reat Britain lost an empire and has not yet found a role,” Dean Acheson’s 1962 overly quoted line about the United Kingdom, still carries with it an element of truth, perhaps even more so since the country’s exit from the European Union. For authors Lord David Richards and Julian Lindley–French, the issue is far more systemic than just a country struggling to find its place and purpose amid a turbulent geopolitical landscape.
In their sharply critical and at times alarming co–authored book “The Retreat from Strategy,” Richards and Lindley–French find the root of the challenge in the UK’s conceptual framing of its grand strategy. For Richards and Lindley–French, London’s political class and civil servants have placed abstract values, not concrete interests, at the heart of the country’s grand strategy. As a result, its defense, security, and foreign policies are adrift and unfocused.
A muddied and confused conception of grand strategy is challenging enough, but Whitehall and the great offices of state have under–resourced and under–invested in the country’s defense and security apparatuses—the very ones used to pursue the country’s grand strategy. In so doing, London has left the United Kingdom exposed and vulnerable to the geopolitical realities of today and potential existential crises of tomorrow.
Over the pages of “The Retreat from Strategy,” Richards and Lindley–French make a compelling and provocative argument, one with which many will no doubt take umbrage. It nonetheless remains an important contribution to the country’s national dialogue, one which should receive far more prominence than it otherwise is at the moment. The pedigree of the authors should offset some of the critical reception to their criticisms. Reactionaries they most certainly are not, but formidable critics they definitively are.
Lord David Richards served as Chief of the Defence Staff from 2009 to 2013. Some critics may find fault in his counsel to Her Majesty’s Government while in post, but then as now he offers keen strategic insights based on–the–ground experience and academic nous. Prior to assuming the United Kingdom’s most senior military position, he commanded British forces during Sierra Leone’s civil war in 2000, commanded NATO’s Allied Rapid Reaction Corps, and was the only non–American to command the International Security Assistance Forces in Afghanistan. His co–author, Julian Lindley–French (a prolific writer himself), is a renowned historian and strategist who has held senior positions with NATO, the EU, and the United Kingdom.
“The Retreat from Strategy” focuses on two interwoven narrative threads, bookended by a fictional scenario (more on that, below) that illustrates the risks of inaction and the results of necessary course corrections. In the first, the authors diagnose the country’s grand strategic ills. For them, the United Kingdom jettisoned ‘interests’ instead focusing on ‘values’ as the central organizing strategic principle. These more nebulous ideas—development, justice, inclusion etc.—are driving British foreign and security policy more than concrete, attainable strategic interests. These abstract ideas and the pursuit thereof is shaping the operations of the civil service itself, resulting in greater attention on process than outcomes.
The United Kingdom, in the authors’ view, is also suffering from post–colonial self–flagellation. It is more than an attempt to reconcile the country’s past and more an intellectual and policy approach that posits that past transgressions must be undone by contemporary actions and that those transgressions have tainted the pursuit of interests.It is important to state unequivocally that the authors are not ‘anti–woke’ rhetorical radicals. To them, values can and should inform and shape interests, but the nation–state must lead with interests, not naïve pursuit of abstract and immeasurable values.
Those interests, in the authors’ minds, are nearer to home than recent rhetoric from 10 Downing Street has suggested. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s “Global Britain” was more marketing veneer than policy substance, overshadowing what was an otherwise exceptionally well–articulated and coherent Integrated Review drafted by professor John Bew of King’s College London (a very fine academic institution, if the reviewer may say so). London has also yet to reconcile its more ambitious interests with geopolitical and strategic realities, including the possible forthcoming change in America’s global orientation (another element of the authors’ calculus and urgency). Washington’s concerns about the United Kingdom’s ability to generate and present forces have quietly and not–so–quietly emerged.
Ambitions that the United Kingdom be a significant military force in the Indo–Pacific are, for the authors, unrealistic. Rather, London should focus on its own near–abroad, prioritizing continental security (especially in the wake of Russia’s ‘special military operation’ against Ukraine) and the high north—considerations of which serve as the framing for the authors’ opening and closing fictional scenarios involving Russian and Chinese military aggression.
At least politically, this should be welcomed by the Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour government, which placed an as–of–yet undefined ‘NATO first’ strategy at the center of its defense planning. The forthcoming Strategic Defence Review is expected to more clearly articulate the new government’s policy priorities and orientation. This is not to suggest that London has neither interests in the Indo–Pacific nor the capacity to pursue those interests. Rather than conventional force development or deployment, London should, arguably, prioritize economic or diplomatic initiatives in the region.
