British army not ready for major war, lacks ammunition, says former defence official

• The British army is not prepared for any war, a former defense official told the Financial Times.
• In addition, any large-scale operation would quickly run out of ammunition, said Robert Johnson.
• Former and current defence officials have raised concerns about Britain’s readiness for war.

The British armed forces are not prepared for any war and would quickly run into supply difficulties, a former defense official said.

“In any major operation we would quickly run out of ammunition,” Robert Johnson told the Financial Times.

In his previous role as director of the Foreign Office’s Office for Net Assessment and Challenge, Johnson led a 25-strong team tasked with war gaming, using research, analysis and the help of external think tanks to ensure Britain’s defence capabilities were running at peak performance.

After leaving office in May, Johnson concluded that the British military could not “properly” defend the British homeland and was inadequately equipped for overseas operations on the scale of the Falklands and Iraq wars.

“Our defences are too weak and we are not prepared to fight and win an armed conflict of any scale,” he told the FT.

Great Britain is a NATO member and one of Ukraine’s closest allies.

However, Johnson pointed to Britain’s “inadequate” air defences to intercept long-range missile attacks; its navy lacks ships to patrol the North Atlantic and monitor and counter Russian submarine activity; and the British air force needs almost twice as many fighter jets as it currently has.

In addition, Britain has failed to play a global role and deter opponents, Johnson told the FT.

“The government does not trust the public about the magnitude of the threat because it knows it is not prepared for it,” he said, adding that honesty does not pose security risks because “the Russians already know that.”

Johnson, director of Oxford University’s Changing Character of War Centre, is the latest defence official to raise concerns about Britain’s readiness for war.

In a report published in February entitled “Ready for War?” the British Defence Select Committee found that the British armed forces were not prepared to fight a “sustained, high-intensity” war.

Meanwhile, outgoing Defence Secretary James Heappey said in an April commentary for The Telegraph that Britain was “very far behind” its allies in preparing for war.

Johnson’s assessment comes just days before the British general election, in which polls suggest the Conservative Party will lose to the Labour Party after 14 years in power.

According to Johnson, the next government should increase defense spending to at least three percent of GDP.

“We have to tailor our coat to fit our fabric,” he told the FT.