https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/t...sion-jgsf29rc2
Top armed forces officers gagged by defence secretary Ben Wallace over aircraft carrier discussion
The head of the Royal Navy has been admonished and all senior armed forces officers have been gagged after military proposals to station an aircraft carrier in the Far East were reported in
The Timesthis week.
Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, has banned officers at one-star rank and above from giving public speeches or appearing at think tank events. The “pause” in external engagement, as it has been labelled by the Ministry of Defence, will remain until further notice.
Ministers want to stop senior officers making public pitches designed to influence the government’s integrated review of foreign policy, defence and security, due to report this autumn. Boris Johnson has said it will be the most sweeping and comprehensive rethink of Britain’s approach to the world since the end of the Cold War.
The Times reported on Tuesday that military chiefs had drawn up an option to station one of the UK’s £3.1 billion aircraft carriers in the Far East as part of an international alliance to counter China. Another proposal involved “forward-basing” a frigate, a smaller warship, in the region. Comments on the subject were made publicly at a think tank webinar by senior personnel from the Royal Navy and the RAF.
Details of the aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth’s maiden grand voyage to the Indo-Pacific early next year also emerged, although the Ministry of Defence insisted that no final decision on its route had been taken.
Admiral Tony Radakin, the first sea lord, was called in to see Mr Wallace to discuss the reports. Mr Wallace is thought to have become concerned about message discipline in the forces.
A defence source said last night that the ban would not last for ever. “The people who know best about what the armed forces need are those serving or in charge of the single services,” they said. "We absolutely want to use their expertise and stories in a way that supports the integrated review, once this [ban] is unpaused and we are ready to re-engage.”
The proposal to send the
Queen Elizabeth to the Far East was backed by senior China hawks in parliament but Tobias Ellwood, Tory chairman of the Commons defence select committee, said that discussing it around the time of the decision to ban Huawei from Britain’s 5G network was “reckless”.