Defence

§ The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Peter Blaker)

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence spoke last week largely about the direction of the defence programme. Today I shall speak first about people, especially the men and women in the South Atlantic task force and those who organised its despatch. My hon. Friend the Member for Chertsey and Walton (Mr. Pattie), if he catches your eye, Mr. Speaker, will say something about the role of British industry.

The Falklands campaign has been a combined operation in two senses. First, it was a combined operation of the British people. The national upsurge of resolve when Argentina invaded our territory exceeded anything since the Second World War. Not only the Armed Forces, the Royal Fleet Auxiliary and the Royal Maritime Auxiliary Service, but the dockyard workers, the civilians who back up the forces in every part of the country, workers in the factories and supply depots and men and women in every part of the country were determined to do what they could to put right what they correctly saw as an international outrage. The speed with which the task force put to sea astonished the country, and, I believe, the world. It may even have surprised some of those who were directly involved in the operation. After years of self disparagement, the British people asked themselves in disbelief "Can it really be we who are doing this?".

I pay tribute to the logistic and supporting elements of all three Services—I hope that I do not offend the other two Services if in this context I mention the Navy—and all the others who worked round the clock to get the task force ready for sea.

In a narrower sense, the campaign has been a combined operation between the three Services. In peacetime there is normally a healthy rivalry between them. In wartime, especially in modern war, it must take second place.

The Falklands campaign was a remarkable demonstration of combined operations between the three Services and the Merchant Navy. It was one of the main reasons for our victory. A good example of it was demonstrated in one of the most important and critical operations of the entire conflict—the landing of 3 Commando Brigade and the 2nd and 3rd battalions, the Parachute Regiment, at San Carlos. An amphibious assault is one of the most complicated and risky operations of war.

154 We have all read or heard graphic accounts of the action. What is less well known is the fact that at the same time as that landing, diversionary attacks were launched by RAF and Navy Harriers on Argentine positions at Stanley, Goose Green and Fox Bay. Frigates and destroyers bombarded Stanley and raiding parties of marines and paratroops went ashore to harass Argentine positions elsewhere on the islands. A Vulcan bombed Stanley airport. The aim was to convince the Argentine commanders that the threat of an invasion lay on the east or south of the islands. The strategy worked and the beachhead was established without serious opposition from Argentine troops and with no battle casualties.

For each of the Services, a great deal could be said of their individual achievements while much is still not yet fully known. However, I should like to tell the House of some of them.

For the Royal Navy, all our missile systems achieved success. With the land-based Rapier and Blowpipe, they were responsible for destroying about 38 Argentine aircraft. Naval gunfire support proved immensely important in the re-taking of South Georgia and in raids and the land battle in the Falklands. Nearly 8,000 rounds were fired by 4.5 in guns. The effect of our submarines on the Argentine navy was profound both before and after the arrival of the task force. After the sinking of the cruiser "General Belgrano", the Argentine navy did not venture again outside their 12-mile limit. Our submarines thus played a fundamental part in the exercise of sea control. Our anti-submarine warfare capability appears to have deterred Argentine submarines from playing an active part in the operations. For the Fleet Air Arm, the fact that throughout the operation we achieved 90 per cent. availability of all aircraft embarked, demonstrates the immense skill and dedication of the Fleet Air Arm support crews.

I should like to say more about the outstanding success of the Sea Harriers. They shot down at least 28 Argentine aircraft, about 23 of which were fast modern jets such as Mirages and Skyhawks. Even when outnumbered by a factor of two to one, as was often the case, Sea Harriers continued to outperform and outfight the Mirages and the Skyhawks. On one raid, two Sea Harriers accounted for three Skyhawks of a flight of four. The fourth flew into the sea while attempting to evade. We suffered no losses in air-to-air combat during the campaign.

The Sea Harrier's success can be attributed to a combination of a highly manoeuvrable and versatile fighter, a reliable and capable missile—the Sidewinder—and, above all, to the resourcefulness, skill and courage of our young pilots who fought in the highest tradition of the Fleet Air Arm. Together with the RAF's Harriers, those aircraft accounted for a total of about 36 Argentine aircraft in the air and on the ground.

§ Mr. Stephen Ross (Isle of Wight)

Will the Minister break down the figures? He said that 30 Argentine aircraft were shot down by missiles from ships and Blowpipe. Will he give the number of aircraft that were shot down by missiles launched from ships alone?

§ Mr. Blaker

I would rather not do that at this stage. Attributing success to one missile or another or to one Service or another is a delicate operation. We are engaged on it now and I would prefer to wait a little longer until 155 we are more sure of the figures. I would prefer to get them right and publish them rather than break them down prematurely.

Some 18,000 men from the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, Royal Fleet Auxiliary and Royal Maritime Auxiliary Service, Merchant Navy and supporting civilians sailed in the ships of the task force. Several ships had already been at sea for some months away from the United Kingdom and were due to return to Britain when the operation started. It is difficult to find adequate words to describe their performance. After long periods at sea, closed up, at high states of readiness, some not seeing daylight for many weeks, often in very bad weather—a good deal worse on average than in the North Sea—they kept their ships, aircraft and equipment in working condition without shore support and then fought well, without the help from shore-based aircraft and allied forces that we expect in the eastern Atlantic. By the time some of the ships return to the United Kingdom they will have been continuously at sea for more than six months.

§ Mr. James Callaghan (Cardiff, South-East)

I am sorry to interrupt, but I should like an answer to a question that I have been asked to ask by the representatives of the families of those who are on HMS "Endurance" which has been at sea continuously, I am told, for nine months. It is said that there is an inexplicable delay in their return and that they will not come back until September. The families are asking about the delay and the Ministry of Defence is not answering. The families are worried and anxious at not being able to discover the reason. We were told that "Endurance" would be one of the first ships to be relieved. Will the hon. Gentleman give me an answer, either now or later, that can be passed to those families as to when "Endurance" will be brought home? That would dispose of some of the reasons that I will not give in public here as to why it is being suggested that she is being kept in the Falklands.

§ Mr. Blaker

I pay tribute to the crew of "Endurance". They have performed a remarkable feat of stamina. I was not aware of the right hon. Gentleman's point. I shall look into the matter immediately and let him know what is happening as soon as possible.

§ Mr. Stanley Newens (Harlow)

Before the hon. Gentleman leaves the success of our operations at sea, will he deal with our defences against sea-skimming missiles which the majority of the public believe are inadequate?

§ Mr. Blaker

I preface my reply to the hon. Gentleman with a request not to be asked to give way too often. I have much to say and I want to deal with disarmament, a subject that I know hon. Members want to discuss.

I gather that the hon. Gentleman is referring to Exocet. It is a dangerous and effective missile. That is why we have equipped our ships with the surface-to-surface version. The air-launched version that was used against us did not have entirely its own way. A high proportion of missiles were successfully countered by the ships against which they were aimed. The position is therefore not quite so bad as some members of the public have thought, but we are certainly looking at this.

Turning now to the men who fought on the ground, part of the initial landing force was 3 Commando Brigade, Royal Marines. These troops were, of course, ideally suited to this operation, first because of their amphibious 156 experience and techniques, secondly, because they are trained and equipped to operate in the cold and wet of the Arctic, and in the Falkland Islands it has been very cold and wet, and, thirdly, because their commando training enabled them to march 50 miles across the mountains and peat bog of the East Falklands with full equipment and then conduct a series of successful night assaults in the mountains west of Stanley against an enemy who had had nine weeks to prepare their positions. The same is true of the training of the parachute battalions who landed with them who shared their forced marches to Stanley and who carried out the now legendary attack on Darwin and Goose Green.

