Globalisation:First Defence:Activities

The Secretary of State for Defence, the Rt Hon Liam Fox was speaker at a Conference on October 5th 2010, the eve of the Strategic Defence and Security Review. The conference specifically addressed how the government views defence, Britain’s future role in the world, and what the outcomes may be.

The following section reports the main points of Rt. Hon Liam Fox's speech.

Introduction

I would first like to thanks Caroline, First Defence [and EADS] for sponsoring this event. First Defence has done so much over the years to advance the defence debate in the UK. Each and every year the First Defence Fringe becomes more and more popular and I am happy to have been invited once again to speak here.

Today, I am going to speak on the future challenges facing defence in the United Kingdom. Here I see two main challenges.

First, configuring national security structures in such a way that will allow us to be prepared for 21st Century Threats.

Second, being able to do so in what is the most challenging financial environment since the Second World War.

I will take each of these in turn.

Future Threats

As we carry out the much needed Strategic Defence and Security Review, it is important to consider what types of threats we may face in the future and how we can best counter these threats.

We know from bitter historical experience the difficulty of predicting future conflict- either its nature or its location. We cannot base our future security on the assumption that future wars will be like the current ones.

That is why we must maintain generic capability able to adapt to any changing threats as they emerge. This is the adaptive posture the NCS decided on in July.

Since the last Strategic Defence Review in 1998 the world has become a more dangerous place. Trans-national terrorism, nuclear proliferation, the battle for cyberspace and the effects of climate change are all playing a part in destabilising the delicate equilibrium of global security.

The terrorists attacks of 9/11 completely altered the Western view of global security. An attack that cost only $250,000 to stage ended up costing the U.S. economy $80bn.

International terrorism continues to pose a real threat.

Although largely defeated in Iraq, Al-Qa'ida is challenging the stability of Pakistan, the Arabian Peninsula-notably Yemen and the Horn of Africa, Southeast Asia and elsewhere.

While some countries like Libya have given up their WMD ambitions, North Korea has successfully tested two nuclear bombs.

Iran is still intent on acquiring a nuclear weapon and continues to be a net exporter of terrorism.

The nature and behaviour of the regime and the risk of triggering a nuclear arms race in the Middle East makes this a cause of growing anxiety.

Climate Change is forcing us to address new threats. For example, with Polar ice caps melting and piracy rife in some of the world's busiest and warmest shipping lanes; maritime transport in the High North is not only becoming a reality but is also looking attractive for commerce. It is also a potential source of political and military tension.

The possibility of state-on-state warfare, most recently demonstrated by the Russian invasion of Georgia and the subsequent occupation of 20 per cent of its territory, cannot be ruled out. Especially as the competition for scarce resources heats up in some of the world's most unstable regions.

Other threats may seem remote but if they became a reality would have a devastating effect on our way of life:

• biological weapons proliferation and their use by terrorist organisations and other non-state actors;

• nuclear terrorism and dirty bombs;

• and the use of an electromagnetic pulse device which could destroy all electronic and communications infrastructure over a distance of hundreds of miles.

Like it or not, Cyber Warfare is a modern-day reality-not something that 'might' occur in the future as some commentators suggest.

And these threats are occurring on top of our contingent overseas operations like Afghanistan, maritime security in the Gulf, or reacting to natural disasters like the recent floods in Pakistan where the key priorities of the UK aid effort in Pakistan were air transport of relief stores and restoring damaged or destroyed bridges—both provided by the British military.

The multi polarity of the post Cold War era and the speed of globalisation mean that Britain's economic and security interests are increasingly interlinked to others with an unavoidable shared set of interests and the shared importation of strategic risk.

As recent events have shown with the economic crisis, instability in one corner of the globe can quickly affect us all.

Britain's national interests no longer stop at the White Cliffs of Dover, Gibraltar or the Falklands.

This global interdependence has major implications on how we must organise our national (and international) security structures and identify our threats. It goes without saying that the challenges this presents to our Armed Forces are numerous and complex.

The Twenty-first Century strategic environment demands that Western militaries are able to simultaneously conduct war fighting, peacekeeping, continuous deterrence-both conventional and nuclear, and humanitarian disaster relief operations.

Furthermore, it requires Western Governments to supplement these military operations through an array of soft power tools, such as international aid, defence diplomacy, and the spread of information and ideas.

This is why the creation of the National Security Council under the leadership of the Prime Minister is so important.

The NSC recognises how issues like foreign relations, international development, homeland security, energy security and the structure of our Armed Forces themselves are all interlinked and require joined up thinking if we are to both protect our own citizens at home and contribute to global security abroad.

