At the General Election, all three main parties were committed to holding a strategic defence review (SDR) as part of their manifestos for government. Today in the House of Commons, the debate begins as to how we configure our armed forces for the challenges we face in the coming years. How Labour engages in this will be important.
In February, Labour in government produced Adaptability and Partnership: Issues for the Strategic Defence Review, the green paper which paved the way for the SDR. The document set out very well the principles that underpin Labour’s approach.
The first is that we cannot simply “defend our own goal line”. This is a response to the “troops out” message that goes out, not just from anti-war protesters, but from sections of the media and parts of the wider public, usually in response to ever-mounting casualties in Afghanistan. (more…)