UK refocuses foreign, defense policies to shore up

DEFENSE BUDGET CUTS
The financial crisis and foreign policy shifts had a direct effect on the kingdom's defense policy which is undergoing reconstruction too.
As Foreign Secretary Hague put it in his July speech, the current coalition government would "chart a clear way forward by launching a strategic review of defense and security needs, led by the requirements of foreign policy as well inevitable financial constraints."
The Whitehall's ongoing Strategic Defense and Security Review actually grew out of a green paper initiated by the former Labor government in its final months.
Despite Hague's wish for it to be a "fundamental reappraisal," it ended up in the hands of Defense Secretary Liam Fox as an acrimonious and highly controversial recast of military spending that was driven more by demands from the Treasury to cut spending than by strategic necessity.
The effects were that Britain's aircraft carrier fleet [link widoczny dla zalogowanych], nominally three vessels [link widoczny dla zalogowanych], will retire immediately along with the fleet of Harrier aircraft they were carrying, leaving the kingdom's global military power projection without a seaborne air capacity until two new large aircraft carriers are completed in 2016 and 2018. Aircraft to fly from the new carriers will not be ready until 2020.
Other cuts were made in the army, notably in heavy armor and artillery and more will follow after 2015 when the number of soldiers will be cut.
The results of the military cuts also means Britain will be unable to field again a force similar in size to what it sent to Afghanistan, signaling a lessening in the country's willingness and capacity to assume the same global role it played in the past.
The military budget cut was driven by budget constraints, but also by a changing diplomatic landscape. Hague asserted that Britain's closest ally would remain the United States [link widoczny dla zalogowanych], saying: "Our unbreakable alliance with the United States ... is our most important relationship and will remain so."
But this did not prevent U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Defense Secretary Robert Gates from giving an alarm about the extent of Britain's military spending cuts. They feared that where Britain cut its capacity the United States would have to step in.
Robin Niblett, director of the London-based think-tank Chatham House, said the "special relationship" between Britain and the United States only remained special in defined areas such as Afghanistan and intelligence.
The transAtlantic ties were "returning a little bit to a more normal relationship, a relationship that is less defined by that unique period of 60 years of Cold War or post-Second World War cooperation."
Prime Minister Cameron has looked to strengthen military ties elsewhere in a bid to save money.
He and French President Nicholas Sarkozy signed a bilateral defense treaty in London in November, which will see long-term and unprecedented cooperation on nuclear weapons and on deployment of troops overseas and on sharing aircraft carrier capability.
Both countries are keen to maintain their global power status while at the same time saving money.
However, as the weaker eurozone nations will likely be at the center of global financial woes in 2011, the Britain-EU relationship is prone to new problems.

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