When I attend meetings in the Council Chamber in Merton, it’s impossible to ignore the Borough’s most famous inhabitant: a huge picture of Admiral Lord Nelson looks down on the assembled Councillors.
Today is the 220th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, which cemented Britain’s naval supremacy. I wonder what Nelson would make of the Royal Navy today, which cannot properly defend us. The core problem traces back to Tony Blair’s expeditionary foreign policy and its emphasis on distant wars. To support this, his government commissioned two large aircraft carriers designed for offshore bombardment and troop support.
In principle, that’s fine. Unfortunately, the focus on these two large ships means the Royal Navy cannot reliably carry out its most basic task: keeping our sea lanes open to receive vital supplies. 95% of our trade is carried by sea, including 66% of our gas supply. The risk isn’t just cargo ships being sunk; we also rely on pipelines from Norway, cross-channel power cables, and the huge web of critical undersea communications cables.
The two aircraft carriers can do very little to protect this vital shipping and undersea infrastructure. For that, we need the rest of the fleet: the remaining submarines (6), Destroyers (6), and Frigates (8). But many of these ships are either not operational or tied up protecting the carriers themselves. There is frequently only one submarine available (which would be with a carrier in wartime). Last year, only two of our six Destroyers—the Navy’s principal anti-aircraft defence—were available to fight, with the rest in refit. We also desperately need more minesweepers to keep our port approaches clear. (I’ve excluded the ballistic missile submarines, which we hope would play no role in conventional naval defence.)
We also need to look beyond conventional ships. Technology is moving fast. Ukraine, without a traditional navy, has had extraordinary success against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet using missiles and sea-based drones.
We must ensure sufficient funding to develop these new weapons and the defences against our enemies using them.
How does this affect the Liberal Democrats? While we have been robust in supporting increased defence spending we have been almost silent on the state of the Royal Navy. I can find few references in Hansard, for example, of our spokespeople addressing this issue.
We need to urgently prioritise our naval forces. History is clear: closing our sea lanes is the closest we came to defeat in both World Wars. Liberal Democrats must be the Party that recognizes an island nation’s absolute need to protect its ocean lifelines.
The Government talks a good game, promising more ships and new weapons in the Strategic Defence Review. We must ensure this is delivered—and that the extra money is not diverted elsewhere.
As for Nelson, he would no doubt be astonished by the current Royal Navy. Yet I suspect he would still say : “A fleet of British ships at war are the best negotiators.”
* Simon McGrath is a Councillor in Wimbledon and represents Lib Dem Councillors on the Party’s Federal Board
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9 Comments
The aircraft carriers have a use as DRONE platforms which can be used to guard sea lanes near the UK or be used to attack enemy ships. Lateral thinking could produce loads of ways of using them. However we do need escort vessels for convoys and minesweepers and more sophisticated ships for all the other paraphernalia of modern life.
Whilst it would probably be a bad decision to build these carriers today we have them and they’re probably worth the money it takes to keep them operational. However, we aren’t likely to be able to fund the full carrier fleets needed to make them truly effective so we need a strategy which involves using them as the core of European carrier fleets. As is so often the case, the solution to our problems is more co-operation with Europe.
Simon, I am not challenging the overall content or message behind this article, but I do just question what is your source for the claim that 95% of our trade is carried by sea.
These are the figures that the Government publish:
“Of all international freight traded with the UK, around 85% by weight and around 55% by value were moved by sea.” https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/port-freight-annual-statistics-2024/port-freight-annual-statistics-2024-route-information
85% by weight is still significant I do accept!
Our Carriers are offensive rather than defensive in nature – they exist solely to enable the UK to project power around the world.
Personally I think we should offer to sell them to Saudi Arabia – they could afford to buy them and may welcome the opportunity to join the small number of countries with Carriers. We can then use the funds to build or acquire ships we need for defensive purposes.
Simon is correct when he says the plan for two aircraft carriers originated with the Blair government.
However, when the Coalition government was formed in 2010, the plan was still in its early stages. It was fully reviewed. The decision of the review, which involved Lib Dem minister, was to proceed. The two vessels were launched in 2014 and 2017.
On the contrary we would need offensive weaponry. Weapons to defend Britain would not have the effective range or ordnance to help eastern Europe.
Might the insufficient nature of all our (inadequately) armed forces be aconsequence of mulri-party adoption of Austerity/Neoliberal policies and a multi-party failure to reform our tax set up so that it does not favour the very wealthy?
@Steve,
Possibly. During WW2 and for many years afterwards the Economic system could be described as Military Keynesianism. It still is in the USA. It’s given them continuing growth whereas the more pacifist European countries have struggled. But we should be careful of what we wish for. Do we want a Military Industrial Complex calling the shots (pardon the pun) in quite the same way?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Keynesianism
@Peter – Military Keynesianism doesn’t seem to be working to the same extent in Russia today. I suggest there are other factors at play which enable the non-military industrial complex to function ie. Food and energy production etc. and thus support the production of “cosmetics”.