[ad_1]
Britain’s army, navy and air force will be cut back in this parliament, despite promises made by Boris Johnson during the election campaign “not to cut off the armed forces in any way.”
A five-year defense review, released Monday afternoon, confirms that the size of the army’s target will be reduced by 9,500 to 72,500 by 2025, its lowest level since 1714, and the number of Navy frigates and destroyers will fall. it will reduce from 19 to 17 in the next 18 months.
The plan is to focus investment on replacing Trident and other high-tech rearmament, which Johnson said Monday would give the military the equipment to make them “all the more useful, much more, I’m afraid, lethal and effective.” worldwide”.
A number of old RAF aircraft will be retired in the coming years, including 24 first-generation Typhoon bombers, as well as nine Chinook helicopters, 14 Hercules transporter aircraft and 20 Puma support helicopters.
Defense sources acknowledged that the air force cuts would reduce logistics and supply capacity at a time when ministers want British forces to be more “deployed” in both Africa and the Indo-Pacific.
A third of the army’s Challenger tanks will be scrapped, while 148 will be upgraded, at a cost of £ 1.3 billion.
The investment cash has come at the cost of daily spending cuts. Last November, the government announced a £ 16.5 billion increase in the defense budget over the next four years, largely earmarked for future projects and to plug a black hole of up to £ 17 billion in the budgets of the Ministry of Defense. Defending.
Although many of the cuts detailed in the defense command document were anticipated, their overall breadth led to spot exchanges in the Commons when Defense Secretary Ben Wallace unveiled the five-year plan.
John Healey, Labor’s shadow defense secretary, said: “What does the defense secretary say to each and every voter who heard the prime minister say at the launch of the 2019 Conservative election campaign? ? armed forces in any form. We will maintain the size of our armed forces. ‘
Wallace accused Healey of “a desperate attempt” to make the additional capital investment “look like some kind of cut”, and the previous Labor government of having “delivered many regiments” and “delivered our soldiers in Snatch Land Rovers”, making it vulnerable to improvised explosives in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Daily budgets hold steady at £ 31.5bn from 2021-2 for the rest of parliament, which the Labor Party on Sunday calculated amounted to a 2.4% cut in real terms between 2019-20 and the year ending. in March 2025.
The current size of the army is 76,000, well below the formal target of 82,000 set in the 2015 defense review, due to ongoing problems with recruitment and retention. No layoffs will be required to meet the new target of 72,500, and military leaders are confident they can complete the cuts through natural waste.
New programs to be funded include the replacement of the UK’s Trident nuclear warheads, the cap of which was raised to 260 last week. No price was mentioned in the review of the work, which will take two decades and has yet to be cleared by parliament. Analysts estimate it will cost £ 10bn.
A total of £ 2 billion has been allocated over the next four years for the future Tempest fighter jet, to be launched towards the end of the next decade, with a mix of manned, unmanned and controlled by ‘loyal wing’ drones. computer.
Last week, Sir Mike Wigston, the head of the RAF, predicted that by 2040, 80% of “aircraft flying in operations” in combat zones like Syria and Iraq “would not have a human in them.” Air chiefs also want to develop “high energy” weapons, a form of lasers, to counter “drone swarms” from enemy countries.
The emphasis on countering China’s rise in the Indo-Pacific region, described as a “complex systemic challenge,” will be achieved by basing two small patrol boats in the region starting in 2021 and a maritime unit starting in 2023.
The number of Navy warships is not expected to reach 20 until the end of the decade.
