Professor of Strategic Studies, Defence Studies Department, King's College London at the Joint Services Command and Staff College
Joined May 2015
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Tim Benbow retweeted
Churchill could have shortened WW2 by years if he had just “done a deal” with Hitler. George Washington could have done a deal to end the American Revolution. Zelenskyy is in good company.
Tim Benbow retweeted
There are still plenty of people who think the likes of me are exaggerating the extent to which woke ideology has infiltrated our governing classes and cultural institutions. But that’s because they’re simply not paying enough attention.
Take the National Poet of Wales. You might imagine the position would be occupied by someone called Dafydd Jones or Rhys Williams. But no. The current holder is Hanan Issa, a Welsh-Iraqi poet who became the first Muslim to hold the title in 2022. A milestone of enormous significance, naturally, to the identity-politics and diversity brigade.
Last week, she was supposed to read a specially commissioned poem in front of the King and Queen at the ceremonial opening of the Senedd in Cardiff.
But there was a problem. Her poem was rejected.
Why? Because instead of writing something appropriately apolitical for a historic ceremonial occasion, she’d produced an ideological tract about Gaza, fascism and so-called trans healthcare.
If you want to read this literary masterpiece, it’s been published in the Morning Star. Of course it has.
I’ve read it. It’s truly dreadful.
And while I don’t know what criteria were used to appoint Ms Issa in the first place, the whole episode raises an uncomfortable question about the priorities of our cultural institutions: are we celebrating literary excellence, or are we more interested in ticking diversity boxes?
Because when identity becomes a qualification in its own right, there’s a danger that merit becomes an afterthought.
And don’t take my word for it - judge for yourselves: morningstaronline.co.uk/arti…
Tim Benbow retweeted
Trafalgar Day is a moment to remember the @RoyalNavy’s greatest victory, and to pay tribute to the service and sacrifice of Lord Nelson’s sailors and marines.
As we honour their commitment and courage, 221 years on, I want to thank every member of today’s Royal Navy for theirs.
Tim Benbow retweeted
The specific case of Sally Rooney isn't an act of censorship.
I am a free speech absolutist. If she wanted to write book called "Why I support Al Qaeda, ISIS, and the IRA" then I'd support her right to do so. Britain should have a First Amendment approach to speech.
However, if she wants to give the proceeds of that book to those organisations, then it is right for her publisher to prevent her (and it would probably be criminally liable too.)
The open letter is cowardly. They should have the courage to state clearly their view: it should be legal to directly fund organisations that unapologetically break into military base.
BTW, I note that none of the signatories of this letter signed the Harper's letter in favour of free speech. Some however attacked it.
OPEN LETTER: Sally Rooney is a writer, not a terrorist. Her books must be available to the public. Their withdrawal from sale, on the basis of ill-conceived and draconian anti terror legislation, is an affront to basic principles of free speech and expression so long taken for granted in this country. We categorically reject censorship - whether direct or indirect - and urge the government to change course, amending the legislation which has led us to this point of repressive absurdity.
Tim Benbow retweeted
Dear America,
We are either on the side of the innocent people who were invaded, killed, mutilated, raped and kidnapped and who are fighting back or...
We are on the side of the killers, rapists and invaders.
It's that simple.
America must stay with #Ukraine
#SlavaUkraïni
🇺🇦 Zelenskyy delivers a blunt message to the United States:
“Just give us Starlink back. If you refuse, Ukraine will survive. We will continue defending ourselves with or without it.
But why would you restrict a country fighting for its survival? Why make it harder for us to defend our people?
I simply cannot understand the reasoning behind this decision. It is a mistake.”
Ukraine isn’t asking America to fight its war. It’s asking America not to stand in the way of its defense.
Tim Benbow retweeted
Attempting to run away from your own burning trousers has to be a metaphor for something.
Tim Benbow retweeted
Imagine if in 1943 FDR had decided that the US would stop helping Britain and instead would side with the Third Reich. That's a bit like what President Trump is now doing by cozying up to Russia as it tries to destroy Ukraine. Utterly shameful. A humiliating moment for the US.