§ Mr. Anthony Buck (Colchester)

The whole House will be glad that my hon. Friend has paid special tribute to the Royal Marine commandos. Could he at some stage say something about their command structure? They particularly captured our imagination. It is a small force and the pyramid is very thin at the top. Would it be possible occasionally for a commandant-general of the Royal Marines to become a member of the Admiralty Board and go on to become Chief of Defence Staff?

§ Mr. Blaker

That is not a subject to which I have previously given attention, but I certainly undertake to look at it.

It is difficult to overstate the achievement of any of the land forces, be they from the Royal Marines, the Parachute Regiment or 5 Brigade. In operations often against odds of two or three to one, their success has been a vindication of the high standard of their training and their professionalism.

The problems of maintaining the fitness of soldiers in cramped, uncomfortable conditions on board ship during a long voyage in rough seas were substantial. Yet this was done successfully and when finally disembarked the ground forces were no less effective fighting soldiers capable of long and arduous marches over some of the most inhospitable terrain in the world. Their performance was in the highest tradition of the Armed Forces.

A vital contribution to the success of our operations was made by the Special Forces. Patrols of the Special Air Service and the Special Boat Squadron were landed into East and West Falklands from the task force three weeks before the landing. Working in among the enemy, living in the field in conditions of extreme discomfort and danger, they were able to provide intelligence that was vital to the successful conduct of the landing and to carry out the most daring and successful raid against Pebble Island, destroying aircraft that would have been a threat to the subsequent landing.

My right hon. Friend told the House something earlier about the contribution of the Royal Air Force. Let me say a little more today. Of the many essential tasks carried out by the RAF, perhaps the most important but least noted was that of supply. From the start of the operation, RAF Hercules and VC1Os were ferrying vast amounts of equipment and large numbers of Service men to Ascension Island, 5,000 miles from the United Kingdom. Every day for the past three months these aircraft and their crews have endured a punishing schedule which still continues despite the ending of active hostilities.

One of the most remarkable features of the operation for the RAF was the way in which air-to-air refuelling dramatically lengthened their reach. The Hercules, for 157 example, have been making a regular shuttle of immensely long round trips to the Falklands and to the task group. The longest to date took 28 hours non-stop. That is a tribute to the crews.

§ Mr. Tam Dalyell (West Lothian)

In referring to the skill of the Service men involved, can the Minister tell us whether any cost tag has been put on the operation?

§ Mr. Blaker

Yes, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State's written answer to a question yesterday by the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) shows the latest figures that we have been able to publish. We hope to publish more in the near future.

After modification for deck operation and ski jump training, 14 RAF Harriers deployed to the South Atlantic. They carried out some 150 operational sorties with only three aircraft lost.

An indispensable role was played, too, by the members of the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, the Royal Maritime Auxiliary Service and the crews of commercial ships. Some of them were at times in great danger, and sadly they too suffered casualties. To be a member of the crew of any of these ships must have required courage, not least those of the oil tankers and ammunition ships in the task force and of the commercial ships which entered San Carlos water.

We have said that we do not propose to draw premature lessons from the campaign. I am sure that that is right. On many subjects it will require some months of careful analysis, with those who fought, of individual events and actions and the performance of individual weapons. The lessons, I believe, will be valuable, to us and to our allies.

There have been reports, both in this country and abroad, that the victory of our forces owed much to superior equipment. We shall learn more about this in the coming weeks, but I can say now that on the whole there is little evidence that Argentine equipment was bad or inadequate.

There is one lesson which I confidently draw now, however. Even in the age of the missile, one of the most important factors in this campaign has been the skill, training, courage, morale, fitness and team spirit of our troops, the leadership and example given by officers and NCOs, and, not least, the efficiency of logistic planning and command and control. All these depend principally on human beings, not on equipment.

Some of the Argentine troops were well trained regulars whose professionalism was shown by the well-prepared defensive positions that our troops captured. There were many examples of Argentine skill and courage, not least from the Argentine pilots.

§ Mr. Robert Atkins (Preston, North)

Can my hon. Friend yet give us any idea of the usage and quantities of Argentine equipment taken since the conflict ended, in view of reports in magazines such as Aviation Week about the extent of equipment captured? I am thinking particularly of use by CCFs and territorial regiments back home as well as the garrison that may end up in the Falldands.

§ Mr. Blaker

I have given written answers to one or two questions on this, which my hon. Friend may care to 158 study. The short answer is that there is a good deal of equipment, which we are still sorting. There is also a great deal of ammunition which will take some months to sort.

§ Mr. Keith Best (Anglesey)

My hon. Friend has suffered many interventions and I apologise for interrupting him again. Has he yet been able to carry out a full analysis of stocks of napalm and dumdum bullets left by the Argentine forces and the purposes to which they were likely to be put?

§ Mr. Blaker

We have no evidence of the use of dumdum bullets. We discovered a substance bearing some resemblance to napalm, but it is still being evaluated.

The leadership displayed by the Argentine officers was unable to compensate for the low morale of their conscripts, who made up 60 per cent. of their garrison. The relationship between officers, NCOs and men was poor. While they had good night vision aids they were not skilled in their use and not well trained in fighting at night. Their logistic planning was inadequate.

In all the human elements I have listed there was, then, no doubt of our superiority. No praise can be too high for the way in which our forces, backed by their civilian support—and backed, I should add, by the nation—conducted themselves during the campaign. The quality of their weapons apart, the ultimate test of any nation's armed forces is whether they have the skill, the training, the courage, and the will to win. The answer for the Armed Forces of the United Kingdom is emphatically "Yes".

I turn now, in striking contrast, to the Opposition Front Bench. The official defence policy of the Labour Party as approved last year is to reduce defence spending to the average proportion of the GDP spent by the West European countries. This would reduce our total planned defence budget by about one-third.

§ Dr. Oonagh McDonald (Thurrock)

That was last year.

§ Mr. Blaker

I am talking about last year.

As was pointed out in last year's debates on defence, this would mean some alarming cuts in our forces—the equivalent of eliminating one of the three Services in its entirety—and between 350,000 and ½ million extra unemployed.

However, this year, the situation has changed. The resolution recently approved by the Labour Party national executive committee includes what the right hon. Member for Deptford (Mr. Silkin) referred to last week as "the proviso". The proviso adds to the commitment to reduce spending the words bearing in mind the need to avoid widespread and precipitate redundancies for which no alternative work has been provided and Britain's need to provide adequate conventional defence forces". I must congratulate the right hon. Gentleman, who one imagines had some hand in the wording of that proviso, because whatever may be the pretence, the reality is that these words make nonsense of the commitment to a one-third reducton in spending. That is what they do and the right hon. Gentleman is to be congratulated upon it.

"But," the right hon. Gentleman will say, "we shall have more money for conventional forces because we will abandon Trident." No so. This year's Labour Party motion destroys that case. It proposes that, while we should still remain good members of NATO, we should cancel the 3 159 per cent. annual increase in defence expenditure agreed by NATO. Even if the 3 per cent. increase were cancelled for only one year, and then resumed, this alone would eliminate from the defence budget all the money saved by Labour's proposed abandonment of the Trident programme. This is because the Trident programme will take only 3 per cent. of the defence budget over the 18 years of its introduction. That 3 per cent. is cancelled out by the Labour proposals.

§ Mr. John Silkin (Deptford)

Will the hon. Gentleman now tell us what the perecentage of Trident on the budget would be during the peak year?

