For 40 years, the World Economic Forum in Davos has been the pre-eminent meeting of minds; but frankly, it’s become unsurprising, and fairly glum. The takeaway from the summit in January was that “trust in governments, corporations and above all banks has become as elusive as sure footing on the icy streets of this Alpine resort,” as the New York Times put it.

Not exactly visionary, encouraging or likely to change the world.

It’s time to bring some fresh energy to the global dialogue. At the inaugural One Young World summit from February 8th to 10th in London, hundreds of young leaders from 192 nations will take up the most pressing issues facing the international community: interfaith dialogue, the environment, global health and the changing media; inspiring hope and change.

As they draft resolutions on our biggest challenges, they will be guided by the likes of Kofi Annan, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Sir Bob Geldof, Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus and former president of Peru Alejandro Toledo.

The event is organised by Euro RSCG Worldwide, who have done other projects that harness the power of young people to change the world, like the Tck Tck Tck initiative for climate justice. David Jones, CEO of parent company Havas, explained the summit’s goals:

“If the world’s leaders can’t actually make the right decisions and get us to the right place … then given how clever some young people are today, we can actually use them to exert pressure on the world’s leaders to do the right things.”

The theme for Davos this year was “Rethink, Redesign, Rebuild.” One Young World delegates will be doing the same things with one important difference – for them, these acts are second nature.

Young leaders today are actively engaged with the world around them, fully aware of how global issues affect their local communities, energetic and passionate about their own power to effect social change.

This is the real-time generation. People in their 20s don’t remember a world with no internet. They have a wealth of ways to find out what’s going on right now, told from countless points of view. Empowered by their ability to connect with each other fast, they’re forcing companies to clean up their act and be transparent with consumers.

It’s not a “Me Generation” but a “We Generation”, guided by optimistic values and an awareness of how interconnected we all are. They have a greater willingness to work together, to compromise in the best possible sense, and a deeper commitment to peace.

Participation in One Young World doesn’t have to be in the flesh. Our community has been growing for months on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and WAYN and has dedicated bloggers around the globe, encouraging debate and spurring action. The summit will be open globally through online streaming and real-time updates.

• To get involved, join the Facebook group, submit questions to be raised at the summit, and follow the dialogue on oneyoungworld.com

Our guest writer is Marian Salzman, president of Euro RSCG Worldwide PR, North America, and one of the world’s leading trendspotters

Davina McCall, Mariella Frostrup, Annie Lennox, Richard Wilson and Meera Syal were among the big names launching a new poverty campaign today, the fifth anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s Make Poverty History speech in Trafalgar Square.

“Forty years ago the UK made a promise to the world’s poor – to spend just 0.7 per cent of our national income on helping poor countries develop. We now have a chance to make that promise a reality, not just for today but for future generations.

“GlobalPovertyPromise.com is our opportunity to show that we keep our promises, even during difficult times. Whether it’s helping Haiti through a disaster or participating in the long term development of Africa the British public has a proud tradition of looking out for those less fortunate, let’s keep it up.”

Five years ago Nelson Mandela’s speech in London ahead of the Gleneagles summit launched the Make Poverty History campaign; today the Department for International Development is publishing an update of the progress the UK has made against the targets set.

Labour has tripled the UK’s aid budget and is committed to spending 0.7% of the UK’s Gross National Income on aid from 2013, with the Overseas Development Bill which was introduced to Parliament last month, while the Conservatives have refused to say they would introduce such a law.

Aid groups are concerned that Tory plans for international development could mean large sums will be diverted from tackling poverty.

• Sign up to the Gobal Poverty Promise and show your support.

Today’s defence green paper, “Adaptability and Partnership: Issues for a Strategic Defence Review”, asks the right questions on the future of defence policy even as Secretary of State Bob Ainsworth gives support to the wrong answers.

Mr Ainsworth called today for “tough choices” in defence spending and warned that in the future Britain would not be able to “insure against every risk”.

Director of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) Michael Clarke praised the paper for asking “the big questions” about the armed forces’ futures, saying the paper asks:

“What sort of country does the UK want to be in the world? How do we adapt to all the very new challenges?”

He added that:

“The war of 2003 in Iraq was very different to the war in 1991 and the war in Afghanistan is different again. So it’s an attempt to say ‘how do we adapt to these things?’ and what are we trying to do?”

But the paper deserves criticism for its failure to, at the very least, signal a willingness to follow through on these big questions with big answers and so runs the risk of ducking the very “tough choices” that Mr Ainsworth rightly says lie ahead.

Whilst the green paper should not be expected to have detailed what should be cut in the future and what should be kept, the government has already indicated a determination to maintain the major procurement projects like the Joint Strike Fighter, the super-carrier project and Trident.

As Liberal Democrat frontbencher Sarah Teather said on “The World at One” this lunchtime:

“Isn’t it ridiculous to have a strategic defence review and have the only thing not under consideration be the most expensive item – Trident.”

Furthermore, the Government’s fixation with big-ticket spending comes at a cost to less glamorous but nevertheless vital spending like that represented by the Defence College at Shrivenham.

The programme also reported the Government was planning deep cuts down to “just three junior researchers” at the College’s much admired Research & Assessment Office, which has played an impressive behind-the-scenes role in conflict analysis from Russia to the Middle East.

On a broader scale, as a recent RUSI report has said, a failure to address defence spending on large scale procurement projects in a responsible fashion could lead to a 20 per cent cut in the number of armed forces personnel.

Beyond mere talk of “tough choices” and “big questions”, the defence discussion must now move on to detailed answers.

In short, what is now needed is a major debate on Britain’s defence future in which threats, resources and choices are considered in an open and honest fashion and all options and programmes are on the table from future force structure to major procurement spending.

As ippr security expert Andy Hull told Left Foot Forward:

“The Government’s defence green paper properly reflects the evolving global security environment – what is important now though is that the post-election Strategic Defence Review should take place as part of a wider Strategic Review of Security.

“And it should precede multi-billion-pound decisions on the purchase of military hardware – not be pre-empted by them.”

The Prime Minister’s commitment yesterday to the construction of two new aircraft carriers is good news for defence sector jobs but bad news for both Britain’s defence budget and Britain’s defence strategy.

The Government is now in danger of eschewing the warnings of its own senior budgetary and strategic advisors. Defence economist Malcolm Chalmers’ recent RUSI report has warned of the grave dangers that await front line troops in terms of cuts if the government refused to take tough choices on big ticket items like the aircraft carriers or the joint strike fighter project. Similarly, the new Chief of the General Staff, General Sir David Richards, has likewise urged the government to make long-term choices between major procurement projects and front line resourcing.

