Critical Defence Theory?

“They are warming up for another one [world war]”.

Heartbroken D-Day veteran remembering his mates, June 6, 2026

 

Critical Defence Theory

June 12^th.  I am going to be controversial.  To govern is to choose and my contention herein is that there is a continuum between critical race theory and what I call critical defence theory which will be implicit in the long-delayed British Defence Investment Plan.  This is why I do not need to wait for it to know what it will say. Or, to put it another way, the collapse of British streets into something like anarchy is a choice. If a government chooses not to secure their citizens by dealing with crime it is a short step for such a government not to defend them either.  For some weeks I have focused on the disaster that is British defence policy.  It is in part because it is my own country, but it is also because what is being inflicted upon the British armed forces and the British people by its government is a warning to all Europeans.  Put simply, as the threats become relatively greater Britain’s armed forces are becoming relatively weaker. Let’s call it Critical Defence Theory or CDT.

CDT is a product of critical race theory or CRT.  CRT focuses on race and racism in its analysis in the belief that racism is structural and normal in societies that are historically majority white with perpetual racial inequality the consequence.  In the last twenty years or so CRT has embedded itself in British government institutions though the politicization of the civil service.  It is also now endemic in education.  CRT’s central tenet is that merit and competition are merely mechanisms to confirm white privilege. Its adherents believe the only way ‘white privilege’ can be reversed is ‘affirmative action’ to re-balance what is claimed to be the disproportionate share of power and wealth enjoyed by white people, whatever their individual circumstances.  The aim of this activist theory (or rather manifesto) is to engineer ‘equal outcomes’ rather than promote equality with all and any critique is dismissed as “hate speech” and the sanction of being cancelled. Go ahead. Make my day!

DEI and defence

In majority white societies, such as Britain, a range of methods are used to promote change through diversity, equity (not equality), and inclusion, most notably the replacing of the hero narrative (Nelson, Wellington, Churchill et al) of British history with an alternative guilt narrative (slavery, imperial genocide et al) and associated accusations of ‘toxic masculinity’.  It is my contention herein that CRT is now embedded in defence policy and that today’s Defence Investment Plan is clear evidence of Critical Defence Theory in action.  Let me explain.

In 2018, the left-leaning More in Common circulated a questionnaire entitled “Hidden Tribes” which found that 90% of the staff in public bodies described themselves as “progressive activists”, even if they only represented 10% of the respondents. In the past weeks and months evidence that two-tier policing exists in Britain has become overwhelming. Police forces across Britain apply different standards of law to different ethnic communities as part of the Establishment obsession with diversity, equity and inclusion. This policy has led to the widespread and growing feeling amongst huge swathes of the British population that the government no longer believes its duty is to act in their interests.  This is evidenced by the collapse in trust in government and the police. 

The abandonment of political realism

I am a political Realist and Oxford historian. For years I have been trying to get British governments to adopt a properly threat-based defence policy commensurate with Britain’s still considerable regional strategic weight.  I have written op-eds, articles and even books but all to no avail because I have been naive.  In the immediate aftermath of the 2008 US-created banking crisis such strategic defence illiteracy could at least be justified.  When Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and US banks (possibly with the collusion of the US government) inflicted their toxic loans on the rest of us, the cost of simply saving the banking system was ruinous public expenditure.  After all, there is no cozier relationship than that between senior bankers, senior bureaucrats and senior politicians.  Back then, defence was emasculated to keep the banks afloat.

The result was the brutal 10% cut to the British defence budget in 2010, even though British forces were deep in a major campaign in Afghanistan and had a host of other responsibilities.   The already taut relationship between ends, ways and means began to fray, not least because by putting the cost of the nuclear deterrent in the defence budget London effectively weakened and cut both Britain’s nuclear and conventional forces.  Now the relationship has snapped.

Some will say Britain’s defence pretence is simply a function of debt.  After all, British debt now stands close to £3 trillion with annual cost of servicing that debt significantly higher than the annual defence budget.  My contention is that the underfunding of defence is no longer simply a consequence of misrule and debt, but rather ideology. That is why I do not need to wait for the DIP’s publication.

The little DIPper

Britain’s service chiefs are becoming desperate. Last week, the Chief of the British Defence Staff Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton pleaded with the government to increase not only investment in Britain’s defence but also the speed with which investment will take place because “This is the most dangerous period that I have known. The risks and threats to this country are greater than I have known since the Cold War,” Knighton said.  To realise the vision in the government’s own 2025 Strategic Defence Review the armed forces would need at least a further £28 billion invested.  Starmer would like to offer £18 billion.  The Treasury will only agree to £15 billion.  In fact, the ‘DIP’ will be yet another “Use Defence to Fund Welfare Plan” by a government that does not believe in either Britain or defence.  Politics dressed up as strategy in which the future of Britain’s defence and NATO are mortgaged simply to maintain the appearance of defence ‘investment’.

So, forget the media spin Whitehall is preparing about drones and hybrid forces proving the DIP is placing Britain’s armed forces on a war footing and that it represents the greatest single investment in the armed forces since the end of the Cold War. It does not and it is not.  The short term will once again triumph over the longer-term, the cost of defence over the value of peace, and a dangerous ideology over sound defence policy and strategy.

Critical Defence Theory can thus be summarised: Britain and its people are guilty of a host of historic crimes and thus must live with the consequences by enduring imposed and increased risk.  Western privilege can only be countered by accepting that those who threaten Britain have been wronged by the British.  And that by choosing to be weak Britain is signalling that the British no longer pose a threat to anybody or anyone, however predatory or dangerous they may be.

Wilful weakness is a threat in and of itself. And as that brave D-day veteran implied, because of it we seem to be warming up for another war.  

Julian Lindley-French