§ Mr. Blaker

On the equipment budget, I believe it is 10½ percent.

§ Dr. McDonald

It is 15 to 20 per cent.

§ Mr. Blaker

The average over 18 years, which is the relevant point, is 3 per cent. That is why the abandonment of the 3 per cent. growth target by the Labour Party for even one year, because it would be carried forward to all successive years, would have the effect of withdrawing from the defence budget all that the Labour Party has undertaken to save by abandoning Trident.

§ Several Hon. Members

rose—

§ Mr. Blaker

I shall not give way again. I have much to say.

I suppose I should out of courtesy refer to the amendment in the names of the right hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dr. Owen) and of hon. Members of the Liberal Party. It generally supports the Government policy except that it opposes the Trident programme. It was moved on Thursday by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Toxteth (Mr. Crawshaw)—who has kindly sent a note to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State explaining why he cannot be here today—in a speech in which he generally supported the Government's policies but failed to mention the Trident programme. We shall wait to hear with interest what the other spokesmen for the SDP and the Liberal Party have to say, however numerous their opinions may be.

I turn now to the subject of deterrence. I note with satisfaction that the national executive committee of the Labour Party accepts the policy of deterrence. Its latest document says: Britain should have sufficient military strength to discourage external aggression and to defend ourselves should we be attacked". Those words were quoted with approval, by the right hon. Member for Deptford on Thursday. They express the doctrine of deterrence. The same document proposes that Labour should maintain its support for NATO, and I understand that also is the position of the Opposition Front Bench.

It was under a Labour Government, with Ernest Bevin as its Foreign Secretary, that NATO was formed because of the perceived threat from the Soviet Union. The Soviet threat has not changed since 1949 except that it has become greater. The Soviet Union has become more powerful, its record of aggression longer and more alarming. Russia since 1917 has absorbed 17 countries or territories which were not its and has imposed its dominion on half a dozen more in Eastern Europe. Its forces grow steadily stronger and it continues to declare that its destiny 160 is to expand the power of Russian Communism. Its interference in the internal affairs of other countries is ever more brazen.

Since NATO was born it has relied on the doctrine of nuclear deterrence. In that time we have had peace in Europe. I believe that is no coincidence. It has had to rely on that doctrine because the Soviet Union rejected the Baruch plan put forward in 1946 by the United States, which then possessed the world's only atomic weapons, for abolition of nuclear weapons and international control of nuclear weapons and nuclear power. Since 1949 the Soviet Union has had nuclear weapons of its own.

The knowledge that created nuclear weapons cannot be wiped from men's minds. So long as the Soviet Union has nuclear weapons—even a few—the West must have them, too. For if the West had none its conventional weapons, however powerful, would have only the value of scrap metal. We would not, in the words of the Labour Party document, have sufficient military strength to discourage external aggression from the Soviet Union, nor to defend ourselves should we be attacked.

§ Mr. Joan Evans (Aberdare)

rose—

§ Mr. Blaker

I shall not give way again.

The question is whether Britain should have its own independent nuclear deterrent. We have had our own independent nuclear deterrent since 1955. We have been unanimously supported in doing so by our NATO allies on many occasions. We believe that if the Soviet Union were to imagine, however mistakenly, that the United Stales would not come to the defence of Europe if it were attacked, the British deterrent would be an added safeguard. The Labour Party now proposes to abandon this policy, which has been upheld by eight successive British Governments, in favour of a policy that relies for nuclear protection on NATO and, therefore, on the United States nuclear deterrent. I find the morality of that position confusing, to put it mildly.

But the unreason of the Labour Party does not stop there. Its latest document goes on to propose the closing down of all nuclear bases, including American, on British soil or in British waters. This is a policy intended to save our own skins while asking the Americans to protect us by risking theirs. But it would, in fact, make Soviet aggression or blackmail more likely.

The document proceeds to reach the apogee of silliness by calling for a European nuclear weapon free zone, ignoring the fact that the Soviet Union's SS20 missiles can reach almost any point in Western Europe, and the whole of the United Kingdom, from outside Europe. This is a shabby document drawn up in a hopeless attempt to cure the ills of the Labour Party. Would that Ernie Bevin were with us now to give his views on a document such as this!

If we are to have an independent nuclear deterrent, it must at least be effective. We believe, on all the evidence available to us, that by the 1990s Polaris, even with Chevaline, which is now in service, may not be effective because the Russians will have improved their defences and because the Polaris boats will be at the end of their useful life. We therefore need a more modern system. Of those available, Trident is by far the most cost-effective. Any system based on submarine-launched cruise missiles would either be ineffective or many times more expensive, for three reasons: the likely vulnerability by the 1990s of the cruise missiles unless launched in very large numbers; 161 the fact that the cruise missile carries only one warhead; and the limited sea area in which the cruise missile submarine would have to operate because of the range of the missile.

If the Labour party believes that Britain should have sufficient military strength to discourage external aggression, Trident is the weapon for it. It is indeed accurate, but so are the nuclear weapons of the Soviet Union. In the form in which we intend to acquire it, it will represent only what is necessary to assure deterrence in the 1990s and beyond. The ratio between the British Trident and the Soviet strategic systems will be about the same as that for Polaris when it came into service.

A number of hon. Members spoke last Thursday about disarmament. The Government believe in disarmament that does not increase the danger of war or of military blackmail. In the words of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister at the United Nations special session last month, we believe in the balanced and verifiable reduction of armaments in a way which enhances peace and security". This is entirely in line with the final document of the first United Nations special session on disarmament in 1978; whose basic assumption was that disarmament should be sought by multilateral means, by negotiation and not by unilateral gestures.

Yet we hear calls from the Opposition for one-sided disarmament and for the United Kingdom to throw away its nuclear weapons, apparently in the hope that other nuclear powers would respond. What I have never heard from any Labour spokesman is any suggestion on which of the other four nuclear powers would respond. China? France, whose Socialist Government have just launched their sixth nuclear ballistic missile submarine? The United States? The Soviet Union? There is no answer.

If the United Kingdom were to be so foolish it would make a futile gesture that would profoundly destabilise NATO and would cause delight in the Kremlin whose leaders, in the words of the right hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan)—I hope I quote him correctly as I am relying on newspaper reports—would laugh at our naivety.

§ Mr. James Callaghan

I do not know whether I said that, but I hope I did.

§ Mr. Blaker

I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman.

Successive Governments since the war have worked for arms control and disarmament. Of the nine agreements achieved since the 1950s, five were signed under Conservative Governments and four under Labour. The one real disarmament agreement, the biological weapons convention of 1972, was signed under a Conservative Government, as was the partial nuclear test ban treaty of 1963.

The main reason why the world has not achieved more is not want of effort by the West. As the Labour Party, of all parties, should understand, it takes two sides to make an agreement. The main obstacle has regularly been the refusal of the Soviet Union to admit verification of the necessary measures on its soil because of the closed nature of its society. Time and time again, that is the block we have come up against.

162 In the face of slow progress towards balanced and verifiable disarmament it is very tempting to throw up our hands and call for dramatic gestures. To do that is to forget that wars have more often come from an imbalance between a powerful, acquisitive State and a weaker peaceful State than they have from an excess of armaments on both sides. One has only to look at the 1930s to see the lesson. Hitler was encouraged in his aggression by the weakness, disunity and lack of resolve of the free world. I doubt whether the Afghans would support the view that the present war in their country is the result of their excessive armaments. Nor would the Poles attribute that cause to the coercion they have recently suffered at the hands of the Soviet Union.

