Latest news with #StrategicDefenceReview
Sky News
5 hours ago
- Business
- Sky News
'No doubt' UK will spend 3% of GDP on defence in next parliament, defence secretary says
There is "no doubt" the UK "will spend 3% of our GDP on defence" in the next parliament, the defence secretary has said. John Healey's comments come ahead of the publication of the government's Strategic Defence Review (SDR) on Monday. This is an assessment of the state of the armed forces, the threats facing the UK, and the military transformation required to meet them. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has previously set out a "clear ambition" to raise defence spending to 3% in the next parliament "subject to economic and fiscal conditions". Mr Healey has now told The Times newspaper there is a "certain decade of rising defence spending" to come, adding that this commitment "allows us to plan for the long term. It allows us to deal with the pressures." A government source insisted the defence secretary was "expressing an opinion, which is that he has full confidence that the government will be able to deliver on its ambition", rather than making a new commitment. The UK currently spends 2.3% of GDP on defence, with Sir Keir announcing plans to increase that to 2.5% by 2027 in February. This followed mounting pressure from the White House for European nations to do more to take on responsibility for their own security and the defence of Ukraine. The 2.3% to 2.5% increase is being paid for by controversial cuts to the international aid budget, but there are big questions over where the funding for a 3% rise would be found, given the tight state of government finances. While a commitment will help underpin the planning assumptions made in the SDR, there is of course no guarantee a Labour government would still be in power during the next parliament to have to fulfil that pledge. 1:21 A statement from the Ministry of Defence makes it clear that the official government position has not changed in line with the defence secretary's comments. The statement reads: "This government has announced the largest sustained increase to defence spending since the end of the Cold War - 2.5% by 2027 and 3% in the next parliament when fiscal and economic conditions allow, including an extra £5bn this financial year. "The SDR will rightly set the vision for how that uplift will be spent, including new capabilities to put us at the leading edge of innovation in NATO, investment in our people and making defence an engine for growth across the UK - making Britain more secure at home and strong abroad." Sir Keir commissioned the review shortly after taking office in July 2024. It is being led by Lord Robertson, a former Labour defence secretary and NATO secretary general. The Ministry of Defence has already trailed a number of announcements as part of the review, including plans for a new Cyber and Electromagnetic Command and a £1bn battlefield system known as the Digital Targeting Web, which we're told will "better connect armed forces weapons systems and allow battlefield decisions for targeting enemy threats to be made and executed faster". On Saturday, the defence secretary announced a £1.5bn investment to tackle damp, mould and make other improvements to poor quality military housing in a bid to improve recruitment and retention. Mr Healey pledged to "turn round what has been a national scandal for decades", with 8,000 military family homes currently unfit for habitation. He said: "The Strategic Defence Review, in the broad, will recognise that the fact that the world is changing, threats are increasing. "In this new era of threat, we need a new era for defence and so the Strategic Defence Review will be the vision and direction for the way that we've got to strengthen our armed forces to make us more secure at home, stronger abroad, but also learn the lessons from Ukraine as well. "So an armed forces that can be more capable of innovation more quickly, stronger to deter the threats that we face and always with people at the heart of our forces… which is why the housing commitments that we make through this strategic defence review are so important for the future."
