The UK is “really unprepared” to fight a war and has been living on a “mirage” of military strength that was shocking to discover, interviews with almost every defence secretary since the end of the Cold War have revealed.

With Sir Keir Starmer under pressure to accelerate plans to reverse the decline, two new episodes of Sky News and Tortoise’s podcast series The Wargame uncover what happened behind the scenes as Britain switched funding away from warfare and into peacetime priorities such as health and welfare after the Soviet Union collapsed.

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This decades-long saga, spanning multiple Labour, Conservative and coalition governments, includes heated rows between the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the Treasury, threats to resign, and dire warnings of weakness.

It also exposes a failure by the military and civil service to spend Britain’s still-significant defence budget effectively, further compounding the erosion of fighting power.

‘Russia knew’ about UK’s weaknesses

Now, with the threat from Russia returning, there is a concern the UK has been left to bluff about its ability to respond, rather than pivot decisively back to a war footing.

“We’ve been living on a sort of mirage for so long,” says Sir Ben Wallace, a Conservative defence secretary from 2019 until 2023.

“As long as Trooping the Colour was happening, and the Red Arrows flew, and prime ministers could pose at NATO, everything was fine.

“But it wasn’t fine. And the people who knew it wasn’t fine were actually the Americans, but also the Russians.”

Not enough troops, medics, or ammo

Lord George Robertson, a Labour defence secretary from 1997 to 1999 and the lead author of a major defence review this year, says when he most recently “lifted the bonnet” to look at the state of the Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force, he found “we were really unprepared”.

“We don’t have enough ammunition, we don’t have enough logistics, we don’t have enough trained soldiers, the training is not right, and we don’t have enough medics to take the casualties that would be involved in a full-scale war.”

Asked if the situation was worse than he had imagined, Lord Robertson says: “Much worse.”

‘I was shocked,’ says ex-defence secretary

Sir Gavin Williamson, a former Conservative defence secretary, says he too had been “quite shocked as to how thin things were” when he was in charge at the MoD between 2017 and 2019.

“There was this sort of sense of: ‘Oh, the MoD is always good for a billion [pounds] from Treasury – you can always take a billion out of the MoD and nothing will really change.’

“And maybe that had been the case in the past, but the cupboards were really bare.

“You were just taking the cupboards.”

But Lord Philip Hammond, a Conservative defence secretary from 2011 to 2014 and chancellor from 2016 until 2019, appears less sympathetic to the cries for increased cash.

“Gavin Williamson came in [to the Ministry of Defence], the military polished up their bleeding stumps as best they could and convinced him that the UK’s defence capability was about to collapse,” he says.

“He came scuttling across the road to Downing Street to say, I need billions of pounds more money… To be honest, I didn’t think that he had sufficiently interrogated the military begging bowls that had been presented to him.”

What to expect from The Wargame’s return

Episodes one to five of The Wargame simulate a Russian attack on the UK and imagine what might happen, with former politicians and military chiefs back in the hot seat.

The drama reveals how vulnerable the country has really become to an attack on the home front.

The two new episodes seek to find out why.

The story of the UK’s hollowed-out defences starts in a different era when an Iron Curtain divided Europe, Ronald Reagan was president of the US, and an Iron Lady was in power in Britain.

Sir Malcolm Rifkind, who went on to serve as defence secretary between 1992 and 1995 under John Major, recalls his time as minister for state at the Foreign Office in 1984.

In December of that year, then prime minister Margaret Thatcher agreed to host a relatively unknown member of the Soviet Communist Party Politburo called Mikhail Gorbachev, who subsequently became the last leader of the Soviet Union.

Sir Malcolm remembers how Mrs Thatcher emerged from the meeting to say: “I think Mr Gorbachev is a man with whom we can do business.”

It was an opinion she shared with her close ally, the US president.

Sir Malcolm says: “Reagan would have said, ‘I’m not going to speak to some unknown communist in the Politburo’. But if the Iron Lady, who Reagan thought very highly of, says he’s worth talking to, he must be worth it. We’d better get in touch with this guy. Which they did.

“And I’m oversimplifying it, but that led to the Cold War ending without a shot being fired.”

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In the years that followed, the UK and  much of the rest of Europe reaped a so-called peace dividend, cutting defence budgets, shrinking militaries and reducing wider readiness for war.

Into this different era stepped Tony Blair as Labour’s first post-Cold War prime minister, with Lord Robertson as his defence secretary.

Lord Robertson reveals the threat he and his ministerial team secretly made to protect their budget from then chancellor Gordon Brown amid a sweeping review of defence, which was meant to be shaped by foreign policy, not financial envelopes.

“I don’t think I’ve ever said this in public before, but John Reid, who was the minister for the Armed Forces, and John Speller, who was one of the junior ministers in the department, the three of us went to see Tony Blair late at night – he was wearing a tracksuit, we always remember – and we said that if the money was taken out of our budget, the budget that was based on the foreign policy baseline, then we would have to resign,” Lord Robertson says.

“We obviously didn’t resign – but we kept the money.”

The podcast hears from three other Labour defence secretaries: Geoff Hoon, Lord John Hutton and the current incumbent, John Healey.

For the Conservatives, as well as Rifkind, Hammond, Williamson and Wallace, there are interviews with Liam Fox, Sir Michael Fallon, Dame Penny Mordaunt and Sir Grant Shapps.

In addition, military commanders have their say, with recollections from Field Marshal Lord David Richards, who was chief of the defence staff from 2010 until 2013, General Sir Nick Carter, who led the armed forces from 2018 until 2021, and Vice Admiral Sir Nick Hine, who was second in charge of the navy from 2019 until 2022.

