3.6%, no way
Apparently the MOD secretly thinks the UK really needs a defence budget of 3.6% of GDP, to fund all three armed services and pay for the nuclear deterrent.
Now I remember reading a very good book about defence spending inflation and gold plating. Including the story of the coffee machine for the B52 bomber which would have easily survived a crash which killed the whole crew.
But the central fact is that the increasing Sophistication of weapons means we can afford fewer which increases their cost further.
It is also true that we cannot afford 3.6% and that the target of increasing it to 2.5% is not enough to square the circle.
The obvious and only major saving is therefore the nuclear deterrence. We are beggaring our conventional defence in a pathetic and failing attempt to stay a nuclear super power. But it is the one thing that no one can mention, Barbara Tuchman could make it as an extra chapter in The March of folly.
Why can’t we just put nuclear tipped cruise Millie’s on our conventional subs, ships and aircraft carriers? We have plenty of conventional aircraft which could carry them too.
We have the farce now of sending patrol ships to the pacific just so politicians can claim we have influence there. We have none at all.
3.6% is impossible but so is our current defence policy. Troops, ships and planes in Europe are what we need, can afford and will make a difference. Everything else is fantasy.
From Jonty Bloom Media ltd
What are we ever going to do with the nuclear capability? Nuke Reykjavik when there’s another cod war? Delusions of empire and global standing but without the wherewithal are simply embarrassing
There is another way forward, which is to take the Nuclear Deterrent out of the Defence Budget and run it directly from the Treasury. The Deterrent is a national strategic asset, and should be funded as such, with the RN in effect providing a service contract to run it. At present all other equipment budgets in defence are held hostage to the Dreadnought programme, removing it means that the MOD can focus on conventional defence programmes, without fear of Dreadnought cost escalation eating into their funds.
Why wouldn't the MOD do this? Partly because that would show how parlous our spending is on conventional defence projects.
Although there is an irony that the new deterrent is called Dreadnought. The original HMS Dreadnought was an innovative battleship that when launched marked a new era in naval warfare. With advances in sensors, AI/ML and Quantum Computing, the new Dreadnought may be launched in time for a new era when submarines can no longer hide beneath the waves, in effect rendering the Deterrent ineffective, just as the original HMS Dreadnought rendered other pre-class battleships obsolete.