Britain Begins to Rearm

Britain Begins to Rearm - Wall Street Journal

Europeans will remember 2015 as the year in which national security became an everyday concern, from Russia’s encroachments on NATO’s periphery to the jihadist threat to their urban centers. So kudos to David Cameron’s government for reversing years of cuts to Britain’s military spending with a strategic review that starts to take account of the world as it is.

“We must expect the unexpected,” the Prime Minister warned Parliament on Monday. Britain, he added, “can make sure that we have the versatility and the means to respond to new risks and threats to our security.”

To that end, the government plans to spend £2 billion ($3 billion) on additional weapons for its special forces, hire 1,900 new foreign and domestic intelligence personnel, buy 20 long-range Reaper drones, restore Britain’s maritime patrol capabilities with nine P8 Poseidon aircraft (useful for hunting Russian submarines), and add new squadrons of land-based Typhoon and sea-based F-35 jets. The government will also set aside £41 billion to build Britain’s next generation of nuclear missile submarines…