Europe has been thrown into political confusion by the pronouncements of Donald Trump and his government on the defence of Europe. The language is brutal, but the message is not new. For a long time the US has claimed, with some justification, that Europe has been complacent. Following the end of the Cold War we decided that we did not need to spend much on defence and that in a crisis, we could depend on the US to protect us. From a US perspective, we have prioritised our welfare states over our defence. And when, in 2014, war returned to Europe, we still failed to change our priorities.
So the US thinks it is time we took more responsibility, while they focus on a more direct threat closer to home in the Pacific.
Our shrinking capability
It is true that we have dramatically scaled down our defence capability. In the last 12 years, the strength of the armed forces has reduced by 20%. Lord Richards, retired Chief of the General Staff recently commented that in 1990, when he commanded an armoured brigade, it was one of five stationed in Germany alone. Now the entire British army could not put one such brigade into the field, and there has been similar scaling down of air and naval forces. Last summer a paper from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) questioned whether the UK can any longer be seen as a major military power.
The immediate threat
It is clear that there is now a serious threat to European security. At the moment Ukraine is the front line, but the Baltic states, Moldova and Poland are all under threat from Russia. Equally important is the principle that countries should not be able to invade their neighbours without penalties.
Polls show that most British support Keir Starmer’s commitment to a major expansion of defence spending, restoring the 2.5% of GDP which we were spending under the last Labour government (though they are less certain when asked how to pay for it).
At a recent emergency summit, European leaders agreed on the need to increase European defence spending. They are preparing to be more independent of US support, even including the possibility of the US withdrawing from NATO. But it is not simple to disentangle 75 years of working relationships.
The US in East Anglia
The US presence has been important to the East of England since the 1940s when 350,000 US servicemen passed through bases here (and 28,000 died).
Now, of the 12,000 US military personnel based in the UK, around 10,000 are here in East Anglia, with 9,000 of them at Mildenhall and Lakenheath in Suffolk, and smaller numbers at Alconbury and Molesworth in Cambridgeshire. There is also an unacknowledged number of CIA staff just over the border in Northamptonshire.
Not everyone welcomes the presence. Since the early years of the Cold War, protestors have pointed out that these bases make East Anglia a first strike target in any nuclear attack from the Soviet Union/Russia.
However, were the US to decide to reduce operations here, the economic impact would be substantial. RAF Mildenhall estimates the overall economic impact of the bases in West Suffolk as around $577mn a year – around 3% of the local economy.
What to buy, and from whom?
A dramatic increase in defence spending also raises the question of what to buy, and from where. The UK’s defence industry is deeply intertwined with the US. In the four years to 2019, the US imported around £7bn worth of armaments from the UK. But very substantial sums go the other way. British firms are providing 15% of the value of the US Lightning II fighter jet programme, but we are committed to buying at least 48 of them, at a cost of £8.6bn. And we have at least £6bn worth of other aircraft contracts in hand. Meanwhile, the EU is working to strengthen its defence industries, and although there are discussions in progress, since Brexit we are no longer automatically included. Currently, over half of all arms imports into Europe come from the US.
In the short term, while our domestic industries scale up, a substantial part of any increased expenditure will go to the US. This is inevitable, not just because of limits on our ability to manufacture domestically, but also because we need parts and replacements for US-made equipment, or equipment made to US standards. Furthermore, our ‘independent’ nuclear fleet depends on US support for maintenance, although in the event of a real crisis, the Prime Minister can order firing the missiles currently at sea without US consent.
Progress may be slow, but the direction is clear
So, despite the noise from Washington, it seems unlikely that any US withdrawal from the defence of Europe will be sudden. But it would be dangerous to assume that it will not happen. From the transactional perspective which Trump seems to favour, it is likely to benefit the USA financially, and it could inflict damage on the economy of Suffolk. One side-benefit will be economic growth: wars always provide an economic stimulus, creating high-skilled jobs making weapons and associated services. And it might strengthen our ties with Europe.
There are many progressives in Britain who will regret large-scale rearmament, especially if it is at the expense of things we value, and that politicians have promised the electorate. But we have been in an undeclared war now for a decade, since an enemy invaded Europe for the first time in living memory. Neville Chamberlain spoke of “a quarrel in a faraway country, between people of whom we know nothing”. We cannot afford to make the same mistake again.
