Rt Hon Dr Liam Fox MP

Secretary of State for Defence

Ministry of Defence
Main Building
Whitehall, London
SW1A 2HB

05 April 2011

Dear Liam,

I am writing to request that you reopen the Strategic Defence and Security Review. There is growing
disquiet that the Review has not survived its first contact with world events.

In the week that the Air Chief Marshall has said that ongoing operations overseas “bring you nearer
the point that you have just about exhausted the bag” and when the MoD plans to remove a further
£1bn from the budget, this situation is becoming increasingly acute.

It is clear that the majority of the defence community believe that events in North Africa and the
Middle East have fundamentally changed the security landscape. No-one foresaw the dawn of the
Arab Spring, but now that it is upon us it is right that the Government considers its implications on
defence policy, and in turn the long-term military capabilities we require, and reopens the Strategic
Defence and Security Review.

The assumptions on which the Review was based now look out of date and it is clear that many of the
capabilities deemed to be unnecessary at the time of the SDSR are central to operational
requirements in Libya.

As you know current operations in Libya are reliant, for example, on HMS Cumberland, which was
due to be decommissioned last week as part of the reduction of frigate numbers.

The Government have extended the life of two Nimrod R1s, despite repeated assurances that the
surveillance capability of the R1s and the now scrapped successor MRA4s could be covered in other
ways.

Operations in Libya have involved Tornado jets, whose fleet is set to be reduced, while there are
reports that there are not enough trained Tornado pilots to replace all of those currently on operations
when the squadron has to rotate.

The decision to scrap Ark Royal and the Harrier fleet means Britain does not have carrier strike
capability for a decade.

Foreign Secretary William Hague has said current events are as significant as September 11th. It is
worth considering how the previous government responded to 9/11. A new chapter was added to the
defence review in 2002. In the first budget after the September 11 th attacks the Government
announced an additional £50 million for domestic security and £950 million for defence.

The Prime Minister said on March 23rd of the SDSR, “if there are further lessons to learn of course we
should learn them”. This was welcome. The Government should learn the lesson from the previous
Governments. Before the end of 1982, as a result of the Falklands Conflict, the Conservatives
reconsidered the Nott Defence Review and restored some of the proposed cuts to the Navy, including
retaining an aircraft carrier and a larger fleet of destroyers and frigates.

In different and specific circumstances those Governments rightly took the decision to think afresh
and came to conclusions that were right for that time. In light of today’s fast-changing world events,
this Government should test the logic of its decisions against the new security landscape.

I know that the Government recognises the severity of the events we are living through, but appears
set on a trajectory designed for another era. The SDSR did not mention Tunisia, Egypt or Libya. I do
not believe that we can achieve this year’s level of foreign and defence policy ambition on last year’s
SDSR assumptions.

It would be the sign of a confident Government today to look again at the Review.

Yours sincerely,

Rt Hon Jim Murphy MP

Shadow Secretary of State for Defence