The UK plans to conduct military training of the civilian population

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That idea will last about ten seconds in the idiot house.

About time chain mail got a fashion update though, aimed at the perforated armour linked article.......
 
So much can be said about this.
But is not going to be a nice clean unpolitical subject.
Especially since it treads into the nature of the state, the people, culture and Current Political Ideological Conformity.
And worse this a UK topic so the usual anti-nation, anti-state, and anti-british attitudes are inevitable.
All will muddy the waters and drag this topic into flames....and maybe worse.

Is this an appropriate topic for this forum?
 
The Guardian ran a piece on this yesterday. The comments were pretty much as you'd expect.
The article pretty much sums it up:
What Sanders describes may seem an implausibly big ask of a squabbling country that currently seems incapable of facing down some light resistance to housebuilding in Surrey, never mind mobilising for war in Europe.
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www.theguardian.com

For generations Britain has taken peace for granted. But a belligerent Putin could change all that | Gaby Hinsliff

A senior general has warned Britons to prepare to take up arms against Russia. He’s not alone in raising the alarm, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
 
There is no argument for a British Army of the Baltic. Beyond a force purely for show.
It can never be on the scale or recieve the undivided support and attention to anything but a minor player on the European Continent.

France, Germany and Poland are better placed and the latter two are less encumbered by divided attention.
Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Austria, Czech Republic and Slovakia, Sweden and Finland are all also less divided in attention.

There is a case for expanding the Navy and maybe the RAF.....and maybe configuring the Army for ease of deployment at key points to tip a balance or relieve others from guard duties.
There is a case for support of such Continental Powers, through logistics and training.
But....
Any attempt to raise the Army up without raising the Navy or RAF and site said Army back on European soil in bulk is nothing but a tax upon the UK.

There is even a case for re-expansion of our Nuclear Arsenal. But not for depleting the civilian economy of personnel to save Continental Powers the effort of raising their own forces.
 
starviking said:
Just give the solders, sailors, airmen/women, and RFA bods decent wages, good perks, and decent conditions and the problems will be solved.
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Or better yet, recruit for the RFA from among the hundreds of thousands of competent South and East Asian mariners. Or recruit for the Army from the masses of trained Colombians or traditional Nepalese Gurkhas. The reality is that most affluent Westerners aren’t inclined to be away from home for months and be subjected to arcane military discipline to risk life and limb in pointless expeditionary warfare.
 
It's not actually clear any Western European nation has the national unity or fiscal and industrial capability to reach the 2% defense spending goal, much less field a major army of any serious capability.

Military training of the civilian population may be, at this point, as much a preparation for civil war as a military measure.

Maybe, as an initial measure, the UK could try to keep its steel factories open? That falls in the realm of SMART goals.
 
DrRansom said:
It's not actually clear any Western European nation has the national unity or fiscal and industrial capability to reach the 2% defense spending goal, much less field a major army of any serious capability.

Military training of the civilian population may be, at this point, as much a preparation for civil war as a military measure.

Maybe, as an initial measure, the UK could try to keep its steel factories open? That falls in the realm of SMART goals.
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We cant actually keep the steel mill open because we sold it, thats right the last blast furnace in Britain is owned by Tata Steel.

Absolutely fundamentally defence critical infrastructure sold off to "chequebook/whoever", (which is by the way certainly treason against the state under at least one law), once you`ve done that, any discussion afterwards about having a military which can do more than perhaps frighten off a couple of gunboats run by pirates is an entirely moot point.

Britain has been sold off piece by piece more or less since the 50`s and I think some of that has been masked by an incredibly lucky victory in the Falklands. Had it happened even a couple of years later we`d never have even been able to send the task force, let alone win.

Since then its been downhill at 1000mph.

The smug criticism of Russian armoured vehicles recently makes me cringe, we`re a hairs breadth from being a basket case nation ourselves in terms of the "conventional" war capacity.
 
