BFBS Radio Sitrep

Boris Johnson has called for the UK to bring back National Service. Sweden did just that seven years ago to solve its military recruitment crisis, and Germany’s looking at the idea.

Sitrep talks to Swedish defence expert Elisabeth Braw and former Welsh Guards officer Nicholas Drummond about whether it’s the answer for the UK’s depleted Armed Forces.

Iran’s ‘axis of resistance’ has carried out regular strikes against US forces in the middle east for months now. Sitrep explains who these militias are, and why Iran is helping them.

And as President Putin visits the small isolated Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, Mark Galeotti explains why some think it could be the place where war with NATO begins.

Strategic command, like the three single services, is deemed important enough to our defence to merit its own Chief of Staff.

General Sir James Hockenhull tells Sitrep about the organisation that he leads and its mission to help the Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force be the best they can be.

From medical services to digital networks, cyber to intelligence, Strategic Command provides joint capabilities for all of the services, and is also tasked with developing new ones.

General Hockenhull talks to Sian Grzeszczyk about briefing the Prime Minister at the moment war began in Ukraine, why he sees himself as an accidental general, and why he chose not to apply for the very top job in Britain’s armed forces.

Tens of thousands of people around the world have seen the moment one Royal Navy minehunter reversed into another in Bahrain, doing millions of pounds worth of damage.

Former Royal Navy Commodore Alistair Halliday talks us through the range of technical and human factors which could explain why HMS Chiddingfold went backwards instead of ahead.

The Chief of General Staff wants the UK to train up a “citizen army” to be ready for war. Mike explains why this doesn’t have to mean conscription, and former Conservative leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith gives us his reaction.

And are killer robots an inevitability in the future of war? Someone who’s helped shape UK policy on autonomous weapons tells us why he’s written a novel to warn about the risks of science-fiction becoming lethal-fact.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith has been a Conservative MP for more than 30 years, and led his party from 2001 to 2003.

In parliament he’s a vocal contributor on defence, security, and international issues. 

His criticism of China’s government is so vocal the country has placed sanctions against him and his family.

He tells Sitrep why he believes China is a threat to the UK, not just a ‘challenge’ as it is officially deemed, how his military service shaped his political ambitions, and whether he’d join the “too small” armed forces of today.

The Defence Secretary warns of tough times ahead...we look at those warnings but also hear from another of Britain’s most senior military chiefs who has a more hopeful message. The Head of Stratcom rarely speaks to the media, but we hear his take on the state of the world.

Also on Sitrep Is diplomacy still a thing? Does it achieve anything? We speak to a former Army Officer who’s worked as a defence attaché representing the UK in 25 countries.

And what do the Houthis actually have in their arsenal?....plenty, according to an expert on the group that’s still causing chaos in the Red Sea.

The First Sea Lord has been asked for a plan to “take forward” the work of the Royal Marines, as ministers effectively confirm they’re again reconsidering the future of the corps’ two amphibious assault ships.

Professor Michael Clarke explains what’s going on, and former Royal Marines Commandant General, Major General Buster Howes, tells Sitrep the Defence Secretary needs to think “very very carefully”.

The Defence Secretary tells the world “watch this space” for possible reprisal strikes against Houthis firing missiles at the Red Sea. British Sailors are already on constant watch there, and former Royal Navy commander Tom Sharpe explains what they experience when missiles and drones are incoming.

And how do you learn to command a multi-million pound military craft in an environment less explored than space? Ryan Ramsay who used to lead the Royal Navy’s submarine command course shares stories of near misses, pushing people beyond their limits, and how he’s turned it all into life lessons for a new book.

Under the sea, in charge of a multi-million pound boat, and the safety of your crew, there is a lot that can go very wrong.

Ryan Ramsay has lived it all, then trained his successors both in how to avoid those disasters, and to cope if they do strike.

