The Excessive Power Doctrine

The other day I ended up disappearing down a rabbit warren of twitter feeds until I ended up coming across this article entitled "The Fate of Britain: offshore balancing and Brexit".

It interested me predominantly because I'm familiar with the concept that they referred to as "offshore balancing" (and no, it has nothing to do with accounting), except that the idea was introduced to me as the "Excessive Power Doctrine". I forget precisely when this happened, but I think it was about ten years or so ago. I also forget precisely where I was introduced to this idea. It might have been through the excellent book "The History of the British Navy" by Michael Lewis, though I confess I haven't re-read it in years (copies running second hand on Amazon right now for as little as 33p. Easily worth several times that. Mine's a 1962 original, former library copy, so you can guess what sort of state it's in).

In a nutshell the Excessive Power Doctrine has a simple aim; to prevent any one country - or alliance of countries - on the European continent from achieving a position of "excessive power" which could threaten the UK and its interests.

It interests me for the same reason that I suspect the War on the Rocks site is interested in it, or their "offshore balancing" version of it, that being how the concept would be affected by a UK exit from the European Union. First though we really need to establish what is meant by "excessive power", and how the UK has historically prevented entities from achieving it.

The concept is very similar really to the political fear of a politician or political body gaining a position of excessive power, whereupon either one individual or a group of individuals begin to wield an excessive amount of sway and influence over a country. Or a Tyranny, as its more commonly known. The entire system of US government is built from the ground up to prevent just such an occurrence, with power deliberately divided between the legislative branch, executive branch and judicial branch, allowing these groups to act as natural checks and balances against one another. People often complain that Washington politics is cumbersome and requires a large amount of cross party support to get anything done without realising that that is precisely the result that was desired when the system was first designed.

The excessive power doctrine took a slightly more blunt approach, replacing committees, hearings, vetos and voting districts with powder and treasure. The goal was the same though, to stop anyone or anything from achieving a position of dominance that would threaten the UK. This could be achieved by anything from commercial and diplomatic means, proxy wars, down to outright open warfare involving the UK itself. Whatever the means, the goal was always the same. The target and the allies frequently changed however.

Take France for example. If France and Scotland are the "auld alliance", then the UK and France are the "auld enemies". In the middle ages it was mostly about who owned which chunks of northern and south-western France. From the 1700s onwards it was more about who owned which chunks of the world. Specifically the UK went to great lengths to not only curtail French interests and influence overseas, but also to curtail its interests and influence over Europe. The rise of Napoleon brought about a series of alliances between other European powers, many of them funded by the UK, to try and keep France in check. British soldiers even went to war on the continent to help prevent a French hegemony.

A hundred years after the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo, French and British soldiers found themselves standing in the mud of flanders once more. Only this time they weren't opposite each other other, rather they were standing side by side against Germany, a situation which would be repeated less than thirty years later. And while the UK had sought out countries like Russia and Austria as allies against Napoleon, against Germany it found an ally in Russia and an enemy in Austria, only for the two to switch places as the cold war descended over Europe. 

It's sometimes said that nations do not have allies, only interests. The UK is probably a prime example of that. Having partnered with and gone to war with all manner of countries over the years, with ally and enemy being frequently interchangeable, the only thing that has stayed constant has been the desire to maintain UK interests. And the need to prevent anyone in Europe from achieving a position of "excessive power" has been dominant among these interests for almost 300 years.

So how does all this relate back to the European Union? Well many believe that the UK will see its influence in Europe wane if we leave, as it essentially opts to sit in its little castle behind its moat and watch as Europe goes about its business. I actually think the reverse might be true. Indeed it might actually be one of the most influential moments in the history of the EU. Because the EU is a club, and like all clubs it can only retain members if they see some advantage to being in it. A thriving UK on the outside, freed from the spectre of ever closer union and with the liberty to cut deals and make laws as it choses could offer a tempting glimpse to other countries about what it would be like if they made their own exit. Portugal, Spain, Greece and Italy among others would surely be paying close attention.

And if we're being brutally honest it might actually benefit the UK immensely if the EU did begin to crumble, at least as a political entity. NATO is, and will remain, the UK's greatest bulwark against the threat of an excessively powerful EU. But I'm interested to see how the UK government will manage this issue in the event of the annoyingly titled "Brexit". Will they leave the EU largely to its own devices, or will we start seeing more and more visits by government ministers and officials to have closed chats with the Prime Ministers of a variety of disgruntled nations?

What interesting times we live in...

(For those that are interested, you can find me on Twitter @defencewithac . I'm off to read the Armed Forces Continuous Attiudes Survey. From the summary it doesn't look like good news).

It's all going up in smoke

Don't call it a comeback. Because it's probably not. 

I've been out of blogging for a while now for various reasons. But this whole EU referendum business has caught my eye and given me a reason to sit down and type. Aside from the quite ludicruous arguments going around that somehow the EU is responsible for keeping the peace in Europe since the end of the second world war - as opposed to say the several decades long stand off between NATO and the USSR which kept things decidedly quiet for the most part - I'm also interested because of how the debate has highlighted the way many of our political leaders look at the UK.

Bizarrely on the "vote remain" side we've seen a mix of two types; those who seem to believe that the UK is nothing without the EU and those who seem to think being in the EU makes Britain a top tier player on a par with the US and China. Thankfully the leave campaign has been far more pragmatic (guess where my sympathies lie) about the idea that Britain outside of the EU can unlock more of its potential without sugar coating the argument and pretending that it is a prelude to ascending to world dominance.

The reason this interests me is because of how often arguments about defence are shaped by our ambitions. People are forever arguing about having this tool or that tool in the defence repertoire because it maintains the UK's position as a top player. And anyone that dare suggest that maybe the UK doesn't need to position itself as an equal of the US, Russia or China, or even as an equal of France or Germany say, is shouted down as being a supporter of "managed decline".

