英国国防备战国务大臣卢克·波拉德针对近期一系列负面头条报道，向媒体记者表达了强烈不满。
波拉德在接受英国军队广播服务（BFBS）采访时直言不讳地表示，他“厌倦了记者和扶手椅将军们唱衰我们的军队”。对于英国政府及其国防计划而言，这无疑是备受打击的一周。据天空新闻报道，英国军事领袖正被要求在今年内寻求数十亿英镑的开支节省。此外还有消息称，英国国防部可能需要为“多国志愿联盟”倡议买单，而非动用财政部的储备资金。
英国广播公司（BBC）本周也对英军现状进行了详细梳理，列举了历届政府在过去数十年间的数据变化。与此同时，英国2025年《战略防务审查》的起草人之一、前北约秘书长罗伯逊勋爵也对当前政府在国防资金规划上的“腐蚀性自满”提出了批评，特别是指责长期延期的《国防投资计划》进展缓慢。
多年来的削减和延误被认为是削弱英军实力的主因。工党内部资深人士也指责政府在防务问题上过于盲目乐观，未能及时落实必要的资金支持。在国防压力与预算争议并行的背景下，英军转型与备战的成效仍有待观察。
UK Minister for Defence Readiness Luke Pollard takes aim at journalists for negative press, amid a string of headlines in recent weeks.
Minister of State for Defence Readiness and Industry, Luke Pollard MP speaking at a UK Defence Industry Roundtable with Gulf Partners in March. Credit: UK MoD/Crown copyright
UK Minister for Defence Readiness blasts “journalists and armchair generals” as defence rows and budget pressures mount
UK forces are described as severely weakened after decades of cuts and delays
Senior Labour figures have accused the government of complacency on defence funding amid the long-delayed Defence Investment Plan
Rattled doesn’t even come close to it, listening to the words spoken by UK Minister for Defence Readiness Luke Pollard, who in an interview with BFBS exclaimed that he was “sick and tired of journalists and armchair generals talking down our military”.
It has been a bruising week for the UK Government and its defence plans, with reports from Sky News that military chiefs are being asked to come up with billions of pounds in savings this year and also suggestions that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) will pick the tab for the Coalition of the Willing initiative, rather than using Treasury reserve funds.
Access deeper industry intelligence
Experience unmatched clarity with a single platform that combines unique data, AI, and human expertise.
Find out more
The BBC this week also outlined the state of the UK military, charting the figures through decades and governments of all political positions.
Elsewhere, one of the authors of the UK’s own 2025 Strategic Defence Review, Lord Robertson, himself a former Labour Defence Minister and Secretary General of Nato, accused Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer of “corrosive complacency” regarding defence funding planning, due to be published in the long-delayed Defence Investment Plan.
Naval Technology has also called the UK Government and Prime Minister Starmer out on the wording of defence-related statements in the House of Commons, that fail to accurately portray that the failures of military planning and funding spread across decades and governments of both the left and the right.
It appears the message has been given that UK ministers should go on the offensive, blaming journalists for doing their job in highlighting the myriad failures, without favour or prejudice, that governments of all persuasions have overseen while in office.
“I’m sick and tired of journalists and armchair generals talk down our military. We know that we have inherited an Armed Forces hollowed out by the last government,” said Pollard in the BFBS interview.
The facts: UK military at lowest ebb
What is without question is that the UK military is at its lowest ebb for generations, brought low by two decades worth of defence cuts, both in budget and real terms, as inflationary pressures and ballooning budgets in other government departm