A Grand Strategy – Part 4 (Defence Policy)

309 thoughts on “A Grand Strategy – Part 4 (Defence Policy)”

1. John Hartley December 17, 2011 at 1:01 pm

   I think it is a mistake to drop the army below 100,000 strong. How would you deploy 13,000 to the Olympics while fighting in Afghanistan? If we are not to run out of troops then 100,000 is the minimum.
   Agreed heavy armour is under used as it is difficult to deploy. In an ideal future our MBT would be similar to the Brazillian EE-2 Osorio, weighing 41 tons while armed with a 120mm gun. Great tank, stillborn by terrible timing. 65 ton MBTs are too hard to deploy.
   Shame the A400M can only lift 37 tons. It should have been designed to lift 45 tons.
   If you want to increase the number of A330 Voyagers, you need to sort out the abomination of the PFI. Perhaps widen the 1977 unfair contracts act to cover PFIs.
2. Chris.B. December 17, 2011 at 1:12 pm

   @ JH

   No MBT is really that deployable though. In general you’d expect them all, whether they weight 60 tons or 40 tons to come via the sea. I guess it depends where you plan on sending them and how many you need.

   @ Martin

   I think I’ll have to repeat what I think it was Jed(?) said about my post; love the time and effort put into it, love all the various angles that are covered… but completely disagree with it!
3. martin December 17, 2011 at 1:42 pm

   @ John Hartley – The Army numbers I propose are based in a post Afghan world. An army with 100,000 troops cost around £15 billion per year. That’s a hell of an investment of the tax payer and I don’t think we can justify it with events like the Olympics. For civil matters be it large scale world events or even national emergencies I would like to see the TA take the lead. We might even find that using civis to police civis is better than using regular army units. It certainly allows us to look at being able to deploy a greater number of regular army units abroad if needed and reserve forces cost around 20% of the price of regular forces.
   @ Chris B – Thanks for your comments. I feel the same way about your post. I don’t think we will ever be able to reconcile the Greens and Blues on a common strategy. While I would love to see a bigger Army I just don’t think we can justify a budget for both a large Army and Navy and I personally feel that we get more bang for our buck this way.
4. jedibeeftrix December 17, 2011 at 1:50 pm

   “Our current set up really only allows us to do one thing. Provide assistance to US lead operations. If we cannot conduct independent operations then our current force and the £40 billion a year we spend on it simply adds up to a subsidy of US foreign policy.”

   Precisely my concern.

   It gives you a force that will perhaps give the the 2IC slot in a yank operation.
   It removes funding for all other expeditionary military capability due to the need to support a eight-ten brigade COIN force.
   It would pin all our military capability in one theatre for extended periods of time, leaving zero flexibility to respond to new events.

   In short, your entire military capability is pinned on one task, and its a task that the public does not like.

   Once the public get sick of the second or third COIN war in a row they refuse to allow the next, at which point you have a one-trick pony that is not even allowed to perform that trick.

   Then you have a military that is useless insofar as acting as a tool to leverage british diplomacy.

   It is a losing proposition, all round, every time!
5. Chris.B. December 17, 2011 at 2:06 pm

   I think there’s an unfairness directed at a large army re; tying it to COIN operations.

   Just because a larger army can be used in COIN operations doesn’t mean that’s all it will ever do. A 100,000 man force could just as easily be used to put two or three brigades down for a one off scuffle, while still being able to maintain deployments to Cyprus and Northern Ireland for example, and maintain a brigade in reserve for deployment to new flash points.

   If anything it is the smaller army that becomes pinned to one task. It can only hope to deploy a modest force to a one off task, and with committments like Cyrpus etc it is left with no deployable reserve.
6. paul g December 17, 2011 at 2:49 pm

   of course with this large army costing so much why not copy the US engineers and go for civvy contracts? spend thousands to train a guy to be a chippy/sparky/plumber and then he just goes off to his unit
7. martin December 17, 2011 at 3:02 pm

   @ Chris B – I agree a larger Army give us more options however I cannot envisage any set of circumstances that would see us having to enter a ground deployment alone. Morally and legally we can only invade someone else’s country or intervene in a conflict with a UN resolution or at the very least part of a coalition of the willing. If this is the case then other armies should be with us. Over contributing to coalition operations as we do now does not represent value for our boss the British tax payer.
   The Kosovo operation would be the only area were a large British commitment was necessary for the initial incursion and if we had had to invade we would have bore the brunt of the fighting as the door was kicked in. However I feel operations such as this and even Kuwait 1991 and Iraq 2003 could be largely performed by a highly skilled reservist force with the bulk of our heavy armour. It’s the much more difficult, dirty and dangerous missions like Afghanistan where the professional Army can really shine.
8. martin December 17, 2011 at 3:08 pm

   @ Paul G – Not a bad idea. Every little helps. I think army engineers are something we do not exploit enough. The Romans used their Army to build roads why not us today?
9. Chris.B. December 17, 2011 at 5:03 pm

   Martin,

   There are plenty of situations where we could find ourselves on our own, or at the very least with few partners. “Them Islands”, Sierra Leone. Had Libya turned really nasty and a resolution was passed for ground forces, it would have been us and France leading the charge.

   The trouble with coalitions then crops up. While indeed our history is ripe with examples (one day I’ll finish the mammoth article I started on this subject) in the modern world our allies are simply unreliable when it comes to land forces. Not in their quality, but in their committment to the needed numbers.

   Many nations like Holland are giving up their tanks completely in favour of lighter forces, which means there could be a time soon where we end up as one of the few European nations capable of deploying these assets.

