https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/l...rces-qmtw0npkv
Labour’s plans to overhaul armed forces
Britain should concentrate its armed forces in Europe instead of pursuing military expansionism in the Indo-Pacific, the shadow defence secretary will argue in a speech.
Labour would prioritise defending parts of the world “where the threats are greatest, not where the business opportunities lie”, in a sign that Sir Keir Starmer plans to abandon the Indo-Pacific tilt, the foreign policy strategy announced by Boris Johnson in 2021.
Setting out Starmer’s approach to defence in a speech at the Royal United Services Institute, John Healey will commit the party to a wholesale review of British defence policy in the first year of a Labour government.
Labour would scrap plans to shrink the overall size of the army to 72,500 troops, and implement a “stockpiles strategy” to put the UK on a war footing in response to warnings that at present troops would run out of ammunition in a matter of days in a Ukraine-style conflict with Russia.
Healey will also call on the government to concentrate British resources in Europe amid an agonised debate in Whitehall over the weakened state of the armed forces.
“The first priority for Britain’s Armed Forces must be where the threats are greatest, not where the business opportunities lie,” he is expected to say. “This is in the Nato area — Europe, the North Atlantic, Arctic. This is our primary obligation to our closest allies. After Ukraine, the US will rightly expect European allies to take on more responsibility for European security.”….
In a stark warning to the Treasury before next month’s budget, Ben Wallace, the defence secretary,
condemned the “hollowing out” of the military after decades of underfunding as he said that the army was unable to field a warfighting division. To compound matters, a senior US general has recently warned Wallace that the British army is no longer considered a top fighting force, according to Sky News.
Healey is expected to say that Wallace’s statements are an “admission of failure over 13 years of Conservative government” and to call on the government to ensure that Britain remains Nato’s “leading European nation”.
He will say: “We need to shift parts of our defence industry and MoD procurement on to an urgent operational footing, both to support Ukraine for the long term and to replenish UK stocks for any future conflict.”