Polish Air Force F-35A Lightning II pilots with the 57th Fighter Squadron execute ground operations at Ebbing Air National Guard Base, Arkansas, Jan. 29, 2025.
Ground operations took place in preparation for Poland’s first F-35 flights, marking a significant milestone for their history, as well as the Foreign Military Sales Program.
EBBING FORT SMITH, ARKANSAS
01.29.2025
Video by Senior Airman Christian Corley
33rd Fighter Wing
Robbin Laird
Dateline: Canberra, Australia
On May 22, 2025, the first seminar of 2025 for the Sir Richard Williams Foundation was held at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra.
The seminar was entitled: The Imperatives for Cost Effectiveness in Multidomain Operations. The program for the seminar laid out the basic aim for the seminar as follows:
The 2025 seminar series will identify and discuss strategic themes which impact the Whole of Australian Government, Defence and industry, as well as international partners in a multi- domain context. Given the increasingly complex set of threats and operational risks, it is also set within the context of the emerging issues aligned with the development of NDS26 and beyond.
The seminar series will address the need to balance near-term decisions in air and space capability to ensure Defence and industry investment also provides the sustainable foundations for future force structure planning and growth.
In recognition of the increasing pressures on Defence spending, the aim of the May 2025 seminar is to examine the imperative for cost effectiveness in multi-domain operations.
The Chairman of the Sir Richard Williams Foundation, Air Chief Marshal (Retd) Mark Binskin, provided the opening remarks for the seminar. He underscored that “the global rules-based order that we’ve relied on and benefited from for many decades is now gone” and warning that it “won’t be back in its form that we were used to.”
He highlighted that the international system is transitioning from one governed by the rule of law to one dominated by “rule of strength and rule of threat.” This fundamental shift places enormous pressure on like-minded nations to actively shape the evolving order through “strong national power, trusted alliances and partnerships and collective will.”
As Binskin emphasized, the required response is needed “now, not 2040,” highlighting the immediate nature of the strategic threat facing Australia and its allies.
The seminar’s central theme—the imperative for cost-effectiveness in multi-domain operations— reveals a critical paradox facing modern defense planners. As Binskin noted, “an affordable force may not actually be an effective force,” particularly when the strategic benefits of military capabilities are poorly understood or misapplied.
This challenge manifests in several concerning ways:
Australian defense planners face the complex task of maintaining two distinct but interconnected focuses. The first involves long-term strategic planning extending to 2040, anticipating how threats and capabilities might evolve over the coming decades.
Simultaneously, they must ensure that current personnel are properly equipped and prepared for immediate challenges. As Binskin pointedly noted, the men and women serving today need to be ready to “compete this afternoon, fight tonight, survive and win.”
The seminar’s strong industry sponsorship underscores the critical role of public-private partnerships in addressing these challenges.
International cooperation remains equally vital, with speakers joining from the UK and the United States (including one virtually due to airline disruptions), reflecting the interconnected nature of modern defense challenges and solutions.
The Sir Richard Williams Foundation seminar represents more than an academic exercise — it’s a critical forum for addressing one of Australia’s most pressing national security challenges. How to build and maintain military forces that are both affordable and effective in an era where traditional strategic assumptions no longer apply?
The collapse of the post-World War II international order, combined with the emergence of new threats and the constant pressure of fiscal constraints, requires defense leaders to make increasingly difficult choices about capability development and force structure.
SRWF_CEMDO_22May25_ConferenceSynopsisProgram
By Robbin Laird
On 30 April 2025, I had the chance to talk with Major White, the Operations Officer at VMGR-252. This is a KC-130J squadron based at the Marine Corps Air Station at Cherry Point and is part of 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing. The last time I visited the squadron was in 2014.
It must be remembered that 2nd MAW unlike the other two MAWs is not assigned to support a single geographic combatant command. It is co-located in North Carolina with II MEF but it is tasked as a global support force. This means that a squadron like the VMGR-252 truly has to be able to operate worldwide at a moment’s notice.
In the complex landscape of modern military operations, few platforms play as vital a role in Marine Corps aviation as the KC-130J. In the interview, Major White, an experienced KC-130J officer with multiple deployments and Weapons and Tactics Instructor (WTI) qualifications, revealed how this aircraft serves as the linchpin for Marine expeditionary capabilities worldwide.
“Our reach is unlimited,” Major White explains. “We can get there faster than pretty much anything else.” This self-deployable capability sets the KC-130J apart from other platforms that often require additional support to reach distant operational areas.
