THE defence review will send a ‘message to Moscow’ about Britain’s ‘readiness to fight if required’, Defence Secretary John Healey has told the BBC.
Ripping up any suggestion that his concern was for the future of the British and world working class, the Labour militarist announced that his Labour government would be spending £1.5bn on at least six new ‘defence factories’, producing nuclear material, to be used against the working people of the world, beginning with the workers of Russia and China.
Healey’s strategic defence review, to be published today, is set to conclude that the UK ruling class faces a ‘new era of threat’ and will warn of the ‘immediate and pressing’ danger posed by Russia and other countries, including China.
For Healey and the Labour government, the enemy is not at home and it is not the ruling class that has so ruthlessly exploited the workers of the world for generations – the enemy is the working class.
Healey told ‘Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg’, his review would set out ‘big new investments in our national security’ and send a strong signal to hostile states.
The Conservatives said they welcomed investment in new munitions but shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge called for ‘greater ambition for the pace and scale of rearmament our armed forces require’ – they are racing towards the Third World War!
On his visit to a factory in Stevenage, where Storm Shadow missiles are assembled, Healey said the government would support the procurement up to 7,000 UK-built long-range weapons. He added that new funding will see UK munitions spending hit £6bn during this Parliament, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said.
The elderly and the sick are to face savage cuts so that Labour can play its part in the Third Imperialist World War.
Healey boasted to the the BBC: ‘Six billion over the next five years in factories like this, which allow us not just to produce the munitions that equip our forces for the future but to create the jobs in every part of the UK – 1,800 new jobs in every nation of the United Kingdom.’ It is to be back to the empire with jobs available through the most brutal exploitation of the working class.
He added for good measure: ‘This is a message to Moscow as well. This is Britain standing behind making our Armed Forces stronger but making our industrial base stronger, and this is part of our readiness to fight if required, but the strength in which to deter those fights in the future.’
As part of its defence review, the Labour government has said it will build new factories to make key munitions and explosives to have an ‘always on’ munitions production capacity that could be scaled up quickly for its military interventions.
Long-range weapons including drones and missiles will be procured over several years at the expense of workers wages and a slashing of pensions no doubt.
Labour Ministers however insisted the extra investment – which came after Healey said that UK defence spending would rise to 3% of GDP by 2034 at the latest – would strengthen the armed forces and boost British jobs.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves said: ‘A strong economy needs a strong national defence, and investing in weaponry and munitions and backing nearly 2,000 jobs across Britain in doing so is proof the two go hand-in-hand.
‘We are delivering both security for working people in an uncertain world and good jobs, putting more money in people’s pockets.’
In a statement, Healey said the UK’s defence industry would become an ‘engine for economic growth’ and ‘boost skilled jobs in every nation and region’, as British imperialism fights for its life against the workers of the world.
‘We are strengthening the UK’s industrial base to better deter our adversaries and make the UK secure at home and strong abroad.’ They are trying to recreate British imperialism out of the ashes of the old.
What the Labourites don’t say is that their militarism will be used to conscript tens of thousands of working class youth who will resist a return of the ‘call-up’ tooth and nail! Youth are determined not to fight and die for the bankrupt British imperialists.
The former head of the British Army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, has already been calling for the UK to boost weapons production.
UK workers and youth will decline to become the cannon fodder for a new generation of would be imperialists.
Youth must join the Young Socialists, the youth movement of the Workers Revolutionary Party which is determined to play a leading role in the dumping of the British ruling class into the dustbin of history through the victory of the British socialist revolution!