Tim Benbow retweeted
One question that gets asked more and more frequently is why France seems to do comparatively so much better than the UK with its defence forces. There is not one single, simple answer. France does not do better under every aspect, to start with. But the one macroscopic problem I will always come back to is that the UK does NOT do strategic planning of military capability.
The UK NEVER has an agreed, long term vision. The UK by design does NOT give its Parliament a real understanding and control of Defence aims and means.
Every successive government that comes and goes does its own thing; obfuscates its plans at leisure, and leaves the following one to do the same.
Other countries are less prone to shock program cancellations and sudden erasure of entire capabilities. If other Countries, France being just one example, agree on the strategic rationale of one capability, they will indicatively stick to it.
The UK will not. The UK holds absolutely nothing sacred (in terms of actual capability). I often hear cries about "sacred cows", but the UK does NOT have sacred cows. Not in terms of actual military capability.
It has cosmetic obsessions such as the supremacy of the "Foot Regiment" that will bend the entire Army out of shape to hang on to this or that tiny, near-insignificant infantry battalion even at the cost of the Supports for fielding an actual brigade.
It has the Red Arrows and a few other trinkets.
Actual capabilities? No. It will happily gap or delete maritime patrol aircraft and AEW (utterly demented things to do from a strategic point of view). It will happily have its army down to 14 self propelled howitzers in total for years.
It has happily given up IFVs altogether.
It has dismantled the Navy.
None of the UK "strategic" papers are ever worth the time they take to be read.
They are only ever lists of the Dead, the Wounded, the Missing. Whatever makes it into the fancy and funding of the day carries on.
What does not dies. What is in the middle lives on for years as a cat in a box, and no one is sure whether it is alive or dead.
Defence in the UK starts getting less demented only when actual Parliamentary scrutiny of Defence is implemented. Something like the rolling Military Planning Law in France, so both sides of Parliament know what the fuck they are doing and have to vote on plans. So there is some actual continuity in planning and execution. So no side of the House gets to make empty statements without attaching an overt vote to a plan.
UK Defence can never get healthier until the Defence Committee is a toothless body meant to be told lies and to hear about things months to years after they have happened.
Commissions must discuss and approve plans BEFOREHAND, not offer commentary when it is too late.
The entire handling of Defence in the UK is designed from the root up to ENSURE failure.
Tim Benbow retweeted
No one should expect to be subjected to aggression and intimidation when giving a lecture at a university. The subject of @AdamWagner1 's lecture makes this all the more shocking.
thejc.com/news/uk/masked-gaz…
Tim Benbow retweeted
Neither Cartier-Bresson, Banksy nor Cold War Steve could have come up with such an image. Absolutely perfect composition and lighting (even the road signs are perfect)! 😍
Tim Benbow retweeted
Yesterday, The Washington Post published an opinion piece by David Ignatius It is essentially being called a leak of the American negotiating team's "peace plan." If that is true, I'm having a sense of déjà vu. It feels as though President Trump’s negotiators didn't even bother to come up with anything on their own and simply asked Russians to bail them out with ideas for the peace plan.
I tried to find at least some differences from what Russia has been demanding for years, but I couldn't find any.
President Trump's team is proposing that Ukraine give up the territories seized by Moscow. From Kushner and Witkoff's perspective, this is what a compromise looks like. The only thing that's hard to understand is where exactly the compromise is.
The EU is in shock over how two negotiating geniuses agreed to reshape the European security architecture as if they are the ones actually calling the shots there.
In 2008-2009, Moscow was pushing for a treaty that would allow it to control the security decisions of European states. In 2021, it demanded a limit on NATO expansion and a rollback of the Alliance's military presence to its 1997 levels.
Now the American team is including agreements between Europe and Russia on Russia's "security concerns" in its proposals to end the war. Truly, why didn't anyone think of this before?!
Now, about guarantees... I’m just tired... This is like an endless Budapest Memorandum...
