Spreading war, not peace

NATO’s Cold War policy was supposed to be a way to oppose communism without directly attacking either the Soviet Union or China. But now this government seems all too eager to fight not just Russia but China too.

Widely reported in the media, Defence Secretary John Healey said on 27 July that Britain is ready to fight in the Pacific if there is a war over Taiwan.

War games

Healy was speaking on board HMS Prince of Wales when it docked in Darwin to join Australia’s biggest-ever war games with its allies, Operation Talisman Sabre 2025.

The UK’s largest strike carrier group, led by HMS Prince of Wales, is armed with 36 F-35B fighter jets and four Merlin helicopters. It is the first non-US carrier to join one of Australia’s annual military drills.

‘This goes further than any British government minister has ever gone.’

Mr Healey said: “If we have to fight, as we have done in the past, Australia and the UK are nations that will fight together. We exercise together and by exercising together and being more ready to fight, we deter better together.”

This goes further than any British government minister has ever gone. No previous British government has said that it would join in if there were a war in the Indo-Pacific region.

Treaty

The government is getting us ever more involved there. The UK and Australia have just signed the Geelong Treaty, a new 50-year agreement firming up the AUKUS pact and committing to build a new class of nuclear-powered attack submarines.

In its National Security Strategy published earlier this year, the Labour government alleged that “there is a particular risk of escalation around Taiwan”. Mr Healey noted, “as threats are increasing, the partnerships like the UK and Australia matter more than ever.”

Added risk

The Labour government is adding to the risks and threats. The HMS Prince of Wales carrier group is on a nine-month deployment through the Pacific. Foreign Secretary David Lammy has previously said that the UK plans to conduct more freedom of navigation operations in the Taiwan Strait – the body of water separating China from Taiwan.

In June Royal Navy patrol ship HMS Spey transited this Strait. Given the government statements , it is likely that the carrier group will also be used to assert the right to freedom of navigation through the Taiwan Strait.

The supposed purpose and likely outcome of entering a war against China over Taiwan, 6,000 miles away from us are troubling. And in any case how could Britain afford yet another war?

Preparations

Starmer wants to spend ever more on war preparations. Warmongers always claim that the country can easily afford the wars they want. It seldom turns out that way.

Sixty years ago USA became more deeply involved in its war against Vietnam as government leaders said that the country could afford it and it would even stimulate the economy. Three years later President Johnson was cutting $6 billion in spending on social programmes to fund the war.