Nevertheless, we are entering a period of negotiation between East and West. The negotiations on intermediate range nuclear weapons are under way in Geneva, resulting from the Western proposal of 1979. The START talks in Geneva have recently begun, on President Reagan's initiative, for the reduction of strategic nuclear weapons. The West is about to put forward new proposals at the Vienna talks on mutual and balanced conventional force reductions in Europe. The West has proposed talks on improving confidence building measures between both sides.

I do not believe we should expect rapid results from these discussions. That is not the Russian way. The Russian way is to probe for disunity in the Western camp, to test our resolution and our firmness, and only when it fails to divide us, to make any move forward. That is the lesson of how we got the Russians to the INF negotiating table.

We must expect further Russian calls of unverifiable but high-sounding declarations. They have called for a declaration on no first use of nuclear weapons. We have a better position—no first use of any weapons. That is what the Soviet Union is already bound to by the United Nations charter and the Helsinki agreement. The Soviet Union has called for a freeze on intermediate range nuclear missiles in Europe. The West has a better proposal—the abolition of all intermediate range nuclear missiles in Europe or targeted on Europe. The Russians have called for a freeze on strategic nuclear weapons. The West has a better position—reductions by one-third in the nuclear weapons of both of the super powers. Some time ago the Russians called for a declaration on the avoidance of the use of force in international relations. Three years later they invaded Afghanistan.

Some of the Western proposals I have mentioned have been put forward by the United States. But they have been fully discussed in advance in NATO and received NATO's support. The United Kingdom Government, for their part, have not been idle. Within the last two years, the Government have put forward, with the Netherlands, the draft which became the basis for the 1981 United Nations agreement to restrict the use of certain inhumane weapons. The Government put forward a proposal in the committee on disarmament for means of verifying a ban on chemical weapons. They put forward last year, with four other countries, not including the United States, the draft of a comprehensive programme on disarmament, much of which has been incorporated in the document now being discussed by the United Nations special session.

The right hon. Member for Deptford quoted on Thursday the saying The price of freedom is eternal vigilance". 163 It cannot be eternal vigilance to throw away our own nuclear defences and destabilise the Western alliance at a time when the Russians have given no comparable undertaking and their spending on arms has increased by 40 per cent. in the last 10 years.

§ Mr. Robert Banks (Harrogate)

Will my hon. Friend give way?

§ Mr. Blaker

I would rather not. I am about to conclude.

As we enter this crucial period of international negotiations on disarmament, it cannot advance the cause of disarmament by both sides to throw away our own nuclear defences and to pretend that a Labour Government would cut our conventional forces by one-third while we and our allies are at the negotiating table. Nothing could be better calculated to make the Russians play for time in the hope of disunity in the Western camp.

Our best course is to maintain our defences and insist that, if we are to disarm, the Russians must do the same. That has been the policy of the West for over 30 years, during which peace has been kept in Europe. The best route to continued peace and to agreed disarmament is to convince the Russians that the West remains united, resolute and strong. The brilliant success of our forces in the Falklands campaign will not have been lost on the Russians. It will, I believe, have enhanced in Europe the prospects of peace and freedom.

§ Mr. Denzil Davies (Llanelli)

Like other right hon. and hon. Members, I pay my tribute to the skill, bravery and dedication of the Armed Forces and members of the Merchant Navy for their achievements in the Falklands. In doing so, I am sure that hon. Members will not forget those who gave their lives and the grief caused to their relatives and families. We must also not forget the pain and suffering of those who were injured and maimed. Some of that pain and suffering may last a considerable time.

The Minister made a curious speech. The hon. Gentleman sought to attack the Labour Party defence policy. He did not do so very effectively. He did, however, make some strange statements in relation to nuclear weapons. One part of his speech was to a great extent a rehash of the Trident debate. It contained the very strange statement—made more blandly on this occasion than on any other occasion—that it is immoral for a member of NATO not to have nuclear weapons. His point was that it was somehow immoral for Britain not to have Trident and to rely on the American contribution to NATO in terms of strategic weapons.

Many countries belong to NATO. Presumably those that do not possess nuclear weapons are acting in an immoral way. If this means, for instance, that Germany is being immoral, then long may that immorality continue. The real problem today is the proliferation of nuclear weapons. The Opposition appreciate that neither Russia nor the United States will give up its weapons unilaterally. We want weapons merely to be in their hands and for those weapons to be reduced. The hon. Gentleman's arguments are not worthy of him. He should drop that kind of approach and argue the substance of the case.

§ Mr. Ioan Evans (Aberdare)

Is it not the case that the only country within the Warsaw Pact to possess nuclear weapons is the Soviet Union? If one follows the logic put 164 forward by the Government, not only Canada but all other NATO countries should have an independent nuclear deterrent as, presumably, should all the Warsaw Pact countries. That would mean a massive proliferation of nuclear weapons.

§ Mr. Davies

My hon. Friend is right. We oppose any proliferation of nuclear weapons wherever that may occur. If we could get back to a situation in which only the two super-powers owned them, that would be a step towards a world that was safer and more free of nuclear weapons.

In the first part of his speech, the Minister dealt with the Falklands campaign. I should have thought that a substantial part of what he had to say could have been included in the White Paper. The Government have published a White Paper that ignores the Falklands campaign completely.

§ Mr. Best

rose—

§ Mr. Davies

I shall give way in a moment. I should like to conclude this point. The Government have published a two-volume document with a glossy cover, costing £8.50, without a single reference to the war in the Falklands. This shows the kind of insensitivity that the Secretary of State has displayed, I am sorry to say, on occasions during his tenure of office. The only mention of the war made in the document upon which we have to vote tonight is a pathetic half-page foreword that is not even incorporated into the main document.

I understand the argument that there must be a military analysis of the consequences. I understand that there should be a wish, over the next few months, to examine which weapons worked well and which worked badly, what went wrong with some of the radar and why the Welsh Guards were left immobilised at Bluff Cove without air cover. These factors have to be examined over a longer period of time. But that need not have prevented the Secretary of State from publishing a White Paper that dealt with some of the things we have been told today and that at least acknowledged the fact that over the past few months, for the first time in almost a generation, Britain has been at war with another country.

Nowhere does it mention that more than 250 men were killed, twice as many were injured, five Royal Navy ships were sunk, and that the "Sir Galahad" was sunk with 30 Welsh Guardsmen still entombed. How on earth can we be asked to approve a document that lists Royal Navy ships as operational when we all know that they are at the bottom of the South Atlantic? That is insensitivity that the Secretary of State should not have shown towards the House.

It is not an academic subject. We are being asked to vote on a White Paper when the facts contained in that White Paper are incorrect. We should not be asked to vote upon it. The Secretary of State should have published a short White Paper incorporating an account of what is known about the Falklands war and in the autumn he should have published a fuller analysis. He could have had his Estimates before the Summer Recess—he has to—and they could have been voted upon. No doubt in the autumn there will be further Supplementary Estimates to pay for the increased costs. That would have been the most prudent and sensible course for the Government to have pursued.

§ Mr. Best

I should like to return to the point that the right hon. Gentleman made about the morality of this 165 country not dispossessing itself of nuclear weapons. Does the right hon. Gentleman consider that there would never be an occasion on which the United States of America would not whole-heartedly dedicate the use of its nuclear arsenal to the defence of Europe? Secondly, does the right hon. Gentleman believe that it is realistic for Europe not to have an essential element in the concept of a deterrent, to which his party subscribes, against the threat of the Soviet Union?

