Soft Power and Conflict Prevention

Lord Craig of Radley Excerpts

Friday 5th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Craig of Radley (CB)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow the noble Baroness, whose knowledge of these issues is profound.

Given the stress in the debate’s title on non-military means of conflict prevention, I hope that the most reverend Primate, who opened it in a most interesting and thought-provoking way, will not take it amiss if one who has spent his whole professional life in the Armed Forces should presume to contribute. I fully share the vision that it is far better to deal with situations by non-military means and sensible applications of soft power, however defined. I shall allude to its application for deterrence or prevention of conflict rather than to Joseph Nye’s definition of an ability to attract and co-opt others.

When I was studying for my RAF promotion exams more than 60 years ago, I was taught to consider three aspects in dealing with potential adversaries. They were political, economic and military. Non-conflict concepts were alive all those years ago. Today they have been rebranded and brigaded in a contemporary media-savvy vision called soft power. I leave it to others to unwrap the conundrum that so many from overseas wish to live and stay in this country while many others are so militantly averse to all that we stand for and believe in.

I turn to my third heading and the point I wish to make. It may be summed up in that phrase first attributed to Theodore Roosevelt. He wrote in 1900 that you can go far if you:

“Speak softly and carry a big stick”.

Others have coined the phrase, “an iron fist in a velvet glove”. My concern about the values of non-coercive soft power and non-military intervention lies not in their intrinsic worth but in the context in which they are applied.

The debate focuses on conflict prevention, not just winning the hearts and minds of others, so the perceptions of the interlocutors in the exchanges are all-important. The view from their end of the telescope may well not match ours. They may need to be cajoled or won over with economic or political gestures—but will those suffice to ensure a satisfactory outcome? The other side will certainly be weighing up what more it might extract, or what pressures it might face.

I fear that in recent years—I know this from my own experience—we have had harsh lessons, paid for in blood and treasure, about an opposition’s presumptions about the temper of the iron in our national fist. For decades before 1982, we had expended much effort in political-diplomatic exchanges to dissuade the Argentinians over their claim to the Falkland Islands. During the mid-1970s, the Argentinians became more belligerent—so much so that a nuclear-powered submarine was dispatched at short notice to the southern Atlantic as a successful deterrent.

As a then Assistant Chief of Air Staff at the MoD, I looked at the possibility of flying ground reinforcement into the Falklands by Hercules. Regrettably, I had to advise that, while a Hercules transport aircraft could, indeed, just fly into Port Stanley’s short airstrip, insufficient fuel was stored there, let alone runway length, to recover even a single aircraft. The idea of building a new airfield of reasonable size to allow for rapid reinforcement and in-theatre operations was considered, following an in-depth report by Lord Shackleton. However, the cost was sizeable and no department felt that it could be afforded, so it was dismissed as unnecessary. Non-military negotiation should continue and would—it was presumed—prove as adequate as in the past.

In subsequent years, the Argentinians noted that our military commitment to the Falklands was further and further diminished, with the withdrawal of a guard ship and eventually HMS “Endeavour”. By the time the Argentinians invaded in 1982, there were just 40 marines in place and no prospect of rapid reinforcement by air. Only after recapture did we get round to building the airfield at Mount Pleasant and positioning aircraft and radar for deterrence and protection. Soft power on that occasion lacked the deterrent of robust and timely further action, and we paid a dreadful price in lives lost, young individuals scarred for life and tragedy for the families involved.

Moving forward to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the first Gulf conflict, Saddam Hussein’s presumption was that the reduction in military capability, as the US and Britain sought to benefit from a peace dividend following the end of the Cold War, made it less likely that we would embark on hostile military action. Between August 1990 and February 1991, this perception of his must have been strengthened in spite of sizeable deployment of coalition forces into theatre, as the US, with our active support, sought to find a non-military solution. Nothing budged Hussein until his forces were attacked by air and, finally, by ground forces.

We lost six Tornado aircraft in that conflict, but there were adequate numbers to sustain our operational tempo. Today, there seems little dialogue with ISIL and we and our allies have embarked on a muted application of force. Is it not sobering to realise that our total offensive contribution to this ongoing operation, apart from some UAV sorties, is just six Tornados? Even with the life extension recently given to the Tornado force to remain at three full squadrons for a further year, there is no continuous capability for an air combat force to remain deployed globally, as a deterrent or for use, as far and as wide as it has been. Other tasks may become more pressing.

I have chosen the Tornado force to illustrate my point, but similar analogies may be made for naval and Army forces. All three services are shadows of their former selves of even a couple of decades ago. The Air Force that I was privileged to lead in the mid-1980s was 100,000 strong. Today, it is down to close on 30,000 and force numbers have declined in proportion. Does this ORBAT any longer have a hope of being the big stick or iron fist that history teaches us is an essential long-stop to soft power and other non-military engagement with recalcitrant opponents?

I repeat that of course I welcome all steps—any steps—that can resolve difficulties between nations without recourse to war and bloodshed. However, these have far greater hope of success if the stick and fist are first class and sizeable enough to carry weight in the minds of those we seek to win over. We deceive ourselves if we believe that today’s force levels are still adequate to foster and promote the success of soft power in conflict prevention. President Putin’s annexation of Crimea, so robustly decried by our Government and many in the West as unacceptable, is now a fait accompli. The strategic prize for Russia must surely outweigh any or all inconvenience caused to its economy, or even individuals, by sanctions, which are the most that NATO and the EU seem capable, or willing, to call upon. The labours of those who diligently seek to solve problems with soft power might be more productive if those who bear responsibility for defence consider the adequacy of the available strengths rather than assume that all is well because we input some now very small amount of GDP on defence capability.

I applaud the efforts and enthusiasm of the most reverend Primate and other noble Lords. I hope that more will be done for the Armed Forces to give him and others the deterrent muscle of “big stick” and well tempered “iron fist” to promote success—the success that a combination of hard and soft power, or “smart power”, may bring. Hard power, it has been said, begets soft power.