It speaks to me about the remarkable capacity human beings have for not being able to accept the reality of the world around them. I'm just as guilty of it as anyone. I smoke. Everyday I tell myself I'll get around to quitting soon. And everyday I convince myself I'll be one of the lucky ones that lives to old age despite chuffing twenty a day. It's not a plan based on reason. It's a plan based on hope and the flimsy evidence of the occasional senior citizen smoker. In truth it ignores the reality that gradually, day by day, cig by cig, I'm slowly poisoning myself.

Yet I still get amused as a I jump on my high horse and watch politicians and commentators refuse to accept the fact that Britain is not quite the power it once was. There was a time when Britain almost literally ruled the world. But like the Roman empire, the Macedonian hegemony, and a score of other empires, Britain's grasp on the world slowly slipped away. It happens to everyone. It is inevitable. Even the mighty US, today the world's only true superpower, will one day slip from its place on the mountain top and gradually give way to others. It's a question not so much of if, but when (though the when is still in all likelyhood a long way off).

The reason this matters is because a failure to acknowledge the reality of the world is a sure path to watching it slide by without you. The first step in overcoming a problem is to realise you have one. How can you possibly take measures to correct issues if you don't acknowledge the issues in the first place? In the defence context what I see is a UK government that - like with the issue of the EU - refuses to accept how the world actually is in favour of how they would like it to be.

Much time and money has thus been spent over the last few years on the two new aircraft carriers, even as the number of aircraft that will sit on them has dwindled, in the vain attempt to chase the ambition of being a global power. This error as I see it is done and is now too far gone to be reversed. All that's left is to make the best of what I consider a bad hand. That's not to say the carriers are not useful. They clearly are. Whether or not they are actually an appropriate use of the country's limited defence resources is another matter entirely. 

The shaping of the army to prepare it for another potential enduring engagement along the lines of those in Iraq and Afghanistan is also a mistake I feel. These operations entailed the vast expenditure of resources, both financial, political and in manpower, yet produced very modest results compared to said expense. The need to shape the army with a view to carrying out this kind of operation again, at least on the same scale as before, would be the last conclusion I would have drawn from the post-conflict analysis.

Meanwhile the air force chugs along in a weird state of what might indeed be called managed decline. As the years pass it progressively moves further away from the skills that historically proved most useful to it such as deep strike and Suppression of Enemy Air Defences (SEAD). What's gradually being left is a mish-mash of penny packet capabilities of dubious utility in the grand scheme of things. Once Tornado retires it's difficult to see how the F-35 will pick up this old workhorses load considering the fleets other commitments.

I'm not saying it's an easy situation to master. If the solutions were easy to come by then chances are we would already have them. And I appreciate that it takes a bit of getting used to to wrap ones head (for one is in posh mode) around the idea of simultaneously not being too ambitious but not being too glum either. It is however a vital outlook in my opinion. I believe that the UK, economically and in defence terms (as well as some other areas) is being held back unnecessarily, with the cause frequently being its own ambition. Money that could be spent making UK defence (in the literal sense) strong and yet an incredibly versatile ally to whomever should need our assistance is instead being squandered on ambitions of being a USA-lite.

The same mentality seems to pervade the "remain" campaign in this EU referendum. Rather than freeing Britain from its European shackles to allow it to become a more dynamic and vibrant economy, it seems the remain campaign would sooner cling to the coat tails of those in Brussels in the hope that one day the UK could be part of a USA-lite style continental government. It's both depressing and frustrating to watch well meaning individuals (at least some of them) trying to carry the country down this path, as indeed has happened in defence.

I'm not sure if people still stop by to read this blog since it fell dormant, though the analytics section seems to suggest that the Russians have been having a good old read of certain older articles lately, but if people want me to elaborate on this a bit more (the defence bit at any rate, and the economic bit as well if enough people are interested), then I may do so.

For now though all this typing has given me the urge to go and have a smoke.

Uk CSAR gap

With airstrikes now underway in Syria it strikes me (pun not intended) that it's time to go back and look again at something I brought up before, if only briefly, and that's the possibility of the UK setting up a dedicated Combat Search And Rescue (CSAR) unit for recovering personnel from behind enemy lines. 

CSAR was effectively pioneered, albeit unintentionally, in 1916 by Squadron-Commander (later Vice Admiral) Richard Bell Davies of the Royal Naval Air Service, on operations in Bulgaria. He received the Victoria Cross for his actions, landing in hostile territory to recover a fellow pilot whose aircraft had been shot down. And now? There doesn't seem to be any formal unit whose sole task is assigned to this role in the UK armed forces. Which seems very odd to me. 

Thankfully Britain has not found itself in a situation where it needed such a unit that often, but there have been a few cases. Some Tornado pilots over Iraq in 1991 were downed by anti-aircraft defences and subsequently captured. The infamous Bravo Two Zero SAS patrol also went missing during this same campaign, though for a variety of reasons predominantly related to communications it is debatable whether a CSAR unit would have been able to find them. Though no pilot from the UK has been shot down over either Syria or Iraq during the current operations, one unfortunate Jordanian pilot ejected and was captured by Daesh, after which he was burnt alive. That knowledge surely has to linger in the back of the minds of RAF pilots as they take to the skies now.

As such this would seem the perfect time to address the CSAR gap. And we even have a unit in the British order of battle that would seem to be well placed to take the role.

That unit would be II Squadron, RAF Regiment. On paper its role is to capture and hold forward airfields by air assault for the use of friendly air forces, hence why it is parachute trained. Quite how an over strength company is supposed to single handedly capture and then secure an entire airfield is a different matter however. As I've suggested before, probably a better role for it would be to attach it to 16 Air Assault Brigade (which has recently regained 1 PARA and its old Pegasus badge) and have them used as the security element of 16 AAB alongside formed units of the reserve 4 PARA battalion, securing a safe zone for the brigade where HQ operations, artillery, medical, resupply, prisoner handling etc would take place.

