I’ve been hesitant to approach this subject, as there is so much to discuss and a real risk of being incoherent. But I think given the actions by the Trump administration, nearly 10 years since Brexit, and China’s actions under Xi, we all need to be thinking much more deeply about what the UK’s foreign policy goals are, and what our core beliefs are.
I should probably start with one of my core assumptions.
I consider the UK to be a medium-sized power. I define this as being significant, but not singlehandedly dominant across the three key areas: military, economics, and technological superiority. The UK, on any of these metrics, is clearly above the vast majority of nations, but in turn would never be a match for the USA or China.
As a medium-sized power, we are in a difficult position because we are large enough to attract direct attention from the great powers, but not strong enough to resist impositions unilaterally. Dealing with this will require strategic nimbleness and humility.
The UK’s post-Cold War strategy rested on three pillars: US security guarantees, EU economic integration, and engagement with China. Each pillar has weakened or collapsed, forcing Britain to rethink its position as a medium-sized power.
The Old Worldview
The fundamental worldview of the UK pre 2016 was loosely as follows:
- The USA was our closest security and intelligence partner. We advocated for a strong NATO and generally believed in aligning ourselves with the USA for “influence” and preferential military technology access.
- The EU functioned as our economic global power amplifier. By remaining in the EU but distinct with no euro and less financial regulation, we could have the best of all worlds.
- China was the rising power that we would assiduously cultivate to form a new, deep relationship. They would handle the supply chains, and we would focus on services and finance in particular.
These fundamental tenets have been broken and shown to be much more fragile than we had assumed.
Why the settlement broke
The United States
The US is looking far less attractive than it did pre-2016, and not just because of President Trump. Firstly, consider its fundamental position. The United States rebuilt the world order after 1945. This relied on the USA consumer which worked when rising powers were Germany (under US military oversight in NATO), South Korea (military alliance and bases), and most significantly Japan (alliance and bases).
This fell apart with the re-emergence of China, a whole new industrial giant. The US has much less leverage here, with its military dominance for the first time contested, particularly around Taiwan, and much less economic domination (or at least not without significant blowback). Deindustrialising the USA in favour of a geopolitical adversary makes the current economic regime untenable, and both domestic parties agree that China is now the biggest threat the USA has faced. Given this, it’s unsurprising that the US has pivoted from European security to focusing on Asia. Europe and the UK are going to have to relearn the art of geopolitics.
Trump has consistently made it clear that the old order in which the USA acts as Europe’s guarantor is over, and Europe has to make security much more of a priority. The likelihood of a future President choosing Europe is small and should not be relied upon.
Europe and the European Union
I’d just note that I’ve touched on this in other blogposts, so feel free to check those for slightly more detail. To briefly recap, in hindsight, we were always likely to leave the EU given our history and our inability and indeed refusal to reconcile the EU’s nature with our own objectives. British politicians, from Thatcher to Blair, did not understand the EU. While I would contend that it did amplify our economic power, politically, it was inherently unstable in UK politics and thus not a sustainable long-term solution.
Even though a majority of British people think Brexit was a mistake, the polling is clear that there is no desire to reopen this issue. Voters prefer British politicians writing British laws rather than a foreign body such as the European Parliament. Furthermore, why would the EU want to reopen this issue, given our 50/50 divide on it and the fact that it has spent years dealing with it?
The EU is also attempting to slowly federalise in response to the actions by the Trump administration and Russia, but with inevitable gaps and shortcomings. But the EU that exists today is certainly not the one that we voted to leave in 2016, and must be treated as such.
China
China has massively whipsawed in our foreign policy, from the post-Cold War heyday of integration and the Western order being clearly superior, to the “Golden Age”, and to now, with the term “Systematic Rivalry”.
It was not an entirely terrible strategy – it stood to reason that China would re-emerge into its historical role as the world’s manufacturing hub and superpower, and this required some engagement. However, there were clearly several key issues that were either not appreciated or understood enough:
Firstly, the Chinese Communist Party’s fundamental ideology was not understood, or wilfully ignored. The UK (along with most of the West) thought that integrating China into the world economy, particularly through the World Trade Organisation, would lead to political liberalisation. In reality, there was no such change, and the UK has moved its supply chains to a hostile power.