Yahoo
5 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
'No doubt' UK will spend 3% of GDP on defence in next parliament, defence secretary says
There is "no doubt" the UK "will spend 3% of our GDP on defence" in the next parliament, the defence secretary has said. John Healey's comments come ahead of the publication of the government's Strategic Defence Review (SDR) on Monday. This is an assessment of the state of the armed forces, the threats facing the UK, and the military transformation required to meet them. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has previously set out a "clear ambition" to raise defence spending to 3% in the next parliament "subject to economic and fiscal conditions". Mr Healey has now told The Times newspaper there is a "certain decade of rising defence spending" to come, adding that this commitment "allows us to plan for the long term. It allows us to deal with the pressures." A government source insisted the defence secretary was "expressing an opinion, which is that he has full confidence that the government will be able to deliver on its ambition", rather than making a new commitment. The UK currently spends 2.3% of GDP on defence, with Sir Keir announcing plans to increase that to 2.5% by 2027 in February. This followed mounting pressure from the White House for European nations to do more to take on responsibility for their own security and the defence of Ukraine. The 2.3% to 2.5% increase is being paid for by controversial cuts to the international aid budget, but there are big questions over where the funding for a 3% rise would be found, given the tight state of government finances. While a commitment will help underpin the planning assumptions made in the SDR, there is of course no guarantee a Labour government would still be in power during the next parliament to have to fulfil that pledge. A statement from the Ministry of Defence makes it clear that the official government position has not changed in line with the defence secretary's comments. The statement reads: "This government has announced the largest sustained increase to defence spending since the end of the Cold War - 2.5% by 2027 and 3% in the next parliament when fiscal and economic conditions allow, including an extra £5bn this financial year. "The SDR will rightly set the vision for how that uplift will be spent, including new capabilities to put us at the leading edge of innovation in NATO, investment in our people and making defence an engine for growth across the UK - making Britain more secure at home and strong abroad." Sir Keir commissioned the review shortly after taking office in July 2024. It is being led by Lord Robertson, a former Labour defence secretary and NATO secretary general. The Ministry of Defence has already trailed a number of announcements as part of the review, including plans for a new Cyber and Electromagnetic Command and a £1bn battlefield system known as the Digital Targeting Web, which we're told will "better connect armed forces weapons systems and allow battlefield decisions for targeting enemy threats to be made and executed faster". Read more: On Saturday, the defence secretary announced a £1.5bn investment to tackle damp, mould and make other improvements to poor quality military housing in a bid to improve recruitment and retention. Mr Healey pledged to "turn round what has been a national scandal for decades", with 8,000 military family homes currently unfit for habitation. He said: "The Strategic Defence Review, in the broad, will recognise that the fact that the world is changing, threats are increasing. "In this new era of threat, we need a new era for defence and so the Strategic Defence Review will be the vision and direction for the way that we've got to strengthen our armed forces to make us more secure at home, stronger abroad, but also learn the lessons from Ukraine as well. "So an armed forces that can be more capable of innovation more quickly, stronger to deter the threats that we face and always with people at the heart of our forces… which is why the housing commitments that we make through this strategic defence review are so important for the future."
Telegraph
7 hours ago
- Business
- Telegraph
Warfare is changing by the day, but Britain is still decades behind
