Latest news with #Nato
Daily Mail
6 hours ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
BAE boss cheers Nato spending surge as its order book swells to £75bn
BAE Systems has hiked its profit and sales guidance, as the British defence giant cashes in on an increase in military spending amid growing geopolitical conflict. The London-listed group said revenue in the first six months of the year soared 11 per cent to £14.6billion and earnings were up 13 per cent to £1.5billionn. Defence firms including BAE Systems have been boosted by a race to rearm across Europe since Russia's invasion of Ukraine three years ago. And it is set to benefit further after Nato members pledged to increase military spending to 5 per cent by 2035. '[The] Nato summit of a few weeks ago and the consensus [to increase defence spending] really underpins our confidence in the long term,' BAE chief executive Charles Woodburn said. But shares in the FTSE 100 giant dipped more than 2 per cent on Wednesday morning as investors were disappointed by the scale of the upgrade. Sales are expected to grow by 8 to 10 per cent in 2025, compared to a previous forecast of 7 to 9 per cent. Profit guidance has been upped from 8 to 10 per cent to between 9 and 11 per cent. 'Investors have lofty expectations for all defence stocks and they might have been banking on a significant upgrade to earnings guidance,' Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said. Woodburn said there might have been 'a bit of profit taking going on' on Wednesday but added that he is 'confident in the long-term outlook'. BAE Systems shares are up more than 50 per cent so far this year. BAE received £13.2billion worth of new orders in the first six months of the year, taking its order book to £75billion. And it has accelerated investment in UK facilities due to the 'deteriorating threat environment here in Europe,' Woodburn said. In the first six months of the year, it expanded its Glasgow shipbuilding site and opened a new £25million artillery factory in Sheffield. The company is on track to recruit 2,400 graduates and apprentices in the UK this year. 'We don't ourselves struggle to attract talent', Woodburn said, but warned that 'some of our supply chain may experience more challenges'. 'As the UK, across Europe and the US look to rearm and increase the pace of that, inevitably there are going to be supply chain challenges,' he said. 'We've had quite some shocks to supply chain that we have been able to navigate through,' Woodburn said, citing the Covid-19 pandemic and the start of Russia's war in Ukraine. 'It does require very active management [but] it's not something I think we can't manage,' he said.
The National
7 hours ago
- Politics
- The National
Hosting US nuclear weapons at RAF Lakenheath only endangers us
It is the first time the US has stationed its own nuclear warheads in the UK for more than 15 years. US nuclear weapons were stored at Lakenheath for much of the Cold War, but removed in 2008. Neither the US military nor the UK Government has confirmed the presence of US bombs at Lakenheath. However, open source information from flight trackers showed a flight from Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico – where US Air Force nuclear weapons are based – to Lakenheath on July 18. READ MORE: Safeguarding concerns raised after Scottish school pipe band plays for Donald Trump Details regarding the aircraft's flight path and protocols mean it is highly likely to have been carrying US B61-12 gravity bombs. These are 100 times as destructive as the Hiroshima bomb. This recent development, along with the news that the UK will spend about £1 billion on US nuclear-capable jets based at RAF Marham, indicates the country is regressing into a Cold War posture. Important questions must therefore be asked about the US and UK's obligations as depository states to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). The NPT was developed in 1968 and presented to the UN by the United States, United Kingdom and Russia. The treaty states that signatories must forgo any efforts to pursue nuclear weapons, with the exception of the five countries it formally recognised as nuclear states: the US, Russia, UK, France, and China. As well as obliging these countries to pursue disarmament in good faith, the NPT prohibits them from transferring nuclear weapons to non-nuclear states or from providing materials and technology to help develop them. The manner in which the US has transferred nuclear weapons to military bases across Europe since the 1950s and throughout the Cold War has therefore been highly contentious. US nuclear weapons were first stationed in the United Kingdom in 1954. In the ensuing decades, they were stationed in Nato countries Germany, Italy, France, Turkey, the Netherlands, Greece, and Belgium. At the peak of nuclear sharing in 1971, the US had more than 7000 nuclear weapons deployed in Europe. The nuclear sharing arrangement between the US