The alternative is to let it form the basis of a new CSAR unit along the lines of the USAF's pararescuemen. It's already parachute capable so has that element down, but would need additional work to gain capability in water based rescues etc, and could potentially serve on the future carriers providing the CSAR element for Royal Navy aircrews as well. It's a tricky subject in many ways. The US learned through bitter experience in Vietnam that there are limits on what a CSAR mission can realistically achieve and what resources can realistically be risked for the sake of recovering one man. But the US at least has a formal process for assessing the risk and making that decision, and a formal organisation in place to action a plan should the decision to attempt a rescue be made. I'd like to see the UK follow this lead and develop a proper, full time CSAR unit.

And really it's not just CSAR for pilots alone. US pararescuemen have had their specialist skills put to a variety of uses. They've been involved in domestic search and rescue operations on the continental US, they've been sent abroad to help search and rescue efforts following natural disasters, they were deployed frequently to Iraq and Afghanistan to protect US medical helicopters sent to pick up wounded soldiers in contact with the enemy, they've supported US special forces by providing a quick reaction unit to support them as well as providing rescue parties to help organise the extraction of SF soldiers in trouble, and were even involved in the Battle of Mogadishu, fast roping in to help secure one the crash sites.

So it's reasonable to presume a UK CSAR force would not solely become a one trick pony. Like much of the armed forces it would likely end up being deployed for a variety of tasks. Predominantly though it would be tasked with making sure people like Daesh don't get their hands on any UK pilots who find themselves having to eject over hostile territory. I think II Squadron RAF Regiment is probably best placed for this right now but I really don't care who does it. Perhaps a role for a reserve unit? And frankly I would rather we gain this capability before its actually needed than wait until its too late.

Hillary Benn's speech on Syria

So the commons has voted and it has voted in favour of expanding airstrikes into Syria. Many members stood to give speeches representing both sides of the argument. But the one that has drawn all the plaudits was that by the shadow foreign secretary Hillary Benn. It received a response in the House the like of which I don't think I've ever seen in my lifetime, the closest the House will ever get to a standing ovation. The press have lauded it, some MPs were supposedly moved to tears by it, and it's possible that some members were swayed by it.

But the whole thing was a nonsense

The presentation was about as slick as they come. Clearly Mr. Benn has been brushing up on his skills and many Labour supporters probably now dream that Mr. Benn could be their leader. The delivery was crisp, impassioned, engaging and perfectly timed. It was a perfect parliamentary speech. Except for the actual content. It was a speech that - like all good political speeches - appealed to and played on peoples emotions, instead of reason. It was very... Adolf Hitler*, but in a calmer, more gentile way. Big on rhetoric, short on actual sense. It was a classic example of the quality (or lack thereof) of modern political discourse.

(*Please note, I DO NOT mean to imply that Hillary Benn has anything ideologically in common with Adolf Hitler. This wouldn't normally need explaining, but this is the Internet after all.)

I found particularly odd the idea put across early in the speech that everyone is going to hold hands at the end and Syria will become a model democratic state once Assad kindly obliges by stepping down to make way for elections. Let us just remind ourselves a bit about who Assad is and what a nice, accommodating chap he is; he used chemical weapons against his own people. 

Yes, apparently that is the Assad that Benn thinks is going to calmly step aside at the end of all this and just make way. A man who used chemical weapons in a desperate bid to cling to power. A man who has been told that one day he will be dragged in front of the international courts to answer charges about crimes against humanity. I'm sure he's packing his bags and preparing his resignation speech as we speak. Oh, and did I mention that Russia has intervened in the conflict in order to prop up Assad's position so they can retain their best ally in the region? No? Well that has happened as well. Right now Assad is only likely to leave office in one way and that's in a coffin. Whether he ends up there through old age or someone puts him there against his wishes is the only real question mark as things stand. Unless the Russians want to take in a VIP class refugee?

 

Continuing, Benn made the point about the threat of terrorist attacks at home and how the UK must reduce this threat. He appealed to peoples sense of fear and spoke about "what if that was London?" etc, an argument that has been a cornerstone of the pro-bombing Syria movement at the minute. What of course he failed to acknowledge was that a) the US has been bombing Syria for a while now. That didn't prevent the attacks in Paris, indeed b) France started bombing Syria in October and a month later was hit by the brutal attacks in Paris. Despite claims by Daesh/ISIS, it's not clear whether the attackers in Paris carried out their operation as a direct response to this fresh twist to the bombing campaign, or whether this was something they had been planning for a long time and this just happened to be an opportune moment. 

What is clear is that this ridiculous relationship that is drawn between bombing ISIS = less chance of a terrorist attack at home is just that, ridiculous. The 7/7 attacks in London pre-date ISIS by some way. The UK and its allies are not fighting one group, or even many groups. They're fighting an ideology, a group of nutters who think blowing up civilians and shooting people in nightclubs will convince western populations to turn against their leaders and bring an end to western involvement in the middle east. Al-Qaeda is so last decade, ISIS is the flavour of the month right now, and I suspect it will be someone else in a few years time. There are lots of good reasons to want to take action against ISIS, but pretending that bombing leadership targets in Raqqa will magically make the UK streets safer is an utter fallacy. Not least because c) home grown terrorists are just that, they're home grown. By definition they exist here, in this country, among our own population. Defeating them is the job of the Security Service and the police, not the RAF.

Next came his claim that bombing stopped the Daesh/ISIS advance, which it didn't. The ground forces of Daesh are just like any other military force. They don't exist in a bubble, they require support. Food, water, ammunition, fuel. The old phrase about how amateurs talk about tactics and professionals talk about logistics springs to mind. Daesh/ISIS was at the extreme end of its logistical trail when it began to run into stiffening resistance from a combination of the Iraqi army, Shia militas and Kurdish fighters. Bombing helped, as pretty much any interdiction air campaign of decent size will against an active military force, as well as providing close support. But it was the ground forces and not the bombing which halted the advance. And it's the ground forces, not the bombing, that will push Daesh/ISIS back.