It’s basically the same in Germany, some of the steel mills are already part of Tata, but what even worries me more is that many highly skilled companies like foundries are all being sold out. The high electricity and gas prices destroyed their business model, despite being having skills which are based on decades of experiences and being able to provide high quality small batches of castings, they can hardly survive. Salesmen from China and Turkey are travelling trough Germany and by everything about casting equipment they can for little money and this is surly not the only branch which is affected…

You should know, that Van der Leyen was our defense minister and she really made the Bundeswehr dysfunctional. She flooded the Ministry and the Bundeswehr with countless consultants from Mc Kinsey (btw, she seems to have a kind of a very close relationship with Katrin Suder from Mc Kinsey) and established an uncontrollable corrupt system which cost Billions Euros of taxpayer money but made the majority of tanks, helicopters, planes, guns …. Unusable. Marcon, who has also a stron relationship with McKinsey made her the president of the European commission, without any democratic legitimac
 
Nicknick said:
It’s basically the same in Germany, some of the steel mills are already part of Tata, but what even worries me more is that many highly skilled companies like foundries are all being sold out. The high electricity and gas prices destroyed their business model, despite being having skills which are based on decades of experiences and being able to provide high quality small batches of castings, they can hardly survive. Salesmen from China and Turkey are travelling trough Germany and by everything about casting equipment they can for little money and this is surly not the only branch which is affected…

You should know, that Van der Leyen was our defense minister and she really made the Bundeswehr dysfunctional. She flooded the Ministry and the Bundeswehr with countless consultants from Mc Kinsey (btw, she seems to have a kind of a very close relationship with Katrin Suder from Mc Kinsey) and established an uncontrollable corrupt system which cost Billions Euros of taxpayer money but made the majority of tanks, helicopters, planes, guns …. Unusable. Marcon, who has also a stron relationship with McKinsey made her the president of the European commission, without any democratic legitimac
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I know some people who stopped using British Steel in the 1980`s because for ultra high (i.e. absolute state of the art) metallurgical purity you could get slightly better (i.e a bit less sulphur etc) steels from insanely expensive bespoke specialists like Aubert & Duvall (French).

These days though, I`ve talked to people in purchasing depts of British firms who long for the steel quality that they got from British Steel in Sheffield, the stuff now all comes from the far east and the variation from batch to batch, is unbelievable, and its highly doubtful if the material actually complies with the standard its sold under. Its far worse than was available here in the 80`s, but hey we saved 25% on our material costs ! so Yay !

(now with the cost of shipping and the gradual erosion of the cost benefit in China, this saving may actually not really exist to a huge degree now, but its too late).

Sorry for the doom and gloom, but I have literally 0% optimism for the happy conclusion of this issue.
 
I do not think Western Europe will have much military capability by the end of this decade. The combined social, financial, and industrial problems seem bad from the outside, and I'm sure are positively catastrophic to those in the know.

So perhaps the plea for conscription is genuine, the UK doesn't have enough recruits and numbers are trending worse and there's no potential for any improvement.

Which leads to the absolutely fascinating (from a purely theoretical point-of-view) situation: what happens when a whole collection of countries lack any military capability? If the total military force that France, Britain, and Germany can muster in 6 years is about 1 poorly armed light-division, what happens?
 
TinWing said:
Or better yet, recruit for the RFA from among the hundreds of thousands of competent South and East Asian mariners. Or recruit for the Army from the masses of trained Colombians or traditional Nepalese Gurkhas. The reality is that most affluent Westerners aren’t inclined to be away from home for months and be subjected to arcane military discipline to risk life and limb in pointless expeditionary warfare.
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A certain Machiavelli had words to say about mercenaries.....

Or are you wanting the British Army to imitate Rome?

As for the idea that Europe cannot raise and equip armies. There is only one significant impediment, which is the lack of will to do so by the Elites.
 
zen said:
As for the idea that Europe cannot raise and equip armies. There is only one significant impediment, which is the lack of will to do so by the Elites.
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Where will you find the money? That means cutting social programs, a hardly politically palatable measure. Where you find the machinery? Europe has chosen to will-fully de-industrialize and reconstituting that will take time, money, and educational talent. Where will you find the people? Most European countries have deep internal divisions that feature the young population increasingly pitted into warring racial camps. Where will you find the leaders? European highly educated elite have whole-heartedly bought into the political and economic mindset that put their nations into the current crisis and - based on the leaders of the populist opposition - it isn't clear there's a good replacement.

If those four issues can be somewhat solved, then there's a potential for military revival. But current trends point towards those four issues worsening.
 