§ Mr. Davies

Europe has an essential element. The countries to which the hon. Gentleman has referred are members of NATO. The hon. Gentleman is saying that he does not trust the Americans. That is a great condemnation of NATO. I did not appreciate that the hon. Gentleman held those views about NATO.

The White Paper contains another statement that I believe will be proved to be wrong by the end of the year. It states that for the financial year 1982–83 defence spending will be just over £14 billion. I understand that that figure has already been overtaken by events and is wrong. The correct figure will be much higher. The Secretary of State looks puzzled. Can he tell us whether at the end of the year defence spending will be £14 billion, because the Falklands expenditure will have to be added to that sum? Despite the answers given by the Ministry of Defence it is clear that when we take account of the costs of the war, the replacing of equipment in this financial year, the cost of maintaining a garrison in the Falklands for the rest of the year—the Ministry of Defence does not yet know how much that will cost—the cost of the Falklands campaign for this financial year may not be far short of £1,000 million. That pushes defence spending for this financial year to nearly £15,000 million, or from 5.1 per cent. of the country's gross national product to 5.3 per cent.

Next year the defence budget and the percentage of gross national product will be even higher, because, apart from the cost of the Falklands, the Secretary of State has given a commitment that the defence budget will increase by 3 per cent. in real terms. If we assume defence inflation of 10 per cent.—that is a conservative estimate because what is often laughably described as defence inflation is the causal relationship between the armaments industry and the Ministry of Defence and it exceeds general price inflation—that adds 13 per cent. to the core £14 billion, and if we add about £500 million for the Falklands, defence expenditure next year may be close to £,16½ billion or almost 5.5 per cent. of the gross national product. Gross domestic product is hardly increasing.

The Secretary of State apparently believes that the Falklands part of the expenditure will come from the contingency fund. Having read the Sunday Express, I am not sure to which contingency fund he is referring, whether it is one that everyone knows about, or one that he keeps in the Ministry of Defence—according to the Sunday Express—out of reach of the Treasury. I assume that it is the main contingency fund. The House knows that that contingency fund is not a bottomless crock of gold; it is a mere accounting device. Eventually, the extra expenditure will have to be found. The Government should tell us how they will find the extra expenditure that increases the percentage of gross national product from 5.1 per cent. to 5.5 per cent. Where will the money come 166 from? It will not come from growth in the economy because, from the Bank of England's report a few days ago, we can see that the economy is not growing. The increase could come from extra borrowing, but the Government do not like borrowing and have spent three years of their existence reducing public borrowing. It could come from increased taxes, but again, the Government theory and philosophy is that taxes should be cut, although they have failed to do so during the past three years.

Under this Administration the increase in defence expenditure will be paid for by other Departments and other public bodies. It will be paid for by the education budget—there will be fewer teachers and larger classes—by less investment in public infrastructure, and by money that should be used to rebuild the country's industrial base. Members of the Conservative Party—especially the defence lobby—no doubt do not mind that. However, I remind hon. Members that the country's ability to defend itself depends not only on the percentage of its wealth spent directly on defence, but on its public infrastructure, the state of its manufacturing industry and, in this sophisticated age of electronics and technology, on the education of its children.

It is interesting to note from the latest parliamentary brief from the CBI that the CBI calls for urgent investment to improve the nation's infrastructure. It asks for £2 billion this year. I have news for it. That £2 billion will not come this year, because at least £1 billion will have to be cut from the budgets of other Departments.

§ Mr. Julian Critchley (Aldershot)

Did the right hon. Gentleman deploy those arguments in 1977 when his right hon. Friend the then Prime Minister decided to accept a 3 per cent. increase in real terms in defence spending?

§ Mr. Davies

The 3 per cent. is not being met by other NATO countries. It is questionable what is meant by a 3 per cent. increase in real terms. The hon. Gentleman should not be so glib about the 3 per cent. We accepted and agreed with the NATO decision. There are difficulties about the 3 per cent. It is not as easy as the hon. Gentleman makes out. If the Government are true to their philosophy the rest of the public sector will pay the increased arms bill. I am told that the Chief Secretary to the Treasury is already moving around the Departments of Whitehall, except perhaps the Ministry of Defence.

The Secretary of State apparently justifies the publication of the White Paper in its present form on the grounds that the Government's defence strategy has not been affected by the Falklands war. If that is so it is a ridiculous over-simplification of the position, because the Falklands war highlighted the fact that the strategy was never credible in the first place and will hasten its inevitable reappraisal.

As I understand it, the Government's defence policy is based on four major roles. There is, first, the strategic nuclear deterrent—upon which there will soon be a substantial increase in expenditure as more money is spent on Trident. There is, secondly, the direct defence of the United Kingdom. Thirdly, there is the continental commitment in West Germany, and finally, the maritime commitment within NATO, which is mainly in the eastern Atlantic. Before the war, there was additionally a rather minor role—described as the out-of-area role—of looking after about 14 dependencies scattered all over the world.

167 They are the residuary legacy of the British empire. They include not only the Falklands but Gibraltar, Hong Kong, Brunei, Belize and many others. Before the war, little money was spent on that out-of-area defence, but that is becoming a major drain on our resources in addition to the four other roles upon which Government strategy is based.

We have to meet the cost of fighting the Falklands war and in the foreseeable future we shall need to maintain a not insignificant garrison on the islands. If the White Paper is right and the main threat is from the Soviet Union, there may be a call from within NATO to replace some of the ships and aircraft that will have to be kept in the South Atlantic. In addition, there will be the cost of replacing the ships and aircraft that were lost in the war.

Moving up the coast of South America we come to Belize. The Government have committed themselves to defending an independent State against the claims of its neighbour. I understand that there are about 1,500 British troops in Belize, some Harriers and probably a frigate. We all heard with trepidation last week the bellicose statements of the president of Guatemala on the treaty between Britain and Belize and of his country's designs upon part of Belize.

The Government's foreign policy in South America cannot be described as a crowning success. The Financial Secretary to the Treasury used to be the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office with responsibilities for these matters. Before the Falklands conflict the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley)— the Financial Secretary—used to carry the Government's policy around South America. I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is not in his place. Over the past few months he must have been gratified that he was able to bury himself in the bowels of the Finance Bill. The Government have a responsibility for the way in which he tried to negotiate with Right-wing regimes in South America.

One result of the Falklands conflict is that the Government will be ultra-cautious in respect of the other dependencies. That does not mean spending less money and it may mean spending more money. The out-of-area role has increased. That, in addition to the cost of Trident II and the commitment to 3 per cent. growth within NATO in real terms, means that finally the Government's strategy will not be able to be carried out.

When the Prime Minister dismissed the last Secretary of State for Defence, the present Foreign Secretary, she did it apparently because the right hon. Gentleman insisted on buying Trident as well as maintaining the level of conventional defence forces. I believe that the Prime Minister's instincts on that occasion were right. They told her that it was not possible to have Trident and that level of conventional forces. I believe that the present Foreign Secretary was wrong. However, the Prime Minister was wrong in maintaining that Trident was sacrosanct and that conventional forces should be sacrificed. We know that the present Secretary of State for Defence was given his job to implement the Prime Minister's policy. He immediately cast around for areas in which conventional defence could be cut.

When the right hon. Gentleman began that exercise he had to find less money than that which will be needed in future. At that time the commitment was to buy Trident I at a cost of about £5,000 million. Unfortunately, Trident II will cost about twice that sum. The cost will be about £10 billion at today's prices. The right hon. Gentleman 168 looked for cuts because that was his brief. There was not much scope for cutting the direct and immediate defence of the United Kingdom.

