Remembrance Sunday comes at a time when Britain is not yet ready for war – and the US is no longer as reliable as it used to be | British news

On November 10, 2024By Pranco

The annual British Remembrance Sunday has a special dimension in 2024 because this year was the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings.

The Speaker of the House of Commons, Lord Lindsay Hoyleand the Imperial War Museum will ensure that images of the men and women who took part in the Normandy campaign are projected on the Elizabeth Tower beneath Big Ben.

Political leaders past and present will parade to lay wreaths at the Cenotaph, which commemorates ‘Our Glorious Dead’ from two world wars and other military conflicts. Those present see no contradiction in the fact that they have all been involved in cuts to British defense capabilities.

D-Day, when British and American troops fought on the beaches to liberate Europe, remains the defining moment of British patriotic pride to this day. a big mistake Rishi Sunak in the summer to leave France and the international commemorations of June 6, 1944 early.

Since then, Britain and Europe have nested under the United States’ security umbrella.

The Americans came too late to help in both world wars and we assume they will do so again. The North Atlantic Treaty (NATO) explicitly states that an attack on one member is an attack on all, and that the US is the dominant contributor NATO both in money and military power.

There has already been new unease among British politicians about how safe we really are as tensions rise around the world, from Ukraine to the Middle East and China. A recent House of Commons report was entitled “Ready For War?”.

Donald Trump’s re-election and his “America First” priorities have increased that pressure.

Russia’s territorial aggression against Ukraine has brought the bloody confrontation between nation states back to our continent.

Meanwhile, Trump, the US president-elect, has said he does not feel obligated to defend European countries that are not spending as much as he thinks they should.

Given the eagerness of successive governments to cash in on a peace dividend by cutting defense spending, there are real doubts about whether Britain could manage itself, according to General Sir Roly Walker, who has taken power defense if a new war were to arise. as head of the British armed forces.

This summer he set himself the task of preparing “to deter or wage a war in three years.”

He aims to double the military’s “lethality” in the face of threats from Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, which may be separate or coordinated.

The recent BRICS summit in Russia and the deployment of North Korean troops to fight Vladimir Putin’s forces in Ukraine, both demonstrate their willingness to internationalize local conflicts. George Robertson, the former defense minister and NATO secretary general who is leading the defense review for the government, has also recognized the threat from this “deadly quartet.”

General Walker says he can increase lethality within existing spending by making smarter use of technology like drones and AI.

The problem is that this will still require diverting resources from existing capabilities, while deployable combat manpower is already at its lowest level in 200 years.

British politicians are increasingly aware of the need to strengthen capacity and a number of overlapping studies are underway.

But given the overall pressure on the national budget, they are reluctant to focus on the full financial implications.

Said during Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday the new Leader of the Opposition Kemi Badenoch challenged Sir Kier Starmer to say when Britain will spend 2.5% of GDP on defence; he responded that it remains an unspecified obligation, but that the last Labor government was the last to spend that much. From Mr Cameron to Mr Sunak, the Conservatives have never done that.

This sparring ignores the reality that effective security requires spending to increase to 3% or more, and that Trump may be the one making that demand.

The US spends 3.5% of its national wealth, equivalent to 68% of all other members’ defense spending.

Not all have yet met NATO’s official target of 2 percent, partly intended to “test” the alliance against the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal.

The US currently has 100,000 troops stationed in Europe, an increase of 20,000 since Putin’s attack in 2022.

The next Trump administration will certainly want to reduce that number. But in any case, there is a slow reduction in American commitment.

This week, Professor Malcolm Chalmers told MPs on the Defense Select Committee: “The most plausible planning assumption for Britain at the moment is that America will provide an increasingly smaller share of NATO’s total capabilities and we will need to fill those gaps .”

Given the likelihood that Trump’s proposed new tariffs will slow the global economy, Sir Keir and the Labor government will have even less to spend on public services than she is proposing. It seems inconceivable that Britain would voluntarily go beyond 2.5%, which is also necessary for the defense of the Empire according to the current defense assessment.

On current defense spending alone, John Healey, the new defense secretary, claimed he had inherited a £17 billion ‘black hole’ of unfunded planned spending from the Conservatives.

Ukraine will likely be the first flashpoint.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s supporters want the US to increase its military aid, while the US wants Europe to shoulder more of the burden of defense, while the US ‘pivots’ towards the greater threat it sees for itself from China.

Trump has said he plans to end the conflict in Ukraine within 24 hours.

Essentially, Putin would retain some of his territorial claims in the Donbas and NATO would not extend its security guarantee to what remains of an independent Ukraine.

Mr. Trump has already said that NATO’s long-standing and vague offer for eventual membership was “a mistake.”

Concerned not to further alienate the US and face severe financial pressure, some leading European countries, including Germany, appear willing to agree to such a sell-off.

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A number of security experts, including former acting Deputy Prime Minister Sir David Lidington, say this deal would be “Donald Trump’s Munich”.

This is a reference to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s ‘peace in our time’ deal with Adolf Hitler, which failed to halt further aggression from Nazi Germany before World War II.

Then, as before the First World War, the “America First” instinct was to let the Europeans clean up their own mess. But American forces ultimately shed their blood decisively in both conflicts.

Once again Britain and Europe are not ready for war and rely on an increasingly unreliable US. The politicians, prime ministers and generals who gather at the Cenotaph to honor the victims of war should have a lot on their minds.