Sir Keir Starmer has led further meetings with European allies to discuss deploying a “reassurance” force to Ukraine to ensure the country’s security against future Russian attacks.
The meeting came in the wake of what he described as a “historic” summit in the White House on Monday, led by Donald Trump and attended by eight of Europe’s top leaders, including Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, to attempt to negotiate a peace settlement with Russia.
Sir Keir had already confirmed hat he is “ready to put boots on the ground and planes in the air” to support a peace deal for the war-torn country. He has taken the lead in creating a “coalition of the willing” to help shore up Ukraine’s defences. Trump, meanwhile, has ruled out sending American troops to Ukraine.
The prime minister had also pledged to increase UK defence spending, saying that “tyrants” like Russian president Vladimir Putin “only respond to strength”. His initial promise to raise spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027, with an aim to hit 3 per cent by the end of the next term, was quickly altered to five per cent in line with Nato promises in June.
Relations with Russia are at their worst since the Cold War period, and military experts believe that European countries need to be prepared for conflict.
But is the UK ready to put boots on the ground; and how do Britain’s armed forces compare now to 40 years ago, in 1984, when the UK was engaged in a stand-off with Russia?
How strong is the UK’s military?
Earlier this year the Ministry of Defence released its latest figures on military equipment, accurate as of April 2024.
The army increased its number of Challenger II Main Battle Tanks from 213 to 219 in the past year to April.
Ministry of Defence figures show that the army also has some 128 Ajax armoured fighting vehicles, though an update from defence minister Lord Coaker suggests that only 91 of these are already in service, after years of delay.
The UK also added four new F-35 fighter jets, also known as Lightning, bringing the total to 35 according to latest figures.
The number of Typhoon jets (137), submarines (10), destroyers (6), and frigates (12) remained the same as the previous year.
In terms of personnel and ships, the UK’s capacity is substantially lower than in 1984, primarily because the UK is in peacetime and equipment needs have evolved.
Technology has evolved significantly since the 1980s, in particular when it comes to air defence and tanks. This means that some equipment will be fewer in number but of a much higher quality.
While jet fighters of the 1980s were technologically advanced for their time, the newest aircraft are more akin to flying supercomputers. Submarines are designed to evade ever more complicated detection equipment and warships have to tackle missiles which travel several times the speed of sound.
Yet the numbers can matter when engaged in direct combat, experts explain, since losses are all but certain.
Some equipment is not in service, is on loan, or is due for repairs, said defence acquisition expert Stuart Young, a former engineer officer in the Royal Navy and visiting fellow at Cranfield University.
“The Challenger main battle tank is currently in service, and that’s being upgraded,” Mr Young explained. “But the challenge is, as those go in to be upgraded, the number of main battle tanks is going to go down until they come back out of that upgrade cycle.”
Many of these supplies have not been updated in decades, meaning in some cases the UK is still relying on the same equipment built in the Cold War.
In fact, the majority of the army’s armoured fighting vehicles are from before the 1990s, and some come from as far back as the Sixties, according to a defence committee report in 2021 which called the lack of new acquisitions “deplorable”. The navy faces similar challenges.
“The oldest type-23 frigates are well over 30 years old now, and the replacement was due originally in around 2010. Those ships were designed for an 18 to 21-year life,” Mr Young said.
If Britain enters into war, it is not clear that the country will be able to get stockpiles and numbers to the levels needed in a timely manner.
The UK has met and exceeded its Nato minimum defence spend of 2 per cent of total economic output, or GDP, with levels currently estimated at 2.3 per cent; and set to rise to 2.5 per cent from 2027.
But James Black, assistant director at security research group Rand, said that Nato’s 2 per cent target was a “politically derived” number that was common in a post-Cold War setting.
“In the Cold War, countries were spending routinely a lot more than 2 per cent, spending three, four or five,” he said.
“So we shouldn’t think that 2 per cent is a magic number at which you are automatically spending enough money that you are well defended against all threats.”
Last year, a Ministry of Defence spokesperson said the government’s first budget including an increase in defence spending to almost £3bn, “clearly illustrat[es] our commitment to national security and ensur[es] we have a military force fit for the future.”
But some military experts fear that this is not enough, arguing that 3 per cent of GDP – a 0.7 per cent increase of some £16.4bn a year — is necessary to replenish stockpiles and prepare the UK for a possible allied conflict against aggressors such as Russia; while Trump has called for 5 per cent spending in Europe.