A substantial reduction in Rhine Army may have appeared attractive, but apart from the question whether the savings would ultimately be very great there were political difficulties contained in a complete withdrawal of troops from Germany. Different views have been expressed from all parts of the Chamber and it is clearly a difficult subject. My view is that we should not underestimate political difficulties, especially if the proposition is that there should be a complete withdrawal of the British Army. We must consider carefully the political effects on some other countries in Western Europe and the Soviet Union's perception of what is going on in central Europe.

§ Mr. Best

What is the Opposition's policy on Rhine Army? By how much should it be reduced?

§ Mr. Davies

AE. I have said, it is an extremely difficult issue to determine. It is one that Government of both major parties have considered. There have been speeches from both sides of the House telling us how difficult an issue it is.

§ Mr. Best

I know that.

§ Mr. Davies

A complete withdrawal of British troops, especially if they were replaced by German troops, would have to be considered extremely carefully because of the effect on some other countries in Western Europe and the perception of the Soviet Union. If the British troops were not replaced, we would be lowering the nuclear threshold in Europe. It would mean that we would have fewer conventional forces. That would make it more likely that nuclear weapons would be used in a war in Central Europe.

The Secretary of State could not move very far in that direction, so he cast his greedy merchant banker's eye on the surface ships of the Royal Navy. That was the only area in which he could try to cut defence spending. He thought that he could do that because of the many trendy and fashionable theories concerning surface ships and the needs of the Royal Navy. Having spent only a few months as a shadow Defence Minister—I know that that is obvious from my speech—I am of the opinion that there is not a portfolio in which there are more trendy and dotty academic theories.

Apparently one of the theories is that Britain does not need a navy any more because it does not have an empire. It is argued that we are now firmly and irrevocably anchored to the Continent of Europe and that we do not need much of a navy. Another theory is that if a conventional war breaks out in Central Europe it will be all over in a few days, or a week, and that then NATO will have to go nuclear. That is said to support the argument that there is no need for a large navy. It is based on the view that the Soviet Union enjoys massive superiority in conventional forces, but I do not subscribe to that view. There is some superiority but I do not believe that it is massive. The final argument is that surface ships are too vulnerable in the age of the missile.

The Secretary of State saw an added bonus in cutting the surface fleet. He recognised that fewer ships meant fewer dockyards. That meant that more money could be saved and used in part to fund a nuclear strategic deterrent.

169 In addition, he felt that he would be able to go to the chairman of Marks and Spencer to tell him that he was reducing the number of civil servants in the Department. The closure of Royal Navy dockyards reduces the number of civil servants in the Ministry of Defence.

The Opposition welcome the very temporary relief for the Portsmouth yard. We deplore the closure of Chatham and the Gibraltar yard. We shall be able to discuss in some detail the proposed closures when we consider the Navy Estimates in a few weeks time.

The Secretary of State has been rather unlucky. He almost got away with his scheme. It is rumoured—we can only read the newspapers—that he was so pleased with his handiwork that he was contemplating a short and pleasant walk across Whitehall to Great George Street and up to the commanding heights of the Treasury. The right hon. Gentleman was a Treasury Minister for a few months. He was not in the Treasury team for four years as I was.

§ Mr. Robert Atkins

That shows.

§ Mr. Davies

Yes, it does. Apparently it was the right hon. Gentleman's ambition to cross Whitehall, but unfortunately he left his flank unprotected. His defence strategy, apart from his personal political strategy was, in effect, torpedoed by General Galtieri. We all know that a task force had to be despatched. We all know, also, that because of the right hon. Gentleman's policies it contained ships that were either on their way to the breaker's yard, under the auctioneer's hammer or in mothballs. The ships were manned by sailors with dismissal notices in their pockets. They were prepared by dockyard workers who were on their way to the dole queues.

When the Secretary of State comes to analyse the military lessons to be learnt from the Falkland campaign, I hope that he will not use the conclusions to bolster and reinforce his own prejudices and attempt to justify his decision to reduce the number of Royal Navy surface ships. It is true that the nuclear powered submarines were extremely successful in keeping the Argentine navy in port, but it does not follow from that that there should be a greater reliance on submarines at the expense of surface ships. The House knows that they perform different roles and that one role is complementary to the other and that one role cannot be a substitute for the other.

It has been reported that the naval chiefs—we can get this information only from the newspapers—feared the loss of a carrier in the Falkland campaign and that they considered such a loss militarily acceptable. If that is so, presumably the Prime Minister considered such a loss politically acceptable. If she had not, she would not have sent the task force on the basis of that military assessment.

What is demonstrated is not necessarily the inherent vulnerability of surface ships but the enormous gamble the Government took in sending the task force to the South Atlantic knowing that many of the ships, in particular the carriers, were not really designed for the role that they were asked to perform. They performed the role very well. Without a land base and with carriers that could be described as truncated, because that is how they were built for anti-submarine work, the Government were lucky that the casualties were not higher in men and equipment.

The conclusion to be drawn from the Falklands should not be that the Falklands war was an aberration and can therefore be ignored, or that surface ships are inherently 170 too vulnerable, but that those suface ships placed in that situation were asked to perform a role that made them vulnerable because not many of them were designed for the role they were asked to perform. That is the lesson to be learnt from the Falklands.

The lesson to be learnt—I am glad that I take the Secretary of State with me—is that in future our ships and the men sailing in them must be adequately protected for whatever role they are asked to perform in an uncertain and a dangerous world—[HON. MEMBERS: "More money on defence."] I am coming to that. I knew that hon. Members would say that.

We believe that the Government are trying to spread scarce resources too widely and too thinly and that there will have to be a major reappraisal of priorities in defence strategy. The Secretary of State may feel—he is now looking pleased with himself—that he has managed to steal a march on the Treasury but, inevitably, either under the present Government or under a future Government of whatever party, defence budgets and this budget in particular will come under pressure. Corners will again be cut, ships will again be built using inferior materials and risks will be taken to save money. In the colourful language of the hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Speed), who is not here today, frigates will again be designed by the Treasury. That will be a fact of life because this budget is not sustainable. Far better for the Government to cut their coat according to their cloth than to try to make a coat which is larger but more threadbare and therefore gives less protection.

The Government should cancel Trident because it is a major escalation of the arms race. Its enormous cost—£10 billion at today's prices—means that conventional forces will have to be cut, thereby bringing the use of nuclear weapons in any crisis that much closer. In consultation with our allies, we should have another look at the costs of our commitment to keep British forces in Germany, although I do not believe that that is an easy option.

Our conventional defence policy should in the main be concentrated on two areas—first, on the defence of the United Kingdom itself. I pay tribute to some of the things that the Government have done in that regard, although there is more that must be done. Secondly, within NATO, we should concentrate mainly on doing what is best suited to our geographical position and tradition. That means making an effective maritime contribution in the Eastern Atlantic. We believe that if a war broke out in Central Europe it is more likely to be a war of attrition, not of blitzkrieg, and the strength and efficiency of naval forces in the Atlantic would again become crucial. That means that Britain must have a modern and well-protected surface fleet as well as an efficient submarine fleet, with proper dockyard facilities to support them—[HON. MEMBERS: "Where will the money come from?"] I have covered that point.