   And as we’ve seen, even nations with large ground contingents have been reluctant to deploy them.
10. All Politicians are the same December 17, 2011 at 5:26 pm

    @ Chris B, other than the Islands that must not be named neither of the other options requires many troops. A modern mech brigade equivelant would have knocked over Libyan resistance in as long as it took to drive from Benghazi to Tripoli. I think between ourselves and the French we could have managed that, also the Italians would have been forced to join in in order to influence in post G Libya and the Turks would have been in there like a shot. Their contribution to the whole Op was massive and hardly reported. One of Martins Amphib BGs is all that could ever be required in Sierra Leone.
    So i guess the question comes that can we foresee an ocassion where the UK has to deploy on its own a large ground force. I personally like Martins idea it takes us back to our military outlook of the Napoleonic era where even in the era of huge armie Wellington never commanded more than 55,000 british troops on the continent. Instead using his well trained infantry and advisors to supllement and train portugese and Spanish during the peninsular campaigns and then as a solid core to the allied armies during Napoleons escape and eventual defeat at Waterloo.
11. Chris.B. December 17, 2011 at 5:48 pm

    That’s a hefty assumption re; one battlegroup against the entire Libyan army. With deployments to Afghanistan plus our various overseas committments, that would have stretched the outlined ground forces quite significantly.
12. John Hartley December 17, 2011 at 6:01 pm

    60 ton or 40 ton MBT. Its not just the ships & planes to carry them, its also the roads/tracks/bridges when they get there. A 40 ton tank can get around with less hassle than a 60 ton tank. Remember most large lorries are 40 tons, so roads/bridges designed for them….

    An army smaller than 100,000 cannot do more than one thing at a time. You could be comitted to one thing, then face trouble, out of the blue, somewhere else, with no means to do anything about it.
13. James December 17, 2011 at 7:12 pm

    “7th Armoured has done very little in 20 years”.

    Total bollocks. Gulf 1, four tours in Bosnia, one tour in Kosovo, Gulf 2, 2 further tours in Iraq. Brigade units have in additional done a total of 9 tours in Afghanistan at Battlegroup level. Much the same applies for the other Brigades in the Army. As for deployability, they are the same as any other Brigade or indeed the RM. It takes air and sea lift.

    7th Armoured Brigade, or any other Brigade of the Army ALREADY operates as a combined arms group. And has done since 1980. In fact, 3 Cdo Bde is less combined arms than a modern armoured brigade, and routinely have to be supported by non-Bde assets when deployed (medium lift helicopters, armour, attack aviation, 2nd and 3rd line logistics, depth fire assets – all missing from the Bde ORBAT).

    “4 Main Battle Tanks”. Are you serious? Armour’s unique capability is the ability to achieve shock reaction through a combination of mass, firepower and manoeuvre. Are we trying to kill the enemy by having them die laughing?

    You tell me when a UK Brigade is commanded by a Major General (or a Lieutenant General). It hasn’t happened. Maybe you are confusing the UK Theatre Commander with a Brigade Commander.

    You appear to mix up the long endurance of some ISTAR UAVs with the short range of weaponised UCAVs. They are not at all the same.

    Your budgeting figures look way off as well, but you don’t provide any detail as to how the figures are constructed.
14. Jed December 17, 2011 at 7:20 pm

    MMM’ I would echo my own comment as already quoted by ChrisB – I think you have done some splendid out of the box thinking here, with some good writing, but I again I can agree with very little of it.

    Although I am totally for “unbalanced – towards Maritime” I think trying to rebuild the British Army on the USMC model is a mistake. Also you I am sure Phil and maybe even Sven will be along shortly to educate you thoroughly on schwerpunkt, massing your force for maximum effect, etc etc… By your reckoning a maximum effort “division” would basically be a light infantry force with 6 x 4 = 24 MBT and 6 x 16 = 96 AIFV – well under-armed for anything except (and maybe even including) COIN !!

    RAF – don’t have a problem with your focus here.

    RN – well having been to Penang when I was in the jolly old Andrew, I can applaud your thinking but really a Far East Fleet running out of Malaysia !! To fight China ??? Oy-vay….

    If your that concerned about countering Chinese influence, then why not concentrate your efforts (based on your previous article) around alliance with India, and confine ourselves to the Indian Ocean (allowing Indian Navy to move ops further east?) and to alliances with African nations (South Africa, Kenya ???) to counter Chinese influence on that continent ?

    To link back to you previous posts, and the idea of climate change – in 2050 both the U.S. and China could be bullying their way through various ice free ‘North West Passages” against the desires of my new homeland (Canada) – perhaps if Canada does not want to move to SSN’s, they would be very happy of bi-lateral agreements where we provide them, and maybe even arctic capable amphibious forces to counter Chinese (and Russian) resource exploitation ambitions in the high arctic (and again, working with our natural allies Norway and Denmark).
15. Jed December 17, 2011 at 7:27 pm

    By the way, totally agree with a properly funded and organised TA / general (cross service) reservist capability.