Which brings me to the faith that everyone seems to have in the opposition forces in Syria. These forces have so far proven themselves in their current state to be singularly incapable of stopping Daesh/ISIS. That's why they're in the critical state that they are. A few extra bombs dropped on Raqqa is not going to change the fact that the Syrian opposition is a mixture of disparate groups, mostly concerned with protecting their own neighbourhoods, and lacking severely in organisation, equipment, training, communications, intelligence (in the military context) and logistical support. You know, all those things that are generally considered critical to the success of a military force. In reality they aren't that much of a step up from Dads Army. 

And frankly the time to start equipping, training and organising them to become an effective fighting force has long since passed. Add to this the problem that they aren't just fighting Daesh/ISIS, they're fighting the Syrian government forces as well. Forces that have tanks, and artillery, and armoured personnel carriers. And are now being backed by Russian airstrikes. That's probably the greatest piece of lunacy in all this. The UK is going to start bombing Daesh/ISIS in Syria with a handful of jets on the promise to the public that this will degrade their fighting ability sufficiently to allow Syrian rebel fighters to defeat them, while at the same time those very rebels are being bombed by the Russians, who have more planes and a much looser definition of "rules of engagement". The Syrian opposition would do well just to survive at this point, let alone start any major offensive against Daesh/ISIS. It all has a whiff of the Iraq wars "dodgy dossier" all over again.

Meanwhile the Iraqi army, its militias and the Kurdish fighters are much better organised, much better trained, much better equipped, and have much better communications, intelligence and logistical support. They're not under dual pressure from Daesh/ISIS and the Syrian government, nor are they being bombed by the Russians. They have secure bases into which international support can flow. They have been making some gains over the last year in recapturing territory from Daesh/ISIS. And they have the ability - eventually - to push Daesh/ISIS back out of Iraq and away from its major logistical bases and economic centres. In other words, at this stage, they're a thousand times more supportable than the Syrian opposition fighters.

So if you really want to speed up the demise of Daesh/ISIS, then Iraq is the place to do it, not making token strikes in Syria. A more organised, aggressive approach to helping the Iraqis and Kurds is at this point a much more sound way of producing the outcome that everyone wants, using the extra Tornados and the Typhoons to help by bombing targets in Iraq instead of Syria, providing a concentration of effort at the critical point. I think you'd be hard pressed to find a serious military analyst who would disagree with this. It wouldn't end the war tomorrow, but if defeating Daesh/ISIS is your desired outcome then this has a much greater chance of success in the long run. And it's not like the Americans are short of their own assets for hitting targets in Syria now is it?

The only way strikes against Syria by the UK really makes sense is if your desired outcome is to simply relieve the immediate pressure on the Syrian rebels, allowing them to worry less about Daesh/ISIS and focus more on beating Assad, with the end goal of toppling him then dealing with Daesh/ISIS later. But no government would be so underhanded in its appraoch would it? To dress up one political aim as if it was another, tricking MPs into voting for one course of action while secretly plotting another? Hmm....

Finally we need to address this fallacy of connecting strikes in Syria with being anti-Daesh, as if strikes in Iraq were not. There's been lots of talk about how this is all about siding with France and helping our allies etc, as if we weren't before hand, just sitting on our hands and watching while everyone else did the dirty work. The UK has been carrying out strikes and ISTAR missions over Iraq for quite a while now. Britain has been playing its part and would have continued to play its part even without the authorisation to hit targets in Syria. I think it's a deeply flawed position to assume that only strikes against Syria can show solidarity with France.

And it sums up Mr Benn's speech in a nutshell. A deeply flawed position, disconnected completely with the reality of the situation, but dressed up in rhetoric that plays to the gallery. Indeed, it sums up UK politics as a whole.

The vote on Syria

So David Cameron is pushing for strikes in Syria. And I have to wonder, why? 

I get the press release, that ISIS was linked to the Paris attacks and so bombing ISIS = helping the French. But why the obsession over boming targets in Syria? If the UK removed that restriction then yes, it makes it easier for an overall commander to guide the strikes because now UK assets can be made available to hit targets where ever they might be needed, but that's really not a good justification at this stage for hitting targets in Syria. Everyone, even people who know little about defence, seem to appreciate that the way to beat ISIS is on the ground. The air strikes are supportive of that effort. And Syria is currently not the place where the ground effort is proving the most fruitful.

That would be Iraq, the place where the UK is already carrying out air strikes. I basically do not buy David Cameron's line that bombing inside Syria will make the UK safer, which is the suggested reason for doing it. What it will do is attract more attention on the UK, while having a minimal impact on the influence of ISIS vis a vis home grown terrorists in the UK. It makes no sense from the angle of justification that David Cameron is using. The quickest way for the UK to aid the fight against ISIS is to concentrate air efforts in Iraq, where the local ground forces have a more realistic chance of pushing back ISIS and denying it space, money, equipment, and influence. 

Once ISIS is back near the Syrian border, then we can talk about authorising the use of force in Syria. But as things stand, the UK makes a fairly modest contribution to the counter-ISIS efforts and if a target of immense value in Syria becomes known to the UK, the best bet at the minute is to hand over that information to the US who have a much greater presence. The UK should be sticking to the age old military principle of concentration of effort and confining itself to helping out in whatever way it can on the Iraqi front, rather than getting sucked into the murky quagmire that is the Syrian front right now.

Perhaps what's more worrying is the number of MPs who seem to have bought all of Cameron's rubbish hook, line and sinker. Even many Labour MPs, who should be reading up on their history about a certain Tony Blair, seem to have been sucked into the farce. I understand that everyone is outraged by what happened in France. Naturally everyone wants to show our immense solidarity with the French people. But this is not the way to go about it. This is a token gesture. Worse, it's a political gesture, one that looks good but ultimately doesn't help the situation. While it's been quite eye opening to hear members from all parties over the last few days talking about the first duty of the state being to protect its people, seemingly having woken up to the importance of defence and security, it's also worrying how many have been led down the garden path on this one. The comparisons between this latest push for airstrikes in Syria and the information war that took place prior to Iraq have chilling similarities. 

