There are trade-offs, and I don't think the UK can afford expeditionary capabilities like the Carriers, CASD, British Army on the Vistula, and ROTOR 2.0 simultaneously, certainly not without spending as a proportion of GDP probably greatly in excess of that of the early 1950s.
I have been musing about small nation defence policy for a long time, as it is extremely interesting to see how different militaries would have to plan for their specific geostrategic needs. The UK is not a small nation, nor is it a small economy, but the changing defence reality since the 1990's has forced it to change in various degrees. Now, we see a combination of overseas deployments to trouble spots around the world, as well as the threat of a wider, large conventional conflict in Eastern Europe, not to mention the Pacific.
In this perspective, the Royal Navy and Airforce take importance, as they can deploy rapidly and flexibly. One can see this in the way that funding is going, and given that the RN needs some big capabilities to solve its current issues, they will likely be given precedence for the time being.
My view is that the Army has had two schools of thought who have competed against each other since the end of the Second World War; those who favour heavy forces and those who favour lighter forces. I think that this only really leads to a "split personality" of the British Army, with two doctrines that attempt to work together but struggle to do so. I think that this split however, could be made to work in favour of the UK. A British Army on the Vistula is frankly not necessary; the realities of the Cold War are completely different to those we face today. During the Cold War, the Warsaw Pact had a huge numerical advantage compared to NATO, in addition to the fact that the line of conflict was in Central Europe, mostly along the Inner German Border, Denmark and Czechoslovakia. This meant that a failure to defend Germany would directly threaten France and the Low Countries. Thus, it was imperative that these countries had large, mechanised armies to defend their territory, in addition to large conventional forces from other Allied powers, the UK included. Now however, the border has moved hundreds of kilometres east, towards the Baltics, Kaliningrad and Belarus. This means that the frontline (once played by Germany, the Low Countries, etc.) is now principally being played by Poland. I would argue that these countries, the UK included, shouldn't fund large conventional armies because they don't really need to.
Instead the focus should be on having a mix of forces, with heavier forces forward deployed to Central Poland. I think the idea of NATO Battlegroups with rotational commands should be continued and enhanced. The rapid build-up of forces in the area showed that they have merit, in my opinion. I think forward deploying "heavy" forces, with Challenger 3s and Ajax to Central Poland, alongside other NATO forces would be quite beneficial to the British Army. I do agree that 148 MBTs is not good, but if one is to increase numbers, is the answer necessarily MBTs? I would argue that there is room for a new type of force, a "medium" one, principally armed with Boxers. The advantage of using Boxers is that they can more or less self-deploy, and would have a much more limited logistics tail compared to heavier forces. These would be ideal as a mobile reserve, with some deployed to Poland or the Baltics, and the rest remaining in the UK for rapid response. These would be further complemented by "light" forces, which would mainly focus on rapid intervention to trouble spots all over the world. Reserves can also be integrated into these to form a sort of Gendarmarie or Carabanieri, similar to what was suggested above. Within these reserves there can also be integrated some better trained units which can do counter-SOF/counterterrorism to a degree, and in wartime can either be deployed around the UK, or as a mobile reserve elsewhere. Ideally, such forces would also be air-mobile, potentially even by helicopter.
The use of such forces would require more transport aircraft. Perhaps the Voyagers not in use with the RAF and leased to civilian needs can instead be put forward for a NATO-led strategic airlift/tanker capacity, so they get some use out of them.
The RAF is now down to 5 main operational airfields spread across the UK, there is the HQ at High Wycombe and the Air and Space Warfare Centre at Waddington.
The RN is now down to two major operational ports Devonport/Portsmouth and Clyde. HQ is in Portsmouth.
The national HQ is Northwood, north-west London.
This could potentially be seen as an advantage, as while that is fewer places to attack, it also means fewer places to defend, and it can make hardening defences around those areas much easier. Firstly, I would personally begin building hardened-aircraft shelters. I think in the era of long-ranged munitions and FPV drones, I think its borderline unacceptable to leave aircraft in the open. I would also increase anti-drone protection around these areas, and slowly start increasing air defence capabilities over time. I don't think that stuffing airfields full of missiles is necessary at all, but perhaps a couple of ABM systems around the country with wide area coverage could be enough? Iron Dome is far from necessary, and at this point it's just being used as a buzz-phrase for anything related to integrated air defence.
I would like to hear your thoughts about this, as I'm certain that some mistakes have been made in my judgement, or maybe I wasn't clear in my explanation, I apologise if that is the case. I do understand that implementing such policies would be quite challenging as well.