The forthcoming deployment of HMS Prince of Wales to the Indo–Pacific as part of a joint Carrier Strike Group, while impressive, will see the carrier out of action for nearly a year in total including mobilization, deployment, and post–deployment maintenance. One could argue that that is too high a cost for the benefits: a show–of–force and testing and exercising interoperability. More frequent rotations and deployments in the waters around the United Kingdom and to the Mediterranean may arguably have greater strategic value for London, but also for continental security. The United Kingdom clearly wishes to avoid becoming another Scandinavian nation—well–protected at home, but less able to deploy globally—a stance that illustrates the strategic tension at the heart of British grand strategy.
The Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP)—the joint UK, Italy, and Japan next generation fighter program—illustrates both defense diplomacy and economic engagement in the pursuit of Whitehall interests in the Indo–Pacific without attendant force deployment. London’s involvement in AUKUS—the multi–pillar, multilateral engagement with Australia and the United States—is another example, one that does tie long–term conventional force development with broader engagement, the lasting impact of which (particularly in the area of technology transfer and cooperation) goes well beyond the nuclear submarines, on which most focus.
The perilous state of the British armed forces constitutes the second narrative thread. Consistent under–investment and de–capitalization, paired with unrealistic grand strategic ambitions, have left the British Army, Royal Navy, and Royal Air Force undermanned, under–resourced, and overstretched. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has dictated how much threat the Ministry of Defense can afford, rather than the threat driving budgetary allocations. There is, of course, always a balance to be struck between guns and butter, but the authors argue that 11 Downing Street—the residence of the Chancellor—has not and does not share a commensurate sense of urgency the world today demands.
In a candid off–the–record observation one Whitehall insider remarked to the reviewer that despite the Ministry of Defence’s metaphorical alarm bells ringing and warning lights flashing, they feared that defense was perhaps the seventh or eighth priority for Starmer’s 10 Downing Street. There were, in their view, simply too many competing priorities for the fledgling Labour government’s attention.
Much of the defense spending debate within the United Kingdom has been an exercise in smoke and mirrors. While Britain spends just over 2% of its GDP on defense, if the nuclear enterprise is removed, it falls to 1.75%—and the costs of the nuclear enterprise have steadily increased and is expected to consume 19% of the overall defense budget. Announced spending commitments—which are certainly to be welcomed—merely cover payments for existing obligations, not ‘real’ new spending. The Conservative government’s commitment to spend 2.5% of GDP on defense by 2030 could well move to the right. Starmer is laying the groundwork for such a slippage saying that the increase would only take place when fiscal conditions permitted—a position that will certainly not go down well in a Trump White House.
The British Army is the smallest it has been since 1714 (72,500) and could fit within Manchester United’s stadium (capacity 74,310) with room to spare. The force is, of course, better equipped, better trained, and more capable than it was 311 years ago, but that is nonetheless a shocking top–level statistic. In candid conversations with British military experts, some question whether the United Kingdom would be able to field a full–strength division in the event of open hostilities.
Secretary of State for Defence John Healey, warned that the country would not be able to fend off an invasion. His comments (which presume many, many things have gone wrong before an invasion of the island nation) were largely an exercise in messaging to the Treasury, but more harmful than helpful given how they were received. There has also yet to be a reckoning with London’s support to Ukraine. While vitally important, it has left the United Kingdom’s cupboards extremely bare, with nearly all the country’s AS–90 artillery pieces sent to Kyiv and “negligible” air defense capabilities left.
The state of the United Kingdom’s defense purse could well force radical decisions. For example, and only as an argumentative stalking horse, the authors raise the prospect of 10 Downing Street jettisoning the United Kingdom’s standalone nuclear deterrent and reallocate the funds toward conventional force development. They are not in favor of such an idea—which is sacrosanct even for the Labour Party—but they raise it to hyperbolically illustrate the state of the British military and the tradeoffs necessary to field a credible force.
“The Retreat from Strategy” was one of the reviewer’s selections for the ‘Best Books of the Year’ precisely because it is provocative and argumentative. It raises critical questions at a critical time for the United Kingdom, both domestically and internationally, and illustrates the challenges and necessity of political (geo– and otherwise) trade offs. Not all will agree with the picture Richards and Lindley–French paint, but “The Retreat from Strategy” should provoke a much needed dialogue within the United Kingdom about the country’s power and purpose in a changing world. If it manages to do so the authors will have achieved a very important, and indeed strategic, objective.
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Values, interests, and the defense of the realm
10 Downing Street. Image courtesy of Number 10 via Flickr. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
January 18, 2025
In “The Retreat from Strategy,” the authors’ critiques of the UK’s failures to frame a grand strategy—blaming a tendency of policymakers to place abstract values above concrete interests—are an uncomfortable but important part of national dialogue, writes Joshua Huminski.