Dual-Role Platform: Air Refueling and Tactical Transport
What makes the KC-130J particularly valuable is its dual-role capability. The aircraft serves as both a critical air refueling platform and a tactical transport asset, though this creates inherent tensions in resource allocation.
The air refueling function is especially vital for CH-53 helicopters, which rely extensively on the KC-130J for refueling training and operations. “The 53s use us a lot because to my knowledge there’s no contract civilian tanker that can fly slow enough,” Major White explains. “We really work hard to make sure we’re able to sustain them.”
This tanking capability becomes increasingly important as the Marine Corps moves toward more distributed operations. The ability to extend the range of rotary-wing assets through aerial refueling directly enables the kind of distributed force posture envisioned in current Marine Corps doctrine.
Working with the CH-53K: A Window on the Way Ahead
The KC-130J squadron at Cherry Point is located nearby the new CH-53K squadron at New River, which enables them to experience working with the new generation heavy lift helicopter.
This is what the 2nd MAW said about what is pictured in the photo: “U.S. Marines with Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron (VMGR) 252 transfer supplies from a KC-130J Hercules into a CH-53K King Stallion assigned to Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron (HMH) 461 with an extended boom forklift – military millennium vehicle assigned to Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron (MALS) 29 at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina, June 7, 2023.
“The tail-to-tail transfer of supplies allowed distribution of sustainment in the minimum time period of vulnerability by reducing break-bulk requirements. U.S. Marines with 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW) experimented with dynamic, assault-support capabilities in a distributed-aviation environment. VMGR-252, HMH-461, and MALS-29 are subordinate units of 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing.”
This approach is facilitated by the new Kilo helicopter. The CH-53K‘s intermodal cargo system allows transfer of Air Mobility Command 463L pallets directly from fixed-wing transport aircraft (without the need for reconfiguration to wooden warehouse pallets) and lock them in place with an internal pallet locking system eliminating the need for the crisscrossing of cargo straps, significantly enhancing the speed of internal cargo operations and in-theater cargo throughput.
Meeting the Force Distribution Challenge
The distributed operations approach being prioritized by the services highlights the importance of such capabilities and more generally of a growing challenge facing the sustainment part of force deployment. If you distribute forces, for how long, where and how do you keep them supplied and their equipment operational?
Couplings like the KC-130J with the CH-53K go up in importance for sure. But there is a general problem of expanding the support for the support force, one might note. I feel particularly strongly that more funding for the sustainability of the fight tonight force needs to be made to enable higher readiness and sustainability rates going forward.
A significant portion of the interview focused on the often-overlooked aspect of military operations: logistics and sustainability. The distributed operations concept presents particular challenges for sustainment. The real question centers on how to sustain distributed forces.
Major White acknowledged the challenges of balancing the KC-130J’s dual roles: “There’s tension between the tanking function, which is important, and the lift function.” This becomes particularly critical when considering distributed operations, which “create an exponential increase in the problem of sustainability.”
Major White referenced the squadron’s work with HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System) rapid deployment, noting how they can quickly transport this critical weapon system over significant distances despite payload limitations.
Modernization Challenges
Like many platforms across the Marine Corps, the KC-130J faces modernization challenges. Major White highlighted that some of their aircraft are 15-20 years old with outdated software compared to Air Force equivalents. “We’ve bought a system, but the Air Force already upgraded to a better system, so we’re still behind where we could be,” he explained.
This points to a larger issue within defense acquisition: the focus on new platforms often overshadows the critical need to maintain and upgrade existing systems. As Major White notes, it’s not a flying problem but a supply problem.
Conclusion
Despite these challenges, Major White remains confident in the squadron’s ability to accomplish its mission. “We’re Marines, and we’ll find a way to get the mission done,” he stated, emphasizing how the integration of smart, creative personnel helps overcome resource limitations.
This integration is enhanced through the Marine Aviation Weapons and Tactics Squadron (MAWTS) training cycles, which Major White described as crucial for cross-platform learning and innovation. “I think from every iteration, we learn from each other and make ourselves better.”
But as distributed operations become increasingly central to Marine Corps strategy, the question remains whether logistics and sustainability will receive the attention—and funding—they require.
In my personal view, if you’re going to force distribute, you’ve now created an exponential increase in the problem of sustainability, and unless you invest and think through how to deal with the new sustainability problem, the force won’t work as effectively as it could.
