London: A Small Island
to Which No-one Pays Attention. 12 September.
DSEI is the world’s leading defence equipment show. The hall stretches before me like some latter
day modernist, Mondianist cathedral. It is pot-marked with large bits of
military equipment laid out in a kind of military feng shui. This week I have had the honour
of chairing various conference sessions and meetings.
The message I take away from the week is that Britain is to pioneer
a radical approach to defence. Indeed, it will be national defence driven by all the talents - official and non-official, national and international. Given that ambition the best and
the worst of official Britain was on show here.
Britain’s armed forces were the best of it. The centre-piece of the week was the RUSI
Maritime Operations Conference at which the Head of the Royal Navy, the
impressive Admiral Sir George Zambellas, laid out what he called “Britain’s
Maritime Renaissance”. Zambellas might have
well called his statement “Britain’s Strategic Renaissance”. In many ways the Royal Navy is the litmus
test of Britain’s strategic ambition and the re-forging of a truly national
strategic force. One does not build
large bits of floating national defence infrastructure (why are bridges counted
and funded as infrastructure and not warships?) if one lacks strategic
ambition.
Divided into three
‘epochs’ the Navy’s renaissance will stretch out to 2040. Right now two large aircraft carriers are
being built with a new class of frigates about to be built. A class of new destroyers has just been
completed with a new class of nuclear-attack submarines rolling off the stocks. A decision will soon be made to purchase a
like-for-like replacement of the Trident nuclear deterrent and a host of
support ships are also being procured.
This year Britain took
delivery of its first Lightning 2 Joint Strike Fighter a version of which will
operate off the carriers and the Navy is beginning to replace its entire stock
of helicopters. Britain’s Secretary-of-State
for Defence Philip Hammond also announced here a further £250m investment in a
new weapons system for the Navy and a radical new approach to
defence-industrial partnerships.
And then there was the
worst of official Britain. It is not the
scale of the reinvestment in the Royal Navy that matters but the radicalism
implicit in it. From the
Secretary of State down through his staff the message was the same – Britain’s
defence is open to new business and new ideas.
And yet the body language from the Secretary-of-State down could not be
more different. Those of us who may have
a tad of a reputation for thinking ‘outside of the box’ are still too often treated
as though we are a bad smell. For all
the talk of new beginnings the new Ministry of Defence (MoD) looks just like
the old MoD – open to new ideas as long as they come from within.
It is not the people
that are the problem but the culture and the climate of fear all too evident in
the MoD. The MoD has been under intense
pressure these past few years but ‘openness’ must not simply mean another tired
reincarnation of the closed and self-serving iron triangle of defence, industry
and politics. Indeed, if the ambition
and enthusiasm evinced by Admiral Zambellas is to be realised (and it must
be) the political and civilian side of the house needs to stop so obviously
holding their noses when the supportive awkward squad make a challenging point.
New thinking requires
risk and yes a few bad journalists will write a few unfair headlines because they are fully paid up members of the Little Britain mafia which is so
pervasive in this town. However,
leadership is not telling people they cannot take questions at sessions I chair
for fear they might be misinterpreted.
Leadership and effective defence engagement is about trusting people and
maintaining the commitment to the exciting defence strategic vision Britain is
pioneering whatever the headlines. Once
again bad politics in London is in danger of confounding good national strategy.
If Britain’s radical
defence strategy is to be realised orthodoxy will need to be challenged because
Britain’s strategic business will never go back to ‘usual’. London’s Excel
Centre from where I write this blog is but a broken banker’s bonus distant from
the City where four years ago this week Lehman Brothers collapsed sparking
Britain’s worst financial crisis for a century because government got it so wrong.
There is a really good
news story to talk about Britain’s strategic defence renaissance. However, I
fear it could well fail because of narrowness of mind and spirit in the
Ministry of Defence. If the MoD simply
talks the talk of culture change but refuses to walk the walk it will be the
same old, same old – big talk, poor delivery.
Culture change starts at the very top, Mr Hammond.
Julian Lindley-French
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