The potential for a strategic redefining of Britain’s interests and consequent resource allocation was outlined in the recent ippr report ‘Opportunities in an age of austerity‘, in which former Defence Chief Lord Guthrie and noted security expert Andy Hull argued that:

“In concrete terms this will have to mean, above all, not developing new weapons to fight old wars. The new 65,000 tonne aircraft carriers, the planes to fly off them and the destroyers to protect them must be firmly in the frame for cuts. The super-carriers are currently costing £5bn (already more than £1bn more than originally predicted).”

This approach meets with favour even from military historian Max Hasting who recently observed:

“Opponents of draconian cuts in navy and RAF strengths cite the importance of a balanced strategy, which addresses potential future threats as well as current commitments, dominated by Afghanistan. The problem with this approach, admirably sensible in theory, is that it threatens to leave Britain’s forces balanced only in inadequacy.”

With the Conservative Party in disarray over its own cuts programme now is not the time for the Labour Government to prioritise defence contractor-pleasing procurement projects over a genuine strategic opportunity to set British defence on a firm and lasting footing.

The Scotland on Sunday newspaper has reported that a group of Scottish National Party MSPs are calling for Tony Blair to stand trial in Scotland over his decision to invade Iraq. It comes after the former Prime Minister’s appearance before the Iraq Inquiry on Friday.

In a letter sent to Scotland’s Lord Advocate, Elish Angiolini QC, SNP backbench MSP, Bill Wilson calls for her to investigate whether Blair breached international law in invading Iraq. He continued:

“and, should you find the evidence against them compelling, prosecute the former UK Prime Minister, Anthony Charles Linton Blair, and others complacent in the invasion in Iraq.”

Mr Wilson used recent findings by a committee of inquiry in support of his case. This committee, chaired by a former Dutch Supreme Court, Willibrord Davids concluded that UN Resolution 1441 did not constitute a legal mandate for launching military action. The Scotland on Sunday further reports that the Lord Advocate and Scotland’s prosecuting authority, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is now examining the case.

Mr Wilson argues that the terms Lord Advocate’s Reference No.1 0f 2000 – which concluded that, “A rule of customary international law is a rule of Scots law” – gives the Scottish authorities the power to prosecute a UK national for breach of international Law.

Wilson’s call has been supported by a further seven SNP MSPs in a motion (S3M-5525) tabled in the Scottish Parliament including Jamie Hepburn, who has previously worked for Housing and Communities Minister, Alex Neil, and Aileen Campbell who has previously worked for the SNP’s Deputy Leader, Nicola Sturgeon.

Scotland on Sunday notes that the SNP have declined to comment on whether First Minister Alex Salmond, supports the calls for legal action, however they add:

“Mr Salmond strongly supports the Chilcot Inquiry, although it would have benefited from having more legal expertise among the questioners on the panel.”

Salmond had previously joined calls for the former Prime Minister to face impeachment over his policy to Iraq. The SNP have further confirmed that at the request of Sir John Chilcot, they have submitted to the Iraq Inquiry the legal evidence that provided the basis of their call for impeachment.

Last year, the Times reported that Salmond with a group of other MPs charged the taxpayer £14,100 to assist with their failed campaign to impeach Blair. As a result, following a complaint by Labour Peer and MSP, Lord Foulkes, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards confirmed that he would investigate Salmond’s conduct and allegations that he used public funds from Parliament to launch a party political campaign.

In response, Scotland on Sunday has said:

“Labour claimed their opponents were guilty of trying to make ‘infantile political capital’ out of the Iraq issue, saying they should focus their attention on jobs and the economy.”

Tony Blair’s performance before the Iraq Inquiry today was as virtuoso as his supporters hoped and his critics feared.

What is most interesting perhaps from both a historical and legal perspective is his contention that:

“What matters sometimes is not to ask the March 2003 question but rather to ask the 2010 question… I think it is arguable that he was a threat and had we taken that decision to leave him there… with the oil price at $100 a barrel, he would have had the intent and he would have had the means, and we would have lost our nerve.”

As the Guardian’s live coverage noted, Blair did not explain what Saddam’s “intent” would have been but the statement may have been both the most honest and dangerous thing said this morning.

His emphasis on the long term implications of Saddam’s retention of power combined with his fear that at an unspecified point in the future Saddam would have been stronger and the West weaker is further evidence that this was not a pre-emptive war to defend British national interests but a preventive one to defeat an adversary who may pose a future threat. The former Prime Minsiter’s directness in this respect is to be welcomed.

The danger however lies in the fact that if this were his motivation for war he crossed the line between pre-emptive war and preventive war. Pre-emptive war has a clear basis in international law whereas the legality of preventive war is far more controversial.

As the testimony of Foreign Office lawyers, former Attorney General Lord Goldsmith, and now former Prime Minsister Blair has made clear, had the precautionary principle been applied to the legality of the Iraq war there would have been no Iraq war.

Since the ‘managed collapse’ of the Copenhagen summit in December, much influential commentary in European media and from governments including our own has focused on blaming China for the failure of the talks.

Green guru Jonathon Porritt delves into the arguments around China’s green credibility in a new article for the latest edition of Prospect magazine. He writes:

“China’s middle classes do not want to be ordered off the ladder of consumption just as they have gained their first toehold on it, and the poor still expect their government to get them onto it quickly. Their leaders fear public anger on economic grounds much more than they do on any environmental issue.”

He goes on to describe how China has what he terms “a classic frog [First Raise Our Growth] economy,” which he notes has “benefited hundreds of millions of people. The number of Chinese living in extreme poverty dropped from 685 million in 1990 to 210 million in 2007” adding, “Who can argue with the mission to eliminate extreme poverty, while improving the living standards of the rest of the population?”

Who indeed? But this is where the real fallacy lies. Development need not mean high carbon growth. In fact, in a carbon-constrained world that’s just not an option if we are to stop dangerous warming, which is why what Porritt has to say about China’s investment decisions on clean energy is so important point.

Porritt highlights that many expect that China will overtake all other countries to “dominate the market for green technologies” with HSBC estimating the renewables market will be worth $2 trillion by 2020. This view is shared by Thomas Friedman of the New York Times and Geoffrey Lean who writes on Grist:

“The main challenge from the world’s new industrial superpower [China] is not that it will continue to use the dirty, old technologies of the past, but that it will come to dominate the new, clean, green ones of the future.”

