Britain must be ‘ready to fight’, minister says ahead of defence review

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Defense Secretary John Hilli has said that Britain must “prepare for war”, but before the government’s strategic defense review acknowledged that he was struggling to stop decreasing the size of the army.

Hilli also refused to say Sunday that the Treasury guaranteed additional funds to take the British spending to 3 percent of the GDP to the next parliament, referring to the target as “an ambition”.

In multiple interviews before the release of Monday’s SDR, which will give military expenditure plans and priorities in the coming years, Hilli said that Britain faced multiple threats, adding: “We are ready for war to secure peace”.

He did not deny a report in the Sunday Times that Britain wanted to buy US -made fighter jets capable of firing strategic nuclear weapons to fight the rising threats raised by Russia.

Asked if Britain is looking at various ways to launch nuclear weapons – excluding its Trishul’s nuclear submarine deterrent – Hilly said: “I will not go to the discussion that I need to be personal.”

Although Hilli said that his “no doubt” would increase the overall defense expenses of Britain to 3 percent of GDP to the next parliament, he refused to say whether Chancellor Rachel Reeves was supporting the plan.

However, he said that the goal was “an ambition” rather than Firm। promise. Britain will grow Defense expenditure Foreign Assistance Cuts the budget cut by 2.5 percent by 2027.

“I have no doubt that we will hurt this ambition in the next parliament,” Hilli told the BBC.

Prime Minister Sir Care Starmar launched a strategic defense review after entering the office last year to help them prepare for the “more dangerous and unstable world” at that time.

The SDR will probably set the target for the size of the army, which will be closely monitored to see if it has gone above the current target of 73,000 for 2025, recently re -confirmed recently in 2023.

However, until April, the full -time trained power of the army has decreased at around 70,860.

Asked about his goal of having 73,3 soldiers, Hilli said that his first job was to stop leaving people.

“There is a crisis of hiring and holding a 15 year in our forces,” he said. “We have compressed that gap but we are still more people than joining. Our first task is to reverses that trend.

“Then we would like to see the ability to start growing in the next parliament.”

Summary of the threat to Britain and the West, he said: “We are now in a world that is changing now. We have been able to respond to the world of growing threats.

“It is increasing Russian aggression, it is a daily cyber attack, it is a new nuclear risk and it is increasing tension in other regions of the world.”

Earlier, Hilli announced that Britain would collect long-range weapons up to 000,5 and spend at least six new munals on construction of the factory. “This is a part of our preparation to fight if needed,” he added.

Former House House Russian Advisor Finea Hill and Defense Worker General Sir Richard Barons led the SDR with the support of the former Deputy Chief of NATO Secretary-General Lord George Robertson. They handed over the final repeat of their review in early March.