UKNDA (UK National Defence Association)
To campaign for sufficient, appropriate and fully funded Armed Forces that the United Kingdom needs to defend effectively this Country, its people, their vital interests and security at home and throughout the world.
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THE THREAT
By Winston S. Churchill
President, UKNDA
President, UKNDA
We live in a dangerous and unstable world. Following the demise of the Soviet Union, the direction and nature of the threats to the security of the UK and her interests worldwide are more diverse and even less predictable.
Looking back over the past 25 years, there were few who foresaw Argentina’s attack on the Falkland Islands in 1982, Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait, or the Al Qaeda attack on the Twin Towers, provoking the Allied retaliation against Afghanistan and the liberation of that country from the Taliban, who are currently staging a fight-back.
Since the time required to bring into service major new equipment programmes, for any of the three Armed Forces, is in the range of 10-15 years, any future war or conflict will essentially have to be fought with the equipment ordered today. There will be no time to build & equip new divisions for the Army, new squadrons for the RAF or new ships for the Royal Navy – hence the vital necessity of the UK maintaining a serious, strong and balanced Defence capability.
Immediate & Near-Term Threats (up to 5 years)
The UK Homeland – The threat remains high, not merely from self-detonating jihadis in our cities, but from aerial or sea borne attack against our civilian population with chemical, biological, dirty-bomb or even nuclear devices. HM Coastguard does not begin to have the manpower or equipment to do the job its name implies, especially given our lengthy and exposed coastline. Nor indeed does the Royal Navy have more than a minimal capability deployed in coastal waters.
Continuing Conflicts in Iraq & Afghanistan – Operations continue at a high intensity against insurgents in Iraq and the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan. Logistic and technological support by Iran to our enemies in both countries, especially with high-tech IEDs (improvised explosive devices) capable of penetrating anything other than the heaviest and most modern armour, is responsible for an increasing number of UK and US casualties.
Instability in Pakistan – Pakistan, Britain and America’s somewhat ambivalent ally in the war on terror, rests on a knife-edge of instability. Following the fall of military President Pervez Musharraf, there is a serious danger that Pakistan – proud, and for the time being, sole possessors of the “Muslim Bomb” – could fall to the friends of Bin Laden and the Taliban.
Iran – The unstable “mullocracy”, which already deploys missiles capable of striking US & UK bases in the Gulf, has the range to strike Tel Aviv, Istanbul or Athens, and is working flat out to acquire nuclear weapons to fit on them. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad not only denies that the Holocaust ever happened but has described Israel as a “disgraceful blot” that “should be wiped off the face of the earth” (The Guardian, 27 October 2005). Not since Adolf Hitler has a national leader so brazenly paraded his evil intentions. There is a serious likelihood that this may, in the near future, provoke the United States or Israel – or both – to attack Iran’s budding nuclear capability. In return Iran, which has armed forces far larger than Britain’s, would strike back at Allied forces and bases in the area, and block the Straits of Hormuz, through which pass some 40% of the West’s oil supplies.
Medium-term Threats (5-10 years)
Iran, in the absence of any decisive action to prevent its acquisition of a nuclear capability, will provide a grave and potent threat to its neighbours, including Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, no doubt provoking a nuclear arms-race in the Middle East. There are signs of this already.
If Iran were to carry out its President’s threats, 3-4 million Israelis and a couple of million Palestinians may well find themselves consumed in a modern-day Holocaust. Furthermore, the survival of London and cities throughout Europe will stand at the mercy of the Iranian mullahs, regardless of any retaliatory capability we may still possess.
North Korea, unless it sets itself firmly on the path of peace (as there is some indication it may be doing) will be a source not merely of regional instability but, if its nuclear ambitions are realised, a source of long-range missiles, radioactive materials, even nuclear weapons, perhaps even to terrorists.
Longer-term Threats (10 years+)
Here we are strictly in crystal ball territory, though it must not be forgotten that the equipment we order today will be all we will have to defend ourselves with in the 2020s, should an emergency arise.
Russia, on the back of its vast energy reserves has, over the past five years, been dramatically increasing its military spending. Its recent attacks on Georgia, its veiled threats to Ukraine and overt threats to Poland show that Russia is willing and able to flex its muscles in the old Cold War style. Meanwhile, China, which is set on present trends to overtake the United States as the most powerful economy in the world, is also becoming a force to be reckoned with militarily.
Unless these goliaths come to espouse the path of democracy in the interim, there is the obvious danger that territorial ambitions, shortages of natural resources, or a dose of good old-fashioned imperialism – which both have demonstrated in the past – could lead to confrontation either with the world’s largest democracy, India, which is also nuclear-armed, or with the United States and Europe.
Meanwhile, every city of the Western world will continue to be at risk from the nuclear-armed terrorist, armed with a bomb perhaps no larger than a briefcase or a backpack.
While hoping for the best, it is always prudent to prepare for the worst. Only thus can one be ready to face almost any eventuality. At least, following the locust years of disarmament in the 1930s – thanks to the English Channel – we had a year or two’s breathing space to rebuild our defences before the full onslaught of the Nazi war-machine was upon us. The next major war will be strictly a “come-as-you-are” party, with no time to repair the neglect of former years.