Our understaffed army lacks ammunition
20 years ago, Britain conducted exercises that showed the unreliability of equipment, a shortage of spare parts and fuel. To date, little has changed. The author of the article talks about a hypothetical war with Russia and admits that Britain is powerless against it.
Edward Lucas
Russia knows that due to years of complacency and spending cuts, the British Armed Forces are poorly armed and equipped.
In the event of a war with Russia, every soldier's nightmare will come true for the British armed forces. The details are quite correctly kept secret (but for Russians they are hardly). But the overall picture is clear, and it is very gloomy: Britain does not have enough forces and means to carry out the main combat mission.
Retired General Ben Hodges, who commanded American troops in Europe, told MPs that the British ground forces had run out of "all important ammunition" on the eighth day of last year's Warfighter exercises. The participants of the military conference held last week were informed that with the intensity of firing like Russia, we will run out of artillery ammunition in two days.
The danger increases due to geography. The most likely theater of military operations for British soldiers today is Estonia, located at a distance of 2,400 kilometers, which will take a day to overcome. Our ability to transfer a large number of military equipment and supplies over such distances, even in peacetime, has not been tested by anyone. When we run out of conventional ammunition, only Americans who are fighting beyond the limits of their capabilities or nuclear weapons will be able to save us from defeat. If Russia holds out in the first week, it will win.
Our troubles are caused by tremendous complacency. The Kremlin has been threatening its neighbors since the 1990s. And we focused on making money in this country. It has been 20 years since Britain last conducted major tank exercises. It was in Oman in 2001. The exercises demonstrated the unreliability of equipment, a shortage of spare parts, fuel and other supplies. Since then, these problems have only worsened in many cases. As Justin Bronk of the Royal United Institute of Defense Research notes, we have focused on the production of munitions such as Paveway IV laser-guided bombs, which have high accuracy and low explosive power. They are ideal for fighting lightly armed Afghan insurgents, in which it is important to minimize civilian casualties. But they are much less useful in a big war against Russia.
Politicians do not want to engage in unattractive and expensive work to create stocks of military equipment and ammunition just in case. When Gavin Williamson was the Minister of Defense, the military leaders begged him to urgently allocate funds for the creation of stocks of material and technical means, which were clearly not enough. Military sources say that his response was: "I'm not going to be photographed in front of a fucking military warehouse." (Williamson himself, through his adviser, stated that he did not remember such words).
Instead, the government's "comprehensive review", as well as the previously published "doctrine of coupled security" elegantly emphasizes the need to combine economic and military potential, extolling the virtues of digital warfare, information operations and high-tech gadgets such as drones and robots. In November, Boris Johnson, with a confidence striking in its inappropriateness, told MPs that the era of major tank battles in Europe had come to an end. Vladimir Putin did not hear his prophecy. He probably doesn't have the most modern approach to waging war. But it's effective. <...> If Russia considers NATO's deterrent forces weak, then the Baltic states may be next. Not now, not right away, but soon enough. "We don't control the course of events," says retired General Sir James Bucknall. "We need to step up our efforts and rearm."
At first glance, fashion trends have changed. The new head of the British General Staff, General Sir Patrick Sanders, gave an inspired speech last week about how our armed forces are focusing on Russia today. But so far we are only setting goals for ourselves, without having the means.
Ukrainian losses (which is 18,000 killed and wounded) are more than the entire infantry of our rapidly diminishing ground forces. Yes, our armed forces are much better equipped, because Britain has some of the most advanced weapons in the world. But even the most modern tank, aircraft and ship is absolutely useless if it lacks the necessary spare parts, if it has run out of fuel, there are no crew members and shells for firing.
The situation with our European allies is even worse. For example, Denmark has invested heavily in cutting-edge weapons systems, such as new frigates. But they don't have the stocks of guided munitions that are needed in a real war. An important exception is Finland, which looks with constant apprehension at its neighbor Russia. It has powerful artillery and has large reserves of well-trained reserve soldiers.
Helping Ukraine makes political and strategic sense, because our freedom and security are at stake there. But such assistance further depletes our meager reserves. And Ukraine demonstrates the need to urgently make difficult decisions about building up our own military potential before the Kremlin deploys its troops in our direction.
The government says the military budget will be increased to 2.5% of GDP. But not before 2030. Defense Minister Ben Wallace is persistently asking Downing Street for money. But there has been a black hole in his budget for many years, because too many tasks were assigned to the army, and not enough funds were allocated. We saved on logistics and spare parts, because it is less noticeable. The costs of such a short-sighted approach are becoming obvious now.
Money alone will not help us get off the ground and start creating stocks just in case. Production lines are worn out. There are many bottlenecks. A lot of time is spent from the beginning of the development of weapons to its commissioning. We get some components from China. A short-term solution to the problem may be the purchase of military equipment and weapons in countries with large armed forces, but not facing serious military problems (for example, in Brazil). Another solution may be cluster munitions, which are very effective against an enemy such as Russia <...>. But Britain has led international efforts to impose a ban on these terrible munitions.
We need a fundamental rethinking of the problems. If our top priority is to assist NATO in protecting European allies from Russia, then our expensive and poorly protected aircraft carriers look like white elephants. The government's dreams of a global Britain are shattered right on our doorstep about the geopolitics of the real world. For many years we have chosen which wars to wage ourselves. The next war may choose us.