As Porritt explains, “China is focused as much on those international markets as on its own energy challenge” and points out that China’s “trio of world-leading solar companies, Suntech, Trina and Yingling, are racing to be the first to achieve “grid parity”—the point at which solar-powered electricity costs no more than coal-powered or nuclear-powered. Solar companies in the US and Germany are worried about this competition.”

With conflicting views of how green China will be, Porritt says:

“The first real test of this will be its next five-year plan, for the period 2011-15. In November 2009, the China Council for International Co-operation on Environment and Development presented (Chinese Premier) Wen Jiabao with a low-carbon road map for inclusion in the plan.

“One of its scenarios is a ‘business-as-usual’ route to prosperity, resulting in emissions of 13bn tonnes of CO 2 a year by 2050. Then there is an ‘enhanced low-carbon scenario’ that would see emissions peaking in 2025 and reducing to 5bn tonnes a year by 2050. Caught between those two scenarios, and the eight billion tonnes a year that divide them, lies the future of human civilisation. Put at its simplest, there is no sustainable, equitable future available to humanity unless China makes that possible.”

In an address to the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) last week, General Sir David Richards, the head of the British army, outlined his arguments for increasing the numbers of soldiers in the army in response to evidence that the very nature of war is changing.

He is right to do so.

75,000 British troops, from an army of more than 100,000, have already served one, two or even three tours in Afghanistan. Hidden within these figures, 25,000 infantrymen will have borne the brunt of more than ten years of warfare by the time the deployment begins to draw down.

During this period some infantry units have been deployed every other year.

The Unites States’ military engine is running hot. The British army’s is nearing meltdown. NATO and its respective populations are war weary.

Although ongoing ‘Transformation’ in the US Army and an impending Strategic Defence Review in Britain may address their core re-structuring issues in the medium term, in the short term, a period of rest and recuperation will be needed in the infantry if they are to remain fully operational.

If this need is fully conveyed by military staffs to policymakers – and that is not a given in a career and legacy-conscious organisation – the result should be a short term unwillingness to commit large numbers of conventional ground forces to emerging conflicts.

Much of this is due to the evidence from both the Second Gulf War and Afghanistan that the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA), in its purest, populist form, is dead. Precision weapons have not stopped the need for the infantry to close with and kill the enemy in combat.

There will be no more wars and interventions without casualties, as in the First Gulf War and Kosovo; the rise of asymmetric ‘wars amongst the people’ coupled with the decline of inter-state warfare have ensured this.

The Weinberger/Powell doctrines that accompanied the RMA and blueprinted quick, clean, military interventions in inter-state conflicts are redundant. While Rumsfeld’s ‘shock and awe’, a synthesis of these doctrines, may deliver tactical victories, Iraq has proven that it cannot deliver strategic victory in conflict’s changed paradigm.

Faced with the overwhelming and precise use of military force in interventions, the west’s enemies now seek refuge amongst the populations. This is nothing new. As a counter-measure it has historic precedent. What is new is the west’s method of continuing to seek victory, despite unfavourable operating conditions, for forces mainly configured to fight conventional wars.

In the US, Generals such as Petreaus and McChrystal have recognised this and adapted accordingly. They argue that the army can deliver strategic victory in wars amongst the people. Their population-centric strategies require infantry intensive forces and massive resourcing over protracted periods.

But evidence from Iraq and Afghanistan indicates that nation building itself is still beyond the scope of both western militaries and the political will of their masters. Such grandiose aims must be tempered to protecting the space within which national institutions, aided by deployable civilian experts, can grow, and on the training of indigenous security forces.

This is a more realistic mission but remains incredibly intensive in manpower, resources, funding, time and political will.

Thus, involvement in these ‘wars amongst the people’ holds greater risks for policy makers than ever before. The lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan are not to get involved militarily if at all possible, because intervention will be lengthy and costly.

This is precisely what the Weinberger/Powell doctrines and ‘shock and awe’ were designed to avoid. They have failed. In war, there is no simple, safe, quick template answer anymore.

This does not mean the RMA in its wider form is dead. On the contrary, the military is wise to continue investing heavily in developing technologies that give the infantry an edge over an asymmetric enemy. Advances in drones, body armour, sighting devices and surveillance systems are force multipliers for the infantryman on the ground.

Evidence suggests interventions are different in each circumstance and require bespoke military training and resources. Therefore, both doctrinally and structurally, forces need to remain flexible and self critical. Britain lags behind the US in this regard.

In a recent address to a higher command course, the army’s next generation of leaders, a British general allegedly surmised his brief with the words ‘Basically, the army’s fucked for the next ten to fifteen years. Get on with it.’ At least some see through the facade, and General Richards’s observations contribute to the growing need for debate within the British army and the wider military.

As the Afghanistan deployment begins to draw down, the British army needs to reflect internally over what it has been good at and not so good at in the last ten years of fighting. Meanwhile, British policy makers need to reappraise their terms of, and aims for, the use of military force. Their decisions must be reflected in the forthcoming Strategic Defence Review.

Amongst other tough options, the Review offers cash strapped Britain stark choices between a light, specialist, expeditionary, sea-delivered force for short deployments or a heavier, more conventional force for longer deployments. In the past, faced with such strategic decisions, British policymakers have decided not to decide. This will not do this time around.

A decision must be made that takes heed of war’s changing paradigm. Our soldiers deserve nothing less.

Our guest writer is Patrick Bury, former captain in the Royal Irish regiment who has fought in Afghanistan; Patrick is also author of the upcoming Simon&Schuster book “Callsign Hades”

Following on from The Times’s coverage of the International Policy Network’s allegations against DfID’s funding of the TUC – allegations that Left Foot Forward showed to be unfounded – they have once again fuelled the aid sceptics’ fire with several leading articles in their paper today.

Here Left Foot Forward examines some of the key points raised and counters them below:

• Firstly, The Times’ Leader and articles focuses on Malawi in an attempt to undermine DfID’s transparency and effectiveness.

In particular, they report on the House of Commons Public Account Committee report on DfID’s programme in Malawi. Whilst the Committee’s report does call for a better structure for monitoring results and measuring efficiency, this is not the same as alluding that £312million has “seeped out of sight” as The Times reported it.

DfID’s aid programme in Malawi is far from unsuccessful. The Public Accounts Committee itself acknowledged aid from DFID has actively contributed to progress in Malawi’s development, “such as reduced hunger and substantially improved capacity in the health system”.