    For ceremonials, how about some para-military force, whereby young adults can join the “Reserve Ceremonial” force, being taught parade ground, drill skills only, serving for 3 years while a portion of their wage is set aside for university ? They would also get adventure training and in-depth introduction to the regular forces. NCO’s and SNCO’s might come from retiring regulars who might see it as a well paid “easy draft” tacked onto the end of their careers (as there would be no requirement to deploy on ops). Perhaps just massively expand the Beef Eaters and go all “historic” for London tourist traps, why have military uniformed “Guards” at all – similar in some respects to the Vatican’s Swiss Guard:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Group_of_swiss_guards_inside_saint_peter_dome.jpg
16. x December 17, 2011 at 7:41 pm

    It isn’t just the ships to move them an infrastructure of the destination but the massive logistic tail that MBTs’ have. Not for nothing do MEUs only have 4 M1Ax.
17. Jed December 17, 2011 at 7:55 pm

    Article on new Aussie army structures, including reserves: “According to the Commander 2nd Division, Major General Craig Williams, the reserve division will be realigned with the regular army, with two reserve brigades linked to each multi-role maneuver brigade.”

    http://defense-update.com/20111216_australian_reserve-under-_plan_beersheba.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DefenseUpdate+%28Defense+Update%29&utm_content=Google+Reader
18. Gabriele December 17, 2011 at 9:08 pm

    @Jed

    2 reserve brigades for each australian MRB.

    In the UK,
    10 TA regional brigades, of which 2 had to go as of SDSR, but were reprieved.
    5 regular MRBs.

    Do you think that Australian officers have been having lots of talks with british ones in the last year…?
    Because their army reform very much reminds me of the UK’s one.
19. Phil December 17, 2011 at 9:14 pm

    There’s only so many ways to skin a cat.
20. ChrisM December 17, 2011 at 10:06 pm

    Just a few thoughts:
    Your Med squadron is based in Cyprus. We dont have a port there do we, and they arent very friendly?
    If your first night strike relies on a large scale reservist call up it is either not going to be much of a surprise or you will have to regularly call them up (and pay for it).
    Your idea of an air transport RFA…when not transporting stuff that goes bang we can lend the capacity to aid agencies and take the cost out of the foreign aid budget. They get experts at the job for free, we get good training and flag-flying. EAW!
    Ceremonial Guards – morph several of the Guards regiments’ traditions into the MPGS. A non-deployable gig for those leaving active duty, with nice uniforms for the tourists, and a better name for recruitment.
    Trying to get rid of the Red Arrows is not worth the bad publicity for the relatively small saving. Better to make them more commercial with endorsements etc.
    Space – a number of naughty countries can, or soon will be able to, launch satellites and make nuclear weapons. If I was them I would be making a satellite that can go boom over Washington/London/Paris. Not all the bad publicity of frying lots of people, but the EMP would be hugely damaging. The West couldnt retaliate with nukes, and the poor of the world would have little sympathy with us bitching that our iPhones dont work. How the hell would we defend against such a threat – could we/would we be prepared to blow an only suspect satellite out of orbit?
21. Mike W December 17, 2011 at 11:03 pm

    @Martin

    I read your posts with great interest and they seemed to me to be argued cogently and expressed very lucidly. I found myself agreeing with much of what you said regarding trends and what our foreign policy should be.

    However, I then came to your fourth post and I must say I found much of what you suggested there pretty unrealistic. Your suggestion regarding the future of the Army (reduction to 60,000 regular personnel, and that including the Royal Marines) I found fatuous. We have an Army of 100,000 “running hot” trying to carry out one medium-sized campaign in Afghanistan! What we often forget is the number of personnel needed behind those in the combat area in order to support them adequately. The old Second World War adage, I believe, was “10 men needed behind every man in the front line.” Obviously not quite so many needed today but you get the general idea. Here I must agree with John Hartley: “I think it is a mistake to drop the Army below 100,000 strong. ….. If we are not to run out of troops then 100,000 is the minimum.” and Chris.B.: ““If anything it is the smaller army that becomes pinned to one task. It can only hope to deploy a modest force to a one off task, and with commitments like Cyrpus etc. it is left with no deployable reserve.” Moreover, I felt you very much deserved the broadside from James regarding the record of 7th Armoured. Overall your practical suggestions concerning the structure if our forces (as opposed to your very readable theories) are lacking and leave our forces incredibly unbalanced. We should all be writing to our M.P.s and to the press etc., pushing for an increase to our Army not resigning ourselves to year-on-year reductions!

    Be very careful too before you argue for the removal of ceremonial troops. Tradition, ritual, symbolism lie very deep in the British psyche. The first thing Vaclev Havel did on assuming office in Czechoslovakia was to restore the symbols, flags etc. of that nation. An intelligent man who knew.
22. martin December 18, 2011 at 3:05 am