I fear this will not end well.

The SDSR 2015

So, the SDSR then.

All in all defence had better be thankful, if for nothing else than having been spared the executioner's blade. Jeremy Corbyn is probably less electable at this stage than me - a liberal leaning, fiscal conservative - and as such the Conservative government smells the opportunity to do a hatchet job on government spending knowing that they'll probably never get an opportunity to strike like this for another twenty years. That defence was spared cuts is good. That it will see a slight increase in spending is nothing shy of a miracle, as my understanding is that other departments are about to get a bit of a beating.

What then did defence manage to rustle up for itself?

Well in general the document itself is a dire product of the modern age we live in, talking a lot but saying very little of substance (like this blog in many ways...). I dread to think what the US constitution and its amendments would have looked like if they were drafted in this era instead of 239 years ago. Lots of vague sections and very little in the way of detail or brevity.

We might as well start with the Royal Navy, being the senior service and all. In this case the announcement about extra patrol vessels and the decision surrounding the Type 26 Frigate program is of the most immediate interest. The government now plans to build two additional patrol vessels of the type currently being built by BAE Systems, "enhanced River class" or whatever you want to call them. Then it's eight of the new Type 26 anti-submarine frigates, followed by an ambiguous order for five new general purpose vessels of a new design, theoretically keeping the UK's escort fleet at 19 once the Type 23 class has been retired.

Reading between the lines, which I probably shouldn't, this smells like an issue with Type 26. Or rather issues, plural. Potentially very big ones. The whole reason for building a new class of patrol vessels was simply because BAE had a contract that guaranteed it payments in lieu of actual work, so the government gave it work in order to get at least something useful out of a bad deal. In theory the Type 26 frigates should have followed on from these, but the addition of two extra patrol vessels is a very concealed way of saying "something's up with Type 26 and it's not ready yet". Hence the need to make a bit more work in the interim.

The new batch of five general purpose vessels also creates more questions than it provides answers. According to the document this will be a fresh design with export sales in mind (stop laughing at the back, this is serious business), which would appear to rule out simply not providing towed sonars etc on a last batch of five Type 26 frigates. So if it's not a Type 26 derivative, then what is it? "Built for export" is another way of saying "probably not much use to the Royal Navy", as most countries that want a full blooded escort want to build it themselves to preserve their industrial capacity. Typically the only takers abroad are countries that want something less shiny and technical. A gun, a flight deck with hangar, some anti-ship missiles, diesel engines for the lower cost and complexity, and a short range anti-aircraft missile for self defence. Something that is fine for patrolling the waters around Chile, South Africa etc, but not much use to a Royal Navy carrier group. It could also throw open the interesting dynamic of being a ship construction program accessible to others except BAE.

One wonders then (for one is in posh mode) what the Royal Navy would do with such a vessel, or indeed with these "enhanced River class" patrol vessels? Given that HMS Severn carried out the Atlantic Patrol Task North earlier this year that might suggest that the RN was preparing for a future where this tasking is carried out by a patrol vessel on a permanent basis, while the escort fleet is held back for working with the carriers. Perhaps when the general purpose vessels show up some time twenty years from now they will take over this APTN role, as well as other less demanding taskings. We shall see.

On the subject of the carriers there's still no clarity as to whether both will be operated at the same time, or whether they will alternate being in active service which seems the most likely solution. There was some talk about supporting amphibious operations, so presumably they'll combine the carrier and helicopter landing roles all in one to make use of that space. That seems fairly logical to me, though again no word yet on how many F-35B the RN will get its hands on just yet.

Overall I think the navy did ok out of this review. Some new toys on the horizon, though the Type 26 situation does seem a little worrying. Originally its cost was projected at around £250 million a pop, something which some people scoffed at as being unrealistic, instead predicting a price closer to £500 million each (ahem). If indeed the Type only gets an eight ship run, which theoretically could be reduced further at the next review, then that £500 million warning is looking about right, inflation not withstanding. It's Hoon-onomics all over again.

On to the army, which will have been pleased to have avoided more cuts, with the confirmation that the army 2020 numbers are set to stand. How those numbers get divided up is the thing that is causing some puzzled looks. In theory I like the idea of 77th Brigade and 1st ISR Brigade - carry overs from Army 2020 - in particular the latter. 77th though is an odd one, with lots of management speak sounding drivel about its role in media ops and lots of talk about "synchronisation of effect" etc. I do like the idea of providing a central pool of resources, human and technical, for civil affairs and security capacity building though. 

The one that's generating chuckles is the announcement of two rapid reaction "strike" brigades... that will be activated in 10 years time. Only the British army could label something as being rapid and yet take ten years to establish it. What this will be made up of is still up in the air for now, though I suspect we'll get some detail in the near future. Talk of using the new Ajax scout vehicle, perhaps in an infantry carrying role, as well as some nebulous new infantry mobility vehicle. A lot of people are putting money on this being an 8x8 vehicle, but this could just as easily be the Mastiff and/or Foxhound vehicles left over from Afghanistan. 

Honestly I don't see the point. Ajax will be many things once in service, but rapidly deployable is unlikely to be one of them. Considering the military has both 3 Commando Brigade and 16 Air Assault Brigade to call on, these would seem to be more obvious selections for something requiring rapid deployment. I guess context is everything. A "strike" brigade based on the continent and equipped with wheeled vehicles would be able to redeploy fairly quickly without the need of air or naval support to move its kit. And if it did need to go abroad, having wheeled vehicles aids its rapid deployment to forward areas, certainly quicker than tracked vehicles. 