In another report by the National Audit Office , DFID was reported as being “well regarded by the Malawian government and scores well against international aid principles”, and having “made well-informed investment choices”.

DfID’s successes in Malawi are comprehensively listed on their website, as they are for every country they work in, and include 4,200 classrooms since 1996, benefiting 430,000 children, and a huge reduction in the number of babies and young children dying before their fiftth birthday – at least 15,000 fewer children die per year compared to 2004.

• The Times make further unjustified claims that budget sector support is ineffective and has no strings attached.

Giving money directly to partner-country governments through general budget support helps poor people have access to the basic services which are everyone’s right – such as health and education. It is also an investment for a future world where poor countries are increasingly self-reliant.

Leading NGOs such as Oxfam have strongly advocated for Budget Sector Support for these reasons. The Budget Support Performance Assessment Framework for Malawi is one example of this successful approach.

A joined up initiative with DFID, Norway, the European Commission and African Development Bank, it has helped to provide food security, affordable fertiliser, and helped to get children into schools, vaccinate children against measles, deliver anti-retroviral drugs, distribute bednets and reduce maternal mortality.

In DfID’s evidence to the Parliamentary Accounts Committee, they stated their view that Budget Support or aid to governments is no more liable to fraud than other types of aid.

Of course aid must be accountable, but when The Times talks about “quantifiable strings”, they would do well to read the No Shock Doctrine for Haiti article on Left Foot Forward so see what damage the wrong strings can have when they force countries to submit to damaging economic policies.

A key success of the Make Poverty History campaign was the Government’s pledge in 2005 that UK aid would no longer be tied to trade liberalisation and that must not be reversed.

• The Times then appear to be copying the Tories’ lazy assumptions about our aid to India and China.

India may have a growing economy, but they still have 456 million people living below the international poverty line, who cannot access basic services or feed their children adequately.

The Times do not even acknowledge the historic debt that Britain owes to a sub-continent which experienced some of the worst famines ever recorded and whose economy was left devastated by British Colonial Rule, as academics such as Amartya Sen have argued.

On China, The Times and the Conservatives are creating a noise over something that DfID is already doing. As Left Foof Forward has reported previously, the 2006-2011 country plan states that the Government are already phasing out our aid to China, switching to a relationship based on dialogue and cooperation helping them achieve the Millennium Development Goals.

• The Times’s running theme is an attempt to cast doubt on both DfID’s transparency and its effectiveness.

Even if improvements need to be made in DfID’s Malawi programme, The Times should not be using an individual project to undermine all of our UK aid.

The accusations of The Times and other aid sceptics don’t stand up under the spotlight, as we have demonstrated on Left Foot Forward with our analysis of the allegations around DfID’s funding of the TUC, and the Tories’ proposed policies.

DfID’s website comprehensively lists all of their projects, country plans, successes, annual reports and accounts, and expenditure statistics, and is independently audited.

• They ask “why is that there is a distinct feeling that the knives are out for Dfid?”

But the biggest knives appear to be coming from The Times’ reproduction of briefings fed to them by aid sceptics and the Conservatives.

These attacks demonstrate the importance of passing the Government’s draft International Development Spending Bill to enshrine into law its promise to raise the share of UK national income spent on aid to 0.7 per cent by 2013.

We covered the reaction from some of the UK’s biggest NGOs to these proposals the day this news broke; Left Foot Forward will look at these proposals in detail in a separate blog shortly

The major stakeholders in Afghanistan meet in London this week to assess progress and plan for the future. The escalation of NATO’s military presence in the region, made up primarily of US troops, is already underway.

Gen. David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, and Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the US commander in Afghanistan, recently emphasized the need both to conduct direct military operations against the Taliban and to negotiate with, and ultimately de-militarise, the insurgent group.

Both approaches will be challenging, particularly in light of a recently-released US intelligence briefing that describes the Taliban as “increasingly effective” and warns that “time is running out”.

The key to the London conference, however, is not the conduct and future of military operations in Afghanistan; rather, it is the political and civilian rebuilding effort.

That the military approach Generals Petraeus and McChrystal advocate can reduce violence is clear – a similar approach brought Iraq back from the brink of civil war in 2007; how long that peace can last in the absence of political progress is not.

The Karzai government is at the centre of this question, as Sir Nigel Sheinwald, UK Ambassador to the US, wrote recently; its handling of institution-building and economic development will ultimately determine whether there is a viable alternative to a NATO military presence.

The fitness of the Karzai government was called into sharp question again this week with the full disclosure of a series of cables from John Eikenberry, US Ambassador to Afghanistan, to President Obama.

That the cables, sent last November when the future of US involvement in Afghanistan was still under discussion, were critical of the Karzai government has been public knowledge since they were sent, but release of the text shows the cables to have been more damning than previously known.

The Karzai government has stumbled over the appointment of its Cabinet, with Afghan lawmakers twice rejecting Karzai’s slate of ministers and accusing him of political gamesmanship. These setbacks mar the already-challenging rebuilding effort.

Bolstering this process and developing a plan for the “civilian surge” that President Barack Obama mentioned in his December 2009 speech should be the London conference’s top priority.

Should the Karzai government prove an unfit partner in this effort, the NATO force could, in theory, seek to replace him by some means, attempt to work around his government through local entities and international agencies, or simply abandon him (and, by extension, Afghanistan) to fate.

The London conference is too early to answer the question of whether Karzai’s government is up to muster, but it is not too early to ask it.

Amidst the maelstrom of media attention over the Christmas Day attempted bombing of Flight NW253 to Detroit, the provocative antics and subsequent banning of al-Muhajiroun and the devastating earthquake in Haiti, it is unsurprising that the conviction in Canada of a few men connected with a terror plot uncovered back in 2006 should have gathered so little attention in the British press.

The case of the ‘Toronto 18’ – so called because the group consisted of 14 adults and four youths who plotted to bomb Toronto – however, is important for what it tells us about radicalisation in North America and how the situation there is a mirror image of the situation in the UK a decade ago.

Four men have so far been found guilty of participating in a terrorist group and intending to cause an explosion that was likely to cause serious bodily harm or death. According to a police informant who infiltrated the group, they were planning to organise a terror training camp in advance of using truck bombs to attack power grids, the Canadian Parliament building, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and various other targets.

The arrests of 18 members of the group coincided with police intercepting an order for three tonnes of ammonium nitrate they say were destined for truck bombs.