But if the nature of the Twenty-first century forces us- the West- to re-evaluate current war fighting we should assume that our enemies are forced to do the same. It is in this context that we can understand the types of threats we are likely to face in the future.

There is an on-going debate inside in the UK on what form the future of warfare will take. Usually there are two schools of thought. On one side we are told that future conflicts will be asymmetric and irregular in nature-similar to what we commonly experience in Afghanistan today.

On the other side we are told that state-on-state warfare in the traditional sense cannot be ruled out and if anything, however remote the possibility may seem, this form of warfare is likely to pose the biggest threat to UK sovereignty.

The choice between the two schools of thought is not binary and mutually exclusive. It is no more true to say that we will face only asymmetric threats than it is to say we face only state on state threats. The truth lies somewhere in between-in a hybrid form of warfare-that will require an adaptable Britain requiring generic and flexible defence capabilities.

State-on-state warfare is viewed by many as an anachronism in the Twenty-first Century but until there is a radical change in the Westphalian nation-state system that has been around since 1648, state-on-state warfare remains a possibility-and one that we must be prepared for regardless of how unlikely it may seem today. There is always the possibility of the UK being dragged into state on state warfare between other nations.

But even state-on-state warfare may not necessarily take the same linear, symmetric, and conventional form as it did in the Twenty-first century.

The present superiority of Western conventional military might, coupled with the advantages offered by globalisation, have led our adversaries to look beyond the approach of choosing between conventional and asymmetrical types of warfare and adopt a hybrid warfare approach.

Potential adversaries may confront us with conventional military might that is at, on occasions, equal to Western technology.

But it is more likely that, knowing that they cannot match our technology, resources or conventional firepower our adversaries will resort to strategic and tactical asymmetric measures in an attempt to defeat us.

With hybrid warfare we should assume that our adversaries will simultaneously employ a mix of conventional weapons and irregular tactics that may even include organised crime and acts of terrorism.

We must understand that the conflicts of the future will go beyond the conventional arena and threaten our social well-being, our domestic infrastructure and our economic capabilities. Russia's invasion of Georgia, with heavy armour, air strikes and ground troops-all very conventional- was augmented by a surgical cyber attack on the Georgian Government and a sophisticated information operations campaign aimed at the Georgian people and the international community.

The changing scope and nature of these threats have implications for our procurement plans. We need to focus more on capability and less on specific equipment.

Saying that we can only focus on one particular type of threat is not good enough for the British people and would be an easy way out for any government whose first and foremost responsibility is the defence of the realm.

Financial Situation

If we learned anything from the Cold War it was that the stronger your economy the more secure your national security. We defeated the Soviet threat because we prevailed in the ideological battle but we also out spent largely because of the strength of the Western economies. Today, we find ourselves in the appalling situation where the out going Labour Chief Secretary actually leaves a note that says “Sorry, there is no money left”.

Labour’s failed economic policies saw our national debt double.

Now, I didn't come into politics wishing to see a reduction in our Defence budget.

Neither did David Cameron.

Indeed, we have both often argued in the past that in a dangerous world – the world in which we live - there is a strong case to increase our spending on national security.

But while we can never predict where events will take us or the unavoidable bills we will have to pay as a consequence, we must confront the ghastly truth of Labour's legacy.

Next year the interest bill alone for Labour’s debt will be over £46bn – more than the entire Defence budget for the UK.

There is an unfunded liability in Defence of around £38 billion over the next 10 years.

During their time in office Labour pushed projects ever more desperately into future years to try to make an impossible budget balance in year, only to increase the overall cost of the Defence programme still further.

They behaved like someone who has just received a catalogue in the post and who keeps ordering more and more items from it without once considering whether they might have the income to pay for any of them when the goods arrive.

The price of this irresponsibility will ultimately be paid for by short-term reductions as we try to return Defence to a sound footing.

So we face the SDSR with unavoidably constrained finances.

Conclusion

We will not be able to do all that we would like at least not in the short term but we will create better stability for planning for both the military and the defence industry.

The Defence Reform Unit which I recently established will radically reform the MoD itself and along with the service chiefs look at issues such as rank structure and force generation where review is long over due.

Regular defence reviews will mean more incremental changes better matched through the changing nature of the threats we face.

The one thing I am determined to do whatever the frustrations and whatever the difficulties is that no future defence secretary will inherit the shambles that I have inherited from Labour and that our national security will take its full place in the country’s political priorities.