This problem worsened under Xi Jinping, and the Coalition Government and the Cameron government chose to ignore it. Again, take the CCP under Xi at their word. They are a Leninist party, not a technocratic elite. They see the economy, defence, and foreign relations as one package, and one cannot be separated from the other.
Actions such as Made in China 2025 and other struggle speeches indicate its intent to establish hegemonic status in its near local areas. China has increasingly challenged the post-WWII order, which we benefited from. It also seeks reunification with Taiwan, which is a critical chokepoint for semiconductors, and China will not hesitate to use these in any dispute, as it has with its own market, rare earths, and other areas. We have seen this being used time and time again by the CCP.
Our strategic reality
These have all made British power and foreign policy significantly more uncertain. The USA is dedicated towards dealing with China, and is much less willing to underwrite European security. The European Union is continuing to evolve in ways that can lead to conflict with British interests. Finally, China has emerged as a major strategic rival and one which controls our production capacity.
We have also seen in our political class an over-reliance on international law, believing that it was a real entity in its own right and capable of constraining other powers. In reality, it has been, and will always be, a reflection of power (economic or military), and it is only able to impose itself in two scenarios: 1) it is in both parties interests to do, e.g. patent claims between similarly developed countries, and 2) it is enforced with some kind of coercive force by a stronger power. The UK contributed to this in Iraq, Kosovo, and elsewhere. In the modern world, particularly since the end of the Cold War, international law should broadly have been considered another phrase for US military might. We need to relearn the lesson that international law is a byproduct of power.
What is the UK to do
Firstly, we must turn to fundamentals. We are an island nation in the North Atlantic, close to Europe, with a handful of key assets worldwide. Ergo, number one is a strong navy and air force, with potentially a rebuild in our merchant navy as well. The reduction in our naval size is a significant concern, leaving us exceptionally vulnerable. It also leaves us bereft of the ability to project power around the world, which we increasingly forget can mean the difference between confronting a threat at home or dealing with it abroad. N.A.M Rodger’s A History of the Royal Navy is illustrative in this regard. There was a societal-wide effort to build the navy’s power, and it was not just an arm of the government.
Military
We also need to urgently review and overhaul our procurement strategy for the military. The Centre for British Progress had an excellent report, which I’ll just emphasise, notes that only two MoD projects out of 49 are on track to be on time and on budget. We have to move our procurement strategy to war footing – an emphasis on simple, ready solutions that only consider their military effectiveness, rather than any wider social issues. The best is what you have in the field, not what it is dreamed up by a contractor. The usual 10 year view of likely threats needs to be inverted from trying to predict the next competitor, and instead be how quickly the UK can mobilise resources into military assets.
Furthermore, we should be intensively studying and leveraging the Ukrainian experience against Russia, in particular with their drone combat and manufacturing. We should absolutely be incentivising them to build drone factories over here, and educating our forces on how to integrate drones with infantry. We should also note that, despite how effective our artillery has been, it is limited by production – there should be an immediate focus on expanding supplies and an emphasis on quantity as much as quality. This fight is probably a good comparison to the Spanish Civil War, before WWII began. This is possibly our last window to prepare.
Economic
Our economy is dependent on imports, from food to energy. As an island, we need to maintain shipping lanes (ergo a strong navy, with the capacity to impose force) and a wide range of suppliers. So we require trade deals with energy suppliers globally and a wider variety of energy sources. We already have dependencies on Norway, the USA, and the Middle East. We should be expanding the energy supply domestically, but an interesting area for us is the Falkland Islands, with largely untapped reserves. We should be massively incentivising production here, encouraging economic growth for a dependency, and securing a domestic supply resource. Though this will take significant time, it should be started now to unlock a strong strategic resource. South America is an area the UK should cultivate, with Guyana another interesting region.