    Thanks for your comments guys I really do appreciate as much feedback as possible especially on the Army as it’s by far the most controversial idea. Obviously if we cut the Army budget by 40% we have to accept we cannot do everything as well as we do today.
    @ James – I concede your point on 7th armoured deployments. In terms of combined arms I realise that all formations already deploy with artillery and helicopters however my focus was to find a way to integrate fixed wing aviation directly with the Army. I think allot of the issues we have faced in Afghanistan i.e. RAPTOR pod data not being available to front line forces fast enough is caused in part by a lack of integration at ground level between the RAF and the Army. The marine ethos of every man being a rifleman and the fixed wing aviation being there to support the grunts on the ground is far superior to what we have today.
    In terms of 4 MBT’s, this is the number deployed by a Marine Expeditionary Unit and they seem to be fairly capable formations. Many of our forces deploy without heavy armour and I don’t think that any one will disagree that even battling the Taliban there are certain instance when a tank comes in handy. Other Armies have successfully deployed armour in Afghanistan why can’t we?
    If you read carefully you will see that I don’t suggest getting rid of heavy armour all together but instead transferring it to a reservist force along the lines of the US National Guard. This should still allow us to conduct Kosovo and Gulf war types of Actions. Let’s not forget that 40% of deployed US forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan are reservists and these operations are far harder than the first gulf war or the opening phase of Iraq in 2003.
    In terms of UCAVS the Taranis program is certainly envisaged to have intercontinental range. At the end of the day the plane does what it’s designed to do and if we design it right there is no reason why it could not fly all the way to Baghdad and back. It’s also envisaged that these aircraft will have AAR capability although there would be no way to deploy 150 on a mission if they all had to be refueled.
    In terms of budgets. If we cut the Army and Marines down by 40% then we can cut the budget down by 40%. If we want to double the Royal Navy we have to double the budget. RAF is a bit speculative I agree as there is no way to know the cost of an intercontinental UCAV. Also not really able to get a handle on what the expanded reservist force would cost. Current TA budget for around 30,000 personnel is £350 million. Increasing the force to 50,000 and tripling pay might bring us up to around £1.5 Billion. Might mean I would have to increase the Army budget to say £ 10 billion but I think I am pretty close on the back of the fag packet scale.
    @ Jed – My major focus with Penang was twofold. After seeing what the Chinese have been doing in the South China Sea over the past few months I am increasingly alarmed. Not looking to fight China unless it’s an all-out global war at which point carriers and armoured divisions will probably not matter. My previous suggestion had us deploying this fleet to Diego Garcia. However I don’t feel that we could support such a large fleet on such a small island. I think India would be a little pissed off if we did this as well. Penang is close enough to India so that we can still conduct exercises without pissing in their backyard. If we are to expect real and meaningful cooperation from India and Indonesia then we need to have some major capability in the region. Trying to replicate what the US Seventh Fleet does all be it on a smaller scale is the best way to achieve this in my opinion.
23. martin December 18, 2011 at 3:08 am

    @ Jed – Great suggestions regading the use of para military forces for cerimonial duties. I think we really have to think outside the box in a world of shrinking budgets but unfortunatly the prevaling culture at the MOD seems completley unable to cut things like guard units (surely the easiest things to cut)
24. martin December 18, 2011 at 3:56 am

    @ X I agree about the logistics of tanks. I still believe that in many situations when deploying in a battalion sized force even a few tanks can be useful and it won’t stretch the logistics too much to deploy 4.
    @ Chris M – We had a squadron deployed at Akrotiri Mole until 2010 although the boats were much smaller. Not sure if the facilities could handle large frigates but we could always build on them. Cyprus may not let us do this but as they are really broke just now is suspect if we offer them some cash (from our foreign aid budget) or IMF assistance of need be we could probably leverage a few decent sized berths.
    I am all in favour of raiding the foreign aid budget to pay for heavy lift however I would much rather scrap it. We should not forget that organisations like UNHCR pay for commercial heavy lift all the time from the Russians so why not us. I don’t think any aircraft in the world is as well suited as the C17 to perform this task. However after reading the US studies I was amazed by how many other civilian companies and agencies would love to get their hands of one.
    With the Red arrows I have been unable to get a hold of their budget so I don’t know what it costs however I estimate that it cost £18 million for a new hawk and at least £7 million to train a pilot( let alone a display pilot) I still feel it’s silly for a force the size of the RAF to expect to be able to have an entire squadron set aside for this. If we can turn a profit on sponsorship then buy all means but if it cost us anything it should go.
    I agree that the space dimension offers some terrible possibilities for naughty people to do us harm. However the catastrophic effects of anti-satellite weapons could be just as bad. Not sure how we square this circle we are kind of dammed if we do dammed if we don’t. I do believe that any missile defence capability should have some form of anti-satellite capability incorporated although maybe not actively deployed. Again though space operations not even in the MOD’s vocabulary.
    @ Mike W – I would love to see an Army of 100,000 + and a big navy and large RAF but we are not a super power and can’t afford to be all things to all men. We would be insane to ever commit to any ground campaign unless part of a coalition. If we are part of a coalition focused on a stabilisation operation then why should we look to deploy forces larger than that of France or Germany? How many stabilisation operations have Russia or China conducted in the last 20 years? Where is the value for the tax payer in over committing? Even with an Army the size that Chris B suggested the thought of ever getting into a situation like we were with both Iraq and Afghanistan is too much to bare. Politicians can’t send soldiers they don’t have and calling up reserves to fight in messy protracted COIN’s is probably too much for them to counter. We have to remember that wars like Afghanistan and Iraq are wars of choice we can always just say no.
    In terms of the tradition effect on the moral of the Army and the psych of the people. I would doubt that most of the British people have any notion of the names of any British Army formations. If they do they are likely to know the Para’s and the Royal Marine Commando’s both constructs of the Second World War. How many guys in the street would know of the Mercian Regiment? For the interest of history and retention of pride I do suggest transferring over the regimental and battalion standards to the new reserve force think this would help the new reserve force to build its independent identity in the army structure.
    About UCAV’s – I do not agree that having a reserve of these in civilian hands will give the enemy an unfair advantage. We would have to call people up weeks in advance anyway to get everything tested and ready to go. It’s not exactly been a secret that we were preparing to bomb people any time we have done it in the past. I am not envisaging us carrying out a pearl harbour type operation any time soon.
25. All Politicians are the same December 18, 2011 at 6:29 am

    Akrotiri Mole cannot support a frigate, it would not fit through the gap. The inside of the harbour is tinu and also quite shallow. it could be extended sea ward to create a large artificial garbour and dredged I suppose. We already have facilities at Gib though that is only notionally in the Med. I would suggest that old friend Malta, there was excellent cooperation from them during the Libyan criscis and it would boost there economy.
26. All Politicians are the same December 18, 2011 at 6:32 am