In his new book ‘A View From Below’ he shares the inside story how submarine captains are trained, the impossible scenarios they’re faced with in a real sub, and stories of simulated emergency suddenly becoming the real thing.

He tells Kate Gerbeau why he turned those experiences into life-lessons that we can all use, what he learned from his most perilous moment in command of HMS Turbulent, and whether any of it helps him on the football pitch while refereeing.

Could more British troops be sent to Eastern Europe, or as peacekeepers in the Middle East? Will Donald Trump return to the White House, and would it guarantee defeat for Ukraine? And where in the world might the next war break out?

Kate Gerbeau and Professor Michael Clarke take on the big questions about what’s in store for our defence and security in 2024.

They hear from the UK’s top military officers, Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, General Sir Patrick Sanders, Admiral Sir Ben Key and Air Chief Marshal Sir Rich Knighton, who tell us what they’ll be working on in 2024.

And some of Sitrep’s expert guests from the last year share their thoughts to help explain what might happen in the next 12 months.

The Defence Secretary has called the Army’s ban on beards for most soldiers “ridiculous and outdated”, as the Chief of General Staff reviews the rules.

Kate and Mike are joined by former Chief of Defence People, Lieutenant General James Swift, to discuss whether facial hair really matters to recruitment, discipline and operational effectiveness.

The next head of the Army has been named as General Sir Roly Walker, so Sitrep takes a look through his CV to see what experience he brings, and explains the challenges he’s taking on.

And we go into The Valley of Death with the Welsh Cavalry, on a unique desert exercise where unseen controllers keep changing the game to push troops to their very limits.

HMS Diamond has been sent to the Red Sea after missile and drone attacks against British owned cargo vessels, and RAF spy-planes have been deployed to search for hostages held in Gaza.

Professor Michael Clarke and former Royal Navy commander Tom Sharpe explain what these assets and personnel can achieve, the limitations & risks of their missions, and the possibility of more UK military capability joining them.

Sitrep also looks at another big deployment much closer to home, a new Royal Navy task group trying to protect critical undersea power and data cables, alongside European allies.

And does military history repeat itself, or just rhyme? Kate talks to military historian Lucy Betteridge-Dyson, General Sir Mike Jackson and General Lord Richards about how the study of past conflicts shapes the wars of today.

Sitrep’s Simon Newton has just returned from Ukraine - he reports for Sitrep from a drone testing centre where new models are trialled before being used in combat.

Sitrep also hears from the former Champion Boxer, and now Mayor of Kiev, Vitali Klitschko, on his country’s will to resist.

Also on Sitrep, as tensions remain high in the Middle East, Britain deploys a Type 45 Destroyer HMS Diamond to the Gulf and America sends the USS Eisenhower through the Strait of Hormuz. 

Sitrep looks at how Aircraft carriers are used to deploy both hard and soft power and hears from the Commanding Officer of the UK’s biggest warship HMS Prince of Wales.

As winter sweeps across Ukraine the ideal window for its counter-offensive is now closed, with seemingly minimal gains from five months of hard fighting.

 So what happens next? Sitrep assesses whether Ukraine has another chance for a significant fightback next year, and if so how it could do that.

Professor Michael Clarke, Ukrainian researcher Mariia Zolkina, and former infantry officer Ed Arnold discuss the military options, and we hear from Kyiv about the mood there.

And we get an insight into one of Britain’s newest military units, the National Cyber Force, from Lieutenant General Tom Copinger-Symes who oversees their defensive and offensive operations.

Cyber-warfare was is no longer simply science-fiction, it is now a military fact that hits hard.

 Military communications, power systems and nuclear processing plants have all been taken offline in recent years by purely digital attacks.

 The UK’s capability for this domain sits in the National Cyber Force, created three years ago as part of Strategic Command, bringing together military and intelligence teams for both defensive and offensive cyber operations.

 Kate Gerbeau talks to Lieutenant General Tom Copinger-Symes, the Deputy Commander of Stratcom, about the cyber threats the UK faces and how the force is tackling them.

