Defence: the wrong kind of war

By Richard North - July 11, 2024

Since taking office, perhaps the only sensible thing Starmer has done is to commission a strategic defence review. Before committing shed-loads of taxpayers’ cash to the bottomless pit of equipment spending, it would be a good idea to work out what we might expect of our defence forces in the next decade or so, and what structures, scale and equipment might be needed to fulfil expected tasks.

As General Sir Richard Shirreff, former deputy supreme allied commander in Europe, says: “You cannot begin to resolve the problem until you understand the extent of it”. He says a review could be done within six weeks if necessary, with chiefs and officials working over the summer holiday.

That said, there is definitely a move in some quarters to gear us up for a war against Russia – presumably a defensive war on the basis that Putin might be tempted to invade some of his Baltic neighbours, or at least make threatening gestures which would require a credible deterrent force to be in place to prevent an opportunistic assault.

At the moment, it is not clear whether Starmer buys into the Russia-war schtick, but it is a fair bet that the population in general, for several and diverse reasons, would not be particularly enthused by the idea of standing in the way of the Red hordes as they piled across the Estonian border.

Short of an aggressive and deeply unpopular conscription programme, it is hard to see how any British government – much less a Labour administration – might assemble the manpower needed to prosecute a sustained war against a peer enemy. Even then, mass disobedience could frustrate official attempts to increase manpower levels.

Then it is unlikely that any amount of funding would be sufficient to equip a sizeable military force, given the erosion of our industrial capacity, the cost of sophisticated equipment and the time-lag between procurement decisions and delivery of working systems in the field.

In short, barring a token force from our existing, depleted military, using existing equipment stocks bolstered by orders already in the pipeline, it is doubtful whether the UK could mount expeditionary force of sufficient strength to make a credible contribution to a – presumably – Nato defence force.

And given that many of the Nato powers have also allowed their capabilities to deteriorate, it is questionable as to whether Nato as a whole could mount a credible defence – especially if the United States was distracted by conflicts in the Pacific, or in the grip of a Trumpian administration which refused to go to war against Russia.

In any event, outside the military and their think-tank handmaidens, it might be difficult to find a consensus to support the idea that Russia was the main (or any) threat to UK security, or that its energies could not be contained by giving the Ukrainians enough kit to keep their troops in the field of battle, feeding the mincing machine with a fresh supply of carcases.

To that extent, the reality of Britain’s defence posture might be the realistic – if somewhat cynical – policy of fighting to the last Ukrainian, in which case the commitment to Sunak’s multi-year £3 billion military funding package would be cheap at twice the price and only a small fraction of the expected £69 billion cost of the UK’s defence budget.

However, that policy might come unstuck if, as many believe they will, the Russians subdue the Ukrainian military. For many months now, the Russian “crumbling” strategy has been yielding consistent if unspectacular results and it would be unsurprising if the terrible toll of Ukrainian casualties forced the Kiev government to sue for peace.

With Starmer giving permission for the Ukrainians to use British long-range munitions on targets within Russia – and thereby elevating the UK to the position of co-belligerent – we could then find ourselves facing the wrath of an invigorated and vengeful Putin, in a conflict of unknown and unpredictable dimensions.

With the progressive retreat of the UK from the global stage, there are few opportunities for the Russians to foment limited, direct conflict with the British. But if – for example – the Kremlin assisted the Argentinians to exert military pressure on the Falklands, this could stretch UK military capabilities and absorb substantial resources.

On another front, the strengthening alliance between Russia and India – instanced by the cordial meeting of Modi and Putin in Moscow – could be used to engineer open warfare in Kashmir, where tensions are already high.

Although any fighting on the sub-continent would not directly involve British forces, open hostilities between India and Pakistan would undoubtedly trigger violence on the streets of Britain, where enmities between the expatriate communities are never far below the surface.

It is here, perhaps, that any defence review should be looking. Rather than gearing up for a European adventure, or interventions further afield, the government might be better advised to staff and equip its armed forces to deal with prolonged episodes of sectarian conflict, in support of the civilian authorities, on the lines of their intervention in the Northern Ireland “troubles”.

As the British demos fragments under the weight of unrestrained mass immigration, we are perhaps closer to experiencing major civil unrest than most would care to admit and, given the limited resources of the civilian police forces, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that military assistance will be needed to quell disturbances.

Just how close we might be to such a situation was illustrated by an event yesterday, when Leicestershire police arrested Majid Novsarka, also known as Majid Freeman, who was then charged with encouragement of terrorism and supporting a proscribed organisation.

It turns out that this man was a prominent campaigner for the independent Muslim MP Shockat Adam and, not only had he been instrumental in intimidating the incumbent MP, Jonathon Ashworth, he has been associated with radical Islamic groups and, in 2022, was at the centre of the Muslim-Hindu disturbances in Leicester, accused of playing a dark role in instigating the violence.

But what was particularly significant about yesterday was that, after Freeman’s arrest, a crowd of Muslim activists gathered outside the police station where he had been held, demanding his release. In a chilling display of arrogance, one activist declared: “If they (the police) arrest someone, we’re not just going to back down and let them get away with it”.

It does not take much imagination to extrapolate from small episodes of violence and intimidation, alongside the more major outbreaks, and conclude that the civil authorities are close to losing control. The impact, say, of fighting in Kashmir, could have a devastating effect on mixed communities in places such as Leicester, but could also trigger major riots in Muslim-dominated cities such as Bradford.

The point here is that the structure, training and equipment required to deal with civil disturbances, up to and including counter-insurgency operations if – as some expect – we graduate to low-grade civil war, is very different from that required to fight an intensive war against a peer enemy. Given the current size of the Army, and the financial resources available, it would be unrealistic to expect both tasks to be taken on simultaneously.

Rather than expend precious funds in an attempt to build a military forces that, even with lavish expenditure, could not form a credible expeditionary force, any strategic review might instead seek to determine the minimum requirement for island defence, while devoting maximum resources to a civil assistance capability.

One might even think in terms of building a paramilitary force, along the lines of the French National Gendarmerie which, although charged with policing duties, is a branch of the French Armed Forces, placed under the jurisdiction of the ministry of the interior.

The fear, of course, is that an embattled government might seek to use such a force to suppress dissent and lawful protests, becoming an instrument of oppression aimed at keeping the government in power.

However, while our political élites might prefer us to focus on an external enemy, with the Russians taking on that role, the more potent threat might be – and probably is – the enemy within. But using Ukraine as an excuse, one can easily see this government picking the wrong kind of war against the wrong enemy.