It's like the biggest "I told you so" in history, people like me have been predicting this mess for decades... but even I can't believe just how bad this looks...
Who could have predicted Labour would adopt a defacto closet East of Suez agenda (not like they played that card before, although last time signalled it openly well in advance), implementing it at the least opportune time... and being caught short... withdrawing ALL of the Royal Navy's assets it had kept in the region, in some form, for over five decades... despite all the obvious signs something big was about to kick off!
Daily Telegraph - Quote: "The well-placed first source said: “The navy spent 50 years in the Gulf ready to carry out transits and offer protection in the Strait of Hormuz but a few weeks before this kicked off pulled out."
“Bahrain gave us Juffair because they expected us to be there. It is beyond embarrassing.” The source said the “machinery of government failed on every level” and blamed the fact there were no navy personnel in senior operational roles.
Full story: When its last minehunter was towed home to save money, Britain’s bases in the Gulf were left without seaborne protection for the first time in 50 years. A drone strike on RAF Akrotiri, in Cyprus, compounded the embarrassment.
The Times understands navy bosses are “furious” with the way the Middle East crisis has been handled. A well-placed source said that they had been “outmanoeuvred” by senior army and RAF chiefs in charge in key posts, while government suffered without senior staff with military experience.
Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, the head of the armed forces, is from the RAF, and Lieutenant General Nick Perry, chief of joint operations, the army. Perry, who served in Afghanistan and Iraq after 9/11, is in overall charge of UK military forces in operations overseas.
About two weeks before Operation Epic Fury began on February 28 — as President Trump amassed his armada in the Middle East — the Americans asked the British government what it would do if they attacked Iran. Would the UK allow the Americans to use British bases, and, ultimately, would the UK be willing to join in? The wider government system — and the military — knew what was on the horizon, but it was clear from the beginning that No 10 did not want to get involved, with critics saying it lacked experience.
John Bew, a well-regarded foreign policy adviser in No 10 who left in October 2024, had already been replaced three times. Since November 2024 it has been Jonathan Powell.
“The UK took a long time to respond and then the indication was we aren’t going to do anything,” added the source.
Opportunities were missed to deploy ships to the region, and HMS Anson, a nuclear-powered attack submarine, which passed through the Suez Canal on January 31 and headed for Australia could have been kept in the Indian Ocean.
This would have offered choice for the prime minister, giving the UK the ability to fire Tomahawk land attack missiles as the armada built up.
The Royal Navy’s last remaining ship in the region, HMS Middleton, a minehunter, was being towed back to the UK. It was the last ship to be permanently stationed in the Middle East, at the HMS Juffair base in Bahrain. HMS Lancaster, a Type 23 frigate permanently deployed at the base had been decommissioned in December in Bahrain.
At the time, John Healey, the defence secretary, who had pursued a “Nato-first” policy and was deemed to be more cautious when it came to the Middle East than some of his predecessors, was said to be “comfortable” with that.
When Trump launched the war in daylight on the Saturday morning, the armed forces was wholly unprepared for what followed.
It was the first time in half a century that Britain had no ship in the region.
Inside PJHQ, Permanent Joint Headquarters at Northwood, where Perry is in charge of military operations, there was a longstanding contingency plan for how to respond to war in the Middle East, according to the source, who was speaking on the condition of anonymity.
The contingency plan was to send one of the Type-45 destroyers — capable of shooting down ballistic missiles with its sophisticated Sea Viper air defence system — to waters off Cyprus.
However, for unknown reasons, that recommendation was not passed to Knighton until Tuesday March 3 at 9.30am — two days after a drone had hit RAF Akrotiri. The kamikaze drone, thought to have been fired from Lebanon or western Iraq by pro-Iranian militias, hit a hangar at the base in Cyprus that housed two US U2 spy planes. It was not a coincidence — it was obvious from Google Maps that the assets were there.
Some believe the flat-footed approach was Knighton’s fault. “He should have been saying a month earlier that the US armada is building up, what are the options?” added a second well-placed source.
On a visit to Northwood — described as the nerve centre of UK defence — on Thursday, Healey said he had “total confidence” in Knighton and he was an “outstanding officer” who is “doing an extraordinary job”.
Defending his decision not to send ships to the region earlier, Healey suggested no one expected the widespread retaliation by the Iranians. Yet others believe there is nothing that Tehran has done that should come as a surprise.
The source said: “The signal was America said we are now calling for a second aircraft carrier. When America empties out the Indo Pacific of its carriers, you know something is going to happen.”
Trump ordered USS Gerald R Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier, to the Middle East sometime in the week beginning February 9.
Knighton was the best placed to know, and interpret, the likelihood of the US attacking Iran.
On the Tuesday afternoon ministers gave the green light to send HMS Dragon, one of only three destroyers anywhere near ready for the task.
By the time the decision had been made, a French frigate, Aquitaine-class Frigate Languedoc (D653), was nearly in the region. The French had also sent a ground-based air defence unit to defend the Mediterranean island.