The question of course then becomes what it will do when it arrives? What threat requires a response that is a bit quicker than loading and unloading tracked vehicles from trailers/trains, but is sufficiently deadly to warrant an 8x8 armoured box complete with turret mounted cannon (presuming this new 8x8 is something like the French VBCI) instead of a 4x4 or 6x6 vehicle sans turret and cannon like Foxhound and Mastiff? I really hope it's not an excuse to purchase 8x8 vehicles, which seem to combine all of the worst elements of various vehicles in one complete package of nonsense. We shall see. 

In about a decades time that is.

Other than that not much change for the army. It seems they'll lose an armoured brigade in favour of these two strike brigades, which begs the question of whether the armour will be retained and split between the two strike brigades, making the purchase of an 8x8 vehicle all the more pointless, or whether this is just the death knell for yet another battalion (sorry, "regiment") of tanks. If so then the nuts truly have taken over the nuthouse. This insatiable desire people have to dispose of tanks in favour of more peacekeeping friendly vehicles like 8x8s continues to boggle my mind, despite the various warning signs over the recent years that suggest tanks still have a key role to play in modern warfare.

On to the RAF and the big announcements basically centre around the introduction of a new Maritime Patrol Aircraft (MPA) and the extension of the life of some of the RAF's tranche 1 Typhoons. The MPA news is good, with nine P-8 Poseidon aircraft set to be acquired. Little odd though that the MoD didn't run an open competition. The P-8 would have been the front runner for sure, especially with RAF personnel already serving on US navy P-8s to maintain skills in anti-submarine operations, but just handing over the victory like that to Boeing is troublesome and establishes a worrying precedent. I guess we should be grateful in a sense, as at least the government isn't going to spend the next ten years mulling over all the options before paying twice over the odds for a bespoke solution. 

Only the MoD could make a negative like that seem like a positive in comparison to the alternative.

As for the Typhoons, it seems like this is more of an insurance policy against potential delays with the F-35 than anything else. Clearly someone at the MoD main building has realised that when Tornado goes out of service in 2019, that will only leave the later two tranches of Typhoon capable of carrying Storm Shadow, Brimstone and certain other types of air to ground weapons while they wait for the F-35 to be qualified for their release. If those Typhoons are tied up on QRA duty then that could leave the RAF in a bit of a tight spot should another Libya or ISIS type situation crop up.

Hence the Tranche 1s get a new breath of life. Or rather, avoid a premature death. And in doing so the UK gets to retain seven squadrons worth of Typhoon. At least until the next decade when F-35 comes fully on stream and the government decides it wont need those Tranche 1 tiffies any more after all.

On the subject of drones, the UK is set to increase the number of surveillance drones for use in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as introducing a new high altitude, long endurance drone for ISTAR purposes only. There has been some more chatter about cooperation with France on the joint development of a stealthy UAV capable of penetrating heavily defended enemy airspace and dropping bombs, which is the definition of insanity. Not the drone part, that's a good idea. The insane part is doing the same thing over and over again (cooperating with France on a defence technology project) and expecting a different result.

In what I would like to christen "Typhoon syndrome", you get two (or more) countries of roughly equal size in terms of finances, stature and technological expertise and try to get them to cooperate on a major defence project. Because both feel they should be the senior partner they then spend the next ten years arguing about work share, program leadership, where to base the development centre, who should get ownership of the IP, what bits and bobs should be included in the program, where the parts should be sourced from, and what biscuits to put in the tea room. The end result is normally a prolonged period where bugger all useful happens, lots of lawyers make lots of money drafting and redrafting contracts, then the whole thing falls apart and the partners end up doing their own thing anyway.

And here we are again. BAE has already built a drone which presumably is close to being suitable for the RAF's requirements. It might not be there yet, but all the information currently available on Taranis suggests it's well on the way. So the reason for going into partnership with France and giving this up is...? What exactly? This can only end in tears and with the UK going back to Taranis again, so how about we skip the middle bit this time where we waste years and years and millions of pounds trying to fit a square peg into a round hole and just go with our own design for a change. Have a bit of faith in ourselves. 

Lastly, cuts to the civil service and the defence estate have been announced. Now I'm all for cutting waste in government (remember the bit about being fiscally conservative?) but that only works when you're genuinely trimming the fat and leaning government down to its most productive level. Cutting civil servant jobs only to fill the posts with more expensive service personnel is not leaning. It's actually making the system more costly. Nor is it a genuine saving if civil servants are laid off, only for consultants to have to be brought in to do the work (worth pointing out that many conservative MPs have connections either directly or indirectly with a lot of the major consultancies). Again in that case you're just making the same outputs but at greater expense.

I'm also a little sceptical of the estate sell offs. We'll have to wait and see what is actually being sold, but this obsession in the modern era with selling off assets just because they lack an immediate value to an organisation is worrying. Based off the "just in time logistics" model of lean business (bloody Toyota), selling assets that have only a book value and no immediate productive value seems like a clever idea, except of course if you happen to be in any industry other than one that has highly predictable demand. Like say, oh I don't know, something like defence. Yeah, defence would be a terrible industry - possibly one of the worst - to try and apply a lean asset approach to. What's that you say? Defence estate? Oh dear...

So all in all not a bad review as far as defence is concerned. Tomorrow we'll find out just how much of a kicking the rest of government is going to take and I suspect that in that light this SDSR will be seen as a God send in some regards. There are however some things I would have liked to have seen included that weren't, mainly because most of them are a bit odd ball and the product of my own musings, which I'll run down here;

1) I wish the army would just bite the bullet and go all in on a restructuring of the regimental system to a non-geographic system. At some point in the future the army is going to get cut again and the whole "but this regiment can trace its origin all the way back to the big bang" type argument is going to start over. This is becoming something of a hobby horse of mine. The army has lots of historic names and titles in its ranks, ones which aren't tied to any given geographical space. The army could still recruit geographically if it so desired, at least in theory, but would now be able to spread the recruiting areas more easily without having to worry about boundaries.

