Atlantic Council Senior Adviser Harlan Ullman writes for United Press International on the relative defense spending of the United States and the United Kingdom:
Tomorrow I shall be addressing the Royal United Services Institute’s Land Warfare conference, hosted by British Army Chief General Sir Nick Carter. The title of the talk is “An Effective Brains Based Strategy for the 21st Century” to which has been added “And What The (British) Army Can Do About Implementing One.
Those who keep up with defense issues know that concern has been registered by a number of senior American officials, in and out of uniform, about Britain’s military and the impact of (severe) budget cuts on its ability to wage and deter war. The Army that defeated Napoleon and Hitler is down to about 82,000 or about half the size of the U.S. Marine Corps. The Royal Navy that once ruled the waves now numbers a handful of major warships. And the Royal Air Force, the victor of the Battle of Britain, will muster just seven squadrons worth of aircraft.