The head of the Royal Navy has warned Britain faces defeat at sea against Russia without more warships and drones.
First Sea Lord, General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, has previously cautioned that Britain is ‘at risk’ of losing its naval advantage to Vladimir Putin‘s maritime forces.
Last night, however, he told a private audience the country needs to ‘strengthen our war-fighting readiness’ and ‘rediscover what it means to be a maritime nation… if we are to prevail in the Atlantic again’.
As the Daily Mail has revealed, our once world-beating Navy has been devastated by spending cuts.
It is not only smaller than at any time in its history but most of the ships and submarines that remain are unavailable to deploy.
In May this year, we revealed how the frigate fleet has been reduced to just five after the retirement of HMS Iron Duke. The warship was withdrawn from service for technical reasons just three years after a £103million refit.
To add to that, on numerous occasions this year the Royal Navy’s entire fleet of hunter-killer submarines has been stuck in port unable to sail – leaving Britain at risk from Putin.
And when RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus was hit by an Iranian-made drone in March, the destroyer HMS Dragon took three weeks to reach the island.
First Sea Lord, General Sir Gwyn Jenkins (pictured), has previously cautioned that Britain is ‘at risk’ of losing its naval advantage to Vladimir Putin’s maritime forces
UK submarines have also been completing record-breaking patrols of more than 200 days at sea due to the shortage of available vessels. Such epic voyages have become ‘the new normal’, according to Navy insiders.
Addressing a private event at Admiralty House in Whitehall, General Sir Gwyn was reported as saying: ‘The greatest threat to our security today is Russia.
‘Russia retains advanced submarines that are increasingly difficult to track, long-range precision weapons and specialist systems designed to operate deep under water. Russia is probing, testing and mapping.
‘It seeks advantage in the grey zone, particularly around the critical undersea infrastructure on which modern societies rely.
‘Churchill attached such significance to the Atlantic because he understood something important. The sea is not peripheral to Britain – it is existential.
‘Sea power not only sustained us during the war. It arguably saved us. Lose the war at sea and you lose the war. That was the warning of Admiral Pound, the First Sea Lord of the day, and it remains true now.’
Yet despite the Russian threat, the Royal Navy, like the Army and Royal Air Force, is suffering a budget reduction.
The services were ordered by Defence Secretary Wes Streeting to find £3billion in ‘efficiencies’ in this financial year. The Army must save £1.2billion, leaving the Navy and RAF to shave off £1.8billion.
Russian advances into UK waters have risen by a third in the past two years, forcing the threat posed by the Kremlin to dictate defence priorities in this country.
The defence spending crisis has triggered furious criticism from former military chiefs and opposition MPs.
There have also been conflicting messages from Mr Streeting and the Prime Minister. While Mr Streeting has insisted other areas of public expenditure are ‘valueless’ if Britain is left defenceless, Andy Burnham has claimed national security cannot come at the expense of social security.
The Daily Mail’s Don’t Leave Britain Defenceless campaign has pushed successive governments for a rise in military cash.
Within the budget constraints, General Sir Gwyn is introducing hundreds of uncrewed systems to support surface and subsurface fleets, focusing on drones to operate from aircraft carriers, frigates, destroyers and submarines.