As Marine Corps operations continue to evolve toward more distributed concepts, the sustainment capabilities provided by platforms like the KC-130J will remain essential. Major White’s insights reveal both the impressive capabilities these aircraft bring to the fight and the ongoing challenges in keeping them ready for tomorrow’s conflicts.
In this context, the KC-130J stands as both a solution to current operational needs and a symbol of the broader challenges facing military logistics in an era of great power competition and distributed operations
Update on C-130 Modernization
This 2023 USAF article provided insight into the modernization path they are on with regard to their C-130s which is of relevance to the USMC as well.
The goal for the AMP Inc 2 modernization effort is supporting mobility air forces to sufficiently meet National Defense Strategy priorities, according to the C-130H legacy avionics branch. The upgrade provides a new flight management system, autopilot, large glass multifunctional displays, digital engine instruments, digital backbone and terrain awareness and warning system.
The 417th Flight Test Squadron’s aircrews were involved in the AMP upgrading since 2017 and began AMP Inc 2 developmental testing at Eglin in August on one aircraft with others to follow this month.
“This modification completely changes the interface for the crew to employ the C-130H,” said Maj. Jacob Duede, 417th FLTS experimental test pilot. “Aircrew essentially had to print the directions before flying and then type the information in using latitude and longitude or use ground-based navigation aids. This new mod is the newest GPS navigation with a by name search function and autopilot, all built into the aircraft.”
The built-in flight plan modification ability is particularly impactful for the pilots. Prior to AMP, to modify the flight plan, pilots coordinated with air traffic control, then looked up new coordinates in latitude and longitude with equipment brought onto the aircraft like a tablet or laptop. Then, the pilots took those numbers and entered them into the aircraft to adjust the flight plan.
“Depending on the proficiency of the crew, this could take 30-45 seconds or two to three minutes,” Duede said. “Either of which is a long time when in the air moving at four miles per minute.”
Using the new built-in multifunctional displays, the pilot can complete the entire process with a hand controller in less than 30 seconds.
“The new process is as quick as the first step of the old process. You just identify the point on the moving map, grab it and execute the flight plan,” said the major, a 10-year C-130 pilot.
Another new key aircraft component is the Integrated Terrain Awareness and Warning System. It is a commercially-used ground and object avoidance tool, but significantly upgraded to react to Air Force tactical flying requirements. The ITAWS, combined with the latest flight navigational programs, are all now built into the aircraft and available on screens easily assessable to the pilot, co-pilot and navigator. Currently, operational C-130H aircrews carry on tablets or laptops to access any navigational software.
All but three of the aircraft’s original analog gauges are gone to make way for the AMP system. In place of those gauges, that worked independently of each other, are six new brightly lit multifunctional displays working together throughout the aircraft’s flight deck.
“This is much larger than just a software or hardware upgrade,” said Duede. “It’s reconstructing and modernizing the aircraft’s entire cockpit area.”
The planning phase of the 417th FLTS’s developmental testing began in 2021 and continues at Eglin through the rest of the year.
During the DT flights, aircrew examine all aspects of these newly-installed tools, none of which existed within the aircraft before.
“This is an entirely new system,” said Caleb Reeves, 417th FLTS test engineer who helped design the test plan. “Everything we’re testing here is being done for the first time ever in this aircraft. We’re also examining if these untried systems perform in the ways we thought they would or not. That data allows us to adjust our testing and provide feedback to the manufacturer.”
The ITAWS test flights sometimes mean flying at terrain and at obstacles to check if those new warning systems react in the timely fashion and with the clarity.
Once the 96th Test Wing completes DT, the aircraft and mission shifts to Little Rock, Arkansas, where the Air National Guard/AFRC Test Center begins the operational test phase.
To better prepare them for OT and the upcoming aircraft changes, AATC pilots augment 417th FLTS aircrew roles during the current DT flying missions. This opportunity gives those aircrews a chance to see and learn the system early. This developmental seat-time helps guide the ANG and AFRC’s new technics, procedures, and training that becomes new aircraft standards for all operational units.
More than 23 Air Force Reserve and 54 Air National Guard C-130H aircraft will receive the AMP Inc 2 modification over the next 5 years at a cost of approximately $7 million per aircraft.
