Last week, the UK defence secretary, John Healey, announced that five Royal Navy warships were to be mothballed as part of a £500mn cost-cutting drive. The 'senior service' hasn’t seen those sort of losses in a single day since the Battle of Jutland, but matters weren’t quite as dire as appearances would have us believe. It turns out that all the vessels have been inactive for an extended period and have played no part in deliberations over the disposition of ships ready for combat.
One of their number, HMS Bulwark, had been undergoing a major refit. Its status had been uncertain for some time, and a shortage of recruits reportedly didn't help either. With budgetary constraints to the fore, the situation isn’t likely to improve in the near-term, unless Healey is considering the reintroduction of impressment.
In addition to the warships, the decision was taken to pull the plug on a drone system and retire some largely obsolete helicopters. There’s always a hue and cry whenever ministers take out the pruning shears, but we might realistically expect further rationalisation measures ahead of next year’s strategic defence review. Despite the government’s somewhat vague commitment to increasing defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP (no timetable given), the “do more with less” mantra currently holds sway in Whitehall.