Get defence wrong and tax cuts won't matter – we need armoured mass now
Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, former Commanding Officer 1st Royal Tank Regiment, writes the Government's lack of major defence announcements in the Budget is short-sighted and the Ukraine conflict proves size does matter for defence.
It is now abundantly clear from the Budget that defence of the realm is not an issue for the Government and probably not the opposition, or anybody else 'shouting' in Westminster.
This seems incredibly short-sighted when we know that if Trump is elected as US president, which is as certain as anything, and with Germany in particular appearing to be an uncertain ally, we could find just ourselves, the French and the former Soviet states the only force to hold back the Russian hordes in Europe.
We have paid lip service to defence since the end of the Cold War and now have an Army barely larger than even Henry V had at Agincourt... and at a time when the threats to this country have never been higher.
Putin and his gangsters threaten to flatten London regularly with tactical nuclear weapons and a massive Russian army is attempting to break Ukrainian defensive lines and could be in the Low Countries sooner than we think. Even more likely, if German defence is infiltrated by Russian spies, as the former defence secretary Ben Wallace suggested last week.
Thirty-three years ago, Britain managed to put an armoured division into the field to defeat another tyrannical leader, Saddam Hussein, who illegally invaded a sovereign country, Kuwait, and today we would be pushed to put a third of that number into Europe to plug holes in Ukrainian defences.
But it is clear we have excellent kit.
The Ukrainians have voted the British Challenger 2 tank best in class, and despite the fact that we have got rid of most of our tanks for tech and flashy aircraft carriers, the Ukraine war is showing us that the tank is still the main currency on the battlefield.
Subsequent governments have listened too much to clever academics and wily politicians and created a UK military force to fight a battle that does not exist, certainly not at the moment, or the foreseeable future.
For sure, over most of the last 30 years we have been fighting insurgents and terrorists, and the few siren voices calling for an armoured warfighting capability have been dismissed as illiterate dinosaurs. Though Putin is teaching us that mass has a quality all of its own, and it has the potential to tip the balance either way in Ukraine.
We have no armoured mass at the moment, and the Budget shows there is no plan for it in future, at least with this Government.
Putin could very well prevail because the Russians kept their armoured formations and mass, not completely seduced by tech, space and boats.
Of course, that is a gross oversimplification, and Putin has no care for his own casualties or civilian casualties and collateral damage to constrain his push west.
He does not have to listen to the Stop Everything Crew whining about climate change, or the hungry screaming to be fed or doctors and train drivers demanding more cash. He has no concerns at the ballot box and murders anybody who opposes him, which makes him the most dangerous man since Hitler, if not more dangerous.
The only thing which will stop Putin is an overwhelming powerful defence in Europe, and a clear demonstration of this to the Kremlin, who are spending north of 30% of GDP on its armies, by the supposed allies of Ukraine.
When he looks across at Europe and sees most countries including the UK barely spending 2% of GDP on defence, he presumably comes to the conclusion that we don’t care that much about what he is doing in Ukraine and probably will only provide a speed bump if he keeps heading westwards.
Hence the decision to decide we have enough in defence at the moment is to hand the initiative to the Russians and consign us to fight them ourselves in Europe or capitulating and letting them take over.
As I will no doubt be one of the first who Putin sends to the Tower, I will at least, have a wry smile, when those currently shouting about climate change, the cost-of-living etc bang on Putin’s door for attention.
Whoever you vote for in the election, vote for the person and the party who will stop Putin. If we fail in this endeavour, everything else vexing us at the moment could become horrifically irrelevant.
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