Don’t trust Labour on defence

Britain must start, unsteadily, to stand alone.

One of the great — and largely forgotten — assets the Conservatives had in the great 2019 election victory (now cast as variously a great triumph of postliberalism, the unique political genius of Boris Johnson, or the unique political genius of Dominic Cummings, depending on your political affiliation) was Jeremy Corbyn.

The Tory campaign was able to suggest to the electorate that he was unpatriotic. Indeed, it appeared to be a credible claim, given his softness on certain terrorist groups, his position on military action, his refusal to sing the national anthem, or his views on the monarchy.

But Labour’s patriotism problem goes back far further than Corbyn. As James Stafford has written, the perception of a lack of patriotism has dogged the party almost since its inception: “In the interwar years and the 1980s, the organised industrial working class, inflationary, uncouth and potentially seditious, was styled as standing outside a ‘true’ British nation characterised by the ‘vigorous virtues’ of bourgeois thrift and propriety.”

Taking over as leader, Starmer was keen to distance himself from this coolness towards national feeling, stating that “Labour should not shy away from patriotism.” The message seems to have got through; there is more widespread use of the Union Jack, and Mike Tapp, MP for Dover and Deal, is consciously trying to take the fight to Reform over working-class patriotism with his constant deployment of vaguely-defined and newly-capitalised “British Values”.

In Trump’s keenness on a peace deal in Ukraine, Starmer seems to sense an opportunity to finally slay the dragon. The closing of the doors to “the Arsenal of Democracy” is interpreted either as an example of the unique threat Trump poses to world peace or a sobering reminder of the realities of European over-reliance on American military might (it should probably be interpreted more simply; Trump just believes that America is getting a bad deal out of Ukraine). Whatever the interpretation, there is now a widespread sense that we can no longer presume that American military power will guarantee security in Europe.

Under Starmer Britain must start, unsteadily, to stand alone. To that end, he has announced a surge in defence spending; the UK’s defence budget is now set to climb to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027, adding an extra £13.4 billion annually. By the next Parliament, it will reach 3 per cent. This increase will be funded by cutting overseas aid from 0.5 per cent to 0.3 per cent of gross national income over the next two years.

If this is patriotism, it is a poor version; a managerialists’ attempt, done by resource allocation rather than genuine feeling. Patriotism is surely deeper than “more money for the armed forces”.

The truth is, as ever, beyond the headlines. There is — as when Tories started including pensions in the calculation — some budget doctoring going on. Although the rise above will happen regardless of this, Starmer has stated that intelligence and security service spending will now be included in the defence budget. It is unclear whether it will be included to be measured against the 3 per cent; frankly, I cannot see why it would have been included in the first place were that not the intention. It’s also unclear, at this stage, whether the budget will be used to fund the Chagos deal. Asked by Christian Calgie whether he understood that “a refusal to rule out any of the cash going to Mauritius would allow us to draw the very very obvious conclusion [that it will be so used], He continued to give no answers.” If Chagos is to be included, then these new spending arrangements would actually constitute a cut.

Starmer — and likewise Tories before him — was able to create these fiscal infidelities because British military spending is governed by a target derived from our membership of NATO — members are expected to meet or exceed the target of investing at least 2 per cent of GDP in defence.

As the Austrian-American management consultant Peter Drucker noted, “what gets measured gets managed — even when it’s pointless to measure and manage it, and even if it harms the purpose of the organization to do so.” Arbitrary targets create perverse incentives, and NATO’s 2% target is entirely arbitrary. It isn’t derived from any evidence-based policy making, it is simply “a politically convenient round number chosen for its simplicity rather than its relevance.” Indeed, any percentage of GDP would be equally so, and would equally create an incentive for politicians to reach the target by underhanded means rather than by focussing on the volume of money spent on direct provision. That is not to mention that cooking the books — as Denmark has done with including Ukrainian aid in the budget — can starve militaries of funding.

Abandoning the 2 per cent spending target entirely would create a far better mechanism. Politicians should decide what military capabilities the nation requires and can sustain, and should fund them accordingly. This, in fact, is how almost every other government department works (although that is no recommendation). A 2 per cent target cannot actually be a measure of the effectiveness of our military, nor our capability. Those are decided by how money is spent, not how much. It might even engineer some political consensus; if politicians are forced to think in terms of capability targets, rather than financials, it may finally put an end to the constant rounds of cancellations, deferments and strategic defence reviews that divert so much money from actual materiel.

Cicero once wrote that the sinews of war were unlimited money. But our money is not unlimited, and our sinews are rapidly wasting away. An uplift in spending is to be welcomed; but how warmly, if we do not know what it is going to deliver? Perhaps an easy solution can be found; early on in government, Labour made £500m’s worth of savings from the defence budget by scrapping ships, drones and helicopters — including HMS Bulwark and Albion, leaving Britain without any amphibious capability. They also cut £160m from the Tempest programme to develop the next-gen Tempest fighter. Boosting spending to fill holes left by cuts made less than six months ago is, as it goes, an excellent example of the plane, ship and tank crash the funding of Britain’s military has become.

Is this patriotism? Pull the other one. At least Jeremy Corbyn had some honesty to him.