The Army’s future is built around the new Ajax armoured fighting vehicle. After years of delays, faults, and even injuries to troops, ministers say the Ajax programme is now ‘in recovery’.

We take a look for ourselves, from the production line to training on Salisbury plain and hear from soldiers using the first of the vehicles.

Another cold-war treaty has collapsed. It aimed to prevent surprise attacks by limiting Russia and NATO’s options for massing their military might. We assess whether NATO will take advantage of the extra flexibility it’s just got.

Plus the British Army’s former top legal adviser in Iraq talks us through the laws of war, and how the big questions he faced in Basra 20 years ago are mirrored in Gaza right now.

Every single country in the UN is signed up to the same laws of war, but Israel’s military campaign in Gaza is reminding us interpretations of those laws often differ.

In this extra Sitrep podcast Kate Gerbeau talks to Rev. Nicholas Mercer, who was the British Army’s top legal adviser in Iraq 20 years ago.

He explains the key principles that govern the legality of military action, how he applied them in the midst of battle, and how the Israel Gaza war mirrors many of the difficult decisions he faced in Basra.

He’s been called a strategic and tactical genius – but he also abandoned tens of thousands of his soldiers to their deaths.

Sitrep goes behind the Hollywood gloss of the new Napoleon film to assess his true military legacy, and Professor Michael Clarke explains how Napoleonic innovations are still used in wars today.

Japan is on a massive military spending spree aiming to become the worlds 3^rd largest military budget. We assess what military capability it has, and what it needs to face down China and North Korea.

Ukraine’s Commander in Chief has declared the war in his country at stalemate. But why, and what does it tell us about tensions at the top in Kyiv. Simon Newton explains all.

Japan is one of the world’s third biggest economic power, but until now its military power has come nowhere close to matching that.

That’s changing though, with a 5-year defence-spending spree to include new counter-strike capabilities which will enable Japan to fire on enemy land for the first time since World War Two.

Kate Gerbeau talks to the author of ‘Japan as a Global Military Power’, Dr Chris Hughes, about how capable Japan’s forces already are, what the extra spending will add, and why Britain is key to Tokyo’s plan for greater military might.

Russia is planning a new naval base in territory it occupies on Georgia’s Black Sea coast, because of Ukraine’s strikes against Russian ships near Crimea.

Sitrep hears from the Georgian capital about worries it could make their country a target for Ukraine.

Professor Michael Clarke and Simon Newton share their assessments, and examine how we can improve ammunition supplies to Ukrainian forces who are having to weigh individual artillery shells at the front line, because ‘standard’ doesn’t mean quite what you think.

And we explain why a new study says training for servicemen and women needs to be less industrial, and more democratic.

Israel’s mission to destroy Hamas has some parallels with the battle to liberate Mosul from the Islamic State terror group – tens of thousands of fighters among a densely packed population of around two-million citizens.

Major General Rupert Jones, who was deputy commander of the anti-IS coalition, shares the lessons from Mosul, and Professor Michael Clarke assesses how they do, or don’t, apply in Gaza.

The RAF’s next generation of drone, Protector, has arrived in Britain for the first time. We’ll explain what it can do.

And as Robert Courts MP becomes the new chair of the Commons Defence Committee, we ask one of his predecessors whether the group can make a difference, or are just a talking shop. 

British ships, planes, and personnel have been sent to Mediterranean, tasked with waiting and watching as war rages between Israel and Gaza.

Professor Michael Clarke explains how they could be used, to stop weapons smuggling and gather intelligence, with the aim of preventing a wildfire spread of the conflict.

Sitrep hears first-hand about the challenges facing Ukraine’s troops as they continue to fight back against Russia, including how some artillery commanders are now limited to just five shells per week.

And General David Petraeus, arguably the most significant military commander of the 21^st century so far, shares some very personal lessons on the evolution of warfare.