NATO allies deployed nearly 40 aircraft to RAF Lossiemouth last year, proof, says Labour that Britain is dependent on “the goodwill of others” to keep the country safe.
Defence Minister Tobias Ellwood said 37 maritime patrol aircraft – including planes from the United States, Germany and France – had been temporarily deployed to the military airfield in 2016 – an increase of 76 per cent on 2015.
The figures were revealed in a written parliamentary answer to shadow defence secretary Nia Griffith, and sparked criticism from Labour who claimed the UK had been left reliant on allies to patrol British waters. In 2010, the Government scrapped a new generation of Nimrod aircraft – a decision which Labour said now looks “downright reckless”.
Griffith said: “As an island nation, the ability to patrol our own shores and protect our key military assets is absolutely essential. As Labour said at the time, the Tories’ decision in 2010 to cut up our Nimrod aircraft and sell them for scrap was a serious mistake. It now looks downright reckless. These figures highlight the extent to which we are now reliant on the goodwill of others to keep Britain safe. We are thankful for our allies’ support but this level of dependence is simply unacceptable.
“Everywhere you look right now – whether it is the shrinking of the Army, the loss of key capabilities or the failure to deliver a national shipbuilding strategy – the damage the Tories are doing to our armed forces is undermining our national security.”
However, the MoD said there were fewer operational flights in 2016 than in 2015.
A spokesman said: “Eighty percent of the flights in 2016 were exercises and the actual number of operational flights was lower last year than in 2015. In 2010 there was a £38 billion black hole in the defence budget and difficult decisions had to be made, including scrapping Nimrod which was nine years late, £800m over budget, and had failed to produce one plane that was safe to fly.
“We work closely with our Nato allies on security in the North Atlantic and have robust force protection measures in place for our assets which we continually review. We are investing in maritime patrol aircraft as part of our £178 billion equipment plan, with the first of our nine P8 aircraft set to be delivered in 2019 as planned.”
The row came as a security think tank the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (RUSI) prepared to discuss the future of warfare and technology.
Veteran US military leader General John Allen will lead a panel of military experts and academic speakers at next week’s event. RUSI said there had been a decade of discussion surrounding “human-free warfare and human-machine combat teaming”, which was now making the transition “from science fiction to fielded capability”.
“To some, we are at an inflection point in the nature of combat – on the precipice of an era that dehumanises conflict and war,” it said. “To others, the evolution of warfare to include machines of greater autonomy is simply a linear extension of historical norms.”
An earlier RUSI paper had looked at the implications for the UK of the US Third Offset Strategy (3OS), a programme to harness the potential of technology into warfare. It found that £16bn of UK defence capabilities were increasingly vulnerable to “low-cost, technology-rich weapons” from hostile states. The paper said the Government had focused too much on offensive rather than protective systems, and called for a commitment to research, innovation and adaptive technologies for defence.
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