It will take more than 10 days to get the destroyer HMS Dragon tooled up, battle ready and on station to protect Akrotiri and the island of Cyprus from Iranian drone and missile attacks. The RAF base there has already been hit by Iranian Shahed drones, probably launched by Hezbollah allies from Lebanon. True, two Wildcat light helicopters equipped with Martlet missiles have been sent on ahead of the destroyer. Britain is already in the widening war launched by America and Israel at the weekend. Ten countries, Arab Gulf nations and now Turkey, have been targeted and hit. British allies whom we have pledged to protect, Jordan and Qatar, have been struck, as has a British base in Bahrain. Roughly 300,000 Brits are vulnerable and many want to leave.
The Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of world energy exports travel — 1.5 million barrels of oil a day — are all but closed. Prices in petrol, gas and food will hit us all here in the UK soon. The crisis is set to run for months. Professor Peter Frankopan, the global historian from Oxford, believes this is the biggest upset in world affairs of recent times, comparable to the attacks of 9/11.
This kind of crisis has been predicted in dozens of war games and exercises, yet the Government seems only half prepared, mentally as well as physically, to meet it. It cannot dial out of the new Middle East war. It is fast becoming global in its economic consequences, as the fighting, overt and covert, moves beyond the Middle East.
A war that could run and run
Forget Donald Trump’s jibe: “This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with.” It was deliberately offensive, but seems to have hit the mark. The war he launched with Israel seemed to have little or no legal justification under the terms of the UN Charter. As a bit of strategic thinking, the plan is more than flaky — it has no defined end state aim, nor exit strategy. Trump has railed against “forever wars”, yet this one seems set to run for quite some time.
The US president is set on regime change in Tehran, but there is no realistic alternative to take over the rule of 92 million desperate, deprived and, in some cases, starving Iranians.
Iranian drones and missiles are targeting military bases, hotels, embassies and commercial shipping. Incirlik, the main air base of Turkey, a Nato ally, has been struck as well as tankers in the Gulf of Oman. Jordan and Qatar have asked for help. RAF Typhoons and F-35B Lightnings have been in the skies defending them, and succeeded in shooting down Shahed drones, using ASRAAM missiles which cost several times the drone itself. Air defence systems, including HMS Dragon, have been moved to the east Mediterranean and the Gulf. We are also sending teams of British and Ukrainian anti-drone warfare specialists to the region. But when it comes to the need to defend the British homeland, we have next to nothing.
The widening war exposes just how bereft British defence and homeland resilience and protection now are. We have about seven or eight destroyers and frigates, with only about five available for operations; some like the Type 23 frigate HMS Portland are now serving well beyond their planned service date and thought too knackered for serious duty.
The Type 45 is possibly one of the most capable air defence destroyers in the world. Its integrated defences can take on multiple attacking missiles and drones at once. The Sampson radar has huge range — HMS Dragon will have coverage of much of the east Mediterranean. It is thought the best available air defence against missile and drone strikes on London would be to station Dragon’s sister ships in the Thames estuary.
Change is needed from the top
Today only three out of the six Type 45s are available at any time. Essentially, we have very little in terms of air defences for these islands. The Government has pledged £1 billion for air defence missile systems under the new Strategic Defence Review. In reality this buys very little — for the handkerchief-sized Qatar the air defences cost $10bn and rising. The offer is a mere bagatelle.
Last year’s Strategic Defence Review is looking more like a false prospectus by the day, as the war in the Gulf highlights. Defence spending may rise to three per cent of GDP by 2030, Keir Starmer has suggested. But so far there has been no funding or budget for the review. All services are low on ammunition and arms — the Army has only 14 medium 155 guns, and programmes for vehicles, aircraft and naval ordnance are stuck in a fiscal no man’s land as Rachel Reeves’s Treasury continues to refuse extra funding.
We are becoming the despair of allies
We are becoming the despair of allies, particularly across northern Europe. They feel weakened and let down by the paucity of British support in hard power.
What is to be done, to paraphrase Lenin? We need to implement a simple crash programme for national resilience, security and defence.
We need to make sure that we have sufficient forces, fit for the task immediately at hand — air defence and protecting vital seaways for a start.
Above all there has to be a change of attitude from the top. We are in real crisis, and war threatens. Team Starmer has to prove it is fit for purpose. Starmer’s belief in the rule of law is laudable and right — but he seems to miss the old warning: we may not choose war, but war has a horrible tendency to choose us.