DrRansom said:
Where will you find the money?
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The money can be 'found' if need be. Literally more money than has ever previously existed has been conjured since 2007.
DrRansom said:
That means cutting social programs, a hardly politically palatable measure. Where you find the machinery?
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Yes it probably does mean cuts elsewhere. A choice people will make if necessary.
Machinery can be built.
DrRansom said:
Where will you find the people?
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There is enough compered to the threat.
DrRansom said:
Where will you find the leaders?
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The potential is there. Only current ideological constraints prevent them. A choice between ideology and survival is no choice.
 
zen said:
A certain Machiavelli had words to say about mercenaries.....

Or are you wanting the British Army to imitate Rome?

As for the idea that Europe cannot raise and equip armies. There is only one significant impediment, which is the lack of will to do so by the Elites.
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Machiavelli:
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Using competent foreign merchant mariners to crew RFA ships or raising a fully manned Brigade of Gurkhas wouldn’t bring down Britain.

In all seriousness, the “will of the elites” is typically behind any war. I’m sure than men like General Blood-and-Guts would be more than happy to reenact the First World War, if given the chance.
 
starviking said:
Just give the solders, sailors, airmen/women, and RFA bods decent wages, good perks, and decent conditions and the problems will be solved.
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That's probably the real intent of the speech - "-or we could just..." is the unspoken part.
 
The much maligned Neville Chamberlain appreciated that Britain could not imitate Germany and wreck its economy to rearm in the 1930s.
A sober analysis of the threats and the resources needed to meet them should be a priority after this year's UK elections
As with previous such reviews noone will be happy with the outcome but we are a parliamentary democracy not a gangster Republic so just keep calm and carry on.
 
I wouldn't raise Chamberlain, as he is amongst the litany of figures who walked us into WWII on the basis of his arrogance and stupidity.
 
What utter scaremongering bullshit by the British government and military alike. It's almost 'Reds Scare 4.0'.
This whole 'Russia invading Western Europe' narrative by the West definitely has hairs on it. The West's schizophrenic narrative of
Russia supposedly being defeated by Ukraine on the one hand and yet they're supposed to be preparing to race to the English Channel in a Blitzkrieg fashion, whilst cleaning up Sweden, Finland, Poland and Germany.....in the process - please neocons, give me a break.

Why do I get the feeling that this British/NATO force build-up has more to do with facing off against China rather than Russia and a few other adventures like Iran in the meantime.

The fact is Britain, no matter how fanciful it wants to be, gob off and beat the drum, is not and hasn't been a world power for half a century and as such, it needs to organise it's military accordingly. The fantasy that Britain can be a pseudo power by being the Deputy of the United States all around the world is ridiculous and more and more embarrassing (to which I can relate being an Australian, seeing and experiencing this blind political and military subordination). Britain's historical overreach has literally economically broken it twice before. It's obviously learnt two parts of FA.

Now we have talk of the U.S. redeploying nukes in Britain.....If this is the case, then what is Britain's so-called independent nuclear deterrent for?

Regards
Pioneer
 
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Okay, safe to say that no-one here is signing praises for this concept/think-out-loud.

I'm curious though, how would this civvies-in-uniform/uniformed-civvies scheme differ from the Home Guard of WW2? And did the Home Guard actually provide a useful service in freeing up troops for the 'sharp end'? Or is that a myth?
 
Preparing the population of a nation for a not-wholly-unreasonably-likely war is sensible. That assumes that the population *wants* to defend the nation as it stands. If, however, a sizable fraction of the population of a nation wants to tear that nation down and replace it with something very different, the idea of a unified defense kinda falls apart.
 
Orionblamblam said:
Preparing the population of a nation for a not-wholly-unreasonably-likely war is sensible. That assumes that the population *wants* to defend the nation as it stands. If, however, a sizable fraction of the population of a nation wants to tear that nation down and replace it with something very different, the idea of a unified defense kinda falls apart.
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Exactly.

I am not looking forward to the results of November 2024.
 
I doubt that we need so many soldiers in the future, instead I'm thinking on a combination of the two major topics of current times, drones and AI. We will still need a decent number of soldiers for maintenance, intelligence, communication, but even here, AI will have a great impact. Currently we see the success of remote-controlled weapons (Azerbaijan/Armenia and of course Russia/Ukraine) which will be likely replaced by AI controlled weapons in future. Surviving on a battleground will become a question of minutes and not days. It might even become unclear were the frontline is, if small self-reliant drones (flying, riving, swimming, diving…) will be able to protrude every defense system at least partially.