An example of this would be replacing the Royal Regiment of Scotland with the more ambiguous "Black Watch". You can now expand the recruiting area across not just Scotland but parts of the north of England as well, such as cities like Newcastle, Sunderland and Middlesborough. Even though such ambiguous names might still in future need to be merged further, it would at least give the army some breathing room for a while by creating a small number of "large" multi-battalion (4-5+) regiments. Sticking most of the armoured infantry into "Dragoon" battalions for example also gives the army the chance to conjure up images of old, which it seems so institutionally tied to, if it so desires.

2) I've proposed before a kind of UN organised international disaster response organisation. Link here. That goes on the list.

3) More focus on NATO and our role within it. The importance of NATO has been given the breath of life over the last few years, after Libya and the ongoing scuffle in Ukraine. NATO has shown that first of all it is still important to the defence of many of its members. Where might the Baltic states be right now if not for NATO moving in to secure their liberty? That's obviously a hypothetical fraught with problems, but it shows that NATO as an alliance still has an important and needed function; the collective defence of its members territories. On top of that NATO has also proven handy recently as a framework organisation, one that has command and control elements already in place, around which an out of area operation can be assembled if needs be.

So, with that in mind we make a case for a modernised NATO that meets members defence goals and also better prepares NATO for some of the modern challenges that it faces?

See it strikes me that the thing that's always been missing from UK strategy over the last twenty odd years has been focus. One of the reason that Israel does so well in defence matters is that it has a very clear focus on what its major threats are and the equipment it needs to solve these problems. The British empire for a long time had a very clear idea about the problems facing it and the manpower and equipment needed to cope with these problems. Now the UK lacks this focus, that guiding hand which shows us where our main enemies are and how best to face them. We have a strategy that encompasses everything from mainland UK defence, to protecting the Falklands, to brigade style interventions abroad and so on. It's all a bit haphazard and most of it is very vague "we need to be ready for this contingency, we need to be ready for that contingency" etc.

What if instead, for example, the UK proposed setting up a north east Atlantic command which it would run? It would be responsible for pulling together naval assets from the UK and possibly Denmark, Norway, Germany, Holland, Belgium and perhaps even the US and Canada, and maybe others that had assets available, to form a task group with a strong focus on the northern and eastern sections of the Atlantic, particularly the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap? Basically similar to the current standing maritime task group, but UK led, perhaps using the Rosyth dockyard as a base after the Queen Lizze carriers are done with, and with a heavy focus on operations in that area, i.e. hunting Russian subs!

The command might include air elements, such as the brand spanking new RAF MPAs, and land elements, by bringing together the amphibious assault assets of the participating nations, perhaps with the official NATO war time mission of reinforcing Norway/Iceland/Greenland, which brings with it the obvious side benefit of providing NATO with a trained and cohesive amphibious assault force for out of area operations should they be needed. In a sense the UK is already heading down this path with the UK Joint Expeditionary Force and the Combined Joint Expeditionary Force (and yes, those are two different things), teaming up with other NATO members to provide land forces for rapid response to crises around the globe. This would be more of a tri-service version of that. 

And given the resurgence of Russia, maybe positing the idea of standing land forces at the eastern end of NATO's European boundary might not be a bad idea, perhaps in the form of a number of divisions to which countries attach on a rotating basis brigades/battlegroups depending on their size and availability. Maybe take the Joint Expeditionary Force concept a bit further and suggest the formation of a Joint Expeditionary Division made up of rotating units from members. Maybe even two, one armoured and one light such as airborne units?

3) Speaking of the Russian threat, when is the UK going to take a more serious look at the issue of Surface to Air Missiles (SAM)? There was a bit in the SDSR about new radars for defence against ballistic missile threats, presumably with a hypothetical finger wagging in the direction of Russia, so why doesn't the lack of a decent SAM system get much attention in the UK? There is a short range system in the pipeline using CAMM, but short is the operative word in that first part of the sentence. I'm talking the need for a longer range missile system, one that can hit out to much greater distances, which the UK could take on operations.

The air threat to the UK, its overseas bases and any expeditionary force is currently somewhat limited, but "currently" is not the same as "will always be". The ability to protect UK forces against the possibility of air attack should be given a bit more thought I feel. When the UK parliament was debating punitive strikes against the Syrian regime in response to its use of chemical weapons there was a fear in some quarters that the Syrians might make an all or nothing gamble air attack on RAF Akrotiri, either pre-emptively or in retaliation. However unlikely that scenario might actually have been, it does give pause for thought about the UK's capacity to defend assets on the ground from an air attack, be it bombs or indeed cruise missiles. With the prevalence now of drones, what AAA type defence do UK ground forces have? (hint: none)

And while I'm mid moan, what about the UK's ability to penetrate such air defences? Where is the replacement for the ALARM missile? Oh right I forgot, it'll all be done with high power radars and smart munitions from now on. Hmmmm, call me a sceptic on that one for now. And what about anti-ship missiles, both air launched and potentially land based? The latter has a more limited use, unless we consider the issue of "those islands", which funnily enough also make a case for the medium/long range SAM system.

4) It's nice to see that the Tranche 1 Typhoons will get some good use, but I have been mulling lately a rather more bizarre idea. What if some were "loaned" as it were to the US to permanently join the aggressor team for Red Flag exercises? UK pilots would fly them and they would be integrated into the red team plans as a way of exposing allied pilots to a highly agile, so called "4.5" generation fighter. The expertise learned from this constant UK presence could then in turn be used to improve RAF tactics. The UK regularly contributes to the blue side of Red Flag, so why not the red side as well?

So that's then. See you again, same time, five years from now, yeah?

The Argentine Presidential Election

Obviously the big defence story of the last few days has been surrounding the SDSR, which I'll get into in a post shortly. But another interesting story is that of the Argentine presidential election, won by Mauricio Macri. Mauricio's victory could mark a new era in British/Argentine relations, in particular over the issue of the Falklands Islands. Macri will still - as any Argentine president will - claim the Falklands belong to Argentina. But it seems that for Macri this issue will drop well down the priority list.

