Large parts of Britain’s plan to prepare Britain’s armed forces for war with Russia are not now affordable until after the next election in 2029, one of its lead authors has warned.
The Strategic Defence Review – essentially Britain’s shopping list for war – published last year, was a blueprint for upgrading the UK’s defences against a heightened threat from Vladimir Putin.
It includes plans for boosting cyber defences, new nuclear submarines, increased troop numbers and more munitions factories.
At the time, its authors and the government said the cost of delivering the 62 recommendations would be funded by the existing plans to spend 2.5 per cent of GDP on defence from 2027 and up to 3.5 per cent of GDP by 2035.
But it has emerged that the chief of the defence staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, warned Sir Keir Starmer before Christmas that the Ministry of Defence faces a £28bn shortfall over the next four years, despite the planned increase in spending.
More money needed than originally thought
Gen Sir Richard Barrons, who co-authored the SDR, told The i Paper that stubbornly high inflation and a worsening global security situation, including the escalating “grey war” activity by Moscow, meant the blueprint now needed significantly more money than was originally envisaged.
Barrons said that the SDR plans within the existing spending trajectory were already “tight” at the time of its publication last June, but warned there was now a “dichotomy between the expectations created by the SDR and the reality of a major squeeze in the first two years of its execution”.
He added: “It really should be no surprise that quite a lot of the SDR is not affordable until after the next General Election.
“After more than three decades of reducing the size and hollowing out the readiness of the armed forces (for very understandable reasons) during the post-Cold War era, it is simply the case that there is so little left to cut now that the prospect of making more cuts in order to free resources for these new or emerging tasks is immensely difficult.
“The Government line will always be that it is spending more money on defence now than anybody has ever done before, and that is of course true, but it is also true that in the world we actually now live in it’s just not enough soon enough – and they also know that perfectly well.”
Britain in a ‘grey war’ with Russia
While the next general election is not until 2029, Britain is being dragged into a “grey war” with Putin, with daily cyber attacks, spy ships straying into UK waters and attempts by Russia’s shadow fleet to interfere with its undersea cables, risking a major power cut.
Ministers declared this week that the UK is ready to exert “hard power” against Moscow, including helping the US seize a Russian oil tanker in the north Atlantic. The government said this week it was preparing to “step up” this action against the Russian shadow fleet, including potentially acting alone.
But experts are concerned that these increasing obligations on the UK military are being made without additional resources.
Calls for tax hike to pay for war
Tobias Ellwood, a leading military analyst and former defence minister, warned Britain was already losing the grey war with Russia and called for all UK political parties to back a 1 per cent increase of income tax to fund the shortfall and ready the country for conflict.
The £28bn black hole, first reported by The Times, means that defence chiefs are likely to have to make huge cuts to the military to meet its increasing obligations.
Defence Secretary John Healey and Chancellor Rachel Reeves were also at the meeting in Downing Street, the newspaper reported.
The shortfall is likely to mean multi-billion pound equipment programmes are shelved or delayed, experts warned.
A Defence Investment Plan was due early in 2026 to deliver the SDR’s recommendations, but this is also likely to be delayed.
‘Cut welfare to pay for defence’
An Ajax Ares Armoured Fighting Vehicle, on the training range at Bovington Cam (Photo by Ben Birchall / POOL / AFP) (Photo by BEN BIRCHALL/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)There is speculation that the £6.3bn Ajax armoured vehicle programme, which is already facing problems, could be axed to save money.
Barrons said that the extra money should be found by slashing the UK’s £324bn welfare bill.
He added: “We either find the way to make these changes, difficult as they may be, and find more money for defence sooner, or we are just going to decide to live with the risk that we know what we need to do and elect not to do it.
“If we pursue that as of course, I will argue that we will more likely than not get caught out by serious harm to our national interests that we could and should have prevented.
“If this Government does not put more money into defence sooner than it currently plans, then cuts will have to be made to the SDR outcome that they agreed only some seven months ago.
“Tell me how that works as the UK steps up in Ukraine (which it must in its own interest) and the reality of US hemispheric imperialism takes root?”
Ellwood argued for a cross-party consensus on more money for defence, including a 1 per cent rise in income tax, as a “national call to arms” to fund the shortfall and meet the 3.5 per cent defence spending target faster.
He said investment for more ships and tanks “simply isn’t there”.
‘No votes in defence’
Ellwood added: “We need an honest conversation with the British public to say, ‘No pretence, we cannot do this within the existing budget, without increasing defence spending and without expecting the consequences, including the whole economy will be significantly poorer, including health, education, policing, unless we safeguard our defence posture’.”
“We need to have a sober conversation with the British public. It would get their support.
“At the moment there are no votes in defence because we do not feel the pain. We do not see the threat as people think it is miles away.
“But if we wake up and see we are being attacked every single day by Russia, they are at war with us and we are in denial.
“The grey zone war has started, but we are losing it.
“It is going to take a major seismic event such as a deniable drone attack up the Thames or a massive power outage, for MPs on all sides to say it is time to look behind the sofa to pay for a significant upgrade in defence spending and not wait for 2035, which is when we are promised 3 per cent.”
Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge said: “These reports confirm what we’ve been warning for months – Labour’s plans for defence spending fall a long way short of what is needed to actually keep us safe, in the face of rising threats.
“Labour promised the Defence Investment Plan for last autumn but it’s clearly going to be months late, entirely because the money just isn’t there to fund it.
Defence Secretary John Healeymeets Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Presidential Palace in Kyiv. The UK this week pledged to put troops on the ground in Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire. Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire“The fact is the Budget Red book set out the detailed cost of scrapping the two child benefit cap up to 2031 but nowhere did it say what defence spending will be in that year.
“Labour have prioritised higher welfare spending over defence of the realm and our armed forces are paying the price.”
Defence budget ‘rising to record levels’
An MOD spokesperson said: “The UK defence budget is rising to record levels as this government delivers the biggest boost to defence spending since the Cold War, totalling £270bn this parliament alone.
“Demands on defence are rising, with growing Russian aggression, increasing operational requirements and preparations for a Ukraine deployment.
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“We are working flat out on the Defence Investment Plan, which will fix the outdated, overcommitted, and underfunded defence programme we inherited.”
A government source said Knighton’s role was to provide military advice to the Defence Secretary.
Any operational deployment, including the planned UK troops “reassurance force” in Ukraine agreed earlier this week, will be funded out of the Treasury reserve, the source added.
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