Tory Defence Policy

What is Britain’s role in the world? And what resources will be devoted to sustaining it? These questions, germane for more than 40 years anyway, have an extra urgency in this New Age of Austerity. Liam Fox is addressing the Scottish Tory conference as I write this.

Fox reiterates the urgent need for a post-election Defence Review but says “There is one area however where the basic argument has not changed. There will be a replacement to the submarine-based nuclear deterrent under a future Conservative government.” Dr Fox acknowledges that it’s impossible to make fim predictions for defence spending, but given that he complains that “despite the two wars [Britain is fighting] this year’s defence spending, at 2.2% of GDP, is the lowest since the 1930s” it’s reasonable to suppose that he believes significant increases in defence spending are needed, not least to equip the missions that are already being fought, let alone lay contingency plans for future, as yet unknown, operations.