Tories demand urgent Army review

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/uk/6910048.stm

Version 0 of 1.

The Conservatives have called for an urgent strategic review of the Army's commitments after a leaked memo warned it had almost no spare troops.

In the memo, the head of the British Army, General Sir Richard Dannatt, said the Army was undermanned because of operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Shadow defence secretary Liam Fox said the government needed to plan for a bigger Army in the years ahead.

But the Ministry of Defence said the current situation was "manageable".

'Reacting to unexpected'

In the memo published in the Daily Telegraph, Gen Dannatt also said vital equipment was being used "at the edge of sustainability".

The Army has "almost no capability to react to the unexpected", he went on.

"It is difficult to predict the long-term effect of this level of pressure on people. It is critical that we improve manning as quickly as we can."

Dr Fox said this situation was increasing stress on army families and had led to a record number of people leaving the armed forces prematurely last year.

"The government needs to very, very urgently address these things," he said.

"They need to go back to their own planning assumptions, recognise the Army is too small and plan for a bigger Army in the years ahead. Otherwise this problem will simply go from bad to worse."

'Political pressure'

Liberal Democrat defence spokesman Willie Rennie said: "What more evidence does Gordon Brown need to pull the troops out of Iraq and focus on Afghanistan?

"Richard Dannatt has repeatedly warned of overstretch. It's now time for the government to act."

There is reportedly just one battalion of 500 troops, called the Spearhead Lead Element, available to be used in an emergency, such as a major domestic terrorist attack or a rapid deployment overseas.

BBC defence correspondent Paul Wood said the Army currently comprised about 98,000 personnel, some 2,000 soldiers short of capacity.

He said the internal memo was leaked to put political pressure on the government ahead of a spending review.

We are certainly not complacent about the longer term implications, which we are acutely aware of and are addressing Ministry of Defence spokesman

The document also said that Britain's second back-up unit, the Airborne Task Force, formed around the Parachute Regiment, could not deploy fully because of "shortages in manpower, equipment and stocks".

The MoD conceded that if "operations continue at this pace, we will have to revisit our planning assumptions".

The spokesman added: "In recent months, we have drawn down our force levels in a number of operations.

"The Armed Forces' mission in Northern Ireland will end on 31 July; we withdrew the bulk of our forces from Bosnia-Herzegovina earlier this year and... we will reduce further our force levels in Iraq by 500.

"We are certainly not complacent about the longer term implications, which we are acutely aware of and are addressing."

In October Gen Dannatt said that the presence of UK armed forces in Iraq "exacerbates the security problems" and they should "get out some time soon".

He also said that initial planning for the post-war period had been poor.