It’s being rumoured by informed sources that the British Army has been told to stop all non-essential training exercises.
Only soldiers facing imminent deployment – in places such as Cyprus, Estonia and the Falklands – can train as normal.
The news of the order comes at a time when the British government is being pressured to increase spending on defence from the current 2.5% to 3% by 2030. The US government believes all European countries should be spending 5%.
The biggest casualties of the cut-back order are the large live fire exercises and platoon attack rehearsals.
These take place in UK training areas such as Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire and Sennybridge in Wales.
On the chopping block are said to be the Royal Tank Regiment conducting live fire drills in Wales and a separate exercise involving tanks and Apache helicopters.
The sources stressed that training aimed at modernising the Army, including drone and counter-drone warfare, is expected to continue.
The army was said to be frustrated by the decision and an official spokesperson came out with a carefully worded statement: “Our training continues and we are prioritising activity that contributes most directly to readiness, deployability and operational effectiveness.
“We are also investing £2bn to transform training for the British Army over the next 15 years.”
Prime minister Andy Burnham and chancellor John Healey are resisting calls to increase the defence budget to 5%, saying it will likely go to 3.5% in the foreseeable future.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has advised the government to “…cut welfare spending and invest that money in our defence.”
The current commitment, set out in the Defence Investment Plan (DIP), will see defence spending rise to 2.7% of GDP by 2027/28.
It is no secret that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) is still struggling to fund all its investment plans.
