Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr Hitler?

 

 

 

The Sunday Times reported last weekend that the Labour government’s Strategic Defence Review (SDR), expected to be published in the next few weeks, will carry a recommendation for the establishment of a new Home Guard to guard critical infrastructure in the UK.

Cue much merriment in the media and references to ‘Dad’s Army’, the hugely popular comedy series about the previous Home Guard, established in 1940 in the face of a threatened German invasion of Britain. It was broadcast on BBC1 between 1968-77 and comprised 80 episodes based on the fictional Walmington-on-Sea platoon and its various adventures.

It was almost compulsory viewing back in the day, and resonated with a television audience familiar with the context as they had lived through the Second World War. Who can forget Captain Mainwaring, Private Pike, and Private Fraser (“We’re doomed. Doomed!”) amongst others in the cast. It was certainly a jewel in the BBC’s crown of light entertainment.

So, will any new Home Guard replicate what existed in the 1940s? The answer is not really, and for several treasons.

The first is that the 1940s Home Guard was formed to defend against invasion of the UK, by sea or from the air by parachute troops. Today there is no threat, or indeed risk, of this happening. So trenches and bayonets and pillboxes are unlikely to be relevant in the modern context.

The SDR will reportedly recommend that today’s volunteers might be better employed defending against attacks on important domestic infrastructure like power plants, airports, and telecommunications hubs. Recent events like the fire at the electricity substation which shut down Heathrow airport, or the cutting of undersea internet cables, have shown the vulnerability of such things to disruption, deliberate or otherwise.

And, whilst the possibility of physical attack against such structures cannot be ruled out, the threat is much more likely to take the form of cyber-attack, armed drones, or other ‘grey area’ sub-warfare interference, where the perpetrators might be difficult to identify.

Against that background, then, I would presume that volunteers with backgrounds in IT and electronics, for example, might be more sought for than straightforward foot soldiers. But you never know.

On a more radical note, there could also be a role for the new Home Guard in ceremonial duties. These are currently carried out by the Regular Army, in the form of usually – but not always – the Household Cavalry, King’s Troop of the Royal Horse Artillery (RHA), and the Brigade of Guards in London, and by Balaklava Company of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, 5^th Battalion of the Royal Regiment of Scotland (RRS), north of the Border.

Is the best use of resources at a time when the Army is at its smallest since Napoleonic times and struggling to recruit and retain its soldiers? These troops are, after all, fully-trained combat personnel taken away from their proper duties to partake in pomp and ceremony on frequent occasions. Fabulous spectacle though it undoubtedly is, can we afford the luxury any more?

According to a 2020 study for Forces News it costs roughly £38,100 per trainee who completes basic training. This includes basic training and infantry trade training, with accommodation, training facilities, and ammunition contributing significantly to the overall expense.

Although we have yet to find out the detail of how a Home Guard might be recruited, trained, and otherwise catered for, I suspect the bill will be way lower than that. Should we not therefore let infantry soldiers and others do the main job they are trained for – closing with and killing the enemy – and let the Home Guard take over ceremonial duties, for which non-operational training will presumably suffice in such a role?

The very suggestion will no doubt result in multiple burst blood vessels and much huffing and puffing from the leather armchairs across London clubs, but it is an idea mooted before by others and one which may be worth looking at again.

After all, the main security duties are carried out by the police in London and elsewhere, and the ability to charge and bayonet a foe is probably not appropriate for Horse Guards Parade or Buckingham Palace. Let the Home Guard take over, I say, and release the present incumbents to bolster our much-weakened field Army. I’m sure it will be grateful to be relieved of a non-core tasking.

The old and bold, of which I am one, will probably hate the idea, but let’s not dismiss it out of hand. The Home Guard might actually be quite good at it!

 

Lt Col Stuart Crawford is a defence analyst and former army officer. Sign up for his podcasts and newsletters at www.DefenceReview.uk

 

 

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