    Martin,

    Whilst i agree in theory with the aim of your piece i belive that scrapping years of regimental tradition for the sake of it is a bad idea. You scoff at people having heard of the Mercians and maybe the general public may not have, local will. what about, the Black watch, the Highlanders, the Royal Scots, The Rifles, The Royal Green Jackets? Regiments with a massive international and national reputation.
27. martin December 18, 2011 at 7:10 am

    @ All politicians

    Thanks for the info on Cyprus. I was very unclear what the facilities were like. I would certainly consider Malta if Cyprus proved unacceptable. I always though the UK’s withdrawal from Malta after the people voted to stay in the BE was wrong. Did not want to use Gibraltar as I feel it’s too close to the UK to make any real difference when forward deploying forces.
    In terms of cap badges I really feel these historic regimental and battalion standards can be better utilised by the reserve force. It should help them to recruit in the local community better. It may also help to improve the reserves image with the regular army. In my experience in the TA the regular army viewed the primary function of the TA as an easy place to knick kit from when on joint exercise. I remember one regular army sergeant telling us to leave our kit over there “don’t worry we will watch your bags”. The entire cap badge debate really galls me. Every time we are forced to cut the budget the top brass seem far more concerned that we keep the rifles name or the scots guard than troops in Afghanistan having proper body armour. The rifles, 2 Para and 42 Commando were all formations formed with resistance of the main body of the Army. Times change and at some point we have to move on. Why can’t the 7th BEU develop a reputation every bit as fearsome as the Black Watch. I also feel the “quant view” that other armies view our naming system with does not help us.
28. Repulse December 18, 2011 at 9:31 am

    @Martin, have enjoyed reading your blogs and I agreed with much of the first 3. The fourth was always going to be most contentious and although I agree with much of the maritime thrust it would push the pendulum too far in the other direction.

    The overall message that the UK should look to 18th / 19th century history to help analyze the likely 21st make is pretty sound in my mind. The UK has to play to it’s strengths to remain relevant and allow it to influence globally.

    The ability to field large land armies are not one of these, it never will be when you have the 22nd largest population in the world but want to be in the top 10 militaries in the world. I never understand the argument that we need a regular army of 100k ready to do large scale interventions at a drop of a hat… It’s not the size particularly that confuses me, though needing 100k to support 10k in Afghanistan (which is around 7% of the total troops deployed) is hardly playing to our strengths nor is it maximizing our amount of influence per buck. It is the fact that we need them at a drop of a hat… Outside of a small rapid reaction core we should be trying to get the best mix of regular to reserves to reduce costs whilst maximizing effectiveness. The money saved can go on true ways differentiate ourselves.

    The RAF should focus on transport, UK (and dependency) air defence and global presence (including ISTAR) through the use of UAVs. Manned UK fighter operations should be solely through the Eurofighter which is primarily for air superiority first and ground/sea strike second – the first strike option should be through missiles (such as TLAM) or UAVs.

    The money saved from rebalancing the army should come to the RN. This will not have the massive increases you suggest, but would be significant enough to make a difference. The RN should have:

    * 2 Carrier Groups
    * 2 Amphibious Groups
    * A presence in every ocean of the world
    * Minor vessels tor coastal defence of the UKs EEZ (and those of it’s dependencies) and MPA.

    Aside from having 12 – 16 first rate escorts to do the first 2 points. The biggest area of investment would be the third point – more SSNs and as many Type 27s as money as the money can buy (or even a cheaper vessel if there is not enough dosh).

    The FAA should be equiped for area air defence (with a small strike capability), but the main strike element would be through missiles and RAF UAVs operated either from land bases or the carriers. I also think that removing the primary strike requirement, but we could look at coverting the 50 tranche 1 Eurofighters for the FAA…

    Making the RN the 2nd largest Navy on the planet is within our technological and more importantly financial reach. Combined with a RAF with global UAV reach and an army with small high end rapid reaction forces, will give us real influence without risking the security of UK.

    BTW, Gibraltar should be our base in the Med, it is part of the UK, has the facilities already and can cover the west coast of Africa (å place of likely conflict in the next 50 years).
29. John Hartley December 18, 2011 at 9:36 am

    Red Arrows are great PR for the RAF, but in austere times they need a dual war role to justify themselves.
    BAE workers were protesting that a lack of Hawk orders could put them on the dole.
    2 birds, one stone.
    Order 11 new Hawk for Red Arrows, with secondary light strike capability (DM Brimstone, Asraam, Aden 25mm gun pod) ideal for Libya/Afghan close air support.
    Then a T-45K , perhaps 9 for FAA, latest engine , built in UK with unique Goshawk bits from Boeing. A more powerful Goshawk would probably also appeal to the USN.
30. martin December 18, 2011 at 9:46 am

    @ Repulse, thanks for your comments. I think we agree on the basis on my strategy. The Amry’s a tricky thing to get right. I do certainly agree that we need to focus on rapid deployment on light forces which was my reasoning behind trying to Mirror the US Marines. However there is more than one way to skin a cat. My choice of three carriers and LHD’s was the need to be able to deploy a permanent fleet to the far east. I don’t think we can hope to build the type of Alliance I recomended without a major asset in the region. We could do this with two perhaps but it would be more difficult. Especially if we had to use one outside on the Indian Ocean. Penang is a long way from Libya.
31. Phil December 18, 2011 at 9:56 am

    Your last sentence says it all. The 7th BEU would become just as coveted a title and will be just as fiercely defended. Then one day there’d be a budget cut and then we’d have the 6/7th BEU. You could have a unit called the Royal Retards and exactly the same reputation mystique and myth will grow around it. The regimental system brings a number of advantages and is a symptom of how effective human organisations work.