Featured image: U.S. Marines with Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron (VMM) 261 receive fuel in an MV-22B Osprey from a KC-130J Super Hercules with Marine Aerial Refueler Transport Squadron (VMGR) 252 over the Atlantic Ocean near North Carolina, May 6, 2025. Photo by Lance Cpl. Mya Seymour.
U.S. Marine Corps F-35B Lightning II fighter jets assigned to Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 121, landing on Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, as part of Cope North 25, Feb. 19, 2025.
CN25 enhances warfighting readiness and interoperability among participating nations, demonstrating our collective ability to deploy airpower and ensure regional security.
GUAM
02.19.2025
By Robbin Laird
Dateline: Canberra, Australia
Australia’s approach to littoral defense represents a strategic pivot that extends far beyond simple territorial protection. As outlined in the national strategy, this approach demands a fundamental rethinking of force deployment and equipment, creating opportunities for enhanced regional cooperation and security integration.
Reframing Territorial Defense
The importance of Australia’s littoral region cannot be overstated in strategic terms. Rather than serving merely as a narrow territorial defense zone, these littoral areas function as a critical component of Australia’s broader perimeter defense system. More significantly, they provide a vital platform for engagement with regional neighbors — a politically crucial dimension of Australia’s defense posture.
This engagement helps Australia maintain familiarity with its regional environment and build trust among neighboring nations, even when diplomatic relationships may be strained. The Australian Defence Force’s presence in these areas serves the national interest by establishing Australia as a credible and consistent regional security partner.
This evolution requires sophisticated command and control networks along with advanced intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities. New technologies are already being deployed to enhance these capabilities, including “blue bottle” unmanned systems being launched from Darwin.
The Manned-Unmanned Challenge
One of the most promising aspects of Australia’s littoral strategy involves the integration of manned and unmanned systems across its northern territories. These areas provide real-world testing grounds for experimental deployments that combine human operators with autonomous systems — creating a laboratory for operational innovation in a geographically relevant context.
The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) is actively working to improve its deployment capabilities across northern and Western Australia, collaborating with the U.S. Marines to develop new operational concepts. Simultaneously, the Marines are advancing their distributed aviation operations doctrine, leveraging their unique position as both an air and land force.
This creates potential for a powerful symbiotic relationship between Australian forces and the Marines, particularly in integrating emerging technologies. The Marines’ dual-domain expertise offers valuable insights for both the Australian Army and Air Force as they adapt to new operational realities.
Strategic Drivers Before Shopping Lists
A key insight from this developing approach is the importance of letting strategic concepts drive equipment acquisition, rather than the reverse. Too often, defense procurement follows an “abstract shopping list” model disconnected from operational requirements and conceptual innovations.
Australia’s littoral engagement strategy represents a different approach — one that begins with understanding how forces will operate differently and then determines what technologies and capabilities will enable those operations. This means focusing on enhancing “fight tonight” capabilities of existing forces rather than pursuing acquisitions without clear operational contexts.
Building Skills Before Systems
Australian defense forces are wisely focusing on developing the skill sets necessary to understand and effectively employ new technologies before making major acquisition decisions. This approach ensures that defense personnel can provide informed advice about genuine priorities — whether for the Army’s independent operations, joint efforts with the RAAF, or collaborative deployments with U.S. Marines and Air Force elements.
Future Directions
As Australia continues developing its littoral defense capacity, several pathways appear particularly promising:
By pursuing a strategically-driven approach that prioritizes operational concepts before acquisition decisions, Australia positions itself to maximize the effectiveness of its defense investments while strengthening regional security relationships.
The littoral domain represents not just a geographic area of responsibility, but a conceptual space where Australia can reimagine its approach to regional security through thoughtful integration of new technologies, operational innovations, and strategic partnerships.
Featured image: The graphic is taken from the Australian Army publication The Australian Army Contribution to the National Defece Strategy (2024).
By Robbin Laird
In an increasingly complex and contested battlefield environment, the U.S. Marine Corps is adapting its aviation support strategy to meet emerging challenges.
Captain Medlen, an eight-year Marine Corps veteran currently commanding the Engineers Company of Marine Wing Support Squadron (MWSS) 272, provided valuable insights into how distributed aviation operations are evolving based on recent deployment experiences.
I met with Captain Medlen at his office in New River on 30 April 2024 to discuss the approach and the recent exercise in the Bahamas.
From Centralized to Distributed: A New Operational Paradigm
“We need to shift towards single touch points with different things,” explains Captain Medlen, contrasting the old model with what’s needed for future conflicts.
