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Defence in the World

I have been suggesting that we undertake a strategic defence review, which I believe the hon. Gentleman also supports. It would seem pointless to call for a fundamental review, only to pre-empt the conclusions that it might reach. My feeling is that our ability to conduct state-on-state warfare is a combination of the cold war legacy and a preoccupation with the idea that that is the only sort of warfare in which we will be involved in future. To pick up the hon. Gentleman's point about expeditionary warfare, I believe that we will need to increase our capabilities in expeditionary warfare even further than they have already been developed. A strategic defence review would have to sort through how best to combine our resources with those of our allies in such a way that we do not undermine our ability, in our strategic alliances, to fight the more conventional battles that we have fought in the past. We do not face those battles imminently, but I share his view that we cannot disregard them further into the future.