    It needs occasional manipulation but you’ll never sweep it away in a good unit because when a human organisation needs to merge the objectives of the individual with that of the organisation then the individual takes on a lot of the identity of that unit, the name doesn’t matter. As history is built up pride develops. You can’t get a less glamorous name than the 5307th combat unit (provisional). Yet they became Merrils Marauders. It is entirely in human nature. You can’t fight it. You just have to manage it, which we’ve proven able to do since FAS and in the 50s and 60s.
32. BertramPantyshield December 18, 2011 at 10:05 am

    Re: capbadges

    If we were to disband all seventeen regular regiments of the infantry, or transfer them to a TA role, what are the actual savings or practical benefits? I don’t think the savings are quite as huge or tangible as some people think. Indeed, if they were transferred to TA, and all officers above captain were permanent, then would there be any savings at all in regimental headquarters?

    Would the newly expanded Royal Navy like to simply number it’s ships? With R07 being scrapped rather than HMS Ark Royal, and D32 ready to deploy as first in the 32-Class. Do you think there’d be a sense of belonging to The Mighty R07?

    Re: the entire series.

    Rebalancing must happen. It already is in sorts, but budgets must realign to reflect the smaller army. On that premise I agree with the articles. I also agree with the United Kingdom becoming the biggest face of Europe, a friendly and less imperial alternative to the US or China. With economic, military, and diplomatic dominance in Europe this would become a real opportunity. Greater military coordination at a European/NATO level are a must.

    Of course should this not happen; I, for one, welcome our new Chinese overlords.
33. Phil December 18, 2011 at 10:07 am

    The Red Arrows are much more than the sum of their parts. They’re value is not just in PR. The world of air combat is extremely individualistic. There’s a good reason why the knight analogy crops up time and time again. In the air individuals also bring disproportionate effects, most air to air kills go to a small number of aces. There is no other realm of combat where one person can make such a consistent difference in a campaign. The Red Arrows harnesses the aspirations of these good pilots, they nurture their egos, confidence and sense of pride. They reinforce that individuals sense of elitism which can be distasteful in general life but decisive in the air. One can argue that this might breed hubris but 2011 shows this doesn’t happen or self corrects very quickly.

    The Red Arrows infuse a biggleesque essence into the RAF. Which is entirely appropriate in an organisation where skilled, confident tally ho chaps like old ginger who went down over the channel, make a disproportionate contribution to victory.
34. Repulse December 18, 2011 at 10:58 am

    @Martin, I think going for 3 CVFs is a bit too ambitious and would impact too much on the rest of the defence force. An annual fleet exercise east of the Suez would probably be enough. Along with UAVs flying from Diego Garcia… Plus the SSN and warship presence I mentioned of course.
35. jedibeeftrix December 18, 2011 at 11:41 am

    “The Multi-Role Maneuver Brigades will include infantry, armor, artillery, engineers, logistics and communications and will be fundamentally alike in structure, to enable sustained operations within a new 36-month Force Generation Cycle.”

    So, three brigades on a three year cycle, presumably one year on followed by two years off, with a mid-season break.

    Seems like a demanding schedule, but rather calls into question our need for five brigades on a 30 months schedule based on six month tours.

    Can we split the difference and have four MRB’s running eight month tours over 32 months?

    It seems rather likely, and you Jed have always seemed to favour a 3:1 deployment ratio…………
36. martin December 18, 2011 at 11:56 am

    @ Repulse I accept the third CVF is a great expense. However central to my ambition is building the second largest navy in the world. While I know I am going to go bashed for saying this carrier’s send a message. We can all argue the points of their effectiveness vs land based aircraft. Maybe there days are numbered. However India, China and Brazil are all trying to acquire carrier capability. They obviously feel that they are important. When trying to influence Indonesian politicians or Indian ones a permanently deployed carrier along with a substantial fleet of SSN’s and Escorts send a very clear message. I agree that helping countries develop better ASW, MCM or anti-piracy is actually far more important however these are not the types of things that will sway political leaders. These guys are all bricking it about an old Russian carrier with a few knock off planes on board sailing the South China Sea. In reality we know that dealing with this would be 5 minutes work for an Astute but they don’t.
    The US is also paranoid about a lack of carriers (god knows why they have more than enough). They will soon go down from 11 to 9 and they will have to pull one deployment. In my mind they won’t pull from the Pacific or Atlantic but will likely pull the fifth fleet Carrier in the Indian Ocean (post 2015) or at least combine with the 6th fleet in the med. Being the only nation with a credible large carrier permanently in the India Ocean gives us major influence with countries from Saudi Arabia to Singapore (I know India is developing a carrier but it’s hardly the same) this type of political influence should not be underestimated. I take your point about having as many T27 and Modular Minor war vessels but I felt 12 T27 and 32 MMWV’s was sufficient for the task especially if we have 2 spare T45 and 2 spare T26. I also think it’s important to have one major war ship (T45) in the Gulf at all times. This little stretch of water is so vital to the world how we cannot.
37. martin December 18, 2011 at 12:00 pm

    @ BertramPantyshield – Ship names and cap badges are different. Ships get scrapped evry 20-30 years and there name goes with them. Regiments last for hundreds of years. I know its petty what I suggest but I just don’t see any other way than to be petty. As I said when top brass are more concerned with maintaing cap badges thna making sure there troops have the right kit we need to make some major changes.
38. martin December 18, 2011 at 12:06 pm