“We think of old school FARPs [Forward Arming and Refueling Points] in Afghanistan and Iraq as large FOB [Forward Operating Base] style, Walmart supercenters with everything under one roof. We need to start looking at Mom and Pop type stores – this place has gas, this place has ordnance, this place has somewhere to sleep.”
This distributed approach stems from a fundamental warfighting concern: survivability.
As potential adversaries develop increasingly sophisticated targeting capabilities, centralizing resources creates vulnerable nodes that can be easily compromised.
By distributing capabilities across multiple smaller sites, the Marines create a more resilient network of mission critical assets and personnel.
“If I lose one of maybe 20 parking spots, that’s not the end of the world,” Medlen notes.
“You can hurt a small part of us, but not necessarily destroy the body.”
The Bahamas Deployment: Testing the Concept
MWSS 272 recently deployed to the Bahamas to test these concepts in a real-world environment.
Using New River/Camp Lejeune as their primary staging area (Echelon 4), they established a command-and-control outpost at the U.S. Navy’s Atlantic Undersea Test and Evaluation Center (AUTEC) on Andros Island (Echelon 5).
From there, they pushed teams to uninhabited islands with little to no available infrastructure in place.
The deployment demonstrated the squadron’s ability to create rapidly operating locations from scratch.
At “Site Four,” combat engineers and heavy equipment operators removed 30-40 foot trees and transformed the area into a functional two-point landing zone in just under one week.
At “Site Three,” they executed a proof-of-concept operation using only hand tools and chainsaws to create a single-point landing zone.
Critically, these sites served different purposes.
While one might provide fuel, another might offer overnight maintenance capabilities.
This approach creates operational flexibility while complicating enemy targeting efforts.
Self-Sustainability in Contested Environments
A key component of distributed aviation operations is self-sustainability. Captain Medlen highlights how the Marine Aircraft Wing (MAW) can support itself in littoral environments.
“We can make potable water from seawater at the main AUTEC installation, package it, put it on a CH-53, add some boxes of chow and a little bit of ordnance.
“When they go get gas somewhere, they drop all that stuff off. Now we have self-supporting sustainment internal to Second MAW.”
This capability for aerial resupply enables Marines to maintain a distributed posture without relying on vulnerable ground logistics chains or large fixed bases.
Challenges and Future Development
Despite promising progress, several challenges remain.
Captain Medlen identifies command and control integration between ground and air elements as a significant hurdle, noting that many Marines, including himself, are experiencing their first assignment in aviation units.
“Being able to bridge the gap in what we understand as C2 from the ground side, and the C2 capabilities that the aircraft and the pilots are familiar with, and being able to make it more cohesive and reduce uncertainty is something that we’re working on getting more proficient at,” he explains.
The recent introduction of Marine Air-Ground Tablets (MAGTABs) (digital tablets for sharing operational information) has improved this situation, allowing pilots to quickly access information about distributed sites, including available resources, munitions types, and fuel quantities.
Another critical challenge is deploying ground support elements. Unlike aviation units that can self-deploy, ground support elements require transportation. Medlen emphasizes the need to “integrate early and often with the flying squadrons” to ensure ground capabilities arrive where needed.
Perhaps most significantly, Medlen identifies distributed medical support as imperative for future conflicts. During the Bahamas deployment, rehearsals and clearly established medical capabilities proved to be instrumental in ensuring that combat readiness was maintained.
“Do we have general consolidation points for routine casualties? Somewhere else for surgical capabilities? Another area for imagery?” Medlen asks, pointing out that distributing medical assets prevents the enemy from targeting a single medical facility, which could have devastating psychological impacts on forces.
Looking Forward
The experience in the Bahamas demonstrated that a Marine Wing Support Squadron could rapidly establish multiple landing zones in austere environments, creating a distributed network of capabilities that enhances operational reach while minimizing vulnerability.
Captain Medlen envisions continuing this approach in future operations: “If we’re there for a longer time, I’m not creating two landing zones. I’m creating as many as possible throughout the operational area.”
This distributed aviation operations concept represents a significant shift from recent conflicts characterized by large, established bases.
By adapting to more distributed postures, the Marine Corps aims to maintain operational effectiveness while reducing vulnerability in contested environments where precision munitions could quickly compromise centralized facilities.
As Captain Medlen notes, this approach creates “standoff” and “uncertainty for the enemy” – essential elements of advantage in future conflicts.
