"I'd be surprised if all Royal Navy, Army, RAF and MoD leaders gets through the SDR intact", General says

Sir General Richard Barrons told the Defence Select Committee on Wednesday (June 11) that the changes set out in the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) must be fully implemented over the next decade.

The recommendations, accepted in full by the government, oversees vast changes to armed forces deployments, priorities for spending, revamping military housing, and other commitments. Lincoln Jopp, Conservative MP for Spelthorne, asked what advice the reviewers would give to future defence secretaries and chiefs of defence staff if they’re going to fulfil this cultural change.

General Barrons, who served in the army extensively during deployments in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan, said the department of state, a military strategic headquarters, nuclear enterprise, and a national armaments director group, must all work together.

The SDR reviewer added: “Given the transformative menu set out in the review, it starts with clear, unequivocal, firm, robust, leadership at the top. We’ll all be looking for that as they work through these changes this summer. You touched on a sense that this is all really difficult and complicated, and it may be both of those things, and I hear those from people who may want to resist this kind of change.

“They have to see this as not optional and have to be held to account, first of all by parliament and ministers, then by their own senior leaders. I would be surprised if everyone in and out of uniform makes this journey intact, but it isn’t optional. The pace can be a bit sporty, but it’s not impossible unless you get on with it.”

The government is increasing defence spending to just over 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2027, with the ambition of increasing this to three per cent in the next parliament. Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte is calling on countries to increase core military spending to 3.5 per cent, with a further 1.5 per cent on cybersecurity and other defence-related budgets.

Change is being pressured at a fast pace to deal with growing tensions around the world, and the actions of UK adversaries such as Russia. Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, who previously served as the defence secretary between 1997 and 1999, said strong leaders are necessary see these defence reform changes through.

“How do you change the direction of a column of ants? The answer is you step on the first ten. The whole question of leadership is really important. What I said at the first meeting of the top 300 people in the Ministry of Defence is that we have to get rid of the idea of business as usual.

“Our adversaries don’t believe in business as usual. We cannot afford to have business as usual. At the moment, we have got serious leadership at the top of the MoD. I believe that John Healey is absolutely determined to make the defence reform proposals work and the strategic defence review implementation work as well.”