    In terms of savings from reserve force. Yes having full time profesional HQ’s would add to the cost but we would still save allot. US estimates are that National Guard Units cost 20% of full time units and they have full time profesional leaders. The pension saving’s alone of Regular vs Reservist are likley to be massive. As a smallish country with limited resources we really need to think outside the box for ways to provide capabilities with out the need for standing capabilities. The MOD especially the Army seems completley incapable of doing this to me. In the last 20 years the TA has been cut from 70,000 to 30,000 while the regular Army has only gone from 120,000 to 100,000. Why such and over whelming cut in reserve forces given there realtivley low cost?
39. martin December 18, 2011 at 12:09 pm

    And before any one says anything I know we having been fighting two wars. However the US forces in thise wars have been made up with 40% of reservists (and they have done a pretty good job) why can’t we try to mirror the same thing.
40. James December 18, 2011 at 12:15 pm

    @ Martin,

    second largest navy in the world? Already, the Chinese, Indians and Brazilians (and probably some other countries as well) have larger navies than we do. I’m not talking about competency here, merely size. Data from a quick Wiki:

    US Navy 284 ships, all top end.

    Chinese Navy:
    1 Aircraft carrier (well, coming in soon)
    3 Amphibious transport dock (LPD)
    25 Destroyers
    47 Frigates
    63 Submarines
    30 Landing Ship Tank (LST)
    58 Landing Ship Medium (LSM)
    332 Coastal Warfare Vessels
    219 Auxiliary/Support vessels
    140 Landing Crafts

    Indian Navy: 175 ships

    Brazilian Navy: 100 ships

    Your prescription sounds pricey to buy, and expensive to maintain if part of the RN is to be based in Asia.

    Also, navies are only part of the equation. The RN has had a part in all of the conflicts of my lifetime, but only in one (Falklands) were they decisive. On the balance of probabilities, is that ratio likely to change in the future?
41. All Politicians are the same December 18, 2011 at 12:16 pm

    Martin, 6th fleet has not had a permanent Carrier this year, only during the transit through Med to 5th fleet and on way back has 6th Fleet had OPCON of a CVN
42. Phil December 18, 2011 at 12:18 pm

    “As I said when top brass are more concerned with maintaing cap badges thna making sure there troops have the right kit we need to make some major changes.”

    It won’t happen. Too many vested interests. And it would be cutting off your nose to spite your face. As I said, organisational pride and history are a natural characteristic of these sorts of human organisations. You can’t deny it.

    But all this is besides the point, we just eliminated a whole tranche of famous names, there was some outrage but there’s outrage when a comedian takes the piss out of a disabled person. Someone is always outraged at something, the point is it happened anyway.

    And the fact is as you say it is petty, you are telling grown, professional men that you’re taking away their pointless little toys.

    That will go down like a shit sandwich.

    Like all organisations, the Army has insitutions, this one broadly does more good than harm, all these nay sayers who say it hobbles re-organisation are wrong, the regimental system has changed several times these past two hundred years alone. Loud voices speak up in protest and old Colonels get upset over their eggs Benedict but it still happens.

    And the Army adapts. Managing it is different from effectively insulting grown, professional, experienced men by telling them the identities and esprit d’corps they work very hard to belong to and instil in their units is a silly little boys game and banning them.
43. All Politicians are the same December 18, 2011 at 12:18 pm

    James,

    I think that Martins whole piece is scripted upon the belief that the next area of crucial interest and possible conflict will be in the Pacific where Naval forces have always been the crucial factor simply due to the Geography.
44. Phil December 18, 2011 at 12:32 pm

    “I think that Martins whole piece is scripted upon the belief that the next area of crucial interest and possible conflict will be in the Pacific where Naval forces have always been the crucial factor simply due to the Geography.”

    Air, sea and land forces have all been critical in the Pacific.

    We always come back to the same conclusion, a balanced force is needed.
45. Julian December 18, 2011 at 12:55 pm

    Your element on RAF EW (which will also apply to Army and Navy EW) is that by purchasing the F-18 Growler, you will concede sovereignty over ‘pre-flight messages’, ‘mission data sets’, ‘countermeasure threat generator’ programmes. Do you seriously believe the US will allow the UK access to the programming of the Growler electronic countermeasure (ECM) equipment?

    We will have our own ‘ELINT collectors’, our own analysts, and our own ECM programmers, but they will most likely not be granted access by the US to the Growler equipment necessary to programme the ECM/radar warning receivers (RWRs). Modern air combat operations require ECM platforms as part of the ‘strike package’; why not task BAE Systems with modifying a Tornado, say, and Selex with providing the UK EW wherewithall for the BAE Systems platform? This way, the UK retains its sovereignty, and the UK gets employment (not the US), and the UK retains more of an indigenous defence capability (we don’t handover our defence capability hook, line, and sinker to the US).

    What your article shows, in respect of EW, is a total absence of knowledge on matters EW Operational Support (EWOS); this charge can also be levelled elswhere in the UK Armed Forces and procurement agencies.
46. DMN December 18, 2011 at 2:00 pm

    Good post Martin, I like the idea of having Mini-MEU’s. However I can see the Cap badge brigade welcoming it with open arms.

