Being Right Better in Brussels and London

9 June. London. Big day. Big issues.

In the morning I gave an interview about NATO and Libya to the BBC’s main morning radio news programme – “The Today Programme”. It was strange being back in a studio I used to attend fairly regularly in the 1990s as a ‘Presenter’s Friend’, a turn to expert on security matters. I am older now, not sure wiser. You can be the judge of that.

The issue at hand was the NATO Defence Ministers meeting in Brussels and what is likely to come out of it. Regular readers will know of my concern about NATO’s Operation Unified Protector. However, before I spoke I listened to a desperate plea from Misrata for NATO’s continued support. It was heart-warming to know that we (and by ‘we’ I mean the democratic West) are on the right side of history in our support of the Libyan people. I just wish NATO would be right better at it.

The figures are nevertheless impressive. NATO aircraft have now flown some 9500 sorties and some 4000 strike sorties to enforce the No Fly Zone. Countries about which I have been traditionally rude, such as Belgium, are for once pulling their weight. Critically, so are a few Arab countries – Jordan, United Arab Emirates and Qatar. There really is no love for Gadhaffi amongst the Arabs.

We may also be approaching a tipping point. Although I need to issue a health warning here; the ‘infallibility’ of the Lindley-French prediction model normally at this point falls flat on its face. The arms embargo has effectively prevented any munitions reaching the Tripoli regime. The introduction of British and French attack helicopters (few though they are) has further restricted the movement of regime forces and there are encouraging signs that the Libyan Army leadership are beginning to consider a Gadhaffi-less ceasefire, which is after all what this is now about. People have to stop dying as soon as possible.

In Brussels some form of solidarity has been crafted from the rubble of national caveats and restrictions over the use of force and the NATO Defence Ministers will agree to extend the mission for another ninety days.

Two things now need to be carefully considered – how we support the Libyan people in establishing an enduring ceasefire, and how we support them in crafting a peaceful political transition.

To that end, three conditions must first be met for a ceasefire: all attacks on civilians must cease; all regime forces must verifiably withdraw to bases, including the very nasty paramilitaries; and full access should be guaranteed for humanitarian relief.

Critically, the political transition will require the Libyan people and their regional partners front and centre. First, any intervention to guarantee the peace must be asked for by the Libyan people. Second, the Arab League and the African Union must be in the lead. Third, all actions must be UN-mandated. That will ensure ‘we’ continue to be right.

Gadhaffi’s personal future? Ultimately that is up to the Libyan people to decide, not us.

And then I went to the British Parliament. I had been summoned to give evidence to the House of Commons Defence Committee on the UK’s National Security Strategy and the Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR). My central contention was blunt; both ‘strategies’ describe a very big world getting bigger and more complex by the day and then promptly make Britain smaller and weaker.

At the military level the Strategic Pretence and Impecunity Review (and the new ‘SDSR2’ which is currently being conducted) will damage Britain’s standing in the world for the foreseeable future and impose upon Britain and its armed forces a much greater level of risk than the British people (and their American allies) have a right to expect. Forget the promise by the Government to reinvest in the armed forces from 2015. From what I am hearing that is not going to happen.

The official line is that Britain’s retreat, for that is what it is, is simply a function of being broke. That would not be unreasonable with the national debt 60% the size of the economy, even if the solution seems to be to disarm the baby and then throw the baby, the bath-tub and the bathroom out of the window. Of particular concern is a conversation I had over tea (what else?) with a senior official whom I very much like and admire very, who had a hand in drafting the SDSR and with whom I profoundly disagree.

His argument was that taken together the NSS and SDSR are not temporary adjustments to cope solely with being broke. Rather, it is a structural change to lessen the reliance of British governments on the armed forces as a tool of strategic influence and shift the balance of effort and investment to other tools such as aid and development and diplomacy. In principle that is a perfectly defensible position, even if it does smack of strategic political correctness.

There is a genuine dilemma. For many years the understandable fixation with Al Qaeda and terrorism has masked the nature and pace of strategic change. Moreover, the threat to British values and security from hyper-immigration has undoubtedly forced British governments to switch resources from projection to protection.

However, when I look at this world of ours as I do and see the nature of dangerous change driven as it is by hyper-competition between democracies and non-democracies I see all the conditions for the kind of instability that needs western democracies to have credible and capable armed forces. ‘Credibility’ and ‘capability’ are defined not by navel-gazing but by properly understanding what is out there and what is likely to be out there. As President Obama said in London if ‘we’ do not play an active role for the better in such a world then who will?

Sadly, if the strategically correct are permitted to hijack and undermine Britain’s security and defence policy all they will succeed in doing is destroying our credibility internationally, our alliances and the very international institutions that are central to Britain’s influence.

And, in the end? Some poor bloody infantryman from Sheffield will find himself in a foxhole under fire armed only with a UN-mandated plastic bottle and a broken elastic band. That is what is at stake if this folly continues.

I just wish London would for once be right…and be better.

Julian Lindley-French

D-Day: The High Water Mark of Anglo-American Defence Relations?