Totally independent from that, it is important to use the money efficiently, Van der Leyen as defence Minister was a perfect example for the opposite. To give you one example, under the rule of Van der Leyen/McKinsey already ordered weapon systems were changed to orders without spare parts and ammunition. The Bundeswehr e.g. had to cannibalize new helicopters to keep at least some flyable. A tank without ammunition is worthless, something at least, we recently learned to understand…
 
Apophenia said:
I'm curious though, how would this civvies-in-uniform/uniformed-civvies scheme differ from the Home Guard of WW2? And did the Home Guard actually provide a useful service in freeing up troops for the 'sharp end'? Or is that a myth?
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Yes and no.
In 1940 it was a desperate attempt to get as many men outside of the recruiting age range into service, it boosted manpower but they were short of weapons and leadership was probably very patchy at that time. But it did provide an important boost to morale.
Until Dunkirk the 'Phoney War' was a genuine thing, most people were ambivalent, fighting for Poland sounded fair on paper but Poland had fallen without Britain barely lifting a finger. Hitler's ally Stalin invaded Finland and again Britain and France did nothing. There was rationing but few air raids. It seemed like the war would be in France and they would cop the brunt of it and Britain would muddle on, a bit hungry maybe, but without any major disruption. Effort was half-arsed. Then France collapsed and panic set in. It could have gone either way - abject defeatism or nationalistic chest-beating bluster. The latter won out. The Home Guard was part of that, instilling a way to get everyone involved. Once the Battle of Britain began, everyone knew it was backs to the wall time given the Germans had rampaged over everyone.
But by 1942 the bulk of the Army was sitting on its arse in barracks with a few troops in the Middle East and Far East (plus its massive Indian Army - a mercenary force if ever there was one) and Colonial and Dominion troops. Britain was nowhere near alone. But by 1942 the Americans were a little hacked off at Churchill's pleading for men and tanks for the 8th Army when he had tens of thousands of troops sat on their arses peeling spuds in Britain. The bulk of the Army did not begin to fight until 1944. Partly due to training, partly invasion fears, partly husbanding.

And of course we already have the Territorial Army, RAFVR and the Maritime Reserve as civvies in uniform.
You'd be amazed how many schoolkids you see in combat fatigues walking to school some days, the Army Cadet Force, Air Training Corps and Sea Cadets Corps are very popular (at least up here in the north). As of 1st April 2023 there were 38,180 in the Army Cadets, 26,000 in the ATC, 13,730 in the Sea Cadets and around 42,000 in the Combined Cadet Force (which mainly operates in private schools). How that translates into forces recruitment in practice I don't know. There are of course VR organisations in universities with lead-in to officer training (University Air Squadrons etc.), but these seem to have a lower profile.
 
Orionblamblam said:
Preparing the population of a nation for a not-wholly-unreasonably-likely war is sensible. That assumes that the population *wants* to defend the nation as it stands. If, however, a sizable fraction of the population of a nation wants to tear that nation down and replace it with something very different, the idea of a unified defense kinda falls apart.
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The problem is that any threat of war requiring conscription and the revival of “Dad’s Army” is entirely imaginary. If Hitler‘s invasion of Czechoslovakia had turned into a 2 year long stalemate, it seems unlikely that he could have managed the conquest of Poland, let alone the Battle of France or any other great victory. Putin is not going to make his way to Warsaw, let along to Paris or the English Channel. If anything, the threat level to NATO is far higher in the Red Sea than in the Baltic or Black Sea. Britain needs a deployable navy not a rabble of civilians preparing for a false threat.
 
Hood said:
There are of course VR organisations in universities with lead-in to officer training (University Air Squadrons etc.), but these seem to have a lower profile.
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There are about 15 units for each service nationally, vs 160 universities. Obviously if you're at one of the London, Oxford or Cambridge colleges it doesn't make much difference if the local unit is in a neighbouring college, but if it's a couple of hours away it gets much more difficult. I looked into URNU when I was at Lancaster in the '80s, but the local unit was in Liverpool and I couldn't make the timing work with my courses, though some did.
 