But I think I’ve figured out where Russia's compromise is: in exchange for territorial concessions from Ukraine and the restructuring of European security, Russia will generously agree to Ukraine stopping its strikes on Russian oil refineries, while Europe gets hooked on gas again.
And Russia still needs to be persuaded to agree to all this. Here, Kushner and Witkoff propose appeasing Putin by lifting sanctions. I think that’s not enough. They should have also offered Moscow compensation for losses.
Ukraine's reconstruction is being used as an argument in favor of territorial concessions. Investment, along with the participation of the World Bank and BlackRock, is supposed to make the deal more attractive to Kyiv. Seems like someone is missing here - Gazprom, the Rotenberg brothers... Who else?
Seriously, though, it’s all depressing. It’s clear that Ukraine and Europe are being treated here not just as fools, but as some kind of pie that it’s time to divide.
If we're going to be this cynical, I'd like to ask the brilliant American team - what part of this pie is left for the United States? Right now it looks like just the wrapper.
Reports about the possible sale of Lukoil's international assets, worth approximately $20 billion, mention investors linked to business partners of Kushner and Witkoff.
Russian television is filled with such loud laughter and mockery of the American president that only someone completely isolated from reality could fail to hear it.
Tim Benbow retweeted
Can't think of a contemporary scholar who has so discredited himself and his work as Mearsheimer has done over Ukraine.
Tim Benbow retweeted
Is the #RAFFairford incident exposing the UK government’s dilemma?
Dr Rob Geist Pinfold notes PM #AndyBurnham is in a "tough spot" over US strikes on Iran. The UK government has to walk a "very strange tightrope" of not being part of the war effort.
🔗bit.ly/4s8HIyqc
Tim Benbow retweeted
The U.S. Naval Institute mourns the passing of Dr. Craig L. Symonds, distinguished naval historian, award-winning author, and professor emeritus of history at the U.S. Naval Academy. Through three decades of teaching and a lifetime of scholarship, he helped generations of naval officers and readers understand the people, decisions, and sacrifices that shaped our naval history.
In May 2023, Dr. Symonds addressed the Naval Institute’s 150th Annual Meeting, reflecting on the enduring relationship between the Navy and its independent forum. His remarks became his most recent Proceedings article, “A Two-Way Street: The Navy–Naval Institute’s 150-Year Relationship.” In it, he described the Institute as “a sounding board and not an echo chamber”—a reminder of the value of thoughtful debate in advancing the naval profession.
We honor his lasting contributions to naval history and extend our deepest condolences to his family, friends, colleagues, and former students. His legacy lives on in the people he taught and the history he brought to life.
Read his article and revisit his 2023 remarks.
usni.org/magazines/proceedin…
Tim Benbow retweeted
I agree that any incoming government in July 2024 would have to look again at the tax, spend and borrow assumptions underpinning the OBR projections, some of which were unrealistic. But RR went in for a massive tax, spend and borrow binge which made matters worse. She added a combined £600bn to tax and borrow over the five year period while making the backloading to hit fiscal rules even more pronounced.
Worth saying in fairness to Rachel Reeves, that the OBR projection which Labour inherited was based upon dubious spending projections and a big projected cut in public sector investment.
It is a snag of the OBR system that the independent forecast has to take as given, whatever spending number the government chooses.
Tim Benbow retweeted
USA: How about you give us Russia's money so we can give it to Russia and help them destroy Europe?
Europe: How about you go f yourself?
Tim Benbow retweeted
If Putin stops fighting, the war ends. If Zelensky stops fighting then his country will be occupied, leaders murdered, language banned, businesses stolen, children kidnapped. That's what happens in Russian-occupied Ukraine.
Tim Benbow retweeted
I oppose banning books. Sally Rooney’s books have not been “banned” - rather it’s a crime in our country to fund or fundraise for proscribed terrorist groups. She chose that her royalties would go to Palestine Action, so her publisher cannot legally pay her the royalties.
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