The head of the British Army has warned that the country has "almost no capacity to react to the unexpected" because of deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan in a leaked memo reported yesterday.
Sir Richard Dannatt added that reinforcements to deal with emergencies were "now almost non-existent," the Daily Telegraph said.
His analysis is the latest high-level warning that Britain's military is feeling the pinch.
In a note to fellow defense leaders, he said that only around 500 troops were available to deal with, for example, a domestic terrorist attack or a deployment overseas at short notice.
"We now have almost no capability to react to the unexpected," Dannatt, the chief of general staff, reportedly wrote.
"The enduring nature and scale of current operations continues to stretch people."
And earlier this month, an influential committee of lawmakers reportedly said that there were "simply not enough" troops to cope with current deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Britain has more than 6,000 troops in Afghanistan, a figure which will rise to 7,700 this year, and around 5,500 in Iraq.
The public accounts committee claimed that the armed forces were 5,850 personnel, or more than 3 percent, below strength.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Defense said that the armed forces were "working hard" but that the current situation was "manageable."
He added that, earlier this week, the government announced that 500 troops were leaving Iraq and others were being pulled out of Northern Ireland and Bosnia-Hercegovina.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS