The government has no national plan for the defence of the UK or the mobilisation of its people and industry in a war despite renewed threats of conflict, Sky News has learnt.
Officials are now starting to develop a cross-government “national defence plan”, it can be revealed.
Dr Keith Dear, a former RAF intelligence officer and former adviser to the prime minister, argues below that it is reasonable for the public to assume there are detailed plans for any anticipated conflicts.
The US secretary of state warns we are “moving from a post-war to a pre-war world” and that “in five years’ time we could be looking at multiple theatres involving Russia, China, Iran and North Korea”.
The chief of the general staff, General Sir Patrick Sanders tell us that we are the “pre-war generation”.
The public might reasonably expect, therefore, that there are detailed plans, regularly refreshed, which would ensure we are prepared in advance for these anticipated conflicts, expected to be dramatically larger and more deadly than anything fought in recent memory – wars we might lose.
Surely, government departments, the Ministry of Defence, the Home Office, the intelligence agencies and our armed forces have a plan to know what to do when it starts, are structured according to the requirements, and can respond quickly?
Such plans are essential not only to avoid scrambling disorder and early defeats but also so that our adversaries, awed by our preparedness, are deterred from fighting in the first place.
The problem is, there is no plan.
We used to have one. Maintained by the government until the early 2000s, the central Government War Book sensibly detailed plans for the continuity of government in the event of war and a possible nuclear exchange.
It was needed so those of us who survived didn’t awake to anarchy.
The book also contained essential plans for mobilising the country…
