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Strategic Defence and Security Review

I beg to move,"That this House has considered the matter of the strategic defence and security review." On this sad day when the House has heard the news of the 300th member of the armed forces losing his life in Afghanistan, our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends, as well as with all those other service families who are mourning their losses. It is also appropriate to remember the families of the victims of violence from 9/11 to the present day. We did not initiate this cycle of violence, but we will certainly confront it. I am pleased to open this debate on the Ministry of Defence contribution to the strategic defence and security review. All parties in the House committed themselves at the election to holding this review. The Green Paper from the previous Government, with its all-party approach, produced broad agreement on the need for fundamental reform, and I am sure that all Members will agree and reiterate that the defence of the nation should be above the worst excesses of partisan party politics. In this review, we will need to challenge many preconceptions and think clearly about what we as a country want and need from our armed forces, and what we can afford. I want to ensure that we benefit from the expertise in the wider defence community, including partners in industry, academia, non-governmental organisations and the charitable and voluntary sector. It is also essential that members of the House of Commons have a proper opportunity to make their views known on behalf of themselves and those whom we represent. In that light, Members submissions on the defence review should be made directly to me at the Ministry of Defence. Those in the other place with specialist interests will also be especially welcome to make submissions. Most importantly, the Prime Minister and I are determined that members of the armed forces and their families have an opportunity to contribute, and the service chiefs will set out shortly how that will be achieved. There has already been a lively debate about the choices that we face, and the MOD will continue to engage. Today, I shall set out the coalition Government's broad approach to the defence review, an assessment of the financial backdrop, a description of the strategic environment and, finally, the way ahead. Conducting a defence review while fighting a war in Afghanistan is rather like trying to build a ship while still at sea. Afghanistan must remain our priority, and as part of the international coalition of 46 nations we must prevail. None the less, after 12 years without a defence review, when our armed forces have at times been overstretched, with some current equipment overused or out of date, with programmes from the cold war that are of less relevance today, and in our dreadful economic and financial circumstances, it is clear that change must come. The review will need to provide a step change, not salami-slicing. We will have to bring defence policy, plans, commitments and resources into balance, confront the harsh facts of the economic climate in which we operate and make a clean break from the military and political mindset of cold war politics. Let me give the House just one example. In the past, military might has been measured by conventional capabilities, such as tanks, aircraft and ships that we can inspect and review; but technology is already moving on at such a rate that there are new domains of warfare, such as cyber and space, where we will require capabilities in which the Government will have to invest but which the public might not be able to see. We also see the development of asymmetrical capabilities that serve to deny us the effectiveness of our conventional capabilities. It makes sense for any adversary to develop what are commonly referred to as area-denial or anti-access strategies in order to deny us the use of our conventional military capabilities without matching us tank for tank, ship for ship or jet for jet. We should not hope that our adversaries do not do so; we should expect and plan that they will; and it is vital that the review consider that point.