to consume 2.25% of GDP by 2025, exceeding the NATO target of 2%.
Most recently the PM has expressed his ambition to reach 2.5%
But is it enough?
During the Cold War, and the ‘temperature’ is no warmer now, we were spending 4% of GDP.
If we take the current threat level seriously, should we be doubling our defence budget?
The war in Ukraine has changed everything. Once again, size really matters: Both Russia and Ukraine are struggling to recruit sufficient forces.
Whilst, Ukraine has mobilized in a war of national survival in which reserve units -like the Azov at Mariupol, have played a critical role, we by contrast, have optimised our forces for expeditionary operations much further afield beyond the NATO area, fighting ‘wars of choice’ against adversaries over which we have significantly greater capabilities.
We now need to prepare for war in Europe against a ‘peer adversary’. With that in mind, what can we learn from Ukraine’s experience against that very peer adversary?
I suggest the lessons are:
-The importance of number of manoeuvre formations that can be put into battle
-The quantity of infantry, thickened by anti-armour and anti-air capability, to protect long lines of communication
-Engineers to keep those lines open
-The manpower challenges of protecting civilian populations and infrastructure
-The even greater manpower requirements of urban warfare and the need to rotate exhausted troops.
When we were last able to deliver these sorts of capabilities we relied on Territorials to swiftly reinforce the British Army of The Rhine. The Territorial Army, with an establishment of 86,000 in formed units, providing potent blocking formations equipped with artillery, anti-tank missiles and mortars.
We make much less use of reserve forces that our the USA, Australia and Canada. Whilst our regular forces are among the best in the world, they are increasingly difficult to recruit and expensive to retain. If we are to pose a risk, sufficient to deter any aggressor, without impoverishing the taxpayer, then it has to be by recovering the ‘citizen’s army’ of reservists.