Featured image: A U.S. Marine Corps AH-1Z Viper with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron (HMLA) 167, flies near Andros Island, Bahamas, June 7, 2024. HMLA-167 conducted close air support training in support of Distributed Aviation Operations Exercise 24, which is designed to distribute command and control of aviation forces across echelons of command, pushing authorities to the lowest levels, while keeping forces moving between airfields and air sites. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Anakin Smith)
F-22 at Sentry Savanah Exercises.Sentry Savannah is the Air National Guard’s premier fourth- and fifth-generation fighter integration exercise, with this year’s event involving more than 1,000 participants and 56 aircraft from eight flying units.
SAVANNAH, GEORGIA, UNITED STATES
01.17.2025
Video by Master Sgt. Rafael Rosa
165th Airlift Wing
By Pierre Tran
Paris – Britain and Germany have pledged to boost military spending in response to Russia’s bloody advance on Ukraine and uncertainty about U.S. defense efforts in Europe, sparking questions on how those funds will be found and what the rearmament drives will yield.
Those two allied nations have highly distinct public attitudes to arms manufacture and the military, and both the British and German political leaders need to win support for the pursuit of weapons, and more combat capable forces.
Talks for a ceasefire between a fairly junior team from Moscow and a delegation from Kyiv opened May 16 in Istanbul, with President Vladimir Putin notably staying away. The absence of the latter fuelled Western doubts on the good faith of the Russian leader, while heightening a perceived military threat from Moscow.
In which country does a company sell buttery biscuits with commemorative packaging featuring a second world war fighter plane?
A Marks & Spencer box of shortbread biscuit proudly bears a picture of the Spitfire in tribute to the 80th anniversary of the May 8 Victory in Europe Day (VE Day). In the U.K., there is a special place for the Supermarine Spitfire, Britain’s iconic second world war fighter.
Those calling in at the Spitfire visitor center at Hangar 42, Blackpool airport, northeast England, can sit in the cockpit of a Spitfire Mk IX for a fee of £10 ($13). There is also a Hawker Hurricane and Messerschmitt Me109 on display, but the center is named after the Spitfire, which has pride of place.
Much depends on whether that national nostalgia for the air combat star of the 1940 Battle of Britain can be transmuted into support for a switch in public spending to boost the services.
Prime minister Keir Starmer has said the U.K. will speed up an increase in the defense budget to an annual 2.5 pct to 2027, and 3.0 pct in a second term after 2029 – assuming re-election. That compares to the present military spending of 2.3 pct of gross domestic product.
Starmer made those commitments a couple of days before he met President Donald Trump Feb. 27 in the White House, leading London’s drive to strengthen ties and persuade Washington to cut tariffs on British-built goods such as Jaguar, Mini, and Rolls-Royce cars, and steel and aluminium.
The U.K. will fund much of the military budget increase to 2.7 pct with a switch of funds earmarked for foreign aid, which will fall to 0.3 pct from 0.5 pct of GDP.
Lower support for overseas projects means less government funding for the BBC World Service, which supporters such as Martin Bell, ex-parliamentarian and former BBC war reporter, see as Britain’s soft power counterweight to disinformation from China and Russia.
The U.K. government is also diverting spending for the disabled and winter fuel payments for the elderly, which has drawn fierce criticism from Labour parliamentarians.
Starmer is leader of the center-left Labour party, which came to power almost a year ago with a surprise majority of 174 parliamentary seats. That tidal wave of support for Labour may have been seen as electoral punishment of the Conservative party, but the May 1 elections for local councils served a drubbing to both Labour and Conservatives, ushering in councillors from the Reform U.K. party.
The latter is a far-right, anti-immigration party led by Nigel Farage, a parliamentarian who campaigned for Brexit and is a keen Trump supporter.
Starmer’s pursuit of public support could be seen with his VE Day speech, announcing a £563 mln contract for Rolls-Royce to service engines on the RAF’s 130-strong fleet of Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jets.
That keynote speech at the London Defence conference included a clear shift and rebranding in U.K. policy. Starmer spoke of “a defence dividend – that will be felt in the pockets of working people and the prosperity of the country.”
Starmer underlined the perceived threat of Russian advance on Ukraine and the pursuit of rearmament, emphasising employment and economic growth. The U.K. leader spoke of the U.S. as an “indispensable ally,” but he made it clear that came second to a higher priority: “Make no mistake – I will always act in our national interest for workers, businesses and families…”
National security came first, he said, while the second concern was “to create jobs, wealth and opportunity in every corner of our country.”
