To think that we should spend less on defence

I've read today that US intelligence says Russia is preparing an attack on Poland. May be true, may be false but the world we live in is very dangerous and getting more so. We need to be prepared to stand alone to defend ourselves, at the moment we are absolutely not.

We are an island surrounded by sea?? If we were to have a physical attack, which alot of countries are capable of, how do you suppose we fight/protect it??

We should not produce any more nuclear weapons or anything capable of delivering a nuclear weapon. Defensive dome technology and drones plus improving cyber security yes but never anything that adds to nuclear arms in any way .

The Saxons took Britain from the once unstoppable Romans. They wrote that when they arrived, the Romans were no longer in fighting shape and had put their weapons aside in favour of hot baths.
When we don’t spend on defence and have a suitably armed standing army, we’re fucked.
No one can say what the next conflict might look like, we need to have a basic level of preparation. Unfortunately funding cuts and poor spending decisions mean we don’t have that.
We’ve handed over so much of our stuff to Ukraine. And still haven’t fully stopped Russia. It’s blisteringly naive to think Russia aren’t a threat if they chose to turn their attention elsewhere. The current stalemate is maintained by the whole of Europe.

It must be an example of this brainwashing we keep hearing about.

I’ve no evidence but to me that’s a war of convenience, Russia = bad. Ukraine = good. The proxy war.
Sanctioning Russia and supplying weapons to Ukraine.
I have no doubt that Russia is a super power. I don’t know what this dance with Ukraine is about or why it’s tolerated by Russia with Europe and America interfering all too willing to spend any amount no limit helping the Ukrainian people.
I saw video footage of a hotel in Odessa it was all happening there, doubtful Somali, Congo or Palestine have the type of luxury Ukraine enjoys during the war.
My DD friend in school, takes a trip back regularly with his family and leaves again, he’s fighting age but okay to visit

A while ago (long before the current Ukraine conflict), we went on a Balkan Cruise. We naively thought Russia's threat was long over. We were very surprised when we visited Finland to see that they still were clearly prepared for conflict with Russia and that they clearly regarded their long Russian border as a significant threat as at that time weren't protected by NATO as they hadn't been admitted, so were taking their own very visible precautions such as military ships, artillery placements on land to protect sea channels, etc.

Yeah it’s the NATO thing - we need to do our part if necessary and for that regretfully we need a certain level of defense spending. We’ve seen that we can no longer rely on the US to do anything sensible.

I dont like it at all but I can see the logic.

I'm no hawk, however I have to admit I was always sceptical about the 'peace dividend'. And even if the fall of the Soviet Union was a reason to cut spending, the speed and degree with which the reduction in defence spending happened was premature at minumum.

There may not be numerous states or other bad actors waiting to invade us but there are certainly many who wish us harm and who are and would be all to willing to act to see harm happen. To see a decent well funded and equipped defence is a prerequiste of a healthy state. There are many things a healthy state has to invest in, that it may not want to (miltary capability, security services, prisons) but to fail to do so is foolhardy. Very much Si vis pacem, para bellum. Thanks for the quote @MeanMrMustardSeed

Si vis pacem, para bellum.

If you want peace, prepare for war.

Duplicate post, apols.

@Blightfitting

You mentioned:

Ukraine are holding their own using teeny tiny cheap drones,

They're not though, there's much more to it than that - They are holding their own and more using the whole layered defence/offence concept.

They are using much more capable/expensive bits of equipment than just small drones to help them hold the line, such as fixed wing fighters and expensive missiles on the defensive side and long range strike munitions such as SCALP on the offensive...even their indigenous drones being used for offence such as Flamingo aren't small and won't be cheap.

One problem with this whole debate is it suits some politicians to claim it will be all drones from now on because those claims can be used to jystify cuts on existing capabilities that in reality might still be very useful/essential for at least the next two or three decades...

...and BTW over the last few years Simon Jenkin's has consistently had a slightly contrary approach to the Russian threat and therefore defence spending - I'm not surprised by the tone of his article.

The world is a very dangerous place.

There are numerous states and bad actors who would very happily invade and destroy us. Many are regularly trying.

Just be very grateful that there are people out there prepared to risk their lives to save yours, as you sit in your middle class home reading The Guardian and signing online 'refugees are welcome here' petitions.

The world, sadly, doesn't work in the way your left wing thought leaders pretends it does.

Your first mistake is using The Guardian as your go-to for trying to understand global geopolitical defence issues.

People who want to spend less on defence are insane. We should be spending far more

This. There is a massive ammo shortage in Europe, of all sizes, because of how much has been consumed in Ukraine. There are no spare weapons, transport, anti-tank missiles etc for the same reason. It has taken the provisions of most of Europe and the US for Ukraine to remain unbeaten. That can't continue at current levels. Ukraine did not survive on its own, so you can't say "Ukraine held its own against Russia", it took two continents worth of help!

I do think we might need to spend more on defence. But the things you list (awareness, strong intelligence activities, and the hardware and computing assets to handle the data) likely wouldn't come out of the defence budget. One of the shortcomings in very simplistic discussions.about how much GDP should.be spent on "defence" is that actual defensive spending is very broad and can include infra spending and things like ICT capabilities. Of which defence spending as in money allocated to the mimistry of defence is only a small (but vital) part.

At the moment our defense strategy relies heaving on the USA. We need to be able to defend ourselves and loosen our ties with USA if we don't want to be caught on the wrong side of history.

Yes and No.

Yes, we should spend less because nuclear weapons are an abomination as well as ruinously expensive, and a lot of defence spending is actually just propping up dying industries (like shipbuilding) instead of buying overseas and transitioning our workforce into jobs of the future.

No, we should spend more, because we are woefully underprepared for war or a security crisis in this country, and as we’ve seen in Ukraine, traditional warfare remains the most likely outcome. Russia is extremely unpredictable and it’s madness to rule out war.

For me, it’s not a Yes or No, because we need to spend to be more secure and better prepared that we are, but we need to spend on different thing. Yes, traditional munitions and equipment and well-trained armed forces, but also on our security infrastructure and preparedness. That includes domestic energy and food security.

Only one nuclear missile? Are you nuts? Do you understand how our nuclear deterant works?

Yeah, to say 'well Russia can't defeat Ukraine so they are not a threat' doesn't tell the whole story;

Western governments and allied institutions have committed over $380 billion (approximately £300 billion) in combined military, financial, and humanitarian aid to Ukraine since the initial invasion. This includes over $170 billion in direct military and defense-related spending specifically allocated to sustain Ukraine’s armed forces.

The problem with defence spending is that the best case scenario is it all is a total waste of money (ie. you don't need it) but if you don't spend it and suddenly you need to defend yourself, you're screwed.

OP to add to the other responses to LESSEN the chances of nuclear war.

If we can't defend ourselves conventionally then we look weak. If an aggressor threatens us then if our conventional defence is weak after a short while we would have nothing to fall back upon other than going nuclear. And that could destroy us all.

We have relied on the US too long through NATO to back us up with their military. They spend proportionally way more than us on defence.

Not unreasonably they are saying we cannot keep riding on their coat tails and need to do more ourselves and want us to increase what we spend on defence to be more equal proportionally to them.

I am afraid it's absolutely necessary OP and successive governments in the UK have ducked the responsibility.