The British military is in disarray as a leaked report from the Ministry of Defence reveals serious labour shortages.
According to Sputnik, the latest revelations about the state of the British army follow other reports that the navy and air force in the island nation are also too small to fight a successful war.
The British army is chronically short of manpower, according to a British Ministry of Defence report released by The Daily Mail.
The internal document, marked as “sensitive,” would indicate that all but one of the army’s 33 infantry battalions lack the manpower needed to defend Britain. Moreover, the main front-line military units have at best only half the personnel needed to deploy for military operations.
According to The Daily Mail, the disastrous situation of the British Army has been blamed on years of poor pay for soldiers and the decision to outsource recruitment to a private company. The army agreed to a 10-year recruitment contract with Capita in 2012, a decision that was later called “naive” by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee.
Many were surprised that, despite the shortage of personnel, Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government committed to further reducing the size of a number of infantry battalions as part of a review of Britain’s long-term strategy.
Colonel Richard Kemp, a British army officer who commanded the country’s forces in Afghanistan, called the decision to hand over the recruitment contract to Capita “disastrous.
Commenting on the upcoming further reductions in the number of forces, he added that “the army is already too small to adequately protect Britain in an increasingly dangerous world. These new cuts are irresponsible. »
The British Ministry of Defence’s report, which, according to The Daily Mail, is entitled “Summary of the strength of infantry battalion soldiers, January 2021,” analyzes the numbers needed by each battalion to work towards operational effectiveness.
The worst among them is the 1st Battalion, the Scots Guards, which is often considered one of the most prestigious regiments in the British Army. It requires 603 soldiers, but currently only 339 are available for operational deployment. The infantry as a whole requires 14,984 soldiers, but currently only 11,301 are ready for war.
Tobias Ellwood, a former British defence minister who serves as head of the House of Commons Defence Committee, is reported to have told the British newspaper that the “infantry is getting smaller and smaller. We all want Britain to stand up and lead in a rapidly changing world. This cannot be achieved if the number of soldiers is reduced and if we cut more infantry battalions. »
by Xavier Cuesta – European Correspondent – EuroNews