Assuming the British Exchequer will find and release the promised funds, analysts say it is not clear the forces will receive more weapons promptly as there are other military needs calling for a higher place in the budgetary queue.
“The first challenge they have is there are more priorities than there is actually money to spend,” said Matthew Saville, director of military sciences at the Royal United Service Institute, the BBC reported May 9.
“I think the first thing that they’ll be looking at is actually to fill out some of the gaps that there are in defense and improve the foundations,” he said. That meant spending on training and recruitment, infrastructure, and accommodation, rather than kit such as tanks and aircraft.
The importance of recruitment could be seen with Serco, a service provider, saying Feb. 6 it had won a £1 billion, seven-year contract to recruit personnel for the British Army, Royal Air Force, Royal Navy, and Strategic Command. There is an option for a three-year extension, bringing the value to £1.5 billion if that were exercised.
The U.K. and the 27 European Union member states are due to meet in London May 19 for a summit, which includes an agreement on defense and security. Britain hopes it will win access to the E.U. ‘s planned €150 bln loan facility for military spending, under the European ReArm project.
Germany Seeks Larger Role
Meanwhile in Berlin, the newly elected chancellor, Friedrich Merz, succeeded in March in winning Bundestag parliamentary support for higher German military spending, which required relaxing strict fiscal rules on debt written in the constitution.
Merz, leader of the conservative Christian Democrat party, even left open May 9 the possibility of the European Union raising loans to spend on EU military programs.
Germany has been guided by deep distrust of debt, having learnt lessons of hyperinflation and the loss of value of the German mark in the 1920s, which partly led to the rise of Nazism.
Alongside fiscal lessons of a conflicted past which led to the 1933 election of the far right, there has been a strain of pacifism in German society after the second world war.
An institutional pacifism could be seen with a readiness to send not much more than helmets to help Ukrainian forces in the weeks after the Russian assault in 2022.
Berlin has in the past deployed troops mainly for training and support missions, not combat.
Germany was among the first of Western allies to send troops to Afghanistan, initially its special forces under the U.S.-led Enduring Freedom anti-guerrilla operation. That was followed by what the Heinrich Boll Foundation, a German think tank, described as a “cautious peacekeeping mission” with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), under protection of a 2001 UN security council mandate.
The early German deployment to Kabul came before Taliban irregular fighters made clear a deadly determination to seize control, which led to a hasty U.S. evacuation, followed by its allies, in 2021.
Germany also deployed troops to Niger in 2023 as part of a E.U. military training program, after initially sending troops in 2018 to train Niger’s special forces. Those German troops pulled out of a Niamey air base in August last year.
Berlin withdrew troops based in Mali in 2023, after a decade of deployment there in support of the UN MINUSMA peacekeeping mission.
The Bundeswehr armed forces needs some 5,000 recruits to meet the 15,000-strong target for its voluntary military service, public broadcaster Deutsche Welle reported Dec. 4 2025.
There are more than 182,000 in active service, but the forces need pilots, computer specialists, electrical engineers and other skilled personnel, but there are few job applicants, DW reported, pointing to strong demand in the labor market for such skilled staff.
Even if the recruitment drive did attract new personnel, DW reported there was shortage of training and barracks. “Operational readiness” stood to suffer if the duty roster for a tank commander were reset to train recruits, rather than deploy to the Nato eastern flank.
It remains to be seen whether that training will arm the German forces with a martial spirit fit for fighting a war.
German Industry Rises
Meanwhile, German industry has prospered from the arms drive, both at home and abroad.
Rheinmetall has said it planned to convert two factories building car parts to “hybrid” plants capable of making protection and military parts. The plants will report to the company’s weapon and ammunition division, Reuters reported.
Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems said May 7 it had won a contract with Singapore to supply two more Type 218SG submarines, bringing the Singapore Navy’s fleet of Invincible-class boats to six. That order will boost TKMS’s order book, presently worth some €16 billion.
Meanwhile, the share price of European companies with core aeronautic businesses, including Dassault Aviation, Safran, and Thales, plunged May 12, even as stock markets rose on signs of less tension between Washington and Beijing in a tariff war launched by Trump.
That drop in stock prices may have been in response to the U.S. Commerce Department saying May 9 it had opened a national security inquiry in the import of commercial aircraft, jet engines, and parts, which may lead to higher tariffs on European-built kit.