Keir Starmer is wasting his time trying to defeat Putin's army
If he is not careful, British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer could find himself metaphorically riding alongside Lord Cardigan astride his horse Ronald in a modern day version of the Light Brigade's disastrous cavalry charge.
For Starmer, it is not the valley of death in Balaclava he faces, which was brilliantly described in Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem of tribute to the brigade's immortal six hundred men.
Instead, this 'valley of death' is the concept of a 'defence dividend' the Labour Party is counting on to remove itself from political life support. Unlike the promised 'peace dividend' arising from the end of the Cold War that was never delivered, Starmer's defence dividend is intended to supercharge Britain's economic growth, and thus save the Labour Party from an ignominious defeat.
In 2027, the UK will increase defence spending to 2.5 per cent of its GDP. This stimulus, the public has been told, will strengthen both the British military and provide hundreds of thousands of jobs to build a new arsenal of democracy.
However, as with Cardigan, this charge has more than a few problems that must be fixed if Labour is to retain power. Consider three.
This increase in defence spending, according to currently serving senior British military officers, will not sustain the already tiny UK force, most likely bringing further reductions.
Along with the submarine nuclear deterrent, the Royal Navy has two aircraft carriers and sixteen surface combatants. The Army is down to about 70,000 soldiers. The Royal Air Force musters 137 Typhoon fighter-bomber jets and with the RN 35 F-35B's scheduled to be increased to 74 by 2033.
As former UK Chief of Defence General The Lord David Richards notes, the brigade he commanded (about 5-7,000 soldiers) in Germany during the Cold War had more firepower than the British Army has today. So unless a new strategy or real change is imposed, the defence dividend will not improve the state of the UK military.
Second, if history matters, more defence spending is unlikely to empower the substantial economic growth Labour needs to become competitive. Under Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, large defence spending increases were made. But the economic impact was minor and huge budget deficits accrued.
Third, the most important consequence is strategic. Increasing defence spending will do nothing to address the most dangerous threat currently posed by Russia. Devastated by losses in Ukraine, a Russian military attack on Western Europe or even the threat of one should not be the principal strategic focus.
That Russia is supposedly stiffening defences on its 1400 mile border with Finland is meant to justify the threat to the West. An example is a small decrepit hospital being upgraded near that border. Almost certainly, the hospital is being renovated to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of wounded Russians as far from public view as possible. Yet, who in power in the West will argue that the likelihood of a Russian attack West is practically zero?
No one can win or would fight a nuclear war. It will take five and probably double that number of years for the Russian military to recover from the thrashing it is taking in Ukraine – the US military needed about a decade to rebuild after Vietnam. So what does Vladimir Putin do? The answer is 'active measures,' often mischaracterised as 'hybrid, asymmetric war or grey zone operations.'
Active measures include espionage; infrastructure and cyber attacks; mis- and disinformation; psychological operations; assassinations and intimidation; and massive propaganda among other tools from Lenin's playbook. Clearly the West is not ignorant of this threat. But complaints are not action.
Can some of this defence dividend be used to counter Russia's 'active measures' beyond whatever resources are currently allocated? Rather than spend a bit more to defend against active measures, money will go to deterring a distant conventional military threat that may never fully materialise.
Active measures cannot be countered with what the defence dividend and spending on traditional forces will buy: ships, aircraft, expensive combat systems and vehicles.
And, frankly, when the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) is released, do not count on it addressing this issue. So can this strategic disconnect with Russian active measures be repaired?
Putin must be thinking what a geostrategic windfall this is for him. Putin knows that reconstituting his forces takes time. But the US and its European allies are convinced that the Russian army still represents a potent military threat to Nato. Thus, Putin can run virtually unchecked in exploiting active measures. Is anyone in Number 10 listening?
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