The Secretary of State has got himself into a corner from which there is only one means of escape. He, the Prime Minister and the former Foreign Secretary failed to deter the invasion of the Falklands, a failure of judgment which has cost us dearly in lives and resources. The Secretary of State is still committed to a defence policy which could not have been carried out before the Falklands war and which cannot be carried out now. There will have to be another fundamental examination of defence policy, 171 but since it appears that the Secretary of State is too blinkered and too much a prisoner of his past errors to carry it out, he should make way for someone who will.

§ Mr. Julian Amery (Brighton, Pavilion)

The right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) said that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister had taken a gamble. What is clear is that he would not have taken it had he been in her shoes, and General Galtieri would be sitting in the Falkland Islands today. At the beginning of his speech the right hon. Gentleman said that the issue that matters is proliferation. He looked back nostalgically to the days when the two super-powers alone controlled nuclear weapons. If the Labour Party ever aspires to Government again it should look at the real world. Not only Britain, France and China have nuclear weapons, but long before the Labour Party is likely to be in Government again, Israel, India, Pakistan, South Africa, Argentina and Libya may have them, too. If the right hon. Gentleman really believes that Mr. Begin or Mr. Botha will be influenced by the policies of an incoming Labour Government on proliferation, I suggest that he is being a bit of a Bourbon on those matters and that perhaps he should think again.

The Falkland Islands crisis teaches us several important lessons that we shall no doubt examine more closely in the debate in the autumn or winter. It provides clear justification for the reorganisation of the Ministry of Defence, and proved by the response it was able to make to a virtually unexpected threat. It provides a remarkable justification of the decision to go over from National Service to all-professional forces. It goes a long way to justify our choice of equipment. But it also teaches another lesson which is fundamental to what I am about to say.

We lost some lives and we spent a great deal of money to win a victory that should never have been necessary had we been prepared. That is the issue that I wish to raise in the debate today. Have we analysed the global threat better than the Foreign Office analysed the threat to the Falkland Islands? Is our response adequate not to secure victory but to prevent the threat from developing?

The threat is graver than it has ever been at any time since the war.

There is the nuclear threat. As a Back Bencher I can say openly—it is obviously difficult for a Minister to say it—that now there is nuclear parity between the super-powers no one can expect to shelter under the American umbrella. We are therefore extraordinarily vulnerable, or would be if we did not have our own nuclear deterrent, to the threat of nuclear attack or of nuclear blackmail. That must be clear.

There is also the threat from the Warsaw Pact whose conventional forces have achieved considerable superiority over those of NATO in both conventional weapons and, with the deployment of the SS20, in tactical nuclear weapons. The deterrent power of the Western Alliance has been fading with the achievement of nuclear parity between the super-powers. Therefore, the validity of our defences in Europe has been declining steadily.

There is also the area of danger beyond which NATO and the threat that has been developing there to our sources of raw materials in South-East Asia, the Gulf and Southern and Central Africa, and to the trade routes on which we and Japan depend, upon which the whole industrialised West depends, for survival. This danger arises from the deployment of Soviet sea and long-range air power far 172 outside the Soviet Union and from the network of bases that the Soviets have developed all over the world. They are manned either by the Soviets of by their allies, in Aden, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Cuba, Vietnam, and Luanda in Angola. That is already a worldwide network with other corresponding facilities.

In addition, there are local dangers. We had one in the Falklands, unrelated to the Soviet challenge. There is the Iran-Iraq war which threatens the resources of the Gulf. Any of those local conflicts could merge into the greater East-West conflict.

As I have already said, this is the gravest threat that we have ever faced. The Soviets enjoy what Dr. Kissinger has called "a window of opportunity" in which they have a temporary superiority. It will be some time before the window can be closed. The Americans are trying hard to close it. They are doing so by defence expenditure that has produced the enormous borrowing requirement with high interest rates about which some of us have been complaining, but which in the long run are in our interest. I see no other way in which the Americans could finance what they are doing.

What is our response, and does it measure up to the threat? Here I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his staunch adherence to the doctrine of maintaining an independent British deterrent. As my hon. Friend the Minister of State said, we have it with the Polaris brought up to date, and we shall have it with Trident. It is quite clear that there can be no British strategy of any sort unless we have our own nuclear power; otherwise it is only an adjunct of someone else's strategy. If we are threatened with nuclear blackmail from the Soviet Union, or, indeed, anyone else, and have no nuclear power, it will be impossible to continue on our desired course. No responsible Government could have embarked on the Falklands operation had we not had our own independent nuclear power.

I well remember that during the Suez operation Mr. Khrushchev threatened Britain with a nuclear strike. We had to turn to the Americans, who were against the operation, and ask, "Will you protect us?" We therefore had to turn to one ally, who did not approve of the course we had adopted, and ask, "What are you going to do?" The Americans said, "We will tell the Russians not to do it", but it meant that we were in the hands of our allies.

This time, we were not. At the beginning, Mr. Haig wanted to support us but he was not quite sure how far. Eventually, he made up his mind, but without the cover of our independent deterrent any threat from the Soviet Union might have been decisive.

§ Mr. Denzil Davies

Is the right hon. Gentleman saying that had we had Polaris or Trident we could have gone on with the Suez operation, even in the teeth of American opposition?

§ Mr. Amery

Yes, in respect of the Russian threat. I shall not go into the history of the Suez operation. I am content to abide by Churchill's verdict when he said, "I do not know if I would have dared to start; I would never have dared to stop".

I am still in some doubt about whether, in considering the nuclear deterrent, we are right to settle for four boats rather than five. The case for four has been argued, but I ask my right hon. Friend to look at this again before he presents his second White Paper in the winter.

173 What of our contribution to NATO? My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Clark) and The Times have asked whether we have got the balance right and whether we should take a bit out of BAOR and give a little more to the Navy and the maritime air force. They have a point if we are in absolutely rigid financial constraints. I brush aside the argument that we are naturally a maritime country—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] I shall explain. In the list of our heroes, the achievements of our generals—the Black Prince, Henry V, Marlborough, Wellington and the generals of the First and Second World Wars—are at least equal to the achievements of Nelson, Rodney, Drake, Raleigh and the admirals in the wars of this century. The difference is that before the advent of modern weapons, the Channel provided a moat behind which we could mobilise. Therefore, all that we needed was a standing Navy, not a standing Army. There was also a political advantage because there was no danger of a military coup.

We defended ourselves perfectly adequately behind that moat until 1940, but in 1940 we cut it damn fine. Had we lost the Battle of Britain—and we nearly did—and had the Germans gained air mastery over the Channel, the Navy would not have been able to prevent a German landing and God knows what would have happened. Just imagine what would happen were the Soviet forces to reach the Channel ports. Only the nuclear deterrent could prevent them from landing. Would it not be wise to man the outer ramparts as successfully as we can rather than simply sitting back behind the moat and waiting for things to develop? I do not see how we could possibly have fewer forces on the Continent than we have today. I join General Hackett in saying that we ought to have quite a few more.

In saying that, I do not disagree with the Navy lobby. It may well be—as far as I understand the matter, it is probably true—that we need more ships purely to fulfil our NATO commitment. I shall not say what sort or enter the argument about how many surface ships or submarines there should be, but I am sure that we shall need quite a few more to meet the third threat that arises from beyond the NATO area.

It must now be clear to the meanest intelligence that our withdrawal from south-east Asia, Aden and the Gulf was an unmitigated disaster. It led directly to an increase in oil prices and led on to the fall of the Shah. The bill that we have had to pay is already many times more than what we would have incurred had we retained minimum forces there. Belatedly, our American friends have come up with the rapid deployment force. Paragraphs 237 and 238 of the White Paper say what we could contribute beyond the NATO area. It looks pretty thin to me. It is true that we have just carried out a major and remarkable operation outside the NATO area in the Falklands, but we did it at the expense of our NATO commitments, by withdrawing forces from NATO, and with ships that were destined either for the scrap-heap or the market.

