…..large multi national alliances the idea of a state vs state war is just far more unlikely than it ever was.
I’m not stupid enough to believe the planet will become a more peaceful place as time goes on (I’d say the exact opposite is true) but name me one country of a similar stature to ourselves that we could realistically see ourselves at war with on a 1 v 1 basis in the next 100 years
BV, remember the various war options: wars of necessity and wars of choice. The Falklands was arguably the former though, as a n overseas territory we could have left them to their fate.
Kuwait, like Poland, was a war of moral choice.
Now which first world power might involve us in a war of necessity? Spain is a possibility as are Turkey or Greece over the SBAs. Of choice? A country with whom we have a mutual assistance treat, say one of the former colonies? We can discount Africa as they are not first world class opponents. We can also discount the Middle East which really leaves the Far East. Our commitment is probably the traditional Malaysian one with a threat from the North rather than the south.
In essence, apart from maintaining a policing role against Russia, the balance of our forces is probably adequate for the more likely different role in our areas of interest. What we have to hope is that our bluff isn't called.
Great posts, BV and PN. Good points well made.
But surely the point is that in today's World you don't get sufficient warning to reconfigure or grow your armed forces to meet a developing threat. Nor can you necessarily rely on being able to make only a small tokenistic contribution to a multinational coalition, or to rely overly on a particular ally. In the 1930s we had enough warning to train lots of people, build lots of kit, and to be ready (more or less) when war broke out - though arguably we had to let the Czechs and the Poles down while we completed our preparations.
How much warning would we get of a growth of isolationism in the US that would compel us to take on more of the burden of our own defence?
And remember that these threats emerge quickly and unpredictably.
In 1977, who could have predicted an Argentinian invasion of the Falklands?
In 1986, who was predicting that Saddam Hussein would march into Kuwait?
In 1998 who would have predicted 9/11 and the subsequent war in Afghanistan?
In 2008 who would have predicted the rise of Daesh?
You necessarily have to size and scale your armed forces not to meet predictable threats, but to be able to deal with the unpredictable-yet-conceivable. The old planning assumptions that sought to size the forces to 'do a Granby' or to undertake two smaller commitments simultaneously were not, in my view, unreasonable or unrealistic.