When Lord George Robertson led the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) in 1997, the GDP of the UK was greater than those of China and India combined. America reigned supreme, the only other superpower, the Soviet Union, having slowly dissolved after losing the Cold War eight years previously. Lord George is back as one of three leads of the latest SDR, widely expected to be published on Monday. But the geostrategic landscape is very different now. No longer can we afford to luxuriate in that uni-polar moment of Western and Nato supremacy. China, Iran and North Korea are functioning surprisingly well as a de facto alliance in supporting Russia in its war on Ukraine. And that is a real war of national survival, not the politically caveated, limited military interventions of the global war on terrorism. This is war at speed and scale, a war mixing the timeless requirements of industrial production with the cutting-edge technologies of the digital age: smart sensors, big-data, cloud connectivity, artificial intelligence, robotics. The new ways of warfare are evolving at dizzying speed. Technical evolution, the obsolescence cycle, is now measured in weeks. Dual-use technology – that with civil and military utility – is blended with more conventional munitions; decades-old assumptions are upended overnight; the ways and means of warfare are being comprehensively disrupted. Historically, this is a change that happens every century or so: Napoleon's Levée en Masse, sail to steam, the aeroplane. That a superpower's navy has, in the Black Sea, been defeated by a country without a navy is a wake up call to all. And here lies the big risk – the victor's paradox. 'Top Dogs' are loath to shed that which put them on top, that in which they have made big investments and of which they are masters. Paradigm shifts are the opportunity for smart challengers to abandon the previous, flagging chase and master the emerging world quicker than the current champions can adapt. China, especially, has had a plan to do exactly this for the last few decades, with massive investments in, inter alia, cyber, AI and hypersonic missiles to add a technological edge to the military mass it has built in parallel: its navy now has more ships than America's. It is using Ukraine, and Kashmir, as a proving ground. Russia has learned (slowly, as it is a corrupt kleptocracy) with grim determination the lessons of modern warfare – exemplified by its recent invention of fibre-optically steered drones. It also knows how to mobilise a war economy. In contrast, and despite much pumped-up rhetoric, most of Nato, including the UK, has demonstrated a reluctance to abandon the old paradigm. Yes, we have bought some drones, but we have bought them as if we were buying sophisticated manned warplanes. We may be buying them slightly quicker now, but these are percentage changes on a system that still takes years, and millions of pounds, to buy tens. Ukraine is on schedule to make four million drones this year. Allied to that is that Western militaries have mirrored a society that has become ever more regulated and risk averse. The British Army is down to 14 artillery pieces, which were bought as stop-gaps. There is still no certification and so no clearance to fire them on a UK range. Similar restrictions apply to innovative drone training – but what if one crashes? The paradox here is that by trying to eradicate every small risk we make the big one – war – more likely. Ultimately we aim to deter, and deterrence depends on credibility. Credibility hinges on the proven military capability to win and the political will to engage with force and see it through. Small forces, a limited production capacity and supply chain to rapidly expand and evolve them, and a risk averse culture that trains and employs them will not impress allies or deter enemies. The SDR's other authors alongside Lord George are Fiona Hill, a proven free-thinker, and General Richard Barrons who was one of the first to write about this changing paradigm ten years ago. Their SDR should not be read as recent reviews have been – a relative tally of platform numbers and the size of the residual, 'bonsai' military. That paradigm was already broken several defence reviews ago – tweaking it is but to fiddle with the increasingly irrelevant. The reader should ask instead: to what extent is this a root and branch reform of our now sclerotic system, and to what extent is it going to re-orientate our whole Defence Enterprise – MOD Head Office processes and accountabilities, agile adaptation and procurement, secure supply chains, rapid adoption of technological advances, expansion of reserve forces? If it charts a clear path to a revised 'theory of winning' that can credibly generate a wartime force with the mass and lethality to defeat our foes then it will be a good review. If it continues the usual horse-trading between the individual services over their peacetime structure then it will have been a missed opportunity. With the US making it clear that Europe must look after its own defence we have no safety net if we get it wrong. But America's position gives us an opportunity as well: the chance, the obligation, to show genuine leadership in Europe.
