SAS shambles caps UK Defence unravelling

Eight SAS  bodyguards and thr junior diplomat they were reportedly protecting have been captured by the Libyan rebels they had been ordered to contact and ignominiously removed to Benghazi.

The British Government, in reality a local council to an offshore island controlled by the EU, is making a complete international laughing stock of itself. Ahead of this fiasco, the following letter had already been received by the Independent on Sunday, whose telling leading article this morning is linked here:

Dear David Cameron,

We accept the need for savings to be made in the defence budget, against a background of the wider economic situation and the history of overspends at the Ministry of Defence.

However, the Strategic Defence and Security Review seems to have been driven by financial rather than military considerations. Recent events in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya have highlighted the unpredictability of global security – there was no mention of North Africa in the SDSR at all.

The security landscape has radically changed and some of the assumptions on which the review was based should be reconsidered.

The irony of HMS Cumberland, which faces being decommissioned, playing a key role in evacuations from Benghazi is not lost on those who take an interest in the future of the Royal Navy. The announcement of redundancies in the RAF on the same day as speculation about enforcing a no-fly zone was also regrettable.

Britain's ability to play a role in the event of military action in Libya has been called into question in recent days. In light of the new potential threats posed by unrest in North Africa, we urge David Cameron, the Prime Minister, and Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary, to reopen the SDSR and ensure the forces are properly structured and adequately funded to meet the nation's requirements.

Signed: General Sir Michael Rose; Admiral Lord West, former First Sea Lord and Labour minister; Rear Admiral Scott Lidbetter, chairman of the Fleet Air Arm Officers' Association; Commodore Steve Jermy, former strategy director, British embassy, Kabul; Colonel Clive Fairweather, former SAS Commander; Commander Nigel 'Sharkey' MacCartan-Ward DSC AFC; Sir Michael Graydon, former Air Chief Marshal; Major General Julian Thompson; Sir Paddy Hine, former Air Chief Marshal; Baroness Brenda Dean, chairman, House of Lords defence group; Lord George Foulkes; Colonel Peter Walton; Sir Nicholas Bonsor, UKNDA vice-president, former Foreign Office minister; Rear-Admiral Jeremy Larken; Col David Benest; Capt Michael Clapp RN; Cdr Graham Edmonds RN; Lt-Cdr Richard Little RN, UKNDA life member; Randolph Churchill, UKNDA vice-president, former naval officer; Andrew Roberts, journalist, historian and author, UKNDA vice-president; Peter Caddick-Adams, military historian; Bruce Dalton, retired Army officer; Azeem Ibrahim, UKNDA vice-president, businessman; Kees van Haperen, UKNDA chief executive; Andy Smith, journalist and military historian, UKNDA board member; Stuart Notholt, journalist and author, UKNDA board member; Michael Codner, director of military sciences, RUSI; Bob Ainsworth, former Labour defence secretary; Jim Murphy, shadow defence secretary; Gisela Stuart, Labour MP; Mike Hancock, LibDem MP; Sandra Osborne, Labour MP; Admiral Sir Jeremy Black GBE KCB DSO, former Commander in Chief naval home command; Dr Anthony J Cumming, author of 'The Royal Navy and the Battle of Britain' and winner of the Julian Corbett prize for research in modern naval history, 2006; Professor Greg Kennedy, Corbett Centre for Maritime Policy Studies, King's College London; Sir Benjamin Bathurst GCB, former admiral of the fleet; Dr Duncan Redford, Centre for Maritime Historical Studies, University of Exeter; David Hobbs, former commander Royal Navy; Captain Alan Hensher RN; Admiral Sir John Forster 'Sandy' Woodward; Lieutenant General Sir Hew Pike, KCB, DSO, MBE; Baroness Ann Taylor of Bolton, minister for defence procurement 2007; Baroness Helen Liddell of Coatdyke, SoS Scotland 2001-03; Dr GH Bennett, naval historian, University of Plymouth; Julie McCarthy, chief executive, Army Families Federation; Sir Peter Squire, former chief of air staff; Major General Patrick Cordingley, commander of the Desert Rats during the first Gulf War; Professor Eric Grove, professor of naval history at Salford University; Lord Williams of Elvel, member of Lords EU sub-committee on defence and foreign affairs; Sir Patrick Duffy, former navy minister.