Strategizing with ghosts

Memories of the past shape strategies of the present

Excerpt: "Several days in London spent speaking to all manner of generals and spymasters, scholars, and advisers to government, for example, brought home the long shadow of empire that still shapes British military policy, for good and for ill. It was tangible while walking through the House of Lords and seeing the coats of arms of field marshals and admirals of the fleet, as it was during the celebration of V-E Day by veterans, admittedly of later wars, wearing the regimental ties and bonnets of defunct but storied regiments.

Imperial self-assurance and memory helps explain Britain’s remarkable leadership in dealing with the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Boris Johnson, whatever his peccadilloes, channeled Churchill’s ghost by dashing off to Kyiv, pushing advanced weapons on Ukraine well before America did, and offering a security guarantee to Sweden as it began to move toward NATO membership. Not only Churchill but Palmerston or Pitt the Younger would have approved of such statecraft. Johnson is well read and eloquent enough to summon their spirits.

Unfortunately, however, the reality of actual British power does not match its reach.

The U.K. possesses outstanding niche capacities in the world of special operations and intelligence gathering, but its navy now has barely a quarter as many surface combatants as it did during the Falklands War; its nuclear force is obsolescent; and its army is tiny, albeit of high quality.

The suggestion by British politicians that the U.K. could regularly deploy a brigade—say, some 4,000 soldiers—as part of a reassurance force to Ukraine in the event of a cease-fire was privately mocked by experts. The U.K. does not have enough troops to do that."