It may be said that another Falklands is unlikely. That is what people said after Suez; yet in 1961 we sent an armada to Kuwait. Like everything in war, these things happen unexpectedly. I do not know whether there will be another lone British operation, but I am pretty sure that, given the way that the world is developing—three wars were in progress only a fortnight ago—there will be a need for a British contribution somewhere outside NATO.

174 We already make a small contribution in Sinai. We now have another in the South Atlantic, and if we are to form a South Atlantic community, which I hope, we may enlarge it. It is also likely that we shall have to make a contribution to the United States rapid deployment force for the Middle East.

Nor can we be sure that emergencies beyond the NATO area will be isolated. They may well be harmonised with an increasing Soviet threat in Europe which may call for a greater state of readiness in NATO. We need to build again what we had until very recently—a force of perhaps two brigades, with the necessary air and sea support, capable by its training and equipment of operating outside the NATO area. Of course, in normal times it could be available to NATO, but it would be surplus to the NATO requirement.

We were very lucky in the South Atlantic, as the Minister explained, that the Marines had had Arctic training. Do we have people who are desert or jungle trained? We do not know where the next emergency will break out, but I should think that we need to have something as least as strong as the task force that we have just despatched to the South Atlantic, but outside the NATO assignment. To have this would be to have the best reason to believe that our American friends will have the guts when the crisis comes, and it may be very near, to put in their overwhelming potential strength in the defence of all our vital interests.

I may be exaggerating the gravity of the threat. If I am, I hope that my right hon. Friend will tell me so, and if so, much of my argument falls away. I hope that it may, but I am also afraid that he may be the victim, as were his predecessors in 1914 and 1939, of financial constraints. It is easy for Cabinets to face the immediate problems of domestic affairs and to give money to them, but to say that they do not know about the foreign danger and take a risk on that. It was very costly in 1914 and in 1939, and it was rather costly in the Falkland Islands.

I am sure that my right hon. Friend will read the signs aright with the help of his professional advisers, and will fight for what he thinks is right by of Government expenditure for our defences. However, hon. Members have a part to play as well. We are the people who vote Supply, and we must play our part and make our views plain to the Government. The issue is the gravest that any of us are likely ever to face.

§ Mr. James Callaghan (Cardiff, South-East)

I disagree with so much of what the right hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Mr. Amery) said that I hope that he will forgive me if I do not spend the whole of my speech answering his. There were some plums that I pulled out from time to time on which I agreed, including the issue on which he finished—the capacity for a force operating outside NATO.

The right hon. Member for Pavilion allows that romantic self of his to run away with him if he believes that if the Royal Navy had still been in the Gulf, the Shah of Persia would be on his throne today. Further, it was not Polaris or the absence of Polaris at the time of Suez that ended that fiasco. It was the fact that Mr. Harold Macmillan, having discovered the impact it was having on our finances, decided that the Suez adventure should no longer be supported. That was what turned the tide.

§ Mr. Amery

I was not trying to argue that that issue of Khrushchev's nuclear deterrent turned the tide. I was merely saying that it was an embarrassing position when, threatened by the Russians, we had to turn to the Americans because we had no nuclear weapons of our own. It was not decisive—many other things were decisive, including Mr. Gaitskell's attitude. However, this argument has a clear military application.

§ Mr. Callaghan

We had atomic weapons at that time, but we were dependent on the Americans. My conclusion is different from that of the right hon. Member for Pavilion. We cannot fight a war unless the Americans agree that we should do so, or unless we have at least their acquiescence in what we are doing. That is as true today as it was at the time of Suez. It is not something that I necessarily welcome, but it happens to be the case.

For example, the crisis in Cyprus occurred at a time when America's attention was engaged in President Nixon's final resignation and Mr. Henry Kissinger had all his attention taken up by that. It was because we could not get the support of the Americans that we did not stop the Turks. The American fleet could have interposed itself. However, I do not wish to spend my whole speech on these issues, because I have other things that I wish to say.

I shall not vote for the Defence Estimates tonight. The Secretary of State can have the money that he wants—that is not the issue. The policy is wrong. I do not deny the Secretary of State the money, although I disagree with important parts of the policy. My particular point is that I disagree with the Secretary of State's assertion last week that we have a balanced mix of forces—Navy, Army and Air Force—which must not be abandoned, and which is appropriate to our needs. That is the central issue for me. I shall not discuss nuclear issues, because my views on them are well known and do not need repeating.

I agreed with the right hon. Member for Pavilion when he asked whether we had analysed the threat. It is to this that the House is turning its attention more and more. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) on the parts of his speech in which he discussed this matter. He came to the nub of it in a way that we have not done for some time in the past.

The truth is not, I regret to say, that we have a balanced mix of forces but that the structure of our forces has been unbalanced for some years, including the period when I was Prime Minister, that it is unbalanced at present and that the Government's new policy is making the problem worse and not better. That is my starting point.

The Government propose to reduce our aircraft carrier strength, cut down the number of frigates and destroyers, close dockyards and run down the strength of officers and naval ratings by 10,000 men, leaving us with the smallest Navy of the century. This policy has serious potential dangers for our country's safety. It is a misapplication of the proper division of resources between the Services. We do not have the right mix, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli said. I support him and I refuse to support the Defence Estimates as they have been published because they have that issue wrong.

I question the prevailing wisdom on two main subjects, both of which were touched on by my right hon. Friend for Llanelli and one which was touched on by the right hon. Member for Pavilion. I question that, in the vernacular, the Falklands was a "one-off' event and can 176 be ignored, and I question the theory of the short, sharp war that will last for only days. That was something that was said before, in 1914 and in 1939.

I am reinforced in this because our maritime strategy policy has not been the result of a careful re-examination of the problems. It has been caused, as my right hon. Friend for Llanelli pointed out, by the fact that the Secretary of State, having been plucked from the obscurity of the Department of Trade, presumably because he was more biddable than the present Foreign Secretary, found himself with some issues that he was unable to touch. He could not touch Trident for particular reasons, he could not touch the troops in Germany for other reasons and so the whole of the expenditure savings that he was required to make fell on our maritime strategy.

There was no balanced judgment about our defence role, and it is this issue that the House as a whole ought to challenge and not merely accept. Just because these fixed constants were there, we do not have to accept what has happened to our surface fleet. We have cut ships large and small. I felt some shame when I heard that we were selling off ships—something that we have never done before in this way—out of the active Fleet to other countries.

We invited Chile to purchase HMS "Norfolk". We attempted to sell HMS "Invincible" to Australia. We asked the Americans whether they would like the Royal Fleet Auxiliary "Stromness", and they said "Yes" and grabbed it with both hands. We have never run our defence system in this way before. I felt rather humiliated when I heard that that was the way in which we intended to try to rake up the money to get within the limits. Nothing was spared.

Perhaps the greatest irresponsibility of all involved HMS "Endurance". I shall not discuss the matter this afternoon, except to say that she was sacrificed, despite repeated warnings from both sides of the House about the impact that it would have. We now know that Mr. Costa Mendez took it as a signal that we would not fight. I shall now leave the issue, but in my opinion, it was a classic example of penny wise, pound foolish.

It is clear from what has been said that there is serious and growing disagreement about our present defence strategy. Indeed, when I listen to my own Front Bench, I begin to feel that we are becoming a Navy party.

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