Richard Shirreff - War with Russia

The Prime Minister sighed and rolled his eyes. “OK, CDS. I take the hit. But what could we, should we do now?”

Kydd thought. “We’ve still got 20th Armored Brigade stationed in Germany, which makes it a bloody sight easier to move it to Eastern Europe than a brigade stuck on Salisbury Plain and on the wrong side of the Channel. With a massive effort—and I’m talking wholesale cannibalization of the rest of the Army—we could give them the manpower, equipment and logistic support to bring them to war establishment… That means proper fighting strength, not some fucking paper strength.

“And be under no illusions, when I say cannibalization, I mean just that. Tank regiments without working tanks, artillery regiments without guns. If anything else blows up in the meantime—like a jihadi attack, Paris-style—we are entirely fucked, because that would mean putting soldiers from tank, gunner, helicopter and logistic regiments, as well as the infantry, outside supermarkets, schools and other potential targets right across the nation… as the French army has had to do. So all our military eggs, what few working ones we have left, will all be in this one basket.”

The PM looked up, stunned at Kydd’s onslaught. “Are you seriously telling me that it’s got this bad, CDS?”

“Yes, and…”

“Rubbish,” Everage intervened, a triumphant look on his face. “We’ve still got eighty-two thousand in the Army and you’re seriously telling us that we’re pushed to find a brigade of five thousand men. We’ve got lots of brigades…”

And now Kydd interrupted him in return. “Every last one of them underequipped and undermanned. To bring them up to full war-fighting establishment we’ll have to fill the gaps from across the rest of the Army. Not only that, many units, particularly logistic units—without which no army can fight—are now dependent on reserves. Great people reserves, salt of the earth, but not easily available in the time span we’re talking about, and there’s lots of gaps in key roles.

“Then there’s equipment. Much of our heavy war-fighting kit, the stuff we’ll need against the Russians, has been neglected as you’ve spent the money on the latest kit to fight the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan—a very different type of war. To put heavy equipment into battle—tanks or mobile guns, for example—you need spare engines, generators and a host of other stuff which we don’t have in our stores any longer. You lot decided to stop spending money on this boring stuff. But if a tank hasn’t got a track pin to hold the track together, a part for the engine, or exactly the right nut to hold the gun in place, then all it’s good for is a museum. You certainly cannot take it to war.

“And, finally, logistics. That’s about getting the fuel, bullets, water and everything else that’s needed to where you need it. That requires a complex supply system from the factory to the front line. Above all, it has to be robust enough to stand the test of combat. And much of that thinking, capability and understanding had been lost.”

“Stop there, CDS.” It was Little who now interrupted. “I’m with the Secretary of State on this. Surely we can send at least an army division and the paras as well. The marines, well, of course, now…”

“Sir.” Kydd now moderated his tone. “The Paras are integrating with 82nd Airborne, as I said. Special Forces have, of course, been gearing up from the start. But a combined arms division? No…”

He gazed at the ceiling for a moment, thinking hard. “Let me try to give you an example of what you,” he nodded at Everage, “have done with your constant and ill-thought-through cost cutting… I take it you know what I mean by a Bailey Bridge?”

Both men nodded.

“A genius bit of kit. Invented in the Second World War and still used today. It’s like man-sized Meccano. The girders bolt together and each girder is designed to be carried by six men. No more and certainly no less. Now, the bean counters ran a calculator over the Engineers and forced them to lose men. So, now there’s only five regular soldiers left to carry each girder and five men are not enough. A few girders maybe, but not a bridge’s worth. Worry not, says the chief bean counter to the press and parliament, the sixth will be a reservist and will be there when we need him. But while number six exists on paper, he does not necessarily exist in reality, as he has not been recruited. And even if he has been recruited, he’s not going to be there in time for what’s happening right now, because there’s not been the time to process him and then train him to the level of the rest of the team. Which means that when we need a Bailey Bridge built to get our men across a river and into battle, the engineers cannot physically build it. Five men cannot lift lots and lots of girders designed to be lifted by six.

“So, what does the ever-resourceful Engineer colonel do? Knowing that it could be the genuine difference between life and death that there is a bridge built when and where it is needed, he begs, steals or borrows a number six from another regular unit. But they now have only four men per girder. Multiply that across the Army and you can see why I tell you we’ve been hollowed out. It will take all our resources just to put together one properly constituted, ready-for-war brigade. That will leave us with loads of cannibalized formations that will be good for casualty replacements, but little else.”

“That’s the first I’ve heard of this,” snapped an angry Everage.

“Naturally,” Kydd replied. “Do you think that a colonel or general is going to tell you he cannot build a Bailey Bridge? What do you think would happen? End of career for him for whingeing for starters. Keep protesting, and too loudly, and I wonder. Court martial? Complaining is not the military way. We improvise until we can improvise no longer. And that is where we are now.”

“And why are you whingeing now, General?” Everage’s voice dripped sarcasm. “I only mention it as you’ve just had the gall to lecture us on what is the military way.”

“Because someone has to tell you. And, if you hadn’t noticed, I couldn’t care a flying fuck. I’m retired anyway.”

“Enough!” The Prime Minister banged his hand flat on a table. “Is there any good news?”

“Well, Third Division HQ has just done a useful exercise with a French brigade, so with some concentrated work-up training we could form a multinational division of two brigades, with an artillery brigade attached… Give me two weeks, Prime Minister, and I’ll give you a force you can be proud of… But you need to engage right now with NATO Heads of State.”

“What do you need?”

“NATO has nearly three and a half million men and women under arms. That far outnumbers Russia’s armed forces. But NATO needs to get its act together and that needs political leadership. Without that, the fucking Russians are going to walk all over us.”

“I’ll get on the case,” the Prime Minister answered, looking at Walker who nodded in agreement.

“You’re going to need to, Prime Minister,” retorted Kydd. “I want you to be in no doubt what I’m talking about here. These are troops from different countries, who have never or only rarely trained together. They fire different-sized ammunition from different weapon systems; they’ve got radios which may or may not talk to one another, and they speak multiple different languages. None of which is exactly clever when you are trying to call down accurate artillery fire, while enemy rounds are killing the men around you, and one mistranslated number might result in a ton of so-called friendly fucking shells landing on you or your mates. There’s nothing simple about this and…”