Since the arrest of the ‘Toronto 18’, four have pleaded guilty, one has been convicted and charges have been stayed or dropped against seven people. Now the group’s leader, Zakaria Amara, who has since apologised to all Canadians for his previous calls to unleash a “bloody jihad” on the residents of Toronto, has been sentenced to life in prison: the harshest penalty ever imposed under Canada’s anti-terrorism laws.

Amara was born in Jordan to a Cypriot Christian mother and an Arab father who had stopped practising Islam and at school he was known as the class clown. Clearly he was not “brainwashed” from early on. In 2004 he married and throughout 2005 he took evening classes in engineering at Humber College whilst working full-time.

Studying engineering is something he shares with many other terrorists, including Osama bin Laden, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Ramzi Yousef and Ziad Jarrah. It was at this very time that friends and family noticed him becoming visibly more devout. So much for sexual frustration, poverty or lack of opportunities as explanations for radicalisation.

What about other grievances? Although Canada has been involved in Afghanistan since 2001, it stayed out of Iraq – although about 100 exchange officers in technical support roles with the British and US armies took part – and its foreign policy can hardly be described as a massive grievance which, in the minds of some, would legitimise terrorist attacks.

Nor is Canada’s culture famous for being particularly racist or violent; remember how, in ‘Bowling For Columbine’, Michael Moore illustrated the violence of US culture by contrasting it with Canada.

None of which should be a surprise because, as terror case after terror case proves, terrorists are not impoverished, ill-educated victims of racism motivated solely by a desire to right the wrongs of their country’s foreign policy and the suffering in their individual lives. Rather, they are individuals have adopted jihadism, an ideology which justifies and legitimises violence as a way to achieve a theo-political goal. It is this ideology which is key, not their background.

Jihadism is a violent strand of Islamism, an entirely politicised approach to the religion Islam, which spread in Britain in the mid-1990s. Activists manipulated situations like Chechnya and Kashmir to encourage others to adopt their polarised worldview whereby Muslims were pitted against non-Muslims and the creation of an Islamic state or caliphate would be a universal panacea. In North America, this ideology initially had little traction but, after 9/11, it has had a second wind.

As the ‘Toronto 18’ show, simplistically blaming terrorism on grievances like deprivation, racism and foreign policy makes little sense. Instead, the explanation lies with a 20th-century ideology which wraps itself up in Islamicised language to disguise its political ambitions and nature – an ideology which anybody, regardless of background, can adopt.

Since 9/11 this ideology has been spreading in North America and terror cases like the ‘Toronto 18’ and recently revealed ones in Minneapolis, New York, Pakistan and from Obama’s inauguration are part of a new trend which shows no sign of abating.

Our guest writer is George Readings, communications officer and research fellow at Quilliam

General Dannatt, the former chief of defence staff who controversially accepted a Cameron invitation to advise the Conservative front bench, has signalled his opposition to the renewal of Trident.

General Dannatt said that the lifetime of the current Trident-bearing Vanguard class submarines should be maintained for a period of a further 15 years but not necessarily beyond that. Dannatt said that the UK should keep Trident:

“At present we should keep it but not forever.”

Conservative Shadow Defence Secretary Liam Fox responded:

“Our position, as stated by David Cameron, is we intend to maintain a minimum credible submarine based nuclear deterrent for the United Kingdom. Let me reassure the people of Barrow, there is no question of changing this policy.”

The debate among Tory defence advisers on the future of Trident comes in the wake of the influential Chalmers Report on the costs and consequences of Minsitry of Defence budget cuts and a public disagreement between the current Chief of the Defence Staff General Richards and the First Sea Lord Admiral Stanhope on the long term need for Britain to possess full spectrum warfare capabilities as epitomised by massive procurement projects like Trident’s successor, the Joint Strike Fighter and the planned new aircraft carriers.

This blog has previously detailed how scrapping Trident could free up some 45bn GBP in the long term defence budget.

News stories about Haiti are full of tales of looters. There’s less talk of a bigger scale plunder to come. In Naomi Klein’s ‘The Shock Doctrine‘ she maps the rise of “disaster capitalism”. She describes how, over 40 years, The International Monetary Fund (IMF), Pentagon, and various mega-corporations have increasingly used (or created) disasters as an excuse to push through unpopular right wing economic policies, and asset strip vulnerable economies.

I was just finishing this book on Thursday as the scale of Haiti’s earthquake was becoming clear. My immediate fear was an obvious one. So I did what all young lefties do in a time of crisis. I set up a Facebook group: “No Shock Doctrine for Haiti”.

It turns out the vultures were already circling. Almost immediately, a friend joined the group and posted a link to The Heritage Foundation – a highly influential conservative American think-tank. They argued (in a paper which has since been removed) for the approach described in Klein’s book. See a description of it here.

Worse still, if this article in The Nation is to be believed, the IMF were way ahead of us. As I was setting up the group, they were haggling with Haiti. They agreed to an emergency loan of $100 million. But, allegedly, they forced the Haitian government to agree to freeze public sector pay, and raise fuel costs in exchange.

This is standard fair for the IMF. I won’t detail them here, but Klein gives examples in her book of how disasters or major shocks have been used by the Fund and others as a chance to force through unpopular, radically pro-corporate policies, which have led ultimately to massive inequality. These case studies range from Russia to Chile, and South Africa to Poland.

Debt is also familiar to Haiti. Jubilee USA provide a useful briefing in which they explain how France’s demands for reparations for the lost labour from Haiti’s freed slaves forced the country into massive debts from which it never recovered.

Despite allowing corrupt dictators to remain in power for decades, when the people of Haiti elected a leader promising to do something about poverty, we either backed, or allowed, two coups against him.

The US has also pushed privatisation – of more benefit to their companies than the poor of Haiti. According to Haiti Progrès, for example, in 1996, the United States Agency for International Development (the government’s aid wing) signed an $800,000 contract with a Canadian Public relations firm to hype privatisation in Haiti.

The economic guru of the radical right, Milton Friedman, explained to his students how their neo-liberal ideas would take over the world:

“Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable.”

The poverty which made this earthquake so devastating is no accident. It is the result of two centuries of oppression of the world’s first black republic. It is the result of enforced neo-liberal policies that have prevented Haiti developing the only way any country has – through investing in infrastructure and people. Friedman’s ideas are so popular with the mega-rich because they have only ever succeeded in doing one thing – making them richer.

