Behind the curve: Britain’s defence investment plan in Trump’s world

Behind the curve: Britain’s defence investment plan in Trump’s world The new defence investment plan is weighed down by the habits of Britain’s defence establishment. By contrast, the British public appear readier to accept change Britain finally has a published defence investment plan (DIP). Does it match the scale of the challenge facing Britain (and Europe)? Three questions can tell us. Readers will feel less optimistic as they proceed through the answers. But the good news is the British public are well ahead of the defence establishment on what needs to be done. Question: Does the DIP match the Russian threat? Answer: Somewhat. Last year NATO’s secretary-general warned Russia would be ready to attack by 2030, if not earlier. The European Commission’s SAFE programme of massive defence loans is geared to that deadline. These prognoses presumably assumed Russia would make short work of Ukraine, and could then prepare itself for fresh aggression. But Ukraine has humiliated Russia’s navy and air force, and mauled its army. The tide of war may now be turning. Still, if Russia looks like losing in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin may become even more dangerous. He would likely prioritise different ways of trying to coerce Ukraine’s allies—sabotage, subversion, cyber assaults, attacks on infrastructure (such as undersea cables and pipes), nuclear menaces and even the sort of air and missile attacks he has nightly rained on Kyiv. In this regard, the DIP rightly focuses on cyber/electromagnetic defence and prioritises underwater robotics as part of the new £5bn investment in drones. However, the plan reaches the extraordinary conclusion that “Capable and effective Integrated Air and Missile Defence can only be accomplished as part of a NATO endeavour”. It took only one misdirected drone to bring down the Latvian government in May. Where are the proposals for an emergency ramp-up of production of air defence missiles by MBDA (Europe’s leading missile company, one third British-owned), and coordination with the plethora of “air shield” projects now springing up across Europe? Incoming British prime minister Andy Burnham may wish to consider whether, apart from a few RAF combat aircraft, he is content to rely for the defence of Britain’s skies on the kindness of others. Question: Does the DIP reflect the lessons of Ukraine? Answer: Not enough. Those lessons are in effect the development of a new paradigm of warfare through the embrace of new technologies. The need for technological “transformation” was a major theme of Britain’s strategic defence review (SDR): and the DIP duly has a lot to say about drones and other robotics. But Ukrainian battlefield success has involved so much more: a fundamental move away from the cold war military currency of aircraft, ships and tanks (all now exposed as dangerously vulnerable) to a web of sensors and surveillance assets, identifying threats and targets for a panoply of different “kill” options, including missiles, drones, cyber and electronic counter-measures. These are connected through AI-assisted battle management systems and data clouds. Development and procurement cycles are shortened to weeks or even days; hardware and software updates take place within hours. The DIP offers no sense of such radical transformation or urgency. True, it envisages a new Digital Targeting Web, and drones are to be introduced alongside next-generation platforms: as uncrewed “wingmen” for the Tempest sixth-generation combat aircraft; as subsea robots controlled from mother ships; as constituents of local combat clouds operated by armoured vehicles. But the balance of overall investment is still overwhelmingly directed towards those next-generation platforms: Tempest, the nuclear deterrent, the AUKUS programme with America and Australia for future nuclear-powered attack submarines, helicopters—the sort of stuff the traditional defence industry loves, and that governments like to term a “defence dividend” of regional job creation. The DIP acknowledges defence must “ruthlessly prioritise and make tough short-term choices, disinvesting in [old] capabilities”. Yet it is hard to see where this is actually happening, apart from the sacrifice of some planned old-style destroyers and frigates. Predictably, mothballing the increasingly irrelevant aircraft carriers is not an option that has found favour. Overall the picture is one of “hybridisation”—grafting some of the new onto much of the old root-stock. Question: Does the DIP reflect how Trump has changed the world? Answer: Not at all. President Donald Trump has sided with Putin over Ukraine, threatened NATO ally Denmark over Greenland and promised US troop reductions in Europe. But the DIP is happy to reaffirm that “the US remains the UK’s closest defence and security ally”. Faith in the “special relationship” is evidently undimmed in the British defence establishment. Symptomatic is the DIP’s endorsement of last year’s bizarre decision to buy more American F35 aircraft to drop US free-fall nuclear bombs. Since half a dozen European NATO allies already provide this service, the additional deterrent value will be minimal. But the decision betrays an extraordinary insouciance about sovereign control of software-driven aircraft with source code the Americans have always refused to share, and that is now rumoured to contain a US-operated “kill switch”. (Compare the fate of American tractors stolen from Ukraine by the Russians, and promptly killed by the John Deere company—or the similar feature on Tesla cars.) Continental Europeans are now taking the issue of excessive technological dependence on America with increasing seriousness. Calls for “strategic autonomy” and “buy European”, once viewed as Gaullist eccentricity, are now mainstream. Efforts to develop national alternatives to American big tech offerings for AI-assisted, data-driven command systems are proliferating. Little wonder that, as Keir Starmer has sought to strengthen ties with Europe, Britain has found its “defence card” commanding less respect than hoped: a year on from last year’s EU-UK summit, Britain’s anticipated quick admission to the EU’s main programme for defence industrial collaboration has yet to happen. With Palantir now well established with the UK’s defence transformation efforts, the next British prime minister needs to address European mistrust of Britain’s commitment to cross-Channel cooperation, Burnham can do this by ensuring the contract for the Digital Targeting Web does not go to US big tech. The establishment trail the public Overall, the picture emerges of a British defence establishment—an alliance of industry, armed forces and political interests—that expects its bills to be promptly paid by the government, without quibble; is ready to introduce some new capabilities battle-proven in Ukraine but while retaining much of the old; and has difficulty imagining a future not fundamentally dependent on America. So the results thrown up by recent ECFR polling are striking. The “Briton in the street” is evidently well out in front of the elite consensus when it comes to internalising the implications of the Trump geopolitical earthquake. Polling respondents hold both EU member states and the EU itself in much greater esteem than they do the US. Many more Britons believe their continental neighbours would help them repel an attack than trust America to do so. When it comes to defence cooperation, fully 63% would prioritise relations with Europe, over 19% for the US. When he takes office later this month, Burnham may find he has more political room for manoeuvre than he expects when defence investment next comes up for debate. The European Council on Foreign Relations does not take collective positions. ECFR publications only represent the views of their individual authors.