The Role and Capabilities of the UK Armed Forces, in the Light of Global and Domestic Threats to Stability and Security

Lord Craig of Radley Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2015 Grand Committee

[Lord Craig of Radley (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for arranging this debate. I would like to follow on from the tour d’horizon of the noble Lord, Lord King, on one particular point—the number of platforms. I have expressed my concern on a number of previous occasions about the paucity of the number of platforms; by which I mean the airframes, ships and fighting vehicles that now form the front-line fighting strength of the three services.

I readily acknowledge that the striking power of individual platforms with modern, smart weapons provides a step change in hitting power and accuracy compared with previous generations. But that makes no allowance for the vulnerability of platforms themselves, nor of aircrew or other key sectors of manpower or logistics that support their use in combat. They are vulnerable to a variety of risks and not just those posed by an opponent. For example, there could be a hangar fire at an operational airfield that destroys a number of airframes; a loss of key components such as engines in a flood disaster; a damaging and fatal explosion in a crowded briefing room or on board a major warship; or a cyberattack on key intelligence or on equipment distribution. There could even be a tornado or other extreme weather event that causes physical damage. Any one of those risks and many more could deplete our already very limited front-line numerical striking strength, suddenly and unexpectedly. It is too easily forgotten that a freak hailstorm in Afghanistan in 2013 did more damage to front-line aircraft than the Taliban managed in the whole of the decade-long campaign in Helmand province. Is it a sensible policy that pays little or no heed to such potentially serious risks to combat capability?

Our complete mastery of the airspace in recent conflicts may also lure some into thinking that future operations will be just as loss-free from enemy action. But a better-resourced and capable opponent could in some future conflict readily inflict operational losses. Even against the less well-trained and equipped Argentinian forces in 1982, we lost half a dozen fighting ships with as many badly damaged, more than a third of our deployed fighter aircraft and numerous helicopters to Argentinian attacks. But we had sufficient strength in numbers to ride out those considerable setbacks. That strength had been procured many years previously and was operationally capable. Today, even small losses could greatly diminish our total combat ORBAT, which so lacks the numerical strength of earlier generations.

As has been mentioned, we pride ourselves that we punch above our weight, but the opposition, too, will doubtless mount some form of counterpunch. To succeed, we must have the resilience and firepower to overcome any form of counterpunch no matter how much damage or destruction it might inflict to our own front-line numbers. Let me say it again: we no longer have such resilience. That could be a critical factor between success and abject failure in future operations.

Even more critical so far as numerical platform strength is concerned is the vital contribution that conventional kinetic power has to play in sustaining and underwriting the credibility of our nuclear deterrent. Previous generations of the deterrent were procured when front-line conventional strength was orders of magnitude greater than what is available today, or likely on present plans to be available in the foreseeable future. Thus, it would have been possible, if faced with some gross threat to national survival, to mount a strong or even sustained conventional response, along with other non-military responses, to the aggressor. This would indicate national resolve and serve to underwrite the determination, if national survival were at stake, and ultimately, after all else had failed to deter or defeat the aggressor, to rely on the threat of a devastating nuclear strike. I fear today that the Government’s determination to remain a nuclear power, which I still support in principle, lacks adequate conventional muscle to underwrite and give a sure credibility to a nuclear deterrent strategy.

What in-depth analysis has been made of a minimum force mix—conventional force mix—that might be necessary to provide the Government of the day with the ability to indicate with strength their resolve to resist an aggressor? Otherwise, due to a paucity of conventional combat power, the Prime Minister could be faced with a most dreadful dilemma: a choice of the very starkest nature. It would be a choice between almost immediate use of a failed deterrent or surrender to the opponent. Does the Minister accept that current levels of conventional hitting power are not yet sufficient to give the deterrent truly believable credibility? Will this aspect of the renewal plan for the four new submarines be given the consideration that it merits in the SDSR work now in hand?

Finally, I return briefly to another issue that I raised, so far without success, in your Lordships’ House. Surely, it is time for the Armed Forces, so much reduced in numbers, to expect and look for some reduction in the number of Ministers with direct responsibility in the Ministry of Defence. I am not singling out personalities: all six of them are most diligent and hard-working, most notably the noble Earl himself. But it should be possible to reapportion responsibilities to have at most five rather than six Ministers on the payroll. Such a discipline has been applied repeatedly over many years within all three services. It would be an important signal to the forces. They have faced redundancies and other cuts. It is time that their Ministers shared in that downsizing burden, allowing the costs saved to be applied elsewhere in the defence budget. It is a reasonable reduction and it is long overdue.