Argentina's finances are in a state and the only way out of that particular hole is to strengthen economic ties with the wider world, basically doing a complete 180 degree turn to the policies of his predecessor Cristina Kirchner. In particular building ties with Mexico, Brazil and the US will be top priorities, but warming relations with the UK won't hurt either and it seems Macri will do just that, putting the old issues aside in favour of more pressing matters.

This doesn't remove the threat to the Falklands Islands, but at least in the short term it reduces it somewhat. Argentina is in no position to start throwing its meagre weight around and it seems Macri is aware of this. Good news on the whole, at least until Argentina hits its next bump in the road.

We will remember them

Part-Time

Since 2010 and the release of the coalition government's SDSR which brought with it a greater role (and reliance on) the reserve forces, I've heard a lot of ideas about how the reserves could be made better, many of them sterling in quality. Such things as offering regular officers the chance to take a career break while becoming reserve officers, full regular course training for NCOs, making a posting as support to the reserves a part of the career progression for regular NCOs (a la Sir Peter de la Billiere's reformation of the SAS NCO career progression) and many other suggestions.

The attraction for the government has always been simple, as reserve soldiers cost less to retain in peacetime than regulars, though become more expensive when activated for service. The hitch has always been the old question of whether they are as good as regulars, or at the least adequate for service abroad. The nature of reserves as part time soldiers naturally places limits on how much time can be spent practising military tasks. Which did give me one pause for thought.

In yonder civilian world, part-time is generally understood to be somewhere under 30 hours a week, frequently under 20. That's a long way from one weekend a month and a training night in the middle of the week. So it begs the question if whether the part-time nature of some reserves could be adapted to a greater commitment than where it stands now, but still falling well short of what would be expected from regular personnel? Clearly not everyone has the time for this, many having demanding day jobs. But it's possible that some could take on a greater number of hours, perhaps in turn becoming the repository of greater military experience and skill in their units, the central core around which reserve units are built.

It's an idea with flaws of course. Primary among which is the misleading notion that regular soldiers spend all day everyday doing military related training, and as such the misleading notion that a part-time soldier would spend all his additional "shifts" (so to speak) doing war related training. It also doesn't automatically pass on the benefits to other members of the units. Yes it could build greater experience and better organisation, and develop a feeling of being closer to regular counterparts in quality overall, but it doesn't inherently mean that the reserve unit has taken a collective leap forward.

It's possible that the extra hours would be consumed with a degree of paper work and other tasks, but at the very least this time spent organising saves time later. Part-timers of the extended hours nature would have the chance to expand their skills and become trainers in their own right for their own units. It's also reasonable to assume that some would have greater time flexibility to accompany their regular counterparts on more frequent and longer exercises, again building knowledge and experience of the latest methods to be taken back to their reserve units.

Just some food for thought while you sip on your cocoa.

This is not the moderate you're looking for...

With the Russian exploits in Syria being plastered all across the media, people have been taking to the Internet, TV, radio, and just about any medium where people will listen to talk up the idea of the west siding with Assad and the Syrian government as Assad represents a "moderate" Syria that could help stability in the region and fight groups like ISIS. I find this train of thought very odd personally. Mainly because the reason that a bloody civil war has been raging in Syria these past few years is because Assad started shooting his own people because they wanted democratic elections. That to me is not the action of a stabilising hand.

You encounter the same argument over Gaddafi in Libya. People talk about the NATO led intervention as if Libya would have been fine without it. Until you stop and remind yourself that the reason NATO intervened was because Gaddafi was about to slaughter a lot of his own people, having already made a start on shooting at protesters and trying to quell clamour for a democratic election by violently suppressing the population. The idea that if it hadn't been for the west intervening then Libya would currently be a peaceful paradise is fundamentally flawed.

I can understand to an extent why people think like this. They're caught up in the memories of Iraq, where the US led war did unstabilise the country and cause a wider conflict. It lingers in the back of peoples minds. But in the case of Libya and Syria it was the government that started the bloodshed and the government that perpetuated it. The fact that Libya didn't turn out to be a wonderful democratic paradise afterwards is neither here nor there. It was not the job of the intervening powers to rebuild the government. They pitched in to help the rebels end the war and overthrow a brutal dictator. The rest was entirely down to the Libyan people, as it should be.

Think for a second about the worlds largest and most powerful democracy, the USA. It began as a revolution against what was perceived as a dictatorial regime (and in effect was). It was a bloody conflict in many regards but ultimately the rebels prevailed. They went on to form a cohesive, legitimate, highly democratic and constrained government. This is what can happen when the rebels win. The point being that people seem to expect far too much from western interventions. It is not the role of NATO, the EU, the USA or anyone to dictate what sort of government follows after the end of a dictatorship. If you intervene to end a conflict swiftly and to overthrow a brutal regime then you must do so on the understanding that you don't really get much of a say in what comes after. That's for the people of the nation in question to decide.

I just find it all a little uncomfortable, this idea that somehow Assad is this wonderful moderate who everyone is now looking to as the beacon of peace and hope in Syria. His actions and the civil war he triggered led directly to the formation and success of ISIS.  That we would now see him as the solution is absurd. Anyone that thinks that Assad would honour some agreement to not kill his own people in exchange for remaining in power and for helping to fight ISIS most likely has a shock in store for themselves if this ever came to pass. This being the man after all who authorised the use of chemical weapons on his own citizens.

Assad is not a nice man. Assad is not the moderate stabiliser that people are looking for or that some seem to think he is. I really do not understand the sudden affection for him and his regime. He is - in mild mannered English parlance - a git. And we should treat him as such, as opposed to seeing him as the last refuge for salvaging the failed foreign policy ambitions of the UK and US.