Scotsman
8 hours ago
- Politics
- Scotsman
Strategic Defence Review: SNP MP urges UK to ‘rethink priorities' and look to Europe
Sign up to our Politics newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... An SNP MP has claimed the UK must 'rethink its defence priorities', as Sir Keir Starmer prepares to publish the critical Strategic Defence Review. The party's Europe spokesman Stephen Gethins urged UK ministers to seek closer ties with Europe, insisting a defence strategy was more than just 'hardware'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Speaking exclusively to The Scotsman, Mr Gethins pointed to the Nordic approach to the threat from Russia as an example for the UK to follow. He said: 'I think the UK needs to rethink its defence priorities. I am not sure everybody gets just how significant the challenge is for Europe and for democracies at the moment with the withdrawal of the United States, and the US being a less reliable security partner. HMS Queen Elizabeth leaving Rosyth in Fife, Scotland, and sailing under the Forth bridge. 'It challenges a lot of the assumptions that have been made in the MoD [Ministry of Defence] for a few years, assumptions they should have been challenging themselves. 'We are years into the war in Ukraine. We are now in the second Trump presidency, the challenges we are facing should not have come as a surprise to anybody.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The strategic defence review is an overarching examination of the UK's defence capability and will be published on Monday. SNP MP Stephen Gethins Sir Keir Starmer had previously said he would set a date for when spending 2.5 per cent of Britain's GDP on defence had to be achieved after the defence review had been completed. Mr Gethins, the MP for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry, claimed the key areas to be looking at were closer collaboration with other countries in Europe. He said: 'The Nordics for example, they have much closer collaboration and are taking the threat from Russia more seriously. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'There are some really good illustrations there. It's also about thinking more about defence not simply as military hardware, but also in terms of energy security, food and drink security, and disinformation. We need a much more well rounded approach to security'. The UK government has already confirmed a new 'Cyber and Electromagnetic Command' to address cyber security. Ministers will also invest more than £1 billion into a new 'digital targeting web' to be set up by 2027 to better connect weapons systems and allow battlefield decisions targeting enemy threats to be made and executed faster. Mr Gethins praised the approach to cyber security, but said failing to work with Europe was undermining the goal. He said: 'I think cyber is an area they are increasingly taking seriously, but it is an area where Brexit damages our security. If you look at most other countries, they see membership of the EU and Nato as being the twin pillars of their security. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'Europe is a way to invest heavily in its arms infrastructure, and actually that is another reason why the UK needs to be closer to its European partners. It makes sense for the UK, or an independent Scotland, to be more integrated in that European defence structure. 'Labour are still wedded to Tory policies and assumptions around a relationship with the rest of Europe and that has to end.' It comes as the UK government announced an upgrade for Scottish military homes, with 3,000 to be improved as part of an overall £7 billion funding during this Parliament. The review will cover all aspects of defence, including the UK's international partnerships and alliances, and how these can be strengthened.
The Irish Sun
17 hours ago
- Politics
- The Irish Sun
Weak defences warning as Britain's stockpile of military drones would run out within HOURS of a war starting
BRITAIN's military drones would run out within hours of a war starting. The stockpile, including RAF, Army and Navy weapons, is under 2,000 aircraft. Advertisement 2 While the UK has fewer than 2,000 drones - Ukraine's fighters, above, fire off 3,000 to 6,000 a day, according to estimates Credit: Peter Jordan Ukraine burns through 3,000 to 6,000 a day, say UK estimates. Its weapons range from shop-bought quadcopters no bigger than pizza box to long-range bombers that blitz Moscow. One defence source said: 'The UK has a huge capability gap. Drones are deciding the war in Ukraine . 'If either side gets drone superiority, even briefly, we have seen them make gains. Advertisement READ MORE UK NEWS 'The UK knows this. We are This week, Ukraine hit Moscow missile factories with drones. And footage emerged of a These are immune to signal jamming as they are tethered to their pilots by fibre-optic cable. The MoD vowed to start building large, one-way attack drones last year but they are yet to enter production. Advertisement Most read in The Sun Meanwhile, drones like Russia's Zala Lancet, which loiter until spotting a target , are not due until 2027. Defence chiefs spent £200million on a loitering Fire Shadow drone but scrapped it in 2018. 'IMPOSSIBLE' BOMB Ukraine pins hopes on 'INVINCIBLE' drone to turn tide of war Most of the UK's drones are designed for surveillance, such as the Navy's new Peregrine spycopters, or for dropping bombs and firing missiles. The RAF does have Storm Shroud drones which fly alongside jets to blind enemy radars. Advertisement The MoD insisted: 'The UK is well prepared to defend itself. 'We are investing in drone technology and operate a variety of large, medium, and small drones across all three services which offer distinct operational capabilities. "We take the threats we face very seriously and the Strategic Defence Review is examining the capabilities we need to continue to keep Britain safe.' 2 Britain's stockpile of fewer than 2,000 military drones would run out within hours of a war starting Credit: Getty Advertisement