and Nato allies therefore precedes the NPT and continued after its adoption by the UN. In fact, articles I and II of the treaty were co-drafted by the US and the Soviet Union to tolerate nuclear sharing, after the US assured the USSR that no hosting country had launch authority. It is on the basis that shared nuclear weapons are totally under the control of the US and cannot be used by the host countries that these arrangements are deemed compliant with the letter of the NPT. But the NPT was written to limit the potential frontiers of nuclear conflict, and as such Nato nuclear sharing violates the spirit, even if not the letter, of the treaty. READ MORE: Humza Yousaf pleads for 'meaningful action' in Gaza after family member killed At the height of the Cold War, the stationing of US Pershing missiles in Europe and Nato's 'Able Archer' nuclear exercises led to an escalation of tensions with the USSR that was possibly the closest Europe has come to nuclear conflict until 2024. The lessons of the Cold War – that nuclear proliferation escalates nuclear tensions – led the US to retrieving most of its armaments so that only around 100 US gravity bombs are stationed in Europe today. In fact, there is an argument to be made that the Trident system is equally – if not more – problematic under the NPT framework than the US nukes based in England. That is because the US provides the delivery system for the UK's submarine-launched nuclear warheads, which are officially not controlled by the US but supposedly a sovereign, UK-controlled nuclear capability. The much-vaunted 'independence' of Trident is of course highly dubious, given the heavy reliance of the Royal Navy on US technical, logistical and communications support to operate the missiles. In any case, without the US provision of technology, the UK would not currently be a nuclear state. The lease of the Trident missiles to the UK could therefore be seen as an act of nuclear proliferation by the United States that violates the NPT in both letter and spirit. By hosting US nuclear weapons again at Lakenheath and building £15bn more worth of warheads, the UK is regressing to a Cold War posture. This shows that our leaders have not learnt the most important lessons of the nuclear age: that the nuclear arms race does not establish international stability but only worsens tensions and raises the risk of nuclear conflict. History has shown that preparing for war does not ensure peace – quite the contrary. Those who want peace in Scotland and the UK must loudly oppose our country becoming a nuclear staging post in a prospective new Cold War era – whether that be at Lakenheath, Marham or Faslane.
Free Malaysia Today
8 hours ago
- Business
- Free Malaysia Today
UK's BAE upgrades forecasts as threat environment drives orders
BAE Systems' order book has been ticking up since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. (EPA Images pic) LONDON : Britain's BAE Systems upgraded its annual earnings forecast after strong first-half results, as it continues to benefit from the heightened global threat environment which is driving countries to spend more on defence. BAE's order book has been ticking up since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. This year, US President Donald Trump's call for European countries to become more self-sufficient in defence prompted most Nato countries to pledge to hike military budgets. BAE, which makes combat vehicles, submarines, drones and other kit, said today that it expected its annual underlying earnings (EBIT) to rise 9% to 11% on last year's result, higher than the 8% to 10% growth it had previously forecast. That came after earnings jumped 13% in the first six months of the year to 1.55 billion pounds (US$2.07 billion), beating a consensus forecast of 1.52 billion pounds. The result was boosted by a contract win in the US for a space-based missile tracking capability, which could lead to further work as the country develops its Golden Dome defence shield, as well as progress made on the GCAP project to develop a new fighter jet with Italy and Japan. Shares in BAE traded down 2% in early deals. The stock is up 60% so far this year, outperforming Britain's bluechip index which is 10% higher. 'Strength was expected,' Bernstein analysts said. BAE, whose biggest markets are the US, Britain and Saudi Arabia, said it was well-placed to win more work from across Europe as well as the Middle East. The company is set to receive a new order for Eurofighter Typhoon military jets after an agreement between Turkeyand Britain was signed earlier in July. Orders from Saudi Arabia and Qatar could also be on the cards. 'There's definitely interest,' CEO Charles Woodburn told reporters. 'But it's hard to put a timeframe on when those potential next buys might come through,' he added. He declined to comment on whether BAE was in talks with Boeing and Sweden's Saab about teaming up on a future replacement for Britain's Hawk trainer jet.
