However, this misses the crux of the issue about Britain's future place at the top table. Multilateralism cannot be at the expense of our ability to operate as an independent military force. It would be foolish to suggest that inter-state warfare is no longer a threat and therefore the capability to wage it is not worth retaining on an autonomous basis. From this premise it would be even more foolish to relinquish the ability to act independently of Nato or the EU. If we haphazardly fund our armed forces in such a way that we are not able to deal with threats presented by individual states, then any spending over and above home-defence is wasted.
Given the nature of potential threats to our national interest in the future, the process of determining our grand strategy must be subject to thorough open debate, so that Britain's true strategic interests guide the process rather than being dictated by the Treasury.
The First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Mark Stanhope, raised perhaps the three most useful questions that need to inform this dialogue. First, what are the standing commitments for defence? What does Britain aspire to do on her own? Where Britain is operating as a member of a coalition, how do we want to influence our partners?
Of these, by far the most important is our national aspiration — what kind of country do we want to be? If military spending remains the same, Britain will have to choose between several variants of an independent expeditionary capability. But if spending is reduced further, as seems likely, we will be reduced to contributing piecemeal to multinational forces over which we have no overall control.
If the government does not actively choose, structure and fund our military as some form of expeditionary force, we will by default lose our autonomous defence function and the associated skills, probably permanently. The penalties in terms of international power and influence will be profound. It is unlikely, in that case, that we will ever contradict Acheson's assessment of our place in the world.
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