“With the impact of Ukraine and the general tightening of government spending, we’re in a catch-up situation. I think spending has to go up to 3 per cent or more, to actually give you the increase in capability needed to meet the increasing threat that we have at the moment,” Mr Young said.
At a NATO summit in June, the Prime Minister pledged to deliver a “historic” 5 per cent of spending on “national security”. This would mean increasing the defence budget to 3.5 per cent by 2035.
Sir Keir has confirmed that defence spending will meet 2.5 per cent by 2027, yet his target of 3.5 per cent has a longer timeframe of nearly a decade.
But Mr Young said he believed that matching the 2.5 per cent promise wouldn’t represent any material improvements for UK defence.
Instead, Mr Young estimates that this figure will be just enough to play catch-up with stockpiles and demand.
“We haven’t invested in stockpiling missiles and ammunition and things like that,” Mr Young said.
In July, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Defence acknowledged that the armed forces have faced resource cuts in the past few years.
“We know we face serious challenges after years of hollowing out of our armed forces and our Strategic Defence Review will assess the threats we face and the capabilities needed to address them in order to secure our nation’s defences.”
The war in Ukraine has also hit the UK’s military budget and supplies, along with other Nato members.
The UK has pledged £7.8bn in military assistance to Ukraine since February 2022 and, like other allied countries, has even donated equipment directly from UK defence stockpiles – including tanks and missiles.
This means that equipment numbers could be even lower than shown in the official statistics, last updated in September 2023.
As a result, if Britain’s defence forces receive an influx in capital, it could take four or five years to replenish supplies of equipment and weaponry, Mr Young suggested.
“The new armed forces minister [Luke Pollard] said we want to buy as much defence equipment from the UK as possible. Well, the UK doesn’t have that capacity any more.”
Dwindling troop numbers
Britain’s armed forces also have a big recruitment problem, exacerbated by budget cuts; which may present a challenge if forces are deployed.
“We need to increase recruitment, especially if we are looking at peacekeeping activities in Ukraine, which needs boots on the ground. The problems we had six months ago have just been exacerbated further by recent events,” Mr Young said.
The number of people in the armed forces is 45 per cent lower than it was in 1984, at approximately 180,000 personnel, according to the MoD at January 1 of this year.
Within this, only 127,000 are full-time trained personnel, while approximately 53,000 are untrained or reserves.
Training takes time, money and, most importantly, retaining personnel, Mr Young said.
In the current job market, army pay is no longer competitive – before even considering how many young people are willing to commit to the hours, lifestyle, and risk of military service.
But Mr Young warned that the biggest problem may be the loss of expertise, as higher trained officials are abandoning the military for private sector jobs.
In particular, the quality of accommodation and other resources for military families has been in decline, which he points to as a reason for older personnel with dependents leaving the military.
Mr Young said the UK couldn’t afford to lose these highly trained groups in the armed forces, especially as equipment becomes more and more technically complex.
“We’ve got people leaving the armed forces because of the living and working conditions, so then you’re losing expertise and talent as well,” he says.
“So, switching on the tap today in terms of recruitment doesn’t give you an instant solution. It’s going to be another three or four or five years or more before you get the fully trained people that you need, and then you’ve got to retain them. They’ve now got skills which are attractive to civilian employees.”
Lessons from Ukraine: the long haul
Rand’s Mr Black said Britain and other Nato members needed to be taking lessons from the war in Ukraine to improve longevity capabilities in combat.
“The war in Ukraine has exposed that a lot of Western militaries have been assuming that any high-end war against someone like Russia would be very lethal, but would also probably be very quick. A kind of short, sharp, horrible flurry of violence. And then the situation would be resolved.”
However, the ongoing war in Ukraine – now three years long – has shown that this assumption is flawed.
And if Britain were to engage in a longer period of war, the armed forces are not prepared to last more than a few months, according to a defence committee report in February.
Former committee chair Sir Jeremy Quin told MPs that the military was “unable to devote sufficient training and resources to high-intensity warfighting”.
Mr Black warns that the existing focus on higher quality, complex machinery does not necessarily work for long combat, with challenges such as refuelling, rapid replacement and stockpiling.
“How do I replenish my stockpiles when I’ve fired all my missiles or dropped all my bombs? And that is partly a military question but also an industrial question. Do we have the industrial base to rebuild in the first place?”