If you want to do something, you can donate to ActionAid or one of these charities. The Shock Doctrine works by pushing policies through while people are distracted and grieving. So we must also be their eyes and ears, and keep the vultures at bay until they can come together to decide how they want their country to be re-built. As I write, more than 4,000 people have joined the Facebook group, and are helping act as those eyes and ears.

Our guest writer is Adam Ramsay who will jointly launch a new blog brightgreenscotland.org on Wednesday.

This week’s Royal United Services Institute report, Capability Costs Trends: Implications for the Defence Review, on the financial crisis’s likely impact on future Ministry of Defence spending is a welcome injection of honesty into both the budgetary and strategic debate on the future of British defence policy.

Noted defence economist Professor Malcolm Chalmers makes a convincing case for hard choices as to the extent and cost of future major MoD spending on operations and procurement alike. Furthermore, he warns that even the long overdue Strategic Defence Review, which all parties have committed to, conducted this year, may somewhat counter intuitively cause more problems then it solves.

The report argues that a combination of “significant real reductions in the available budget” and “continuing growth in the unit costs of defence capabilities” is likely to lead to a reduction of around 20 per cent in numbers of service personnel, and a commensurate reduction in numerical military capabilities (major vessels, aircraft and ground formations).

In total, the defence budget is likely to decrease by 10-15 per cent between 2010 and 2016 at a time when, to meet existing commitments alone, it would require a real terms increase of more then 4 per cent per year for the next decade.

Professor Chalmers says:

“If cutbacks are evenly spread, ground formations (including infantry, armour, artillery and support regiments) would have to fall from 97 to 79, available aircraft (fixed wing and rotary) would be reduced from 760 to 615, and major vessels (submarines, carriers, escorts and major supply ships) would fall from 57 to 46.

“The central question for this year’s defence review will be whether some of these capabilities should be protected at the expense of deeper cuts in others.”

Commenting on the report, RUSI Director Michael Clark notes that the defence budget is now so overstretched that:

“Even small wars can throw long-term defence planning into chaos.”

The coming Strategic Defence Review therefore poses both a challenge and an opportunity.

The challenge of a long term SDR in this situation is that such a review runs the risk of cutting too far, too fast – fundamentally undermining Britian’s ability to pursue it’s international security goals. This points to the possibility of a three-year only SDR to cover the immediate budget shortfall and then a reassessment in light of the economic situation in 2013 – a model used by the Labour Government of 1964-1970.

Chalmers argues that:

“Politically, the choice between these two options may depend on an assessment of whether it is better to incur the political pain of defence cuts all at once, or in successive smaller doses.

“In strategic terms, the choice may hinge on whether longer-term defence priorities can be agreed while the broader consequences of the Afghanistan operation remain so uncertain.”

On the other hand, the opportunity in this crisis lies in a real and radical re-assessment of Britain’s defence posture in terms of both mission and assets. It is clear that efficiency savings in terms of consultancy contracts, pay freezes and staff cuts will prove insufficient to the scale of the likely defence budget gap in the years ahead.

Major procurement projects like the planned new aircraft carriers, a new generation of RAF fighters, and the largest potential saving, the Trident successor, may have to be axed as serious decisions are taken as to whether or not Britain will continue its attempt to possess a fully fledged naval, nuclear, ground and air force designed for each and every eventuality or if Britain will instead choose more selectively what kind of international security role its armed forces should play in the 21st century.

A slew of recent articles seek to undermine the important and justifiable role for the Trades Union Congress in delivering development policy.

On Monday, The Times reported that “The Government is giving the Trades Union Congress millions of pounds from its foreign aid budget to pay for the education of British trade unionists and to support advocacy work in Britain.”

The International Policy Network (IPN), who released the report on which The Times reported, claimed on Wednesday on Conservative Home that this money “was spent in the UK on activities that do not seem to have yielded any practical benefit to the poor either inside or outside of Britain.” IPN then made this following astonishing accusation:

“To make matters worse, unions that are members of the TUC represent over half the funding of the Labour Party. Since the DfID grants to the TUC come with few constraints, it is possible that DfID’s money could essentially substitute for money that would otherwise come from member unions – freeing them up to give more to the Labour Party.”

On the same post the Conservative’s shadow minister Andrew Mitchell said: “Labour have some very serious questions to answer about how they are spending aid money which is supposed to go to people in some of the poorest countries in the world.”

Left Foot Forward looks at these allegations and refutes each in turn.

Claim #1: DfID spending money in the UK is a bad thing.

The Times article clearly implies, and IPN explicitly so, that the spending of DfID money in the UK is a bad thing. There has, in fact, been a clear and transparent justification for doing so since DfID’s first White Paper in 1997 established the Building Support for Development programme (BSD) which addressed the need for an “increased public understanding of our global mutual dependence and the need for international development.” The then Secretary of State Clare Short states in the foreword the need for “an informed public opinion [to] help ensure that the UK plays its full role in generating the international political will necessary to meet the international poverty eradication targets.”

There is therefore nothing shadowy about DfID granting money to the TUC to spend in the UK – it is part of a broader strategy that includes development education and engagement with the media, businesses faith, BME and diaspora groups. The Times and IPN made much of the sentence in the BSD evaluation which said there was “little evidence regarding the effectiveness of the individual projects.” But that single sentence is a comment on the evidence sought or found, not explicitly on the project itself or the wider relationship with the TUC. The same document actually praises DFID’s work with the TUC (page 28).

Claim #2: The TUC have no expertise in development and have been given the money in a secret deal.

IPN claimed in their report ‘A Closer Union‘ that the TUC should not have received a Partnership Programmes Arrangements (PPAs), which are given by DfID to civil society organisations to achieve DfID’s objectives. They claim that “obviously [the TUC] is not an organisation that has a track record of performance in international development,” and claim that the arrangement is a “secret arrangement” because, “The terms of this grant still have not been published on the DfID website.”

IPN fail to outline why the TUC are an inappropriate partner for a project aimed at ”increasing [the] rights of workers in developing countries through greater support for and strengthened capacity of developing country trade unions.” Responding to the article in The Times, the TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: “With more than six million members in the UK and strong links with fellow trade unionists in every developing country, the TUC is a sensible and appropriate partner for overseas aid.”

It is true that the TUC are not listed on the DfID web page explaining the PPAs, but this seems more likely a technical error than a conspiracy. It is however publicly listed in their project directory, and you can read the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and Objectives online.