TinWing said:
Putin is not going to make his way to Warsaw, let along to Paris or the English Channel.
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Hitler did not have any real strategic air bombardment force. While Putin is unlikely to invade Britain, he has the ability to rain nukes all over the country. Why and whether he would do such a thing is debatable, but he has the *ability.* And in that event, the Brits will need some sort of "Dad's Army" to pick up the pieces and to fight the inevitable warlords and other internal strife.
 
Apophenia said:
Okay, safe to say that no-one here is signing praises for this concept/think-out-loud.

I'm curious though, how would this civvies-in-uniform/uniformed-civvies scheme differ from the Home Guard of WW2? And did the Home Guard actually provide a useful service in freeing up troops for the 'sharp end'? Or is that a myth?
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Apophenia is talking the most sense here.
The greatest challenge is weaning the youth off of their soft living and electronic masters and training them to think beyond their tiny, self-centered bubble.
I advocate a “gap year” of “living rough” in the interests of national service. Teenagers are often immature and “direction-less” when they graduate high-school, so I advocate a gap-year away from their home town. Traditionally, sons and daughters of wealthy families did the “grand tour of Europe” where they sowed their wild oats and prayed for crop failure.
Hah!
Hah!
They also learned more subtle lessons about train schedules and living on a budget and doing their own laundry, etc.
Similarly, traditionally sons and daughters of poor families got “Mc-jobs” in the fast-food industry. After a year of flipping boring burgers, they enrolled in trades colleges to learn better-paying skills.

Physical fitness is one challenge, considering that currently only …. say … 25 percent of American youths are physically fit enough to join the US Army. But the greater challenge is weaning youth off their need for the hundreds of dopamine hits provided by their electronic baby-sitters … er … cell phones. A decade ago, a U.S. Army staff Sargent told me that the biggest challenge for recruits was going without their cell-phones for weeks at a time.
So the challenge is teaching youths how to get their dopamine hits via physical labor and team-work.
A year of living rough in a forest can teach youths how to live without their cell phones. And - trust me - cell phones are going to be one of the first parts of the first-world that will collapse when the next war hits.

We have a dozen workable solutions to chose from.
For example, back during the Cold War, all West German men were subject to the draft. HOWEVER, fire-fighters and medical professionals were exempt from military service.
The need for thousands of Civil-Defence workers (fire fighters, medics, plumbers, electricians, etc.) was pounded into Germans during the mass bombing campaigns of WW2.

Hint: last summer (2023) Canada could have used a few thousand short-service forest fire fighters. Fighting fires is dangerous and difficult and miserable work that toughens the mind and body. Fire-fighting is also a good way to learn basic manual skills, while building muscle and team-work.
Tough minds and bodies are what is needed to defend countries. Who cares whether those young minds and bodies were toughened while driving a fire truck or and ambulance or a tank. Remember that modern mechanized armies need 2 or 3 support staff: drivers, mechanics, signallers, cooks, blanket-stackers, etc. to support a single front-line soldier.

Or perhaps we could implement the Danish model of conscription during the Cold War, when (non-violent) conscientious objectors could opt to do their national service in fire halls or hospitals or old folks homes or archeological digs.

Military conscription also worked well to reinforce national unity under the Swiss model of conscription. Italian-speaking conscripts from Locarno were sent to French or German-speaking cantons for their military service while French-speaking recruits were sent to Locarno or German-speaking cantons. This practice reinforces bi-lingualism or tri-lingualism and forged bonds of life-long friendship, comaradery, team spirit and national unity. At the end of their national service Swiss Army recruits conclude that it may have been a cold and wet and hungry and tired year, but it was still a huge improvement on all the stupid and bloody and destructive wars fought by their Austrian and Italian and French and German neighbours.

A side benefit of learning other languages is that it broadens the mind. For example, I was essentially uni-lingual when I joined the Canadian Army at age 17, but a summer of immersion (CFB Valcartier) taught me the entire vocabulary of Quebecois cuss words. Later while stationed in West Germany, I learned to speak German. Later civilian travels taught me the basics of Spanish. I now greet my co-workers in another dozen languages.

In conclusion, I advocate a “gap-year” of “living rough” to get youths’ minds out of their cell phones and broaden their minds to include their entire country. Whether they learn physical fitness while fighting fires or playing war games is a minor difference.
 
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I think there's some essential background missing from this discussion.

