Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy

Lord Houghton of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 22nd April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Houghton of Richmond (CB)]

My Lords, time is short so I will not waste too much of it on congratulations. I also think a huge amount of the review is to be welcomed. It presents a largely compelling view of the global security context and the defence and security challenges we face. I wholly agree about the character of a far more competitive world—one that exists in a perpetual state of aggressive, but primarily non-kinetic, rivalry below the threshold of what we have previously viewed as formalised warfare.

In principle, I do not take issue with the theory of achieving military advantage through technological superiority, though I worry that the seductive nature of technical novelty has led to a premature gamble on a further reduction in military capacity. I suspect that the true state of the defence budget is the reason for this gamble. I applaud the further moves to integrate action on multiple fronts and the need for a strategy of persistent engagement. I regret the review’s lack of emphasis on allies.

I have more serious reservations about the review. To explain them requires a short digression into some military doctrine: specifically, the three subordinate components of what we call fighting power. They are: the physical component, the means to fight—tanks, planes and ships; the conceptual component, by which the physical capabilities are coherently employed—strategy, operational art and tactics; and the moral component—the ability to get people to fight, which I abbreviate as the integrity of leadership combined with the moral superiority of purpose. The military doctrine of our nation believes that the full potential of fighting power is realised only when all three of these components are working in harmony.

I believe you can apply those components to an assessment of this review. The review is pretty good at the physical component. Indeed, historically the outcome of many reviews has been judged on that element alone: is the right amount of money being spent on the most appropriate equipment, human capability or departmental activity? Where the review lacks clarity is in accepting that in the context of our two principle threats, China and Russia, our most important weapons are not physical ones: rather, they lie in the cognitive domain. We need a more compelling narrative that better justifies our sense of moral authority and the superiority of the values that we promote and defend. This is why the moral component is so important, but I fear it is the moral component of our nation that is currently damaged because our national integrity is under threat. Brexit, the state of the union, tensions over race, the alienation of politics from society, the continued maldistribution of wealth and opportunity, and sleaze: all these things combine in varying degrees to undermine our integrity, and therefore our moral superiority, in a war of ideas.

The review has described some of the conceptual component, but the description is somewhat abstract and short of explanation as to how ideas are operationalised in practice. For example, what is the ethical, moral and legal framework within which we deploy autonomous weapons, harness artificial intelligence, destroy space-based targets and initiate or threaten offensive cyberattacks? In the battle of competing narratives about what is normal and legitimate, how do we successfully attribute the false claims and illegal acts of our enemies? How does our political leadership sustain legitimacy for its actions? How much of what is envisaged will be disclosed to society? Does the requisite of government even exist to fight this war? Who are the architects of the enduring strategy? Who are the authors of the competing political narratives, and how are the narratives disseminated? Can the NSC really achieve all this sitting for an hour every other Tuesday?

I suppose my fundamental question is: having identified through this review the Government’s best estimate of the character of future war, have we both the machinery and the mentality to prosecute the necessary campaign successfully? Are we both ready and organised for what we have apparently just discovered? My fear is that the war has started and that, at least for now, we are firmly on the defensive.