‘We cut too far’

At one point, Sir Grant, who held a variety of cabinet roles, including defence secretary, is asked whether he regrets the decisions the Conservative government took when in power.

He says: “Yes, I think it did cut defence too far. I mean, I’ll just be completely black and white about it.”

Lord Robertson says Labour too shares some responsibility: “Everyone took the peace dividend right through.”

“Systematic failures” led to the Chinese spy case collapsing – and there’s a risk they could be repeated, a parliamentary inquiry has said.

A report by the Joint Committee on the National Security Strategy (JCNSS) criticised the government and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) after the case against two British men accused of spying for China collapsed.

Former parliamentary researcher Christopher Cash and teacher Christopher Berry were accused of passing secrets to Beijing between 2021 and 2023. They deny the allegations.

The charges were dropped in September as the CPS said it could not get evidence from the government referring to China as a national security threat, prompting accusations of a “cover-up” by the Conservatives.

The report by the cross-party group of MPS and peers said the case was beset by “confusion and misaligned expectations” and cautioned against dismissing the case as a “one-off” caused by outdated espionage laws – something the government blamed for the case’s collapse.

‘Serious systemic failures’

The committee – which launched a highly unusual investigation following the controversy – warned there are parallels in new legislation which must be handled carefully to prevent a similar issue from recurring.

But while “the sequence of some events has raised eyebrows”, it found no evidence of deliberate or co-ordinated attempts to block or collapse the prosecution – including by the prime minister’s national security adviser Jonathan Powell, who met with officials about the case two days before it was dropped.

However, the committee added: “Overall it is clear that there were serious systemic failures and deficiencies in communications, co-ordination and decision-making.”

It described communications between the government and CPS as “inadequate” and lacking clarity, with an “insufficiently robust” level of senior oversight right from the start of proceedings in 2023 under the Tories.

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Not enough ‘common sense’?

A statement by deputy national security adviser (DNSA) Matt Collins became the focus after the case’s collapse.

Prosecutors said his refusal to describe Beijing as a “threat” to national security meant the case could not continue.

Mr Collins, the central expert prosecution witness, told the investigation he had provided evidence of a “range of threats” posed by China, but did not describe it as a “generic” threat as that was not the then Tory government’s position.

The committee acknowledged the CPS’s assertion it would have undermined the case at trial if Mr Collins refused to describe China as an active threat, but suggested his statements taken together would have been sufficient.

“We regret that common sense interpretations of the wording provided in the DNSA’s witness statements were apparently not a sufficiently strong basis for meeting the evidential requirements the Crown Prosecution Service considered necessary under the Official Secrets Act 1911,” it said.

It accepted the “root cause” of the problems lay with the Official Secrets Act, which required the term “enemy” to be used of a foreign power, but warned the new National Security Act 2023 doesn’t eliminate “diplomatic sensitivities” around labelling people members of a foreign intelligence service.

The committee recommends:

• The Cabinet Office and security services to work with the CPS to formalise principles for handling sensitive cases within the next six months

• Establishing a new rule for a formal case “conference” within 30 days of such charges to avoid a “lack of clarity” over evidence in future.

“We urge the government to avoid characterising the failure of the Cash/Berry case as a one-off peculiarity created solely by outdated legislation: there are structural parallels in the National Security Act 2023 which will require careful handling to avoid comparable issues recurring,” the committee said.

A CPS spokesperson said: “We recognise the strong interest in this case. We will review the recommendations carefully and work with partners to identify where improvements can be made.

“Our decisions are made independently and based on law and evidence, and that principle remains at the heart of our work.”

A government spokesperson said: “We welcome the committee’s report that makes clear that allegations about interference in this case were baseless and untrue.

“The decision to drop the case was taken independently by the Crown Prosecution Service. We remain disappointed that this case did not reach trial.

“Protecting national security is our first duty, and we will never waver from our efforts to keep the British people safe.”

Prediction market odds on Kevin Hasset becoming the next chair of the US Federal Reserve spiked after US President Donald Trump appeared to hint at who he has in mind during a White House event. 

Speaking at the White House on Tuesday, Trump introduced guests, welcoming Hassett as a “potential Fed chair.” 

“It’s a great group, and I guess a potential Fed chair is here too,” he said. “I don’t know, are we allowed to say that, potential? He’s a respected person, that I can tell you. Thank you, Kevin.”

It was only during a cabinet meeting earlier in the day that Trump reportedly said they had already whittled the race down to one person. 

“I think we probably looked at 10 and we have it down to one,” he said.

The odds on blockchain-based prediction market Kalshi for Hassett to be nominated as chairman of the Fed rose to 85% following Trump’s comments, from around 66%. On Polymarket, the odds followed a similar pattern. 

Kevin Hassett is the director of the government’s National Economic Council, having taken the role in January 2025 after being selected by Trump. 

Regarded as crypto-friendly with a $1 million stake in Coinbase and having overseen the digital asset working group, Hassett is one of many candidates being explored for the leadership of the Fed, with Jerome Powell’s term set to end in May 2026.

Trump has had a tense relationship with Powell since taking office.

In late November, Trump said, “I’d love to fire his ass … grossly incompetent.” 

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has been tasked with leading the search for the next Fed chair. In terms of what the government is looking for, last month, Bessent said the government was looking for a leader who could guide the Fed more quietly behind the scenes.

“I think it’s time for the Fed just to move back into the background, like it used to do, calm things down and work for the American people,” he said.