Even as the United Kingdom prepares to cut its defense budget by nearly eight percent over the next four years, spending increases are likely in key emerging technology areas, a top U.K. defense official said this week.
“Notwithstanding the difficult reductions that we are making, we still aim to invest in the capabilities that we will require in the future,” said Ursula Brennan, the U.K. permanent undersecretary of defense.
For example, Brennan said, the Defense Ministry “will be spending more on cyber” technology, and the need for video feeds from surveillance drones continues to increase as British troops operate in the rough terrain of Afghanistan. Further, the country’s commitment to maintaining a technologically advanced, submarine-launched nuclear arsenal “remains unchanged,” she added.
Brennan was speaking at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington.
The United Kingdom’s 2012 Strategic Defense and Security Review (SDSR), unveiled in October, emphasizes new technologies and future operational needs, Brennan noted.
“We recognize that future missions may well look very different to those taking place in Helmand (Afghanistan),” she said. “The SDSR deliberately set itself the objective of identifying a posture and set of capabilities for the 2020s, rather than for today’s circumstances.”
Following the public release of the SDSR last year, Gen. Nicholas Houghton, vice chief of the British defense staff, said next generation combat unmanned aerial vehicles (UCAVs) and long-range missiles would replace the United Kingdom’s fighter fleet “in the second half of the 2020s” (Defense Daily, Nov. 3, 2010). The details of when the United Kingdom goes completely unmanned for the deep-strike mission will be determined when London conducts its next strategic defense review in 2015, according to the general.
The United Kingdom had been the Pentagon’s most significant international partner in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter development effort until earlier this month. London had plans to purchase the B-model jump jet version of the aircraft. However, the 2012 SDSR revealed senior defense leaders’ recommendations for cutting military spending by nearly eight percent over four years, reducing the number of F-35s to be acquired and dropping the B model in favor of the carrier variant of the plane.
Still, Brennan reiterated her country’s commitment to its alliance with the United States, including continued bilateral training to promote interoperability of troops and equipment.
“We retain our ambition to be the U.S.’s most capable ally, and to act as ‘deputy sheriff’ when needed,” she said.
Brennan also acknowledged, however, that British Prime Minister David Cameron’s government has as its top priority reducing the country’s national debt.
“Without a sound economy we will not have the funds to tackle our security problems, and we will not have the thriving defense industrial base on which we rely for innovation,” she said.
“The U.K. does not want to follow the path of Greece or Ireland,” she added.
Since the onset of the debt crisis in Europe last year, Greece and later Ireland have been forced to seek emergency loans from the European Union and International Monetary Fund in exchange for a series of austerity measures and economic reforms.
However, Brennan said British defense spending would still remain above the NATO standard of two percent of GDP, even after the cuts are implemented.
To make a significant dent in the budget, the ministry plans to make reductions in both equipment purchasing and personnel. According to Brennan, 25,000 civilian jobs as well as 17,000 non-front-line military positions are to be eliminated.
The secretary acknowledged rumors in the British press about the Defense Ministry’s current “annual planning round” but declined to comment on specific equipment and capability cuts because the deliberations “have some way to run.”