While the new MoU authorises the TUC to spend money on UK activities (as part of DfID’s Building Support for Development work above), the TUC are now rolling out their capacity building work in developing countries as part of their 2009-11 partnership with DfID – including two new funding arrangements with ITUC-Africa and the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions to support their capacity to work on women’s empowerment, post-conflict resolution, the rights of migrant workers and political advocacy.

Claim #3: “DfID’s money could essentially substitute for money that would otherwise come from member unions – freeing them up to give more to the Labour Party.”

By adding claim 1 and 2 together they have made their most serious allegation, claim 3. But the sum is closer to 2 + 2 = 5. There is no evidence of any link between DfID’s work with the TUC and the funding of TUC member unions to the Labour Party.

The TUC is not affiliated to the Labour Party. The majority of unions that make up the TUC are not affiliated to the Labour Party. The majority of the unions that have received funding from DfID are not affiliated to the Labour Party either.

The TUC receive LESS under a Labour Government than they did under Major’s Conservative Government. As Brendan Barber stated in his letter to the Times, DfID’s support for the TUC has “actually, year for year, been less under the current and recent Labour governments than it was under John Major’s administration.” The TUC have received what amounts to £450,000 a year over the period 2003-11. The £2.4 million the TUC recieved for the PPA was part of a total of £90 million given to 27 organisations. DfID is doing what governments of all persuasions all over the developed world have done when they distribute small parts of their overseas aid budgets through unions. As Barber pointed out, George W. Bush’s Administration channelled $20 million a year through the US trade union movement.

Labour does actually receive money from DfID – but so do the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. DfID fund the Westminster Foundation for Democracy to develop comprehensive programmes of joint activity between UK parties and their sister parties in developing countries.

It is the Conservatives and IPN  who have some serious questions to answer.  IPM make serious allegations of the Labour Government’s links with the TUC, but are they as impartial as their status as a charity (No.CC 262982) requires? Left Foot Forward intends to investigate this further.

On Monday we reported on the Conservatives’ fixation with triviality when we examined their aid proposals. It now appears they are not only happy to associate themselves with petty issues, but slanderous ones as well.

Philippe Sands QC, the leading expert on international law, has listed the questions that he believes Tony Blair must answer at the Iraq Inquiry if it is to be considered a success. Inspired by the 38 Degrees campaign calling upon John Chilcot to ask “tough questions” of Tony Blair when he gives evidence, he said the inquiry could play “a cathartic role in getting over a deeply divisive moment” in the UK, and that it was essential that it “get to the truth and assist in rebuilding trust.”

In an event hosted by the Foreign Press Assocation, and chaired by Channel 4 broadcaster Jon Snow, Professor Sands outlined several key questions which he believed the panel must ask Blair, including his reasons for going to war and his own examination of the intelligence available to him at the time he was making the decision:

“I would ask why he waited so long to get legal advice … and what thought, if any, was giving to the post-invasion consequences.”

Asked about the chances of the panel reaching a robust conclusion, Sands expressed reservations about their relative inexperience of legal processes, as well as their lack of reference to documentation in their questions so far. “The British public is entitled to see this documentation”, he said.

Compared to the Dutch panel that published their findings yesterday, the British panel has very limited legal experience and has so far been far less forensic in their questioning. Another concern was the short time the panel has with Blair: “They need more than a day to do it properly.”

Professor Sands also criticised former Blair adviser Alastair Campbell’s performance at the inquiry yesterday, describing how he, “stumbled on a number of issues” and “took his argument too far.”

Our guest writer is Hannah Lownsbrough, Campaigns Director at 38 degrees

On January 1st, Andrew Mitchell was interviewed in The Guardian outlining the Conservatives’ priorities on international development. Here Left Foot Forward analyses some of the Tory claims.

Claim #1: DFID is too scattergun in its approach

In the Conservatives’ Green Paper on development, they claim that DFID spends aid in 102 countries.

However, DFID in fact has only 56 country programmes, with 90 per cent of our aid going to 23 country programmes. The Department for International Development (DFID) outline clear principles when prioritising where aid is spent: levels of poverty, population size, and confidence that the resources with be used effectively.

The 102 figure is actually based on a much longer list of countries that receive small amounts of UK funding via multilaterals, the European Community and British Overseas Territories.

Claim #2: A “proper independent evaluation” of DfID spending and its outputs is needed

DFID is already independently audited by the Independent Advisory Committee on Development (IACDI), which reports to both the Secretary of State and the International Development Committee, as well as evaluations being published on the DFID website

Claim #3: Labour has “under-valued” the Commonwealth. They would focus more aid on the Commonwealth by cutting aid elsewhere, for example cutting the £50m annual aid grant to China

Over 450 million people in China were lifted above the $1 per day international poverty line since the reform process began in 1979, but China still has more than 500 million people still living on under $2 a day. Once again, however, the Conservatives are creating a noise over something that DFID is already doing. The 2006-2011 country plan states that the Government are already phasing out our aid to China:

“We anticipate that by the end of 2011 our partnership will have evolved from a donor-recipient relationship to one largely based on dialogue and cooperation with China on international development issues.”

On the Commonwealth, there appears to be little evidence of Mr Mitchell’s accusation that it is being under-valued by Labour. Despite being repeatedly mentioned by him, their Green Paper gives no evidence of just how Labour “neglected the potential of the Commonwealth”.

Meanwhile, a browse through the DFID country plans of Commonwealth countries gives little evidence either. To give some examples, in the financial year 2008/2009 Bangladesh received £135.7m, India £402.2m (which despite their views on China, Mr Mitchell claims they would preserve), Kenya £109.8m, Malawi £82m, Pakistan £129.7m,Tanzania £142.3m, Uganda £72.1m … and so on.

Claim #4: Government is focussed too much on inputs rather than outputs

Ending the article, Mr Mitchell is quoted as criticising the Government for putting “far too much focus putting large sums of money on the table, for education for example … instead of being focused on outputs [and asking] how many schools do you build and how many teachers you train”.

Once again, the evidence is lacking. Most DFID communications outline the outputs of their work. One such example are the outputs outlined in the Government’s 2009 White Paper (Chapter 5), such as the focus on delivering an additional 10 million malaria bed nets each year from 2010-13 in order to prevent a further 165,000 child deaths, or the commitment to work with others to save the lives of 6 million mothers and babies by 2015.

The priorities outlined by Mitchell in his Guardian interview seem to have one thing in common – a fixation with triviality. Of far greater importance are the Conservative policies in the following three areas:

• Firstly, why have they so far refused to guarantee that any aid for climate change adaptation will be additional, and not from our existing aid budget (or at least no more than 10 per cent, as the Government have pledged)?