Before HMS Dragon had even set sail this Monday, the French aircraft carrier, and its escorts, had reached the region, having been retasked from operations near Sweden. As HMS Dragon made its way, a Spanish frigate was near the shores of Crete.
The prospect of the UK sending HMS Prince of Wales, one of two £3 billion Royal Navy aircraft carriers, was not raised as an option until President Macron started talking about the Charles de Gaulle, said one senior MoD source.
But when it was raised, the military advice was that it was not necessary because of Cyprus, it is understood. Typhoons and F-35s were already at key bases in the region flying missions to defend against Iranian missile and drone attacks.
The well-placed first source said: “The navy spent 50 years in the Gulf ready to carry out transits and offer protection in the Strait of Hormuz but a few weeks before this kicked off pulled out.
“Bahrain gave us Juffair because they expected us to be there. It is beyond embarrassing.” The source said the “machinery of government failed on every level” and blamed the fact there were no navy personnel in senior operational roles.
“The navy has been outmanoeuvred over a period of time,” they added.
The navy, led by General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, the first Royal Marine to take on the post, is “not impressed by the outcome,” they said.
They pointed out that long delays to the defence investment plan, which is still yet to be published despite being expected last autumn, had “paralysed the department”. Services don’t know how much money there will be nor what it will be spent on. Healey and his ministers were given proposals weeks ago from the chiefs and are still sat on them.
“You can’t get anything done,” added the source.
Knighton, meanwhile, has come under criticism for being too dismissive of the importance of the Royal Navy in projecting power abroad. He has no direct combat experience.
“He is often called the best bureaucrat in the building but he is supposed to be the prime minister’s military adviser.” His chiefs, deemed highly capable, don’t always know what he is thinking.
Yet others across defence say he is “hugely respected” both in the MoD and the wider government, and pointed out he is “working tirelessly to keep the country safe”. Knighton is constrained, somewhat, by the current state of the armed forces, which lacks available ships, submarines, and air defence systems.
Against the backdrop of an exasperated department facing a £28 billion black hole in the next four years, the services are competing for resources.
“People are busy fighting internal battles to fight external ones,” added the first source.
They said the UK’s handling of the crisis in the Middle East was “nationally significant and not something that blows off”. They said when it came to the UK’s standing, the perception in Europe was that the UK was “neither a credible or reliable partner”.
But the problems began long before the crisis in the Middle East and can be traced back to June last year, when the strategic defence review (SDR) was published.
The authors of the review had been working to a 2.5 per cent target and then in the final weeks of the review, they were told the UK would spend 3 per cent on defence some time in the next parliament. This affected decision-making.
In reality, Angus Lapsley, the UK’s ambassador to Nato, and Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the then chief of the defence staff, had been warning the government it would be forced to commit itself to a 3.5 per cent target at the Nato summit a few weeks later.
They had urged Healey and the chancellor Rachel Reeves, and even the prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, to make that commitment early and amend the review accordingly. But they were accused of “stoking” the idea and were ultimately ignored.
“The government was planning to hide behind Canada, Italy, Belgium and Spain. They never thought it would happen. It was delusion inside No 10 and Healey was key to that. He wanted to get the SDR out,” added the second source. In the event, all of the countries except Spain agreed to the new target of 3.5 per cent on defence and a further 1.5 per cent on defence-related items.
As it stands, the defence review remains unaffordable, despite assurances that Healey and Knighton gave the prime minister and the chancellor before Christmas.
The Treasury has never fully accepted even a 3 per cent target in the next parliament, it is understood, and refused to give a precise date which would allow MoD to plan on 3 per cent.
The chiefs are now left with a situation where they do not know when the government will commit to 3 per cent of GDP on defence, and there is no obvious pathway to the much higher 3.5 per cent, as promised at the Nato summit. “If the authors had planned around 3.5 per cent then everything would stack up and fit into place,” they said, adding that was the problem with the government’s investment plans.
Healey had surrounded himself with those who lack military experience. Three senior figures in the MoD do not have defence experience, including the national armaments director, the permanent secretary and the chief of defence, nuclear.
As No 10 searches for ways to defuse tensions with the US, the armed forces, having been hollowed out for decades, has been left with little to offer.
An MoD spokeswoman said: “We acted early to protect British people and British interests and to support our allies. Since January, we have deployed significant military assets into the region, including Typhoons, F-35 jets, air defence systems and an extra 400 personnel into Cyprus. Those preparations made a real difference, enabling our troops to conduct defensive operations from day one.
“Our top military commanders are in constant communication.
Following Iran’s reckless response, we assessed our military posture and when the option of a destroyer was put forward on Tuesday it was quickly agreed by the chief of the defence staff and the defence secretary the same day.
“The chief of defence staff is hugely respected across defence and government and, along with our military personnel across the world, is working tirelessly to keep the country safe.”
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/defence/article/royal-navy-furious-iran-war-g2crqrfzx#selection-1817.0-1837.184