Irish Independent
13 hours ago
- Politics
- Irish Independent
Sixteen dead and 90 injured as Russian missiles hit Ukraine prison
Four powerful Russian glide bombs hit a prison in Ukraine's southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, authorities said. They killed at least 16 inmates and wounded more than 90 others, Ukraine's justice ministry said. In the Dnipro region of central Ukraine, authorities said Russian missiles partially destroyed a three-storey building and damaged nearby medical facilities, including a maternity hospital and a city hospital ward. At least three people were killed, including a 23-year-old pregnant woman, and two other people were killed elsewhere in the region, regional authorities said. These were conscious, deliberate strikes – not accidental Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said that overnight Russian strikes across the country hit 73 cities, towns and villages. 'These were conscious, deliberate strikes – not accidental,' Mr Zelensky said on Telegram. Mr Trump said on Monday he is giving Russian president Vladimir Putin 10 to 12 days to stop the killing in Ukraine after three years of war, moving up a 50-day deadline he had given the Russian leader two weeks ago. The move meant Mr Trump wants peace efforts to make progress by August 7-9. He has repeatedly rebuked Putin for talking about ending the war but continuing to bombard Ukrainian civilians. But the Kremlin hasn't changed its tactics. I'm disappointed in President Putin 'I'm disappointed in President Putin,' Mr Trump said during a visit to Scotland. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said yesterday that Russia is determined to achieve its goals in Ukraine, though he said Moscow has 'taken note' of Mr Trump's announcement and is committed to seeking a peaceful solution. Mr Zelensky welcomed Mr Trump's shortening of the deadline. 'Everyone needs peace – Ukraine, Europe, the United States and responsible leaders across the globe,' Mr Zelensky wrote in a post on Telegram. 'Everyone except Russia.' The Kremlin pushed back, with a top Putin lieutenant warning Mr Trump against 'playing the ultimatum game with Russia'. 'Russia isn't Israel or even Iran,' former president Dmitry Medvedev, who is deputy head of the country's security council, wrote on social platform X. ADVERTISEMENT Learn more Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war 'Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country,' Mr Medvedev said. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of its neighbour, the Kremlin has warned Kyiv's Western backers that their involvement could end up broadening the war to Nato countries. 'Kremlin officials continue to frame Russia as in direct geopolitical confrontation with the West in order to generate domestic support for the war in Ukraine and future Russian aggression against Nato,' the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think-tank, said late on Monday. The Ukrainian air force said Russia launched two Iskander-M ballistic missiles along with 37 Shahed-type strike drones and decoys at Ukraine overnight. It said 32 Shahed drones were intercepted or neutralised by Ukrainian air defences. The Russian attack close to midnight on Monday hit the Bilenkivska Correctional Facility with glide bombs, according to the State Criminal Executive Service of Ukraine. Glide bombs, which are Soviet-era bombs retrofitted with retractable fins and guidance systems, have been laying waste to cities in eastern Ukraine, where the Russian army is trying to pierce Ukrainian defences. The bombs carry up to 3,000kg of explosives. At least 42 inmates were taken to hospital with serious injuries, while another 40 people, including one staff member, sustained various injuries. The strike destroyed the prison's dining hall, damaged administrative and quarantine buildings, but the perimeter fence held and no escapes were reported, authorities said. Ukrainian officials condemned the attack, saying that targeting civilian infrastructure, such as prisons, is a war crime under international conventions. The assault occurred exactly three years after an explosion killed more than 50 people at the Olenivka detention facility in the Russia-occupied Donetsk region. Russian forces also struck a grocery store in a village in the northeastern Kharkiv region, police said, killing five and wounding three civilians. Alongside the barrages, Russia has also kept up its grinding war of attrition, which has slowly churned across the eastern side of Ukraine at a heavy cost in troop losses and military hardware.
South China Morning Post
20 hours ago
- Business
- South China Morning Post
If China no longer takes Europe seriously, Brussels has itself to blame
The China-EU summit on July 24 confirmed what Beijing and Washington have long surmised: Europe has sidelined itself from great-power competition. After five decades of diplomacy, Brussels and Beijing have never been further apart, exactly as Trump's wedge intended. Yet the bridge to China wasn't demolished from abroad. Europe dismantled it, piece by piece, through its own incoherence. Brussels' only meaningful gain was a marginal agreement on rare earths . The European Union's other concerns, ending China's 'systemic distortions and growing manufacturing overcapacity', were unaddressed. Instead, the EU walked away with hollow climate declarations and technical scraps. This confirms that China sees no need to concede anything substantial: a passivity that exposes Europe's irrelevance. Washington engineered this outcome with precision. Trump's tariff threats had seemed to corner Brussels into a false dilemma: either prioritise commercial ties with China or reinforce transatlantic loyalty. The set-up succeeded. The summit laid bare Europe's misreading of geopolitical reality. The EU continues to act as a liberal power in a realist international system. Its principles – multilateralism, consensus and legalism – unravel when confronted with raw power politics. Trump exploits this mismatch, trapping Brussels and exposing its failure to define an autonomous stance At the last Nato summit , European members increased their military dependence on the transatlantic alliance. Trump's attempts to fracture Nato only yielded a more submissive Europe. Brussels aligned without protest to a defence spending increase worth 5 per cent of gross domestic product through 2035, effectively binding Europe to the US security-industrial complex.