We also benefit from selling goods and services to nations with similar GDP per capita and legal structures. So naturally, this includes the USA, the EU, and other key nations like Australia, Canada, and the Middle East to some extent. Note that this does not include China, given the differences in legal structure and the aim of substituting Western goods with their own. So China should not be a priority for our trade teams, and energy on cultivating a relationship should be limited.
Europe and the European Union
Our relationship with the EU has transformed, and we are struggling to adapt. We need to recognise that we are now in competition with the EU in certain areas, and act accordingly, even though we are also still close allies. We need to be willing to utilise our key assets, defence, intelligence, and our consumer demand in our negotiations where possible, but accept that this can only go so far.
We should increasingly be targeting EU industries and sectors for relocation to the UK. An obvious area would be going further and faster with undoing net zero and carbon pricing to capture EU industrial giants. Another area would be reforming our capital markets, such as removing stamp duty tax, listing requirements, and preferential tax treatment to attract European companies to list here.
An area where Britain still has some advantages (for now) is defence and intelligence, particularly with the Baltic states due to their proximity to Russia. We should be leaning on them for support within the EU for agreements with the UK where possible, and smoothing opposition to us. But this requires us to be willing to withdraw or reduce forces if it is clear that the Baltic states are not interested. This will lead to a reduction of influence, but a recognition that we are serious about our interests again. There will be sharper trade-offs and diplomatic uproar as a consequence. It will require a shared sense of UK purpose and obligations, both to our allies and friends, as well as reciprocal behaviour.
We can offer ourselves as a relatively neutral party by leveraging our advantages to build military partnerships with European allies, with special emphasis on Poland and Germany, given their need to arm (and rearm), and a need for an alternative to the USA and France.
The United States
Our military dependence on the USA seriously needs to be rethought. Our view of close dependency and alliance equalling influence is a mirage, and unfortunately for us, the French have it right. Independence is key, even with technological limitations that we would inevitably have as a much smaller economy and power. Again, we cannot have it all, so we must choose accordingly. Our interests require a strong navy and air fleet, with relatively limited armies and an emphasis on special forces. If this coincides with American interests, great, but we should not put their interests ahead of our own.
We also should recognise that the USA remains by far the more attractive option between the two superpowers, and reflect this in our policy accordingly. We need to avoid deluding ourselves by calling it the “Special Relationship”, but we do have a key relationship in intelligence that can continue to be deepened.
China
In terms of China, we are in a difficult situation. Our supply chains are tightly bound up, and it will take years, probably decades, to move our most critical chains. However, we do have some options. We should mandate that China build manufacturing capacity in the mainland UK to access our domestic market, and be willing to limit this if they refuse to cooperate. We also need to take a much harder stance towards Chinese attempts to buy influence in the UK, including throughout Parliament and our Universities. It should be designated as a threat, or at least much stricter than the current ambiguity.
Our relations with mid-sized powers in China’s region, notably Japan and South Korea, should be strengthened where possible, such as in defence and manufacturing capacity. Intelligence, including non-military (e.g. pandemic awareness), should also be strengthened here.
We also have to be exceptionally careful to avoid being forced into uncomfortable stances by the USA in its approach to China. To some extent, this is inevitable given our relative position. However, we should designate areas of red lines that we will not cross. An example could be allowing our domestic market to be used by Chinese car makers (under the proviso that they build capacity here), as this would benefit our own domestic capabilities as well.
Conclusion
The UK is in a difficult situation, but ultimately it still has a lot of control over its own destiny. What has changed is that our fundamental tenets are gone, and the political class are still struggling to come to terms with what this means. Hopefully, in this post, I’ve given a framework for what our next moves should be. We will need agility, humility, and a willingness to accept difficult trade-offs. Some of these goals will require sustained investment over decades for payoff, which will require some degree of political unity, which is difficult to imagine in the present circumstances. Furthermore, our foreign policy will be built on our domestic success or failure. We should be interlinking the domestic and international spheres together to drive home the message to British voters that the world has changed.
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