This is an important MUST READ article from the Telegraph. Check it out!
via Defence cuts threaten US-UK partnership, says Robert Gates – Telegraph.
For me, Robert Gates comments are no surprise. David Cameron’s government has effectively ignored proper strategic analysis. Indeed the only strategy has been cuts in the name of austerity. In my view, this will leave many areas of government vulnerable to major risk for years to vome.
Any thoughts?
Robert Gates, former director of the CIA. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
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Twice in the last century, we in the UK, were nearly starved to death by German E-boats and then U-boats.
Now, we import about 75% of our food, lack even a coastal protection vessel, have aircraft carriers with no aircraft on them, and will soon have a Tri Forces of less than 100,000 men and woman.
We are in a position where we cannot defend our sea lanes because our navy is too small and are proposing to sack another 3000 soldiers who are fully trained and replace them with reservists.
All this at a time, when we cannot find enough reservists to replace them.
In terms of power capacity, we have just 4% over requirements and lack the ability to defend our power stations against terrorist attack or defend the Port of Felixstowe through which the bulk of our meagre exports flow.
The Chinese have just tested a hyper-sonic jet which could render the defense systems of every nation on earth obsolete and reset the global calculations of nuclear diplomacy.
It also makes a nonsense of any thought the West might have had of “containing them” or winning “Air Sea Battle” easily. Both those strategies have now been rendered obsolete along with the UK,s ability to play a role in them.
The aircraft tested under intensive secrecy has been named WU-14 by the Pentagon and is designed to hit targets anywhere on the planet with nuclear or conventional weapons before warning systems and anti missile systems could react.
As with fighting and storming robots, Eko-skeletons and their ability to attack satellites in space Western military sources said in Beijing that China’s apparent progress had come”very much sooner than expected”.
China is also thought to be building a hyper-sonic aircraft that could be launched from a bomber before flying at speeds of up to Mach 10 using supersonic combustion ramjet or scramjet technology.
The speed of the WU-14 was between 6084 and 9127 mph as opposed to Concorde’s top speed of 1350 mph and a bullet from a US Army rifle of 1969 mph.
Only the Americans have anything better than this (Boing X-51 Waverider) and their budgets are being cut as China’s grows.
It really is now time that David Cameron, and others living in the past, came to terms with the fact that we are no longer a “Great Power” who people listen to in the “Councils of the World”, which can “punch above our weight” or make the traffic lights stop.
We lack the money thanks to the wholesale theft of our resources by those behind the bankers, to be anything other than a small country on the edge of Europe run in the Prussian image by Angela Merkel.
Now the days when we could rely on the Americans to save us when life got difficult or on the “Empire” have now gone as Robert Gates has told us.
We should reappraise our role in the world, become a neutral tax haven, jettison the Scots, the Northern Irish, the Welsh and the descendants of Michael Ango the Cornish patriot or anyone else who dislikes rule from Westminster/wants independence and regain control of our borders.That done, we should then concentrate like Singapore on business, sovereign wealth ,productivity and exports whilst getting rid of those outmoded institutions which hold us back.
Our military should become what it now is a self defense force and people, especially the BBC and the metropolitan elite should stop pretending, and stop wallowing in nostalgia for things that to quote the line from the epic film “Gone with the Wind”