The Tories have sent out confused messages about supporting the need for “additional mechanisms” but have made no firm commitments to specific figures. Oxfam, among others, are concerned that a Tory government would “divert existing aid provisions to pay for measures such as flood prevention and the introduction of drought-resistant crops”. Oxfam’s chief executive has warned that:

“Forcing poor countries to choose between life-saving drugs for the sick, schooling for their children or the means to protect themselves against climate change is an unfair burden that will only exacerbate poverty.”

• Secondly, just as important as how much they have committed to spend, is what will they spend it on? Would their aid force privatisation on poor countries as it did in the 1980s?

In education, the Green Paper stated that they will “seek to harness the accountability and responsiveness of the private sector to help drive up standards and get more children into school”. This was slammed by aid experts including the Director of UNESCO’s Global Monitoring Report on education, who said:

“This is using vulnerable people to advance an ideologically loaded, market-based vision for education, which would exclude millions of kids from school. It completely overlooks the achievements of publicly financed, publicly provided education in countries such as Ethiopia and Tanzania.”

On healthcare, the Green Paper stating that:

“Rather than aiming to replace or eliminate the private sector from healthcare, we will seek to work with governments and the private sector to help them achieve the MDGs [Millennium Development Goals].”

This too has drawn a lot of criticism from Non-Governmental Organisations, with Oxfam’s research demonstrating that:

“The vast majority of evidence shows that public services deliver best for poor people in most countries.”

• Third, what do their proposed changes to DFID mean to its status as an independent Government department?

It is unclear how their pledge to maintain DFID independence reconciles with Mr Mitchell’s musings in this interview that they will “perhaps wire it in a little bit better into the Whitehall constellation”, or this interview in the Independent in which he said that “the Foreign Office will be given much greater influence over the use of overseas aid should the Tories win the next election”, and the numerous on-record calls for DFID to lose its independence by senior Tories including John Major.

As the situation in Yemen and its implications for Western security continues to arouse media interest, online content offers real added value to the mainstream media which due to budget and time constraints alike is often unable to explore the complexities of this most challenging of situations.

In terms of sensible and informed calls for restraint, Foreign Policy.com’s Marc Lynch warns against the dangers of overreacting and argues instead that the Obama Administration should continue doing:

“Pretty much what it’s been doing … Be patient, build intelligence and CT assets, strike against clearly AQ targets when available but only where the civilian costs will be minimal and the rewards high, search out local partners… the usual.”

The Yemen-focused site waq al waq draws attention to shortcomings in mainstream media coverage of the Yemeni situation, particularly the flawed reporting of the New York Times.

On the ground, Sana’a-based journalist Nasser Arrabyee was amongst the first to report the reopening of the US and UK embassies in the Yemeni capital.

Meanwhile, in the broader blogosphere, the jihadist monitoring sire Jihadica focuses on the suspicion that the suicide bomber responsible for the Dec 30th attack on the CIA in Kabul was a jihadist blogger – a revelation that has already caused considerable activity amongst online jihadists.

Overall, the reporting and anaylsis emphasises the need for a more cautionary approach then crisis headlines might indicate.

The West’s policy options are limited in a country as fragile as Yemen and policy makers would be well advised to pause for more sober and extended reflection in the context of both expert opinion and local analysis before racing to pubically promte a new major front in the struggle with al-Qaeda.

The closure of the US and UK embassies in Yemen marks the latest deterioration in the security situation the fragile Gulf state is experiencing.

Riven internally by insurgency, ethnic tensions and a faltering economy Yemen also suffers from likely Saudi and Iranian backed interference in its own internal affairs and is a likely base to a larger number of al Qaida operatives then Afghanistan.

It is against this backdrop that US Senator Joe Lieberman has described Yemen as potentially “tommorow’s war” and has cited three instances in which Yemen-linked terrorists have breached US security.

White House counter terrorism advisor John Brennan, however, has stated that with regard to a possible formal US troop presence:

“We’re not talking about that at this point at all.”

With Prime Minister Gordon Brown calling for an international summit to consider the worsening Yemeni situation, London and Washington will be examining the full range of policy options available to stem the growing al Qaida threat.

As a result, a matter for greater public discussion is the presence and role of US and UK special forces in Yemen and the potential dangers of escalation and proxy conflict, particularly with Iran, in Yemen.

Domestically, the Prime Minister’s announcement of new full body scanners at Heathrow airport to detect the kind of explosive used by failed 23-year-old Yemeni terrorist Umar Faruk Abdul Mutallab – the former University College London student whose Christmas day Chicago attack prompted the latest security upgrades – has drawn criticism, including from Conservative MP Ben Wallace.

A former employee at the defence company QinetiQ, he warned that the approach is “not a silver bullet”. However, noted air security specialists like The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder argue that target-hardening measures like full body scanners can play a valuable role in restoring public confidence about air safety as well as increasing actual real security.

Ministers and defence chiefs are grappling with the prospect of swingeing cuts to defence expenditure in the light of a projected £36bn black hole in the defence budget in the wake of yesterday’s National Audit Office report.

Even as the Ministry of Defence increases the UK troop presence in Afghanistan whilst pledging more support for front line forces, notably in the form of twenty Chinook helicopter reinforcements, the MoD is also preparing £1.5bn worth of cuts in manpower and equipment costs.

However, the scale of the problem is so great that it is only through dramatic cuts to the procurement budget that the real gap between costs and spending can be closed. As Conservative MP Edward Leigh, chair of the Commons Public Accounts Committee, said:

“[The] report reveals the unpalatable truth that the current defence programme is unaffordable.”

Citing the example of the Royal Navy’s carrier project, the report also warns of the long term cost of short term savings; these take the form of more delays to existing large scale procurement projects that could end up costing the taxpayer more than if they had proceeded on schedule in the first place.

The NAO report says:

“These decisions were necessary to ensure that the programme was affordable in the next few years, but they increased the overall procurement costs and represent poor value for money.”

That warning should be a cause for reflection amongst defence policy makers with regard to any planned delays of the new Astute class hunter-killer submarines.

The ultimate solution to the projected shortfall is therefore likely to be the total scrapping of large scale defence procurement projects and the modification of exisiting platforms to serve multiple purposes. In the case of Britain’s nuclear deterrent such an approach could be achieved by scrapping plans for a wholly new successor to the existing Trident-bearing British nuclear submarines and modifying the Astute class to possess a nuclear weapons capability.