1) Internationally he's the third NATO/Soon to be NATO head of service to say this since December after Sweden and Germany. Fourth when you add the Dutch head of the NATO Military Committee. I assumed there's at least informal coordination.

2) The German Defence Minister said something not too different on Thursday https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...oris-pistorius-military-unfit-europe-problems

3) Locally, Sanders has had a ding-dong battle with the Chief of the Defence Staff - Admiral Sir Tony Radakin - over intra-service spending priorities, lost, and been asked to step down a year early. He's in the nothing to lose stage of his career.

I think there's multiple points made in his speech:
That we need a conversation about reversing defence spending cuts at the political level. Parts of Europe are doing this, but the Tories are still in military cuts mode, even if they're mooting a defence budget of 2.5% rather than 2% of GDP at some indefinite point in the future, but the chances of them being in power long enough to be held to that seem poor. As to whether that's affordable, we spent the Cold War at around 4% and there's 12 years of sustained tax cuts that can easily be reversed. He's undoubtedly aiming at getting both parties to make defence spending pledges in an election year.

That civil society needs to start looking at the potential of a prolonged confrontation with Russia. Remember, the Cold War's a distant memory for the parents of the kids coming up towards service entry age, never mind the kids themselves, people don't have the thought patterns for evaluating and living with that (cf opposition in Germany towards confrontation with Russia, though Putin seems to have largely fixed that on his own, with the sole exception of the far-right AfD). We're at the point even the Chief of the Defence Staff was commissioned after the end of the Cold War.

WRT the citizen soldier thing, I wouldn't be surprised to see that morph into calls to reinforce the Army Reserve (Territorial Army as was, i.e. the UK version of the National Guard). Remember, much of the mobilisation strength of BAOR during the Cold War came from mobilised TAVR infantry battalions, it wasn't just the US with their own version of REFORGER.

I think he's wrong when he calls this a 1937 moment, however Ukraine plays out, Russia will need time to refit and incorporate lessons learnt, it feels more like a 1934 or a 1947, 10 years from a putative "year of maximum danger". (Yes, Hitler went early).

Though if Trump wins in November and hauls the US out of NATO, then Putin may be tempted to chance his arm sooner. Remember, he's a spy, not a general, and thinks he can get things by clever risk taking.
 
I don't see how Russia could beat Poland, Germany and France. The last will launch rather than endure such a defeat and then we're all getting a case of the mushroom clouds.

I'm not convinced the UK or it's Ministers would gain enough to reverse the trend long since rooted in their basic assumptions of how to rule the UK.

Frankly such a reversal risks the current Elite being too exposed by their incompetence and being cycled out of power.

The idea they'd run such risks to create a large standing army without the Cold War threat is going to expose them, correctly so, to effective criticism at every level. From strategy to the particulars of recruitment.

This could be painted correctly as nothing but a tax to subsidise continent powers. All for Generals to get bragging rights?
For ministers to sit at the 'top table'?
 
I suggest in the UK, and Australia, and several other NATO countries, have all issued variations on this theme, is the real message, that we need to give more support to Ukraine now, so us nice soft pension planned home owning westerners wont have to go to or send our sons(and daughters?) to war.

UK has taken the 'peace dividend' now its time to spend it back into Défense, starting with a 15% pay rise.

@zen point is spot on, that UK would be better to strengthen our Navy and Air force, which will take longer than just raising another 100k of troops.

We need a plan:
Build more of the current production systems - typhoon, boxer, frigates.
Recruit and train the officers and techies for these new kit.
Setup the bases for them.
Get on with it.

Really not rocket science.
 
I think, Putin totally underestimated the effort it would take to defeat Ukraine, shortly before the beginning of the war, he sends intelligence stuff to Kiew which should take over the government shortly after the first attack. Now it lasts already two years and the front is stuck. Both sides are slowly bleeding out of men and material. His war might still be supported by a large part of the Russians, but I totally disbelieve that starting a new world war is a popular idea in Russia, even among the leadership (with exceptions). Attacking GB and unavoidably all the other countries on the way, would be totally insane. Sure, he could send nukes, but what could hardly trained civilians do against that thread?

I do agree, that one year in the military can be a valuable experience for young people, but often it is just waisted time. I had friends (in Germany) who were slightly disabled and spend one year almost entirely in an office with cooking and serving coffee without any proper job left to do. It is quite weighty impact in your personal freedom which has to be justified.