D-Day. June 6. London. Good news - it is raining.  Good to see the natural order restored.  Back in 1944 Americans, Britons and Canadians were struggling ashore onto Norman beaches under heavy fire to rid Europe of the Nazis.  On this day of days it is right and proper to look back and remember and in that light consider Anglo-American defence relations today.

For me this is an especially poignant moment as my grandfather was there and this week I have been called to give evidence to the British Parliament on Britain’s future defence strategy, or what is left of it! The word on the street in Washington is that Britain is seen as an increasingly unreliable ally, abandoning the four principles of alliance upon which D-Day was launched – strategy, influence, competence and commitment.  Was D-Day the high water mark of Anglo-American defence relations?

First, let me de-mythologise the relationship that existed back in 1944.  The US routinely demonstrated frustration bordering on a lack of respect for the 'ponderous' British.  That was unfair.  D-Day and the subsequent battle for Normandy are cases in point. Of the 156,000 allied troops landed on D-Day, only 57,500 were American, with the rest being mainly British and Canadian, with the bulk British.  British General Montgomery (Monty), so often derided by American historians, was the architect of D-Day, which worked like clockwork on the two British and one Canadian beach.

It was the British and Canadians who took on and defeated the cream of the German 7th Army, particularly the Panzer Lehr and Hitler Jugend SS divisions.  This enabled the Americans to eventually break out of much more lightly-defended parts of Normandy. Montgomery said the Allies would reach the River Seine on D plus 90. That objective was achieved on D plus 81.

Furthermore. the British advance from Normandy to Antwerp was the fastest advance in military history until the American advance on Baghdad in 2003. Even Operation Market Garden, the attempt to get over the Rhine at Arnhem bridge in  September 1944, and widely regarded as ‘Monty’s’ folly, could have worked if US Airborne had taken intact the bridge over the River Maas at Grave. Their failure held up the British XXX Corps for a critical thirty-six hours.

But what of today? The evidence of the past decade would suggest the high-water mark may indeed have been reached.  Britain was an effective junior partner during the re-taking of Kuwait in 1991 and the performance of the British armed forces during the 2003 Iraq War was solid, if not spectacular.  However, in Afghanistan the British Army has come close to being broken, trying to follow American strategy on British resources over a long time and at great distance from a politically uncertain home base. 

And yet, the British are still there and in force in Afghanistan, with some ten thousand troops deployed unconstrained by the absurd caveats and rules of non-engagement of other Europeans.  Equally, Britain took the lead wth France to uphold UN Security Council Resolution 1973 in Libya, an operation which has just entered a new and dangerous phase with the deployment of British Army attack helicopters.

So, why is Washington sniping (at least the ever-shrinking bit that cares about Britain)?  There are three main concerns which have been apparent since London launched the Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) back in late 2010 and which are growing in intensity. First, Britain’s ability to work effectively with the US is being rapidly eroded. Second, Britain’s ability to influence and lead European and other allies and partners is being dangerously undermined. Third, Prime Minister Cameron is retreating ever further into strategic and defence ‘spin’.  

Current actions are particularly exercising the Americans. First, Defence Secretary Fox seems to be re-visiting the SDSR by carrying out a further review to 'match' defence planning assumptions to funding. It is little more than yet another thinly-disguised Treasury-driven attempt to force armed forces at war to squeeze a further £1 billion of cuts above and beyond the savage cuts announced in the SDSR.  The SDSR abandoned any pretence at ‘strategy’, this review is in danger of burying it. 

Second, the British seem unsure as to the effect of policy.  The Government aims to cut some £38 billion ($62.4 billion) of unfunded commitments inherited from its Labour predecessor, mainly in the procurement and acquisition of defence equipment. Not an unreasonable goal the Government thought it had successfully found at least £19 billion ($31.2 billion) of savings by 2015. However, my sources in Washington tell me that a further £9 billion ($14.8 billion) of over-spend has now been uncovered and that the real figure is back up to £28 billion ($46 billion). Any pretence to competence is being rapidly abandoned.

Third, the British are behaving badly.  Prime Minister Cameron is ‘punishing’ the Americans for not supporting him more aggressively over Libya. Specifically, he is refusing to permit the British Army to replace the successful US Marine Corps mission in the upper Gereskh valley, which ends in October. This is in spite of military advice that the British Army is up for the mission and can do the job. As a consequences the Taliban will re-infiltrate an area of critical strategic significance close to the main Helmand province base at Lashkar Gah. Such a failure could torpedo any hopes of handing authority over to the Afghans as part of the transition.  Any pretence to commitment is in danger of being abandoned.

This is not the first time Prime Minister Cameron has behaved in such a dangerously churlish manner. He scrapped the brand new MRA4 spy aircraft, to teach a ‘lesson’ to BAe Systems, a defence contractor. How we British could have done with such eyes and ears over Libya today.  The Prime Minister is also micro-managing the Libyan campaign, issuing so-called ‘red cards’ to stop attacks on targets the military regard as essential. As for the famous attack helicopters, much of it is 'spin'.  The British can only deploy four, the French fourteen.  The Americans?  They are quietly having to divert their own over-used and over-stretched strategic eyes and ears to support the British and the French. No wonder the Yanks call the Brits the ‘Borrowers’.  Just wait until Congress finds out!

