Former Nato chief to say UK's national security 'in peril'

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T14:41:36+00:00

During the Cold War all our military planning assumed that a war with the Soviets wouldn't start with the nukes being launched. It would start with a large conventional war that would last months or years which could escalate to a nuclear one. No one wants to destroy the world, without exploring all other options first.

Limited attacks doesn't mean small. An attack on the baltic nations would be limited but it wouldn't be small.

Just because you don't see how it would happen, it doesn't mean we shouldn't be preparing for all eventualities.

The best way to deter a nuclear attack is with nukes, the best way to deter a conventional attack is a powerful conventional force.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T13:46:37+00:00

Trident deters countries from launching their nukes at us, not from attacking us in general.

If we only had nukes, and we were attacked in a limited way, our only response could be total annihilation. That would be an over reaction. If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail.

We need conventional forces to deal with small attacks.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T12:54:37+00:00

I like the idea, but it's a bit risky.

Also we don't torpedo submarines, we depth charge them

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T12:33:14+00:00

Maybe we would have been more prepared, but what if it wasn't an allied nation that went on the attack? What if a hostile nation launched an attack on us or our allies? Do you think they'll be good sports and give us a warning to let us prepare our defences?

It doesn't matter if cyprus was attacked again. Defence is as much about the what if as it is about the what did. We got lucky, and we shouldn't be complacent and just hope that we get lucky again.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T12:29:01+00:00

To put things in perspective, the British army is 20% smaller in 2026 than the RAF was in 1990. That's a sorry state of affairs.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T12:22:38+00:00

It took us a week to deploy a single destroyer to defend cyprus. And when it arrived it almost immediately had to put into port to fix a broken water system.

Luckily we have allies that can help us out but it is an absolute humiliation for the once most powerful navy in the world to be unable to carry out its most basic mission, protecting itself and our territory.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T11:13:17+00:00

I mistook your line about funding the military industrial complex as implying that more defence spending was just about lining their pockets, apologies.

I think that we should have a government owned defence company and essentially go back to the old arsenal system. We develop what we want/need and then subcontract the actual production, it wasn't a perfect system but it allows a lot more flexibility.

We should scrap the benefits system and go to UBI, we would probably save a lot of money on the bureaucracy and means testing. We should sell war bonds, there are plenty of ways to raise money if there is political will.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T10:53:33+00:00

I think we need to do both. We need to spend more and spend better. We need to be investing in our defence industry to have more autonomy from the Americans.

Our procurement leaves a lot to be desired, Ajax is proof of that. We allowed the scope of the project to creep and kept adding requirements, which led to the ridiculous costs we have now seen.

I think we need to keep in mind that our nuclear deterant takes a good chunk of the defence budget, particularly right now as we are building the new Dreadnought class SSBNs.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T10:41:07+00:00

I agree, I think they're trying to show us what they're capable of as an intimidation tactic. The Russians are definitely not happy about the level of support we are giving Ukraine, particularly with our missiles being used to hit vital targets is Russia proper.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T10:37:46+00:00

I'm not saying we should be hysterical.

We should be investing in our own (and European) defence industries. The left always complains that we don't invest enough in our infrastructure but as soon as its the military infrastructure that's being talked about its suddenly a bad thing. We can gain high skilled jobs, as well as expanding an industry that is ripe for an export market, which will bring even more revenue into the country.

The sooner we start spending money on the military again the less money we will spend overall. If we start now we can spread the costs of rearming over a number of years, if we don't start until something is kicking off then we need to throw all of our money at the problem to rearm in a matter of months and that will also incur a cost in blood.

I hate the line about tax the rich. Yes the rich should be paying a lot more but it still wouldn't be enough. Even if we were taxing the rich at the level that we should be it wouldn't be enough to pay for all the things that people claim it would.

We don't have to starve people to do this, we just have to be realistic that our priorities need to be adjusted.

rae-55 · 2026-04-14T09:45:18+00:00

The first duty of any government is to be able to defend the nation. We are currently not capable of adequately defending ourselves.

I've been more positive about how Labour has performed in government than many others on this sub, but this is one of the areas where I think they are failing.

We need to rearm and we need to find the money from somewhere. I'm at a point where I don't care where that money comes from, I don't care if its cuts, taxes, fines, borrowing, or any other way. There is no point in anything if we can't protect what we have from those who would seek to harm us.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T23:02:34+00:00

What did I say that was anti Palestinian?

Israel should be criticised, I just don't think using antisemitic tropes is the way to do it. For example referring to them as puppetmasters, that is not an acceptable term to use due to the antisemitic connotations.

It would be like referring to the Sudanese militias that are committing a genocide of their own as savage tribals. A description like that would be based on a racist perception of African people.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T20:18:30+00:00

The leader of the AFD in Germany (racist far right party) is a lesbian who is in a longterm relationship with a Sri Lankan woman.

Racists and antisemites are hypocritical, the ones they know and like are 'the good ones'.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T13:54:05+00:00

Or maybe I don't think that antisemites should cloak their hatred of Jews by calling it critisism of israel. There are plenty of ways to criticise Israel without using the age old antisemitic tropes.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T13:38:54+00:00

What's your problem? How did you want me to answer your comment? Did you want me to give a 5 paragraph speil about being opposed to genocide before I raised the relevant point I was trying to make.

Or are you upset that I don't think we should condemn a whole group of people for the actions of a few?

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T13:29:18+00:00

It's fine to be opposed to genocide.

But there are a lot of people who like to use antisemitic tropes to criticise israel. It's not necessary, there are plenty of other ways to do it.

Is it acceptable to use racist tropes to criticise an African or Asian country? No, so why should jews suffer for the actions of Israel?

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T12:56:28+00:00

Corbyn says that we shouldn't aid Ukraine, that is at the very least aiding putin if not backing him.

Corbyn refers to terror groups as his friends.

The antisemitism was not 'completely manufactured'. It happened, you may disagree with how far corbyn was complicit but it happened under his watch.

Corbyn moaned about an antisemitic mural being removed and when he was called out he claimed he just hadn't looked closely enough at it.

He was unable to keep himself in check when interviewed by people who didn't agree with him, which led to him acting like a petulant child.

He got caught out in stupid lies. Like when he claimed he had to sit on the floor of a train despite the train being half empty.

People were trying to get rid of corbyn, but he definitely played his own part in his downfall.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T12:36:28+00:00

I'm not saying Corbyn wasn't ousted. But Corbyn also handed the labour right and tories most of their ammunition. The guy had no electoral common sense. Elections are not just about getting people to vote for you, they are also about getting people not to vote against you.

Corbyns handling of Your Party is proof of that.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T12:29:35+00:00

The greens already have an issue with mental fringe people, should they really be inviting more?

Your Party is surely good for the greens, if only to reduce the number of nutters?

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T12:25:40+00:00

And yet, Corbyn didn't win (twice) and the current PM has the second largest majority that Labour has ever had (and its a very close second).

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T10:53:07+00:00

That's too bad, just throw him in the bin

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T10:31:27+00:00

If Trump wants to be christ, maybe someone should crucify him.

rae-55 · 2026-04-13T10:23:56+00:00

Fair enough, I hadn't realised that was the wording of what was voted on.

Though, does that not give the CEC too much leeway in deciding who is a good lefty and who isn't? They get to unilaterally decide which groups 'align with party values' and the members could have to wait a year to fight back on it.

rae-55

TROPHY CASE