G
reat Britain lost an empire and has not yet found a role,” Dean Acheson’s 1962 overly quoted line about the United Kingdom, still carries with it an element of truth, perhaps even more so since the country’s exit from the European Union. For authors Lord David Richards and Julian Lindley–French, the issue is far more systemic than just a country struggling to find its place and purpose amid a turbulent geopolitical landscape.
In their sharply critical and at times alarming co–authored book “The Retreat from Strategy,” Richards and Lindley–French find the root of the challenge in the UK’s conceptual framing of its grand strategy. For Richards and Lindley–French, London’s political class and civil servants have placed abstract values, not concrete interests, at the heart of the country’s grand strategy. As a result, its defense, security, and foreign policies are adrift and unfocused.
A muddied and confused conception of grand strategy is challenging enough, but Whitehall and the great offices of state have under–resourced and under–invested in the country’s defense and security apparatuses—the very ones used to pursue the country’s grand strategy. In so doing, London has left the United Kingdom exposed and vulnerable to the geopolitical realities of today and potential existential crises of tomorrow.
Over the pages of “The Retreat from Strategy,” Richards and Lindley–French make a compelling and provocative argument, one with which many will no doubt take umbrage. It nonetheless remains an important contribution to the country’s national dialogue, one which should receive far more prominence than it otherwise is at the moment. The pedigree of the authors should offset some of the critical reception to their criticisms. Reactionaries they most certainly are not, but formidable critics they definitively are.
Lord David Richards served as Chief of the Defence Staff from 2009 to 2013. Some critics may find fault in his counsel to Her Majesty’s Government while in post, but then as now he offers keen strategic insights based on–the–ground experience and academic nous. Prior to assuming the United Kingdom’s most senior military position, he commanded British forces during Sierra Leone’s civil war in 2000, commanded NATO’s Allied Rapid Reaction Corps, and was the only non–American to command the International Security Assistance Forces in Afghanistan. His co–author, Julian Lindley–French (a prolific writer himself), is a renowned historian and strategist who has held senior positions with NATO, the EU, and the United Kingdom.
“The Retreat from Strategy” focuses on two interwoven narrative threads, bookended by a fictional scenario (more on that, below) that illustrates the risks of inaction and the results of necessary course corrections. In the first, the authors diagnose the country’s grand strategic ills. For them, the United Kingdom jettisoned ‘interests’ instead focusing on ‘values’ as the central organizing strategic principle. These more nebulous ideas—development, justice, inclusion etc.—are driving British foreign and security policy more than concrete, attainable strategic interests. These abstract ideas and the pursuit thereof is shaping the operations of the civil service itself, resulting in greater attention on process than outcomes.
The United Kingdom, in the authors’ view, is also suffering from post–colonial self–flagellation. It is more than an attempt to reconcile the country’s past and more an intellectual and policy approach that posits that past transgressions must be undone by contemporary actions and that those transgressions have tainted the pursuit of interests.It is important to state unequivocally that the authors are not ‘anti–woke’ rhetorical radicals. To them, values can and should inform and shape interests, but the nation–state must lead with interests, not naïve pursuit of abstract and immeasurable values.
Those interests, in the authors’ minds, are nearer to home than recent rhetoric from 10 Downing Street has suggested. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s “Global Britain” was more marketing veneer than policy substance, overshadowing what was an otherwise exceptionally well–articulated and coherent Integrated Review drafted by professor John Bew of King’s College London (a very fine academic institution, if the reviewer may say so). London has also yet to reconcile its more ambitious interests with geopolitical and strategic realities, including the possible forthcoming change in America’s global orientation (another element of the authors’ calculus and urgency). Washington’s concerns about the United Kingdom’s ability to generate and present forces have quietly and not–so–quietly emerged.
Ambitions that the United Kingdom be a significant military force in the Indo–Pacific are, for the authors, unrealistic. Rather, London should focus on its own near–abroad, prioritizing continental security (especially in the wake of Russia’s ‘special military operation’ against Ukraine) and the high north—considerations of which serve as the framing for the authors’ opening and closing fictional scenarios involving Russian and Chinese military aggression.
At least politically, this should be welcomed by the Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour government, which placed an as–of–yet undefined ‘NATO first’ strategy at the center of its defense planning. The forthcoming Strategic Defence Review is expected to more clearly articulate the new government’s policy priorities and orientation. This is not to suggest that London has neither interests in the Indo–Pacific nor the capacity to pursue those interests. Rather than conventional force development or deployment, London should, arguably, prioritize economic or diplomatic initiatives in the region.
