Like it or not, the era of hard power has returned. For too long, Britain and Europe have basked in the comfort of an “international rules-based order,” assuming that diplomacy and international agreements would keep us safe.
That illusion has been shattered. Putin’s aggression and China’s growing expansionism, combined with a weak, complacent West have created the gravest defence and security crisis since the Second World War.
Combine that with President Trump’s “flooding the zone,” and the cold, hard reality is that hard power is back. Diplomacy without firepower is meaningless.
The UK must wake up to the fact that only military strength and solid security will deter those who seek to challenge our way of life. You can love him or you can loathe him, the choice is yours and it doesn’t really matter: Donald Trump has torn through conventional wisdom, proving that only strength matters.
Trump wants to push Nato defence spending target to 5 per cent amid Russia and China threat
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From tariffs on friends and China alike, to demands for NATO allies to pay up, to his America-first doctrine, Trump is showing that the only thing that matters is what you can do, not what global intelligentsia say you can do.
You might hate some of it, and on some of it, you’d be right: his attacks on Zelensky are wrong, but you can’t ignore the point that lies behind his action – “Europe, what’s your solution?” – because Europe is willing to provide the words but unable to supply the means.
Europe has grown soft under the assumption that globalisation and multilateralism would protect it. It has left itself weak, vulnerable, over-reliant on an America that is increasingly tired of footing the bill for European defence, and consequently unable to influence events on its own doorstep.
The UK is no exception. For years, defence spending has been an afterthought, sacrificed on the altar of bloated welfare budgets, net-zero schemes, and overseas aid. That must change.
As former Lib Dem Foreign Office Minister Jeremy Browne put it: “2.3 per cent of GDP is not a big enough defence budget to frighten aggressors or fully reassure allies.”
Even the Lib Dems – who rarely know which end of a ‘plane is the front – apparently now admit Britain needs hard power.
Although don’t ask them how to fund it: Sir Ed’s lot demand more spending everywhere while opposing tax rises and growth reforms when it suits them if they think there’s a vote in it.
But if the penny really has finally dropped with them – it may not have done, given their fondness for saying whatever they think people want to hear at any given moment – then things really are bad.
LATEST MEMBERSHIP OPINION:
Sir Keir Starmer announces a surge in defence spendingGBNThe question isn’t whether to increase defence spending, it’s how quickly we can do it, while locking in procurement reforms from the last government so we spend what we have, better.
The last government’s 2.5% pledge was progress – but now it’s not enough. The UK needs a clear, immediate commitment to reach 2.5% by this summer, on a path to 3% by 2030 and 3.5% beyond that.
Anything less will leave Britain unable to defend itself, let alone stand as a credible force in NATO. As the Labour government starts to say the right things, we must be constantly vigilant for Treasury sleight of hand: where ministers shuffle spending from other departments into the MoD budget to artificially inflate the numbers.
No more Treasury tricks – the investment must be real. Of course, increasing defence spending means cutting the fat elsewhere.
If Britain is serious, we should be reducing the foreign aid budget to spend more on defence, scrapping the strategically insane and ridiculously expensive Chagos deal, cutting bloated welfare, identity politics waste, and net-zero excesses, whilst stripping out the unnecessary regulations strangling growth.
This isn’t about military budgets. It’s about the survival of our way of life. Without proper defence spending, there’s no security, no prosperity.
Only hard power keeps Britain safe, NATO strong, and America onside. The “rules-based order” is finished. Power is all that matters. Britain must step up – or be left behind.