About the young generation and their cell phones, don’t forget that computer nerds and drone pilots can be much more useful in a war than physical fit sport asses!
 
I still think a thorough defence review is needed not least to deal with the points raised here.
I also defend Chamberlain's refusal to sacrifice the economy to rearmament. Britain became bankrupt in any case but only in order to secure US support.
Putin is not Hitler or the Soviet Union but he is one of a growing number of Mussolini style despots who want to build empires in their regions and challenge international rules. Individually they can and should be stopped by sanctions and force but there is a risk of too many such conflicts breaking out at once.
 
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uk 75 said:
Individually they can and should be stopped by sanctions and force but there is a risk of too many such conflicts breaking out at once.
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This is the sensible view, and the only logical justification for any military increase.

That we might have to deploy forces to multiple fronts.

Rather like Afghanistan and Iraq. Though hopefully not like those specific instances.

But we might need to resurrect 'reinforce Norway' and 'support Denmark/Schleswig-Holstein', and we might need to support say Guyana or aid Australia and Singapore or intervene in West Africa.
And of course trouble, like buses, comes in multiples.

So rather than a large continental army, the logical UK view is multiple smaller forces deployed simultaneously.

However as I said elsewhere....
In their own words.
https://obr.uk/forecasts-in-depth/brief ... -finances/

"In 2023-24, we expect it to raise £1,058 billion, equivalent to around £37,000 per household or 41.1 per cent of national income."

And
"In 2023-24, we expect it to spend £1,189 billion, equivalent to around £42,000 per household or 46.2 per cent of national income."

We are 131.6 billion short from the last financial year.

" In 2023-24, we expect debt to be equivalent to 103.1 per cent of national income. It is equivalent to around £2.7 trillion or £95,000 per household. We expect the ratio of net debt to national income to peak in 2023-24 "

The plan is to get debt falling gradually to reach 96.9 per cent in 2027-28.
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Although the US appears about to return to isolation and even hostility to other democracies from January 2025 the remaining countries are nowhere near as feeble as the democracies were in the 1930s.
The two great economies of Japan and Germany are open societies with a strong awareness of where repression and dictators can lead.
The neutral countries in many cases are now active participants in collective defence.
Britain and France have small but effective nuclear deterrents which act as longstops against Munichlike blackmail.
Australia, Canada and New Zealand are strong forthright democracies.
But other nations have chosen an anti-western position influenced in part (India and South Africa) by an understandable mistrust of former colonial powers but also by growing self-confidence and desire not to be bossed around.
The legacy of failed nations or partitioned nations are the well armed terrorist/criminal groups that infest every continent. These continue to be a daily threat.
 
Nicknick said:
... About the young generation and their cell phones, don’t forget that computer nerds and drone pilots can be much more useful in a war than physical fit sport asses!
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Too true.

And I note that the ROK Army is easing its restrictions on off-duty smartphone use by new recruits. No doubt, current demographic panics are prompting fresh looks at morale loss related to the previous absence of 'connectedness'.
 
riggerrob said:
... Hint: last summer (2023) Canada could have used a few thousand short-service forest fire fighters. Fighting fires is dangerous and difficult and miserable work that toughens the mind and body. Fire-fighting is also a good way to learn basic manual skills, while building muscle and team-work.
Tough minds and bodies are what is needed to defend countries. Who cares whether those young minds and bodies were toughened while driving a fire truck or and ambulance or a tank. Remember that modern mechanized armies need 2 or 3 support staff: drivers, mechanics, signallers, cooks, blanket-stackers, etc. to support a single front-line soldier.

Or perhaps we could implement the Danish model of conscription during the Cold War, when (non-violent) conscientious objectors could opt to do their national service in fire halls or hospitals or old folks homes or archeological digs...
Click to expand...

Excellent points. In BC, a lot of those wildfire-fighters are tree-planters the rest of the time. Mainly a bunch of back-to-the-land hippy types, but if you're looking for tough ...

I too like the Scandinavian model - have those who want to join up, compete for their most desired spots. Then there those elements of the 'tail' that don't require completely soldierly qualities. For conscientious objectors and other who are simply 'not in the vein', follow (and expand on) the Danish example.
 
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