    How about 4 MEU’s all based around an RM Commando plus supporting arms/units? Four allows for one to be ship based as an MEU, one working up, one rest and the 4th to be split up across various ships (smuggling, anti-piracy etc).
47. James December 18, 2011 at 2:13 pm

    @ APATs & Phil

    any proposition that does not put the prime effort into forces that cannot effect the situation on the land, for long periods of time, is a total waste of intellectual effort. People don’t live in the sea, nor in the air. Naval and air forces have only two purposes, to enable decisive operations on the land to occur, either by shipping/ flying the land forces to where they need to be, or by providing protection for them. Sea and air blockades are ultimately futile, and in any case require huge numbers of ships / subs / aircraft that we cannot afford.

    Name me one campaign – just one – that the UK has achieved success in that did not involve land forces. The most recent – Libya – was fundamentally changed for the better when land forces (disguised, and deniable) were in place. Success in the second world war was enabled, but not guaranteed by the battle in the Atlantic. The Falklands were not liberated by ships, but by boots on the ground. Maritime forces are totally peripheral to Afghanistan or Iraq. The Armilla Patrol did not stop the strategic development of either Iraq or Iran. The no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq did not stop Saddam being a threat to his neighbours, nor having to be finally dispatched. The RAF in Northern Ireland did not contribute much, nor the Navy with some dinky little boats on Carlingford Lough.

    The only exception is the strategic deterrent.

    The Navy and Air Force are entirely supporting or enabling providers, and important for those reasons, but ultimately their force posture, balance and resources should be designed to allow land forces to do what they can do, and most of this web site seems to be some mutual fan club of pointy sharp air and maritime forces pored over by some excited civvies.
48. martin December 18, 2011 at 2:25 pm

    @ James – Really talking about gross tonnage (that can put to sea) not vessels not to mention quality. If we look at vessels North Korea has some 800 nearly 4 times the US Navy number. I agree that the Navy has only been decisive in the Falklands War and was pretty dammed useful in Sierra Leon. Interestingly enough these are the only two solo operations we have committed to.
    £15 billion per year on the navy and sticking a third of it in Asia is obviously expensive. It’s just as expensive as £15 billion on the army and sending is full deployment capability to Asia as we do today. The question is whether or not it’s worth the expenditure. I can’t see any way for us to properly engage in with the super powers of tomorrow without deploying a major asset to the Far East. In my mind the best asset to deploy is a fleet rather than an Army Division or an RAF wing.
    I have still not had a single person come back to me about the value to the tax payer of over committing to coalition operations like Afghanistan. While a large navy does not let us do everything on our own it does allow us to do some major things on our own. In order to build an Army capable of letting we act on our own in a major way we are talking 250,000 men with a budget of £40 billion and that’s before we look at air power. This is simply too much for us to swallow even if the Army could recruit that many men.
    I think we need to stop justifying our armed forces by looking and new and painful ways to exploit them. It really should be a case that if we have to fight we have not done the job right. Sending this fleet to the Far East is far more about defence diplomacy and winning friends than it is about bombing people or invading their country to give them a better life.
    @ All Politicians – I was not aware of that looks like things are already getting worse for the USN. What will happen when they go down to 9 carriers?
    Your point about the pacific is exactly what I am trying to say. If we start getting into Army deployments in this arena then we start to look really silly. A little Island in the North Atlantic with 60 million people can’t hope to compete in an area with almost 3 billion people when it comes to counting numbers. Steel is cheap and people are expensive. Basing our diplomatic and military efforts on a force that requires shear weight of numbers plays to our weakness. A force that relies principally on technology and high Tec manufacturing plays to our strength. We can afford a world leading Navy but we can’t afford a world leading Army it’s as simple as that.
    @ Phil I keep hearing balanced banded around but really what is balanced. Having the capability to do everything is balanced. The USA spends $700 billion per year and has a balanced force. $60 billion per year does not allow us to do everything we have to choose capabilities. On that basis any force structure we build is unbalanced. Are 100,000 troops with a small navy balanced? Are 60,000 troops with a decent sized navy balanced? There is another name for balanced forces with a small budget-Salami Slicing and we have had more than enough of that.
49. jedibeeftrix December 18, 2011 at 2:33 pm

    @ Phil – “We always come back to the same conclusion, a balanced force is needed.”

    Define balanced?
50. All Politicians are the same December 18, 2011 at 2:36 pm

    James

    You maybe cannot win the war in the air or at sea but you can lose it. WW2 after the army was gubbed in France the RAF (battle of Britain) and RN supported by the RAF (Battle of the Atlantic) stopped us from losing it.
    The Army has always been an option for the UK to use in wars of choice abroad but the security of the UK, first duty of any Govt has always been provided by the RN or RAF.
    No offence James but the Libya op was fundamentally changed by great utilisation of French AH power and there rather Liberal implication of ROE.
    Your point about Libya is guess work as there have been no official report on use of ground forces, the Qataris freely admit they had them on the ground but they mainly supplied cracking HUMINT which allowed precise application of air power, especially the French AH force which was vital in breaking every deadlock in the last month of the campaign.
    Of course only the army can fight large wars on land but why should we? If we accept that the days of the Empire are truely over then what good is an ability to send 1 division anywhere?
    Let the French or the Germans or the Italians do it, they all can. If it is in Asia and we need to contribute let the Indians, Indonesians or Viernamese supply the ground sloggers. We do not have the numbers to make a difference. what we could supply that they cannot is SSN capability, MCMV capability, ASW capability all of which we are simply miles better at than anyone else. Maybe one day we can supply carrier strike. Current UK forces in a major conflict consists of a Navy not large enough to guarantee landing a force that is too small to make any difference in a major conventional conflict anyway unless the US are playing. By rebalancing we can have a Navy large enough to guarantee landing a force of our partners and our own that will make a difference.
    That is a bit of a rant and is just as unbalanced as your post!