The forthcoming deployment of HMS Prince of Wales to the Indo–Pacific as part of a joint Carrier Strike Group, while impressive, will see the carrier out of action for nearly a year in total including mobilization, deployment, and post–deployment maintenance. One could argue that that is too high a cost for the benefits: a show–of–force and testing and exercising interoperability. More frequent rotations and deployments in the waters around the United Kingdom and to the Mediterranean may arguably have greater strategic value for London, but also for continental security. The United Kingdom clearly wishes to avoid becoming another Scandinavian nation—well–protected at home, but less able to deploy globally—a stance that illustrates the strategic tension at the heart of British grand strategy.
The Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP)—the joint UK, Italy, and Japan next generation fighter program—illustrates both defense diplomacy and economic engagement in the pursuit of Whitehall interests in the Indo–Pacific without attendant force deployment. London’s involvement in AUKUS—the multi–pillar, multilateral engagement with Australia and the United States—is another example, one that does tie long–term conventional force development with broader engagement, the lasting impact of which (particularly in the area of technology transfer and cooperation) goes well beyond the nuclear submarines, on which most focus.
The perilous state of the British armed forces constitutes the second narrative thread. Consistent under–investment and de–capitalization, paired with unrealistic grand strategic ambitions, have left the British Army, Royal Navy, and Royal Air Force undermanned, under–resourced, and overstretched. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has dictated how much threat the Ministry of Defense can afford, rather than the threat driving budgetary allocations. There is, of course, always a balance to be struck between guns and butter, but the authors argue that 11 Downing Street—the residence of the Chancellor—has not and does not share a commensurate sense of urgency the world today demands.
In a candid off–the–record observation one Whitehall insider remarked to the reviewer that despite the Ministry of Defence’s metaphorical alarm bells ringing and warning lights flashing, they feared that defense was perhaps the seventh or eighth priority for Starmer’s 10 Downing Street. There were, in their view, simply too many competing priorities for the fledgling Labour government’s attention.
Much of the defense spending debate within the United Kingdom has been an exercise in smoke and mirrors. While Britain spends just over 2% of its GDP on defense, if the nuclear enterprise is removed, it falls to 1.75%—and the costs of the nuclear enterprise have steadily increased and is expected to consume 19% of the overall defense budget. Announced spending commitments—which are certainly to be welcomed—merely cover payments for existing obligations, not ‘real’ new spending. The Conservative government’s commitment to spend 2.5% of GDP on defense by 2030 could well move to the right. Starmer is laying the groundwork for such a slippage saying that the increase would only take place when fiscal conditions permitted—a position that will certainly not go down well in a Trump White House.
The British Army is the smallest it has been since 1714 (72,500) and could fit within Manchester United’s stadium (capacity 74,310) with room to spare. The force is, of course, better equipped, better trained, and more capable than it was 311 years ago, but that is nonetheless a shocking top–level statistic. In candid conversations with British military experts, some question whether the United Kingdom would be able to field a full–strength division in the event of open hostilities.
Secretary of State for Defence John Healey, warned that the country would not be able to fend off an invasion. His comments (which presume many, many things have gone wrong before an invasion of the island nation) were largely an exercise in messaging to the Treasury, but more harmful than helpful given how they were received. There has also yet to be a reckoning with London’s support to Ukraine. While vitally important, it has left the United Kingdom’s cupboards extremely bare, with nearly all the country’s AS–90 artillery pieces sent to Kyiv and “negligible” air defense capabilities left.
The state of the United Kingdom’s defense purse could well force radical decisions. For example, and only as an argumentative stalking horse, the authors raise the prospect of 10 Downing Street jettisoning the United Kingdom’s standalone nuclear deterrent and reallocate the funds toward conventional force development. They are not in favor of such an idea—which is sacrosanct even for the Labour Party—but they raise it to hyperbolically illustrate the state of the British military and the tradeoffs necessary to field a credible force.
“The Retreat from Strategy” was one of the reviewer’s selections for the ‘Best Books of the Year’ precisely because it is provocative and argumentative. It raises critical questions at a critical time for the United Kingdom, both domestically and internationally, and illustrates the challenges and necessity of political (geo– and otherwise) trade offs. Not all will agree with the picture Richards and Lindley–French paint, but “The Retreat from Strategy” should provoke a much needed dialogue within the United Kingdom about the country’s power and purpose in a changing world. If it manages to do so the authors will have achieved a very important, and indeed strategic, objective.
