UK military ill-prepared to defend an attack, says retired chief

The armed forces are ill-prepared to defend the UK against a serious military attack, a senior commander has warned the defence secretary. 

In a memo before he retired in April as head of Joint Forces Command, Gen Sir Richard Barrons said key capabilities had been stripped out to save money. He said Whitehall was "preserving the shop window" with items like aircraft carriers, the Financial Times reports.

The RAF is spending £2.5bn on 14 F-35B Lightning II stealth fighters

Defence officials said Sir Richard had backed the last defence review. The FT said it had obtained the 10-page private memo, which had been sent to Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon.


It followed the government's decision to raise defence spending by nearly £5bn by 2020-21 and its pledge to meet Nato's target to spend 2% of GDP on defence for the rest of the decade.

Sir Richard said: "Capability that is foundational to all major armed forces has been withered by design." He said critical technical and logistical capabilities had been "iteratively stripped out".

"Counter-terrorism is the limit of up-to-date plans and preparations to secure our airspace, waters and territory," he said.   "Neither the UK homeland nor a deployed force could be protected from a concerted Russian air effort."