In this light D-Day does indeed seem a very, very long time ago and the Americans have a point. Both the Americans and the British armed forces deserve better.  Too often they are forced to make up for London's strategic contradictions, its lack of vision, the strategy and policy mistakes, as well as the endless prevarications of an increasingly surreal Whitehall village.

With the gap between stated ambition and available forces now yawning London is snatching contempt from the jaws of American respect. Strategy, influence, competence and commitment underpinned D-Day. The four principles still inform an Anglo-American defence relationship which the British still regard as vital to both national and defence strategy.  

If London is serious (a big 'if) it is time for to wake up and smell the coffee...as the Americans would say.

Julian Lindley-French

"Everyone Needs a Dragon Slayer"

“A thousand hearts are great within my bosom; Advance our standards, set upon our foes; Our ancient word of courage, fair Saint George, inspire us with the spleen of fiery dragons! Upon them! victory sits on our helms”. Richard III, William Shakespeare.

Krakow, Poland. What role does national myth play in forging national identity and cohesion? Here in this beautiful country of Poland it is a question that seems particularly apposite. Poland is a country that through the centuries has had to sustain its identity in spite of many attempts to wipe the country from the face of Europe. But, where does one draw the line on national myth? What happens when myth evaporates? My visit to Auschwitz was eloquent testimony of what happens when myth through strategy and policy becomes industrialised. Hitler, Mussolini, Mladic – these people represent the danger that can emerge from unbridled, industrial myth.

One could argue that Europe’s violent past is itself the result of a myriad of myth-makers. Myth fits neatly into the ancient tradition of European story-telling.  And yet myth clearly has a role to play. My own sorry country Britain is a sad example. Now denied its myths by the Komissars of political correctness, drowning in a sea of meaningless multiculturalism, St George has been slain not by the now protected dragon, but by the health and safety laws of a state that has become over-mighty. 

It was my old friend, Hans Binnendijk of the National Defense University in Washington, who gave me this phrase which crowns this blog.  It is powerfully convincing. Americans of course have their own myth; purveyors of the American dream, a nation recast from nations, the shining city on the moral upland of rectitude looking down upon the rest of us dwelling in servitude amongst dark, satanic mills from which narrow calculation is ground out. And, of course, the one in which the Americans turn up late and then 'win' World Wars One and Two.  America's hollywood myth has almost written we Brits out of history.  Hey ho.

But there is a point to myth.  Take America indeed.  We all need America to believe itself that America is an idea, rather than a power. When America simply becomes another power, as it did during the last decade or so, the West lost much of its moral compass and with it much of its political authority.  The European Union is trying to cast itself in a similar mould, but Europeans do not sit comfortably on top of shining hills.  European myth requires that someone always has to win and someone always has to lose. Sad, really.

Here in Poland myth is alive and well. Do not get me wrong. This amazing, modernizing country is testament to human spirit, faith, myth, NATO, European Union but above all Poles. Indeed, standing in the centre of beautiful Krakow I felt ashamed of the fast-fooded, fading, filthy centres of most British cities. The beauty of central Krakow is a myth in itself and speaks of centuries of defiance of a people gang raped repeatedly by history, most recently by Nazi and Soviet alike. Remember, the liberation of Europe from Soviet occupation began here in Poland.

Indeed, it is that heady mix of faith, myth and modernity that makes Poland.  There are warnings.  I saw several gangs of skin-headed youths that looked dangerously aggressive and seemingly fed by a more unattractive form of Polish national myth.  I also saw the contrasts of Poland as I drove out to Auschwitz.  Smart Polish Catholics on the way to church weaving to avoid drunks...at 10am.  Poland has come a very long way, but still has a ways to go. 

My hosts took me on a tour of the amazing Wieliczka salt mine. Some three hundred kilometers of tunnels, diving some nine-hundred metres deep, taking some seven hundred years to carve out. And, what carvings! Here Polish faith, myth and modernity are represented by salt carvings that range from cathedrals to monuments to myth in huge chambers that leave one speechless and breathless.

In a sense this mine is itself a metaphor for national myth. Bring myth too fast and too abruptly to the surface and it can break the delicate social and political balance upon which all societies are built – ancient, modern and post-modern. Why? Because national myth in Europe (and for much of the world beyond) is not like America's myth in which everyone is meant to win.  In Europe most ‘dragons’ are metaphors for the slaying of enemies, and historically in Europe most enemies live next door. That was the tragedy of the Balkans where myth became fact and fact became murder.

Rather, keep it safe, discreet, carved in some underground gallery of shared awareness so that we can from time to time we can remind ourselves of who we were and maybe, just maybe, who we are.  

Yes, everyone does indeed need a dragon-slayer, but keep him in the closet.

St George, England, today? My money’s on the dragon.

Julian Lindley-French