[The British army] occupies a curious place in both the emotional heart of the nation and the head of policy makers. The public if asked are usually aware of an organisation steeped in regimental tradition, know of units like the SAS, Guards and Parachute Regiment and may know a little bit about the equipment such as tanks (noting that all APCs are tanks to the layman’s eye…). They recognise it from state ceremonial, where it is an integral part of the national fabric and identity, and are proud of the perception of “our boys” serving overseas in warzones. There is often a deeper rooted, but baseless suspicion of the senior echelons, dating back to the tired cliché of “lions led by donkeys” and fed by a generation of misguided historians trying to rewrite WW1 as not the greatest victory in the history of the British army, but instead four years of class war and turgid poetry.
To policy makers the army is an institution which is central to the survival of the nation, and which carries out many vital roles to meet defence and security policy objectives, but which is also extremely good at champing at the bit to get involved in operations overseas, even when it is not necessarily in the national interest to do so.
A cursory examination of history suggests that the British army is not by itself a war winning organisation. It does not go to war alone with peer rivals and expect to win – UK policy instead for centuries has been to maintain a small (but professional) army able to either conduct colonial policing, or work as part of a larger coalition force to achieve victory. This is not to do down the efforts of the army, but to accept the reality that as an island nation, the UK has relied on the navy as the ultimate guarantor of its security.
Sir Humphrey, “How Do You Solve a Problem Like a Deployable Division?”, Thin Pinstriped